which is to penetrate all creatures freely in order to support them in being. There was doubtless a time, when the Danes, admitting the same doctrine, worshipped their divinities only in open air, and either knew not or approved not of the use of temples. Although we want the greatest part of the monuments which might instruct us concerning that stage of their religion, the traces of it are not yet entirely deftroyed. We find at this day here and there in Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, in the middle of a plain, or upon some little hill, altars, around which they assembled to offer sacrifices and to assist at other religious ceremonies. The greatest part of these altars are raised upon a little hill, either natural or artificial. Three long pieces of rock set upright serve for basis to a great flat stone, which forms the table of the altar. There is commonly a pretty large cavity under this altar, which might be intended to receive the blood of the victims; and they never fail to find stones for striking fire scattered round it; for no other fire, but such as was struck forth with a flint, was pure enough for so holy a purpose. Sometimes these rural altars are constructed in a more magnificent manner; a double range of enormous stones surround the altar and the little hill on which it is erected. In
