Archaic England : $b an essay in deciphering prehistory from megalithic monuments, earthworks, customs, coins, place-names, and faerie superstitionsBayley, Harold
History
Archaic England : $b an essay in deciphering prehistory from megalithic monuments, earthworks, customs, coins, place-names, and faerie superstitions
Bayley, Harold
Archaeology; England -- Antiquities
But, though certainly upholders of what would nowadays be termed
complacently "the Larger Hope," it was certainly not supposed that evil
was capable of admittance to the Land of Virtues: on the contrary, the
Celts believed firmly in the existence of an underworld which their
poets termed "the cruel prison of the earth," "the abode of death," "the
loveless land," etc.
According to the Bardic Triads there were "Three things that make a man
equal to an angel; the love of every good; the love of exercising
charity; and the love of pleasing God". It was further inculcated that
"In creation there is no evil which is not a greater good than an evil:
the things called rewards or punishments are so secured by eternal
ordinances, that they are not consequences, but properties of our acts
and habits."
It was not imagined as it is to-day that "the awful wrath of God" could
be assuaged by the sacrifice of an innocent man, or that--
Believe in Christ, who died for thee,
And sure as He hath died,
Thy debt is paid, thy soul is free,
And thou art justified.[187]
It is still the doctrine of the Christian Church that infants dying
unbaptised are doomed to hell, but to the British this barbaric dogma
evidently never appealed. In the fifth century the peace of the Church
was vastly disturbed by the insidious heresy called Pelasgian, and it is
a matter of some distinction to these islands that "Pelasgus," whose
correct name was Morgan, was British-born. Morgan or Pelasgus, seconded
by Coelestius, an Irish Scot, wilfully but gracelessly maintained that
Adam's sin affected only himself, not his posterity; that children at
their birth are as pure and innocent as Adam was at his creation, and
that the Grace of God is not necessary to enable men to do their duty,
to overcome temptations, or even to attain perfection, but that they may
do all this by the freedom of their own wills. A Council of 214 Bishops,
held at Carthage, formally condemned these pestilent and insidious
doctrines which, according to a commentator, "strike at the root of
genuine piety".
There is no known etymology for the words _God_ and _good_, and some
years ago it was a matter of divided opinion whether or not they were
radically the same. In Danish the two terms are identical, and there is
very little doubt that the one is an adjective derived from the other.
Max Müller, however, sums up the contrary opinion as follows: "God was
most likely an old heathen name of the Deity and for such a name the
supposed etymological meaning of _good_ would be far too modern, too
abstract, too Christian".
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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