Our knowledge of the higher side of Celtic religion is practically a blank, since no description of the inner spiritual life has come down to us. How far the Celts cultivated religion in our sense of the term, or had glimpses of Monotheism, or were troubled by a deep sense of sin, is unknown. But a people whose spiritual influence has later been so great, must have had glimpses of these things. Some of them must have known the thirst of the soul for God, or sought a higher ethical standard than that of their time. The enthusiastic reception of Christianity, the devotion of the early Celtic saints, and the character of the old Celtic church, all suggest this. The relation of the Celtic church to paganism was mainly intolerant, though not wholly so. It often adopted the less harmful customs of the past, merging pagan festivals in its own, founding churches on the sites of the old cult, dedicating sacred wells to a saint. A saint would visit the tomb of a pagan to hear an old epic rehearsed, or would call up pagan heroes from hell and give them a place in paradise. Other saints recall dead heroes from the Land of the Blessed, and learn the nature of that wonderland and the heroic deeds "Of the old days, which seem to be Much older than any history That is written in any book." Reading such narratives, we gain a lesson in the fine spirit of Christian tolerance and Christian sympathy. FOOTNOTES: [2] Some writers saw in the bardic poetry a Druidic-esoteric system and traces of a cult practised secretly by the bards--the "Neo-Druidic heresy"; see Davies, _Myth. of the Brit. Druids_, 1809; Herbert, _The Neo-Druidic Heresy_, 1838. Several French writers saw in "Druidism" a monotheistic faith, veiled under polytheism. [3] Livy, v. 46; Cæsar, vi. 16; Dion. Hal. vii. 70; Arrian, _Cyneg_. xxxv. 1. [4] Cæsar, vi. 15, cf. v. 12, "having waged war, remained there and cultivated the lands." [5] Cf. Pliny, _HN_ xvii. 7, xviii. 18 on the wheeled ploughs and agricultural methods of Gauls and Britons. Cf. also Strabo, iv. 1. 2, iv. 5. 5; Girald. Camb. _Top. Hib._ i. 4, _Descr. Camb._ i. 8; Joyce, _SH_ ii. 264. CHAPTER II. THE CELTIC PEOPLE.