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London, England, 1824-05-28 00:00:00

Mew in which the Bards were permitted to hold- private emelt-vs
in performing the functions of the other (heists, they were obliged!
to assemble, as they expressed it, In the rye of light, and in thn
face of the sun. I have not the least tiouht, from the information
I have obtained, but that this class of craftwros was the origin of
ftecinasonry ; for in times of persecution the Bards found it too
dangerous to hold public meetings: they therefore assumed the
ovule character, which permitted them to meet under cove.; anti
indeed many of the very terns arrangements, anti principles of
Masonry are to be found in Bardism. So that Masonry is Bardism
in disguise, being so involved In technical trams that it esquires
great application in those who are initiated to sec through the mys-
terious covering. The Bards too have a secret like the ~lawns, by
which they can know one another. The three letter. 0. 1. W. are
with them the unutterable name of the Deity ; they therefisre wade
else of another term, known only to themselves, just as she Jews,
who always make use of ;Menai when the name ofJehorah occurs.
Each of the letters in the Hardie name is also a name of itself: the
first is the word when uttered, that the world burst into existence ;
the second is the word, the sound of which continues, by which all
thinggs remain in existence; and the third is that by which rte
consummation of all things will be in happiness, or the state of
renovated intellect, for ever approaching to the immediate prescoce
of the Deity.
Each of these three Orders wore an appropriate dress. That of
the primary order, or the Bards in general, wits of sky-blue, em-
blematic of light, or truth, and of peace. White, as is mask of
purity and holiness, was appropriated to the Druids. The (hales
wore green, thus denominating that the earth was the object of their
rIdII4IIILS.
The fundamental object and principle of the Bardie system vrre,
the search after truth, and a right adherence to justice and peace.
They never bore arms, nor engaged in any party divines; sit that
eventually they became totally exempted ()um all political connec-
tions; and they were therefore employed as heralds en war between
different Powers. So sacred were their persons considered in the
office of mediators, that they passed unmolested through hostile
couotries, and even appeared in the midst of battle, to arrest the
arm of slaughter, while they executed their missions. But this
state of disinterested virtue was at length the means of procuring to
the order the supreme influence in the nation, by the perversion of
its original principles, as we find to have been the case amongst the
Gauls, where the office of Arch-Druid was established, and made
permanent, in direct violation a those principles; and this High
Priest bad acquired so great an ascendancy as In struggle success-
ful) against the Keenan power for nearly bOU years.
Thee idea with respect to the moral government of the world
was, that life was gradually increasing In perfection; that there-
fore truth and justice were advancing therewith ; so that the Bards
looked fur a period when those attributes should predominate over
the principles of evil and devastation that when that 'Knott ar-
rived man would begin to make rapid appmaches towards that per.
faction which ids state aid capable of undergoing; and then, on
the consunintatien of such an event, the design of this terrestrial
world was answered, and it would be changed into mutate state
by fire.
In tracing the origin of the Bantle system, we are led back to
very remote antiquity. The first who inane verse the vehicle of in-
struction and of record, according to the Tch.ds, was Tydain Tel
Assets, or Tydain, Father of the Mare, ketwet o whom and Tula,'
Thoth, ur Hennes of the Egyptians, there is a striking conformity
as in the names as in their attributes. From this oriOnal
were derived die privily tes and peculiar customs which were ar-s
ranged and methodiaed by the three primeval ilards, Plennydd,
Alon, and Ownsn, and then sanctioned and adopted as a part of
the constitution of the re tion,and which before ouir received through
courtesy what was afterward, insured by law. The Triads differ
as to the periods when this took phase, whether in the time of
Prydaio, son of .ledd the Oma(, or Of Dyvnwal Idoelmuil, his son.
The exact era of all these personages is lost In antiquity; but it is
curious to o'eterve thrt the Mon here mentioned, seems to be the
same with ()len, the Hyperborean, Anima, or Linos, in the Gee.
can mythology. It may be pertinent here to notice another
wherein it is said, that Gwysition Hanhebon was the that
who cemposed verse—that Hu the Nighty was the first who
made it the vehicle of record and instruction ; anti that Tydain
Tied A wen was the first who reduced it to an tut, and fixed rules of
comonsition ; and hence originated Bards and Median, and the
regulation of the system in all its privileges, by the three primes al
Bards, Plennydd, Mon, and Owron. The fiwyddoo (lanhehon
aboreatteationed, seems, accordingi to another Triad, to have
achieved a work that Is to be identified with the Pillars of Hennes
iu Egypt ; fur this Triad stems to mention three great exploits
one of them being " the stones of liwysidon lianhebon, upon
which were to be read all the arts and sciences in the world." I