local gods of a people extending right across Europe, appeal can be made
to the influence of the Celtic temperament, producing everywhere the
same results, and to the homogeneity of Celtic civilisation, save in
local areas, e.g. the South of Gaul. Moreover, the comparison of the
various testimonies of onlookers points to a general similarity, while
the permanence of the primitive elements in Celtic religion must have
tended to keep it everywhere the same. Though in Gaul we have only
inscriptions and in Ireland only distorted myths, yet those testimonies,
as well as the evidence of folk-survivals in both regions, point to the
similarity of religious phenomena. The Druids, as a more or less
organised priesthood, would assist in preserving the general likeness.

Thus the primitive nature-spirits gave place to greater or lesser gods,
each with his separate department and functions. Though growing
civilisation tended to separate them from the soil, they never quite
lost touch with it. In return for man's worship and sacrifices, they
gave life and increase, victory, strength, and skill. But these
sacrifices, had been and still often were rites in which the
representative of a god was slain. Some divinities were worshipped over
a wide area, most were gods of local groups, and there were spirits of
every place, hill, wood, and stream. Magic rites mingled with the cult,
but both were guided by an organised priesthood. And as the Celts
believed in unseen gods, so they believed in an unseen region whither
they passed after death.

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,