In reconstructing from our existing literature the beliefs and religion of our ancestors, we can only do so incompletely, and with difficulty, from passages in the oldest sagas and other antique fragments, mostly of pagan origin, from allusions in very early poems, from scanty notices in the annals, and from the lives of early saints. The relatively rapid conversion of the island to Christianity in the fifth century, and the enthusiasm with which the new religion was received, militated against any full transmission of pagan belief or custom. We cannot now tell whether all the ancient Irish were imbued with the same religious beliefs, or whether these varied--as they probably did--from tribe to tribe. Probably all the Celtic races, even in their most backward state, believed--so far as they had any persuasion on the subject at all--in the immortality of the soul. Where the souls of the dead went to, when they were not reincarnated, is not so clear. They certainly believed in a happy Other-World, peopled by a happy race, whither people were sometimes carried whilst still alive, and to gain which they either traversed the sea to the north-west, or else entered one of the Sidh [Shee] mounds, or else again dived beneath the water.[5] In all cases, however, whatever the mode of access, the result is much the same. A beautiful country is discovered where a happy race free from care, sickness, and death, spend the smiling hours in simple, sensuous pleasures.
There is a graphic description of this Elysium in the "Voyage of Bran," a poem evidently pagan,[6] and embodying purely pagan conceptions. A mysterious female, an emissary from the lovely land, appears in Bran's household one day, when the doors were closed and the house full of chiefs and princes, and no one knew whence she came, and she chanted to them twenty-eight quatrains describing the delights of the pleasant country.
"There is a distant isle Around which sea-horses glisten, A fair course against the white-swelling surge, Four feet uphold it.[7]
Feet of white bronze under it, Glittering through beautiful ages. Lovely land throughout the world's age On which the many blossoms drop.
An ancient tree there is with blossoms On which birds call to the Hours. 'Tis in harmony, it is their wont To call together every Hour.