Were they moved by some echo of those most ancient Eastern rites which include the cult of a virgin mother and child, or had they heard, these wise and inscrutable priests, some echo of Isaiah’s prophecy: _A virgin shall conceive and bear a son?_ Possibly. At any rate, we know that a hundred years before the coming of Christ the Messianic idea had grown familiar to the Gentile world. The works of Greek and Roman writers are eloquent of this fact. Plato, in a passage which seems to echo the very words of Scripture, had long ago foretold what would be the fate of the perfectly just man upon earth; and Vergil, voicing the prevailing belief that the world’s great age was soon to begin anew, and referring to an oracle of the Sybil, prayed for the speedy coming of the promised Saviour in language strikingly like that in which the prophets of the Old Testament speak of the Messiah. The Magi, the wise men and watchful astrologers of the East, waited impatiently for the coming of God upon earth, till they beheld a new star which rose over Bethlehem and announced His Nativity. And these ancient Druids also gave expression to the yearning of all Creation. _Virgini Parituræ_--To the Virgin who shall bear a son, they dedicated a wooden statue in the mysterious sanctuary hidden in the depths of their sacred forest, beneath the shade of which was the meeting-place of the Carnutes.
Thus it comes about that with the dawn of history we see, through the mist of the ages as it were, a solemn procession winding amongst the trees of the primeval forest.
At the head are two white bulls and the sacrificial priests, and in their train follow bards and novices chanting anthems, and a herald clad in white. The Druids follow. One of them is carrying bread, another a vase full of water, the third an ivory hand, the emblem of Justice. The high priest closes the procession, and about him cluster the other priests of the Oak and the chiefs of the local tribes. For the oak, Pliny tells us in his _Natural History_, is the Druid’s sacred tree, and the mistletoe that grows thereon they regard as sent from Heaven and as the sign of a tree chosen by God. This golden bough of mistletoe, which they call All-Heal, the high priest is now about to cull from the chosen oak with his golden hook. As it falls, the sacred plant is caught beneath in a white mantle; the victims are slain, and the mistletoe is distributed whilst God is besought to prosper His gift to them unto whom He has vouchsafed it.