THE INTERNATIONAL STANDARD A MAGAZINE DEVOTED TO THE DISCUSSION AND DISSEMINATION OF THE WISDOM CONTAINED IN THE GREAT PYRAMID OF JEEZEH IN EGYPT JULY, 1885. ISSUED BIMONTHLY. PRICE 35 CENTS TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION AND MEMBERSHIP, $2.00 PER ANNUM IN ADVANCE. The International Institute as a body is not responsible for the facts or the opinions put forth by any of the writers for this Magazine. Until the articles of incorporation are taken ont, this Magazine is published on the responsibility of Charles Latimer, therefore neither the members individually nor the Society as a body assume any liability. All in favor of advancing truths most absolute, as portrayed in the revelations of the Great Pyramid of Egypt, and of the success of the Society in preserving inviolate the Anglo-Saxon weights and measures, will kindly communicate with the President, by whom also subscriptions, donations and communications will be gratefully received. THE INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR PRESERVING AND PERFECTING THE ANGLO-SAXON WEIGHTS AND MEASURES CLEVELAND: 64 EUCLID AVENUE INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR PRESERVING AND PERFECTING WEIGHTS AND MEASURES. FOUNDED NOVEMBER 8, 1879. CHARLES LATIMER, President, Cleveland, O. LUCIAN I. BISBEE, Vice President, Boston, Mass. A. M. SEARLES, Treasurer, Cleveland, O. MARY B. SANFORD, Secretary, Cleveland, O. REV. H. G. WOOD, Chairman of Committee, Sharon, Pennsylvania. PROF. C. PIAZZI SMYTH, Astronomer Royal for Scotland, Edinburgh, Scotland. J. RALSLON SKINNER, Cincinnati, Ohio. J. F. HILGARD, U. S. Coast Survey, Washington, D. C. PROF. N. B. WOOD, Cleveland, Ohio. PROF. ALFRED TAYLOR, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. SAMUEL BESWICX, C. E., Strathroy, Canada. JACOB M. CLARK, C. E., New York. CHARLES LATIMER, C. E., Cleveland, Ohio. LIEUTENANT C. A. L. TOTTEN, Garden City, Long Island. W. H. SEARLES, C. E., Cleveland, Ohio. S. F. GATES, M. E., Cambridgeport, Massachusetts. J. K. HORNISH, Denver, Colorado. PROF. STOCKWELL, Cleveland O. PROF. ROGERS. COL. CHESTER. WILLIAM W. WILLIAMS, PRINTER. and 147 St. Clair Street, Cleveland, Ohio. THE INTERNATIONAL STANDARD JULY, 1885. VRC THE DRUIDS. "Hear ye this, O house of Jacob, which are called by the * * * name of Israel which swear by the name of the Lord, and make mention of the God of Israel, but not in truth nor in righteousness. For they call themselves of the Holy City, and stay themselves upon the God of Israel. The Lord of hosts is his name," Isa. xlviii., 1, 2. In the May number of our Magazine, page 88, the statement is made, in regard to the builders of these gigantic temples of which the ruins abound in Great Britain, that they were erected through the influence of a powerful and learned priesthood known as Druidical. It was also shown that there is strong evidence, that the temples combined an astronomical design with the requirements of worship. This fact points to an eastern origin for this priesthood, where devotees still bow to the Sun and dance in imitation of planetary movements. But the Druidical was a strangely mixed religion, it combined Sabianism with Jehovah worship, and added to both, the impure ceremonies of faith in Baal and Moloch. Its varied rites paralleled those of many oriental nations. With them it combined both mercies and cruelties. It roused both hope and fear. It was a mixture of the Divine and human, that could only have been a growth. It was the conglomerated religion of "wanderers." Phoenicians, Palestinian Jews, Chaldeans, Persians, and later Greeks and Romans could each have found some point of union with these sturdy priests who symbolized their power by their gigantic temples. These Druids were priests not only of the Cymry and Gaels but of the Celts, of whom in fact the Cymry and Gaels were a part. Herodotus unites Celtae and Cynetae, (Cymry, according to Higgins), and Diodorus Siculus unites Celtae and Gaels. Under different names this priesthood appears, but these names can be traced to the same root. In "Celtic Antiquities," page 3, by John Smith, we read that "the religion of the Druids is allowed to be of the same antiquity with that of the Magi of Persia, Brahmans of India, and Chaldees of Babylon and Africa." Higgins, in his 'Celtic Druids,' says that Virgil was a Druid, and the Druids were Pythagoreans, holding the doctrine of the harmony of the spheres, as did the Pythagoreans, and that the word Pythagoras in Welsh means explication of the universe. In tracing the derivation of the word Druid, we are taken to all nations and to all tongues, indicating either the wandering of these priests, or their common origin. John Smith tells us that the Celtic name for natural philosophers or magicians is still Druidh, meaning literally, wise men. One derivation is said to be from a Celtic word Derw, an oak. "Magic," Higgins says, "was little more than the knowledge of astronomy," and that some derive the word Druid from the Hebrew, derussim, drussim, or drissim, meaning people of contemplation. The Welsh word, Drud or Druid, according to Vallency, means an absolver or remitter of sins. The Irish Drui or Druid is from the Persic duru, a holy man. Ousely derives both from the Arabic Deri, a wise man. Persic, Daru, English, Druid. (Examine Higgins' Celtic Druids, page 94). Another derivation from Abbè Pierre de Chiniac, gives the Celtic compound Di, God, and rouyd, speaking. A writer in the Standard of Israel tells us that the priests of the Cymry were first called Gwddon, meaning wise men, and this combined with deru-oak forms Der- Wyddon, oak wise men. Davies gives a derivation of Taliesen's, the Welsh bard, who says it is composed of the Celtic words Dar, Gwydd, superior (or high) priest. After examination of all these and their comparison with the most striking peculiarities 'of the Druidical worship, which really were the imitative processions of planetary movements I would choose a derivation from the Hebrew Dur, to go round. This would suggest a religion beginning before the Phoenicians taught their idolatry to Israel, and which is still found among the Shakers of our own land. A religion "scattered" as was the house of Israel, sifted "among all nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve," (Amos 9, 9. Perhaps if this derivation is objected to, a combination will bring us nearer to the meaning of the name, and we will consider the Druids as priestly wise men, astronomers, men of contemplation, enchanters, claiming inspiration (or those to whom God spake) imitators of heavenly movements, worshippers in groves, reverencing trees, and so gain a very comprehensive idea of the offices of Arch-Druid, Druid, Prophet and Bard. The Druids say of themselves, that they were descended from the god Dis, a word easily derived from Dies. The elementary words expressed, light, water and deity. The servile letters were added by different nations, but the original meanings preserved as Dydd, Dies and Deus, God and day. The self existence of the Deity is found in these words. "The verb, to be, Eheyeh, as in the Hebrew of the first verse of Genesis, with its many prefixes and terminations is perhaps the most widely diffused. It is frequently to be found in the names of the Supreme Being, as in the Greek Theos and the Mexican Teotl, He who is the Eternal, transmitting the divine truth recognized by the elevated intellect of Plato, that God alone is; a sublime revelation made a thousand years before by the voice. of God himself." The Jehovah who was, and is, and is to come. "The word contains in itself the distinguishing letters by which the three tenses of the word 'to be' are denoted," Mazzaroth, page 76. In a note appended to this is a quotation from Socrates, who says that the words Zeus, and also Dis, meaning "living and giving life," were the offspring of some great intellect. From this god Dis, the Jehovah, the descended. Israel's claim is the same: Druids say they were "I am a father to |