I. 59 THE Mercians, before the acceffion of Egbert, CHAP, had very nearly attained the abfolute fovereignty in the Heptarchy: They had reduced the Eaft-Angles under fubjection, and established tributary princes in the kingdoms of Kent and Effex. Northumberland was involved in anarchy; and no ftate of any confequence remained but that of Weffex, which, much inferior in extent to Mercia, was fupported folely by the great qualities of its fovereign. Egbert led his army against the invaders; and encountering them at Ellandum in Wiltshire, obtained a complete victory, and by the great flaughter which he made of them in their flight, gave a mortal blow to the power of the Mercians. Whilft he himself, in profecution of his victory, entered their country on the fide of Oxfordshire, and threatened the heart of their dominions; he fent an army into Kent, commanded by Ethelwolph, his eldest fon; and expelling Baldred, the tributary king, foon made himself master of that country. The kingdom of Effex was conquered with equal facility; and the Eaft-Angles, from their hatred to the Mercian government, which had been established over them by treachery and violence, and probably exercised with tyranny, immediately rofe in arms, and craved the protection of Egbert'. Bernulf, the Mercian king, who marched against them, was defeated and flain; and two years after, Ludican, his fucceffor, met with the fame fate. Thefe infurrections and calamities facilitated the enterprifes of Egbert, who advanced into the centre of the Mercian territories, and made easy conquefts over a difpirited and divided people. In order to engage them more easily to fubmiffion, he allowed Wiglef, their countryman, to retain the title of king, whilft he himself exercised the real powers of fovereignty". The anarchy which prevailed in Northumberland, tempted him to carry * Ethelwerd, lib. 3. cap. 2. Ingulph. p. 7, 8. 10. Ibid. lib. 3. cap. 3. CHAP. ftill farther his victorious arms; and the inhabitants, unable to refift his power, and defirous of poffeffing fome established form of government, were forward, on his first appearance, to fend deputies, who fubmitted to his authority, and swore allegiance to him as their fovereign. Egbert, however, ftill allowed to Northumberland, as he had done to Mercia and Eaft-Anglia, the power of electing a king, who paid him tribute, and was dependent on him. Kingdoins united THUS were united all the kingdoms of the Heptarchy in one great ftate, near four hundred years after the first arrival of the Saxons in Britain; and the fortunate arms and prudent policy of Egbert at laft effected, what had been fo often attempted in vain by fo many princes". Kent, Northumberland, and Mercia, which had fucceffively aspired to undu Egbert-general dominion, were now incorporated in his Keng & Wessex willingly to fhare the fame fate. empire; and the other fubordinate kingdoms feemed རྒྱ ༡༤ to fhare the fame fate. His territories Cosemporary of were nearly of the fame extent with what is now Charlemagne properly called England; and a favourable prospect was afforded to the Anglo-Saxons, of establishing a This civilized monarchy, poffeffed of tranquillity within THE Saxons, though they had been so long fettled in the island, seem not as yet to have been much improved beyond their German ancestors, either in arts, civility, knowledge, humanity, juf Christianity tice, or obedience to the laws. Even Chriftianity, though it opened the way to connexions between them and the more polished states of Europe, had not hitherto been very effectual in banishing their ignorance, or foftening their barbarous manners. As they received that doctrine through the corrupted channels of Rome, it carried along with it a great mixture of credulity and fuperftition, equally de Chron. Sax. p. 71. Ibid. structive 1. structive to the understanding and to morals. The CHAP. reverence towards faints and reliques feems to have almost fupplanted the adoration of the Supreme Being. Monaftic obfervances were esteemed more meritorious than the active virtues: The knowledge of natural causes was neglected from the univerfal belief of miraculous interpofitions and judgments: Bounty to the church atoned for every violence against fociety: And the remorfes for cruelty, murder, treachery, affaffination, and the more robuft vices, were appeased, not by amendment of life, but by penances, fervility to the monks, and an abject and illiberal devotion". The reverence for the clergy had been carried to fuch a height, that, wherever a perfon appeared in a facerdotal habit, though on the highway, the people flocked around him; and showing him all marks of profound respect, received every word 'he uttered as the most facred oracle 9. Even the military virtues, fo inherent in all the Saxon tribes, began to be neglected; and the nobility, preferring the fecurity and floth of the cloister to the tumults and glory of war, valued themselves chiefly on endowing monafteries, of which they affumed the government'. The feveral kings too, being extremely impoverished by continual benefactions to the church, to which the ftates of their kingdoms had weakly affented, could bestow no rewards on valour or military fervices, and retained not even fufficient influence to fupport their government'. These abuses were common to all the European churches; but the priests in Italy, Spain, and Gaul, made fome atonement for them by other advantages which they rendered fociety. For feveral ages they were almost all Romans, or, in other words, the ancient natives; and they preferved the Roman language and laws, with fome remains of the former civility. But the priests in the Heptarchy, after the first miffionaries, were wholly Saxons, and almoft as ignorant and barbarous as the laity. They contributed, therefore, little to the improvement of the fociety in knowledge or the arts. a Bede, lib. 3. cap. 26. Bedæ, ad Egbert. Ibid. lib. 5. cap. 23. Epiftola Bedæ Epift. ad Egbert. ANOTHER CHAP. I. ANOTHER inconvenience which attended this corrupt fpecies of Chriftianity, was the fuperftitious attachment to Rome, and the gradual fubjection of the kingdom to a foreign jurifdiction. The Britons, having never acknowledged any fubordination to the Roman pontiff, had conducted all ecclefiaftical government by their domeftic fynods and councils: But the Saxons, receiving their religion from Roman monks, were taught at the fame time a profound reverence for that fee, and were naturally led to regard it as the capital of their religion. Pilgrimages to Rome were reprefented as the most meritorious acts of devotion. Not only noblemen and ladies of rank undertook this tedious journey"; but kings themfelves, abdicating their crowns, fought for a fecure paffport to heaven at the feet of the Roman pontiff. New reliques, perpetually fent from that endless mint of fuperftition, and magnified by lying miracles invented in convents, operated on the aftonifhed minds of the multitude. And every prince has attained the eulogies of the monks, the only hiftorians of thofe ages, not in proportion to his civil and military virtues, but to his devoted attachment towards their order, and his fuperftitious reverence for Rome. THE fovereign pontiff, encouraged by this blindnefs and fubmiffive difpofition of the people, advanced every day in his encroachments on the independence of the English churches. Wilfrid, bifhop of Lindisferne, the fole prelate of the Northumbrian kingdom, increased this fubjection in the eighth century, by his making an appeal to Rome against the decifions of an English fynod, which had abridged his diocefe by the erection of fome new bifhoprics". Agatho, the pope, readily embraced this precedent of an appeal to his court; and Wil Append. to Bede, numb. 10. ex edit, 1722. Spelm. Conc. p. 108, 109. u Bede, lib. 5. cap. 7. w See Appendix to Bede, numb. 19. Higden, lib. 5. 1. frid, though the haughtieft and most luxurious pre- CHAP. THE great topic by which Wilfrid confounded the imaginations of men was, that St. Peter, to whofe cuftody the keys of heaven were entrusted, would certainly refuse admittance to every one who fhould be wanting in refpect to his fucceffor. This conceit, well fuited to vulgar conceptions, made great impreffion on the people during feveral ages; and has not even at prefent loft all influence in the catholic countries. ersutions HAD this abject fuperftition produced general peace and tranquillity, it had made fome atonement for the ills attending it; but befides the ufual avidity of men for power and riches, frivolous controverfies in theology were engendered by it, which were so much the more fatal, as they admitted not, like the others, of any final determination from established poffeffion. The difputes excited in Britain, were of the most ridiculous kind, and entirely worthy of those ignorant and barbarous ages. There were fome intricacies, obferved by all the Super Christian churches, in adjufting the day of keeping Eafter; which depended on a complicated confideration of the courfe of the fun and moon: And it happened that the miffionaries, who had converted the Scots and Britons, had followed a different calendar from that which was obferved at Rome in the age when Augustine converted the Saxons. The priefts alfo of all the Chriftian churches were accustomed to fhave part of their head; but the form given to this tonfure was different in the former from what was practifed in the latter. The Scots and Britons pleaded the antiquity of their ufages: The Romans, and their difciples, the Saxons, in-. × Eddius vita Vilfr. § 24. 60. |