Saxon

monarchy

its limit.

in safety, never been assisted by the cowardice or treachery of the northern Thanes, never overthrown the whole force of England in the one decisive battle, still it is fully evident to us The Anglonow, that the appointed time had arrived for had reached the extinction of the Anglo-Saxon monarchy. In our age-the old age of the world-we are privileged to discern, more clearly than those who lived in its youth, the evidence how each successive incident is induced and led on by that incomprehensible union of free will on the part of man, and the foreknowledge of the Almighty, which equally guides the actions of each individual, and the collective fortunes of mankind. The more the successive facts accumulate upon us, the more clearly we obtain a knowledge, imperfect and limited though it may be, of the certain tokens which precede the decline and fall of empires. In this sunset of the life of the world, we more than ever distinctly observe how coming events cast their shadows before. When the corpse is borne to the grave, we then know the secret progress of death in life, the inward extinction of the vital fire, the wasting of the organs, the irretrievable decays, the causes of the slight ailments, the transient pains, the momentary depression, the langour, unaccountable at the time, but now proving to us that the term never could have been prolonged. The gust blows down the tree: you examine the fallen trunk, and then discover that

Buying and selling in the Temple.

334

CORRUPTION OF THE CHURCH.

its roots were so rotted in the soil, that though the winds might have been hushed, the weight of its own boughs would have laid it low.

6. The English clergy were grievously corrupted. The reforms so zealously and honestly attempted by Popes and Councils in other portions of the Catholic Church in the west had not reached them. Very many of the bishops and abbots had obtained their dignities by simony. Sinful as this bartering of holy things is under any circumstances, we hardly feel its full import in the middle ages, nor understand why the church, collectively, was so exceedingly earnest in labouring to repress the evil, as existing in individual members. We are accustomed to view simony merely as a spiritual offence and as a violation of the sacred functions of the priesthood; but, in the middle ages, it was also a grievous offence against the civil relations of society. It was introducing base motives into all the various functions which were attached to the prelatic character. What people buy, they sell his bishopric would sell ferment within his gift.

the bishop who bought any ecclesiastical preHe was a trustee for

the poor; but he had bought his trusteeship, and therefore he would sell their rights for his own advantage. The bishop was a member of parliament, and he had bought his seat in the legislature from the king, and therefore he would sell his vote to the king, his patron in

every sense of the term. Ecclesiastical historians have obscured the real bearing of the conflicts between crown and clergy, and exceedingly damaged their own cause, by using language which obliterates the most important truth, that the contest for the liberty of the Church was in the main a contest for the liberties of the people. The open and shameless barter and sale of ecclesiastical dignities, throughout this period, is scarcely conceivable to us, amongst whom this abuse at least has ceased. "Give you a nomination to a prebend!" exclaimed Philip I. to an applicant, "I have sold them all already." The bishop was a judge, bound to attend to the reformation of manners, but he had bought his office, and therefore would sell impunity to the vast evils of opulent transgressor; hence the universal re- to national laxation of all discipline, and the prevalence, throughout England, of the lowest immorality. In all these transactions the clergy were the most guilty. Every simoniacal promotion they obtained was accompanied by perjury; the higher the standard of morality which the priesthood were bound to assert, the greater was their guilt, the more deleterious their example upon the rest of the community. Never does any neglect of duty in one class fail to extend its evil influence to the other orders of society. The foul marsh beneath the palace walls will diffuse its contagion to the presence

VOL. III.

Z

these abuses

morality.

fourishes.

chamber. Vices fostered or tolerated by ruling powers in the subject classes, work out their retribution by including governors and governed in the avenging punishment. Lust, luxury, and sloth defiled and enervated the aristocracy. The Slave trade lower orders were heavily oppressed. Slavery was exceedingly extended. Hard as the situation of the Theowe had been in earlier periods, it had now become infinitely worse. The provision, merciful to a certain extent, which prohibited the sale of the slave out of his native country, was entirely violated; and it was the common practice to sell these miserable creatures to the pagan Danes in Ireland; so that Bristol was the regular slave-market; and the English connected their slave-dealings with the same disgusting profligacy which is now exhibited amongst their descendants, so proud of claiming their connexion with the Anglo-Saxon race, on the opposite shores of the Atlantic. There were, of course, many to whom these censures did not apply: many holy men amongst the clergy, many servants of God amongst the laity, but not sufficient to avert the destiny of the people, and in one common ruin they were involved.

Although the empire of Britain appeared to subsist under Edward the Confessor, it was really on the verge of dissolution. As an ancient building is kept together by the roughnesses of the surface, and the ivy which has

eaten out the mortar, and yet binds the stones by its frail tendrils, and the iron clamps giving a temporary support to the walls which they have split and rifted, till the blow comes which beats them down :-so are ancient States sustained by dull habit, by usages which have lost their original principle, by institutions which have ceased to command respect, and by the convulsive energies of rash innovation, affording a temporary vigour, though they exhaust vitality, till the appointed season of destruction. In the case of Britain, some additional duration Confessor. had perhaps been imparted by the personal character of the Confessor, his virtues, and even his failings. Yet let it be recollected that many of his failings resulted from his great love of peace. His passive and tranquil disposition, which prevented his exerting his authority against those who were usurping his rights, also rendered these usurpers less inclined to disturb an authority which they scarcely felt, and which they knew must, at no distant period, expire.

of the

divisions of England at

Conquest.

27. The ancient kingdoms of the so-called Existing Heptarchy, had merged in the three great divi- date of sions of Wessex, Mercia, and the Danelagh. They were not merged or united into one kingdom, but connected by a common policy: whether each had at this period an assembly, which, by a conventional term, we call the Witenagemot, is not certain. Wessex was the chief or ruling Wessex the portion of the empire, yet under the Confessor,

chief.