TEPHEN.

_Contemporary Monarchs._

EMP. OF GERM K. OF SCOTLAND. K. OF FRANCE K. OF SPAIN.

Lothaire II. 1138 David I. 1143 Louis VI. 1137 Alphonse VIII.
Conrad III. 1152 Malcolm IV. Louis VII.
Frederic I. Lucius II.1145

POPES
Innocent II. 1142
Celestin II. 1144
Eugenius III. 1153
Anastasius IV.

{1135.} IN the progress and settlement of the feudal law, the male
succession to fiefs had taken place some time before the female was
admitted; and estates, being considered as military benefices, not as
property, were transmitted to such only as could serve in the armies,
and perform in person the conditions upon which they were originally
granted. But when the continuance of rights, during some generations,
in the same family, had, in a great measure, obliterated the primitive
idea, the females were gradually admitted to the possession of feudal
property; and the same revolution of principles which procured them the
inheritance of private estates, naturally introduced their succession to
government and authority. The failure, therefore, of male heirs to the
kingdom of England and duchy of Normandy, seemed to leave the succession
open, without a rival, to the empress Matilda; and as Henry had made all
his vassals in both states swear fealty to her, he presumed that they
would not easily be induced to depart at once from her hereditary right,
and from their own reiterated oaths and engagements. But the irregular
manner in which he himself had acquired the crown might have instructed
him, that neither his Norman nor English subjects were as yet capable of
adhering to a strict rule of government; and as every precedent of this
kind seems to give authority to new usurpations, he had reason to dread,
even from his own family, some invasion of his daughter's title, which
he had taken such pains to establish.

Adela, daughter of William the Conqueror, had been married to Stephen,
count of Blois, and had brought him several sons; among whom Stephen and
Henry, the two youngest, had been invited over to England by the late
king and had received great honors, riches, and preferment, from the
zealous friendship which that prince bore to every one that had been
so fortunate as to acquire his favor and good opinion. Henry, who had
betaken himself to the ecclesiastical profession, was created abbot of
Glastonbury and bishop of Winchester; and though these digni