by instant and strenuous application
soon became a distinguished proficient in the art.

FOOTNOTES:

[37] Inesse quinetiam sanctum aliquid et providum putant; nec aut
consilia carum aspernantur aut responsa negligunt.--Tacit. de Mor. Ger.
c. 8.

[38] Bed. Hist. Eccl. Lib. I. c. 30.

[39] Id. c. cod.

[40] Dugdale's History of St. Paul's.

[41] Bed. Hist. Eccl. Lib. IV. c. 13.

[42] Bed. Hist. Eccl. Lib IV. c. 13.

[43] Spelm. Concil. p. 329.

[44] Instauret etiam Dei ecclesiam; ... et instauret vias publicas
pontibus super aquas profundas et super caenosas vias; ... manumittat
servos suos proprios, et redimat ab aliis hominibus servos suos ad
libertatem.--L Eccl. Edgari, 14.

[45] Aidanus, Finan, Colmannus mirae sanctitatis fuerunt et
parsimoniae.... Adeo autem sacerdotes erant illius temporis ab avaritia
immunes, ut nec territoria nisi coacti acciperent.--Hen. Huntingd. Lib.
III. p. 333. Bed. Hist. Eccl. Lib. III c. 26.

[46] Icolmkill, or Iona.

CHAPTER III.

SERIES OF ANGLO-SAXON KINGS FROM ETHELBERT TO ALFRED: WITH THE INVASION
OF THE DANES.

[Sidenote: A.D. 799]

The Christian religion, having once taken root in Kent, spread itself
with great rapidity throughout all the other Saxon kingdoms in England.
The manners of the Saxons underwent a notable alteration by this change
in their religion: their ferocity was much abated; they became more mild
and sociable; and their laws began to partake of the softness of their
manners, everywhere recommending mercy and a tenderness for Christian
blood. There never was any people who embraced religion with a more
fervent zeal than the Anglo-Saxons, nor with more simplicity of spirit.
Their history for a long time shows us a remarkable conflict between
their dispositions and their principles. This conflict produced no
medium, because they were absolutely contrary, and both operated with
almost equal violence. Great crimes and extravagant penances, rapine and
an entire resignation of worldly goods, rapes and vows of perpetual
chastity, succeeded each other in the same persons. There was nothing
which the violence of their passions could not induce them to commit;
nothing to which they did not submit to atone for their offences, when
reflection gave an opportunity to repent. But by degrees the sanctions
of religion began to preponderate; and as the monks at this time
attracted all the religious veneration, religion everywhere began to
relish of the clois