But of his spirit and subsequent conduct the details are clear and abundant.

Neot is described to have been a very meek and mild man ; to have become a monk at Glastonbury; to have visited Rome seven times; and to have retired to a wild solitude in Cornwall, which he afterwards quitted to build a monastery (1). He died before 878. The principal feature in his moral character is the resolution which he formed of copying the predominant virtue of every person in his cloister that had any,-the continence of one man, the pleasantness of another, the suavity of a third; the seriousness, humanity, good nature, and love of singing, and of study, in others. Hence the summary of his character is thus transmitted to us : "Humble to all, affable in conversation, mild in transaction of business, venerable in aspect, serene in countenance, moderate even in his walk, sincere, upright, calm, temperate, and charitable (2)." It is not extraordinary that such a man should have led the mind of Alfred to favourable impressions of sincere religion.

It is an agreeable instance of Alfred's good humour, that after his restoration, he was in the habit of narrating to his friends the adventures of his adversity, with lively pleasantry (3).

There is one little incident attached to the memory of Alfred, which, as it exists in an author who seems to have been curious in searching into ancient remains (4), may be mentioned here, that nothing concerning so great a man be lost.

One day as he was hunting in a wood, he heard the cry of an infant in a tree, and ordered his huntsmen to examine the place. They ascended the branches; and found at top, in an eagle's nest, a beautiful child, dressed in purple, with golden bracelets, the marks of nobility, on his arms. The king had him brought down and baptized, and well educated; from the accident, he named the foundling Nesting am. His grandson's daughter is stated to have been one of the ladies for whom Edgar indulged an improper passion.

We will close our account of Alfred's moral character by one remarkable trait. An author who lived at the period of the Norman conquest, in mentioning some of the preceding kings with short appropriate epithets, names Alfred, with the simple but expressive addition of "the truth-teller (5)," as if it had been his traditional character.

(1) See the preceding lives, and Whitaker's account.

(2) Ramsay's life, p. 341.; Whitaker, p. 93.; and see his further account, p. 94, 95.

(3) Malmsbury, 43.

(4) This is Johannes Tinmuth, whose MSS. have not yet been published, though they appear to contain some curious particulars. I find an extract from his history in the Bodleian library, lib. xxi., quoted by Dugdale, Monasticon, i. p. 256.

(5) Hermanni miracula Edmundi script. circa 1070. MS. Cotton library, Tiberius, b. ii. It follows Abbo's life of this king, It is very beautifully written,

CHAPTER VI.

Alfred's Public Conduct.

The conduct of kings affects the whole nation which contemplates it. The fortunes of human nature are in their hands. Virtue and intellect flourish as their conduct is wise and moral; and nations prosper or decline, as the measures of the executive authority are salutary or ignoble.

Although his conduct in the first part of his reign was objectionable, few sovereigns have shaped their conduct with more regard to the public happiness than Alfred, after his restoration. He seems to have considered his life but as a trust to be used for the benefit of his people; and his plans for their welfare were intelligent and great. His military exertions for the benefit of the nation, and their final successes, have been already commemorated. But although performed by him as necessary duties, they were uncongenial with his heart and mind. These turned, as soon as they were at liberty to pursue their natural bias, to nobler objects than war and bloodshed..

His predominant wish was the mental and moral improvement of his countrymen. His letter to his bishop, prefixed to his translation of Gregory's Pastorals, and already cited (1), breathes this principle throughout. To communicate to others the knowledge which we possess, he even states to be a religious duty. He laments the ignorance which overspread his land; he desires that all the youth, who had pecuniary means, should learn to read English; he gently censures former students who had not put their knowledge into a popular form, by translating it into the vernacular tongue; he devotes his own leisure, and he calls upon his literary clergy to devote theirs, to the translating into English the books they possessed. He led the way with taste and judgment in his historical and philosophical translations: he seems to place his glory in the intellectual advancement of his rude countrymen.

His correspondent, the French archbishop, also bears testimony to the same spirit (2). The translation of Gregory's Pastorals could have no other meaning than to rouse the clergy to labour for the moral emendation of his people; and, at the same time that we surrender this book to disapprobation, for its tendency to enchain the

P. 21. he says "Elueredi Veridici." In his epithets of the kings, he seems to have closely followed their traditional biography, for he calls Edred" debilis pedibus," which is a very marking trait.

(1) From p. 10. of this volume.

(2) See before, p. 9. of this volume.

mind, it may be proper to remark, that the principle upon which the king recommended it to his clergy was unquestionably just. We cannot look round the world without perceiving how much the morality of a people depends upon the sagacity, the knowledge, and the virtue of its sacred preceptors. Why has the fair influence of true religion been lessening among us, but because the appointed guardians of our morals were not always careful to acquire the talents, to display the enlarged views, and to exert the conduct which will interest the thoughtless, impress the dissolute, and satisfy the doubting? In every age the world requires, from its moral teachers, example, persuasion, and conviction. The clergy of Alfred were not distinguished for either; and the king knew no other book which at all aimed at educating them, to influence honourably, as well as to exhort; nor was any other way at that time likely to be more efficacious than to increase the influence of the ecclesiastical order.

In the first days of society, and in its most improved period, when religion and philosophy have become duly united and firmly seated in the heart, the patriarchal and the priestly character may be often most usefully united; but in the intermediate eras, when so many myriads are ignorant of religion, or indifferent to it, or prejudiced against it, if there be not a well educated, respected, and authorised clergy, it will depart from the young intellect amid the pressure of worldly objects, and become associated with degrading superstitions in the vulgar and older minds. Alfred could not at that time have pursued a wiser or more patriotic object than that of endeavouring to enlighten and improve the ecclesiastical body.

The school which he established for his nobles (1), and the masters which he provided for high and low, who were educated with his son Ethelweard (2), are proofs of his desire to augment the knowledge of his country.

His invitations to his court of learned foreigners and skilful artisans ; his search around his dominions for men of literary attainments; and his munificent patronage to all whose talents came within his notice, concur to demonstrate his laudable anxiety to improve his people.

He lived in an age, when to promote the general welfare was an idea which seldom influenced the conduct (3). His plans to benefit his subjects were therefore counteracted by their prejudices and their ignorance. Many of his royal exhortations were not obeyed; even the castles which he advised, or ordered his nobility to build,

(1) Scholæ quam ex multis suæ propriæ gentis nobilibus studiosissime congregaverat. Asser, 67.

(2) Cum omnibus pene totius regionis nobilibus infantibus et etiam multis ignobilibus, sub diligenti magistrorum cura traditus est. Asser, 43.

66

(8) This is a feature which Asser gives of his contemporaries, Qui nullum aut parvum voluntarie pro communi regni necessitate vellent subire laborem.

to protect their own lands against the Northmen, were reluctantly begun. It often happened that the ravages, which his advice was meant to prevent, occurred before the landholders would obey his foresight. Then, when they had lost their families and property, they mourned their folly with a repentance, says Asser, that could neither restore their slain relations, redeem their captive friends, nor even support themselves with common subsistence (1).

But Alfred was not discouraged by the tardiness of his subjects. By mild expostulation, by reasoning, by gentle flattery, or by express command; or, in case of obstinate disobedience, by severe chastisement, he overcame the pertinacity of vulgar folly; and wisely made his bishops, earls, ministers, and public officers, exert themselves for the common benefit of all his kingdom (2). Among other things, he was inflexible in exacting from all a competence for their offices. To produce this he compelled them to study lite rature. Even they who had been illiterate from their infancy, earls, governors, and ministers, were compelled to learn to read and write (3), choosing rather to endure the painful toil, than to lose their preferment. If from age, or peculiar dulness of intellect, they could not be taught themselves, their son or some kinsman, or if none, some freeman or slave, educated for the purpose, was ordered to recite before them Saxon books, both day and night (4).

His public demeanour was very affable, mixed with decorous pleasantry; he was eager to join in the investigation of things unknown (5), for the curiosity of his mind was insuppressible.

Many Francs, Frisians, and other neighbouring nations, willingly came to submit to his authority, both noble and ignoble. He loved them all like his own people, received them honourably, and gave them both money and power (6).

His bishops and clergy, his nobles and servants, he treated with paternal affection; he was indefatigable in his endeavours to educate such of their children as were in the royal court, in every valuable morality; and he himself did not disdain to assist in their scholastic tuition (7).

His embassy to

His embassy to India, to the shrine of St. Thomas, India. is as expressive of his mind and public spirit as any other action of his life. No other potentate in Europe could in that day have conceived it; because no other had acquired that knowledge which would have interested them in a country so remote and unknown. The embassy displays not only the extent of Alfred's

(1) Asser, 60.

(2) Ibid. 59.

(3) So I construe the expressions, "Literatoriæ arti studerent." Asser, 71. (4) Asser, 71. These passages of Asser are very curious.

(5) Et maxima et incomparabili contra omnes homines affabilitate atque jocunditate et ignotarum rerum investigationi solerter se jungebat. Asser, 44.

(6) Asser, 44.

(7) This I presume is the meaning of omnibus bonis moribus instituere et literis imbuere solus die noctuque inter cætera non desinebat. Asser, 44.

information, but that searching curiosity, which characterised his understanding.

The journey is stated by several chroniclers. The Saxon Chronicle (1), Florence of Worcester (2), Radulph (3), and Bromton (4), simply mention, that Suithelm, the bishop of Shircburn, carried the benevolence of Alfred to India, to Saint Thomas, and returned in safety. Huntingdon (5), and Alured of Beverley (6), express that the embassy was sent in a discharge of a vow which the king had made. Matthew of Westminster (7), and Malmsbury, mention the curiosities which Suithelm brought back with him.

Malmsbury, who gives the fullest account of the incident, says that the king sent many presents over sea to Rome, and to St. Thomas, in India; that Sighelm, the bishop of Shireburn, was his ambassador, who penetrated with great success to India, to the admiration of the age; and that he brought with him on his return many foreign gems and aromatic liquors, the produce of the country (8). In another passage, Malmsbury declares, that some of those gems were to be seen in his days in the monuments of the church (9).

In the former editions of this work, for the purpose of verifying this extraordinary incident, a careful investigation was pursued, in order to show that it was long before believed that St. Thomas had been in India; that in the age of Alfred he was presumed to have died there; and that at that time there were Christians living there. It was also proved that such journeys were in those days attempted, and the inference was drawn from these facts, that the assertions of our chroniclers were not counteracted by any improbability in their assertions of this remarkable embassy (10).

(1) Sax. Chron. p. 86.

(2) 883. Assero Scireburnensi episcopo defuncto succedit Suithelmus, qui regis Alfredi eleemosynam ad S. Thomam, Indiam detulit, indeque prospere retulit. Flor. Wig. 320.

(3) Rad. Dic. 451. He dates it 887.

(4) Bromton, 812.

(5) Alfredus autem misit eleemosynam suam Romæ et etiam in Indiam ad S. Thomam, secundum votum quod fecerat quando hostilis exercitus hyemavit apud Londoniam. Hunt. 350.

(6) Lib. vii. p. 106.

(7) Malt. West. 333. Malm. calls him Sighelm. (8) Et trans marc Romam et ad Sanctum Thomam in Indiam multa munera misit. Legatus in hoc missus Sigelmus Scireburnensis episcopus cum magna prosperitate, quod quivis hoc seculo miretur, Indiam penetravit; inde rediens exoticos splendores gemmarum et liquores aromatum, quorum illa humus ferax est, reportavit. De Gestis, p. 44.

He says that Suithelm brought back precious stones.

(9) Nonnullæ illarum adhuc in ecclesiæ monumentis visuntur. Malms. De Pont. 248.

(10) In the Saxon life of St. Thomas, in MS. Calig. A. 14., which is ascribed to Elfric in Jul. E. 7., the legendary account there is, "The Saviour himself came to him from heaven, and said to him, A king of the Indians, who is called Gundoforus, will send his gerefa to Syria's land to seek some labourer who is skilful in