SOME EARLY MIRACLES EXPLAINED.

233

that no man would trust it in his own affairs; the cure of a blind man, which St. Augustine performed, produced no effect on the convictions of those who witnessed it.1 St. Wilfrid's success with the baby is unaccountable, and may fairly be left so, in the absence of more precise details. In minor cases of sickness, St. Cuthbert's cure is a good specimen of a numerous class. He was lamed by a swelling in his thigh, and was sitting at the door of his father's house, when a stranger who passed by dismounted to learn the cause of the boy's illness, examined the swelling, and recommended that it should be poulticed. The remedy proved efficacious, and Cuthbert then knew that he had been visited by an angel. At a later period in life, the same saint, traversing the Northumbrian wilds, was in want of shelter and food; he suddenly saw a shepherd's hut, found it deserted, and discovered some meat and half a hot loaf hidden in the thatch. The parallel of Elijah and the ravens seems to have secured him from any scruple as to the lawfulness of taking his neighbour's goods; he could not doubt that the supply was miraculous. Here the event would no doubt be classed by some modern religionists under the head of special providences. Often the miracles of the gospel were the model of Saxon experiences. When Athelstane paid a visit to his kinswoman, the abbess of Glastonbury, she obtained by her prayers that the mead in the house should increase so as to suffice the king's retinue;3 the remembrance of the marriage-feast at Cana had no doubt suggested the propriety of applying to God for help. Often the sacraments of the church appear invested with a magical efficacy. Bede tells a story of a thane who was taken prisoner in battle. His brother, a priest, believing him to be slain, said masses for his soul; their efficacy in delivering was

1 Bede, H. E., lib. ii., cap. 2. It is clear that miracles lost half their value as evidence, when they were supposed to be ordinary events.

2 Bede, Vita S. Cudbercti, caps. 2, 5. That remarkable book, "Some account the Lord's Dealings with George Müller," abounds in cases of divine intervention to relieve one who, in the nineteenth century, has founded and conducted a large institution on the principle of taking no thought for the morrow.

3 Wendover, vol. i., pp. 387, 388.

234

RESULTS OF AN UNCRITICAL FAITH.

transferred to his body, and no chains being able to bind the prisoner, his captor was at last glad to ransom him on his own terms. This story is elucidated by an event in St. Wilfrid's life. He had been thrown into prison and was to be manacled, but no fetters could be made that were not either too small or too loose for him. The imperfect art of the smith became material for faith to feed upon. It is clear that this habit of mind, which looked for the perpetual intervention of God in the events of life, could not exist in any society without notable effects. In the cases of a few men, it no doubt raised the moral tone. The monk went out to colonize the wilderness or reclaim the heathen, believing that the powers of darkness were thwarting his efforts, scoffing him, seeking to destroy him, but believing also that he would overcome in the end. It was thus that St. Gall, when he was out fishing, heard spirit crying to spirit, "Come over and help us, for a stranger is spoiling our heritage," and the saint made the sign of the cross, and the fiends fled wailing. But the same belief led men of baser mould to accept the results of their own cowardice as the special judgement of God; this it was unnerved the Saxons in their wars with the Danes and Normans; the same thought inspired the system of the ordeal, in which innocence and guilt were determined by chance or imposture. Lastly, men who see visions are a little unfitted for dealing with realities. The Saxon's faith in the supernatural world was no separate part of his mind; and the predominance of the precise and dogmatical over the critical clement in his religion, disqualified him for exploring nature or weighing evidence. All learning took the form of a poem, into which fresh facts were woven up more or less artistically; but there were no separate sciences, and no part of knowledge which was not more or less a mystery or a miracle. This feature, however, was more largely developed in Norman times, when the study of the early fathers was revived.

1 Bede, H. E., lib. iv., cap. 22. Vita S. Wilfridi, Gale, vol. iii., p. 70. 2 Vita S. Galli; Vita S. Sturmi; Pertz. Mon. German., vol. ii., pp. 7, 8, 367-370.

CHRISTIANITY ENFORCED BY LAW.

235

It is important to observe that the profession of Christianity was not optional in England. Paganism and witchcraft were proscribed under heavy penalties. Parents were bound to see that their children were baptized. The penalties imposed on guilt probably needed no other enforcement, with the people at large, than a spiritual censure suspended over their heads; in the case of powerful criminals, the king interposed to carry out the sentence of the church. There were even stringent laws for the observance of the Lord's day, and of festivals. How far this was carried, is a little difficult to decide. The great Gregory had protested strongly against anything like a Jewish sabbath ;2 we find Dunstan delaying mass on Sunday till Edgar shall return from the chase; and Ælfric even praises a man who works seven days in the week. Probably the general principle was that all profitable and all engrossing labour should be suspended, and that nothing should interfere with attendance upon the church ordinances.

1 Laws of Ine, 2; A. S. Laws, vol. i., p. 102.

2 "Pervenit ad me quosdam perversi spiritus homines prava inter vos aliqua et sanctæ fidei adversa seminâsse, ita ut in die sabbati aliquid operari prohibeant. Quos quid aliud nisi Anti-Christi prædicatores dixerim."-Greg. Epist., lib. xiii., 1.

Eccl. Inst., 24; A. S. Laws, vol. ii., p. 421, forbid all work except preparing meat or necessary travelling. Sunday was kept from the noon of Saturday till the dawn of Monday.-Elfric's Canons, 36; A. S. Laws, vol. ii., p. 363. Eadmer, Vita S. Dunstan, Ang. Sac., vol. ii., p. 217. The angels, however, interposed to celebrate mass on this occasion, and Dunstan, corrected by the miracle, forbade the king to hunt any more on Sunday.-Elfric's Homilies, vol. ii., p. 357.

XXI.

THE LAST SAXON KING.

HAROLD'S OATH OF FEALTY TO WILLIAM.-REFUSAL TO PERFORM THE COMPACT. -CONTINENTAL FEELING IN FAVOUR OF WILLIAM'S CLAIM.-TOSTIG'S INVASION AND DEFEAT.-NORMAN INVASION OF ENGLAND.-BATTLE OF HASTINGS. -CHARACTER OF HAROLD.

THE witan of the south or Saxon England decided easily upon nominating Harold as their king. He conciliated the northern provinces by a personal canvass. His connection through the marriages of his family with the Saxon and Danish royal lines, was no doubt an argument in his favour. The only other candidate whom Englishmen could possibly think of, was Edgar Ætheling, the legitimate heir according to modern notions of inheritance, who was still under age, and whose character, as his after-life showed, was feeble and unambitious. His pretensions were satisfied with the title of ealdorman of Oxford. But if the witan were free to choose their king, there was one reason which might have induced a more scrupulous man than Harold to decline the dignity. During the previous summer, 1065 A.D., he had been wrecked on the coast of France;

1 The statement of Florence that he was elected "a totius Angliæ primatibus" is probably near the truth. But great nobles were scarce in the north, and the people north of the Humber were likely enough to object to any king of Saxon descent, even though a few Northumbrian thanes had been present in the witan.

2 The more credible account is that Harold was sailing out, either officially as guardian of the coasts or on a pleasure excursion. Eadmer's story is that he went against the king's advice to reclaim his brother Wlfnoth and his nephew Haco, who had been confided as hostages to the duke of Normandy in 1052 A.D., when Edward and Godwin were reconciled. But no reliable history mentions any giving of hostages on that occasion, when Godwin was able to dictate terms. Even granting that part of the story to be true, it is most improbable that Harold, merely to bring back a brother, would put himself in the power of one

thrown into prison by Guy of Ponthieu, the count of the district where he landed, and finally handed over to the duke of Normandy, who paid his ransom. William entertained the earl with high respect at his court, and even associated him as brother-at-arms in an expedition against Brittany, but allowed him to feel that he was something more than a guest, and might easily become a prisoner. At last, all reserve was thrown aside; Harold was required to promise that he would assist William to obtain the English crown, which the duke claimed in virtue of a promise from Edward when they were both boys in Normandy. The other articles of the treaty stipulated that Harold was to give up the castle of Dover to William, and to let his own sister become the wife of a Norman baron; in return for this, the earl was to marry William's daughter, and might freely make any demand in reason upon William's gratitude. Harold had no alternative but to comply. An oath was demanded, and he could not excite suspicion by refusing it; he laid his hand on what seemed a small reliquary, and vowed before God to perform all that he had agreed to. The covering of the table was withdrawn, and Harold perceived with horror that he had sworn over a vase, in which all the relics that could be found near Bayeux were contained. He was now set free, and returned to England, where his plans for achieving the kingdom were carried on as unscrupulously as before; his nature was not one to be hampered by verbal engagements. But one point in this trans

whose rivalry he must have foreseen. The Norman story that Harold was sent over by the king to confirm a promise of the kingdom made to William long before through the primate, Robert of Canterbury, is absurd; Robert was banished from England in 1052 A.D., and died not long afterwards; yet five years later the scrupulous Edward sent for his nephew, Edward Ætheling, intending to nominate him his successor. Harold was the last man to have accepted such a mission, at a time when the king's death was a question of a few years. Malmesbury's story is not improbable, but his fondness for reconciling contradictions makes him untrustworthy. He represents Harold as declaring himself a secret ambassador to the Norman court, in order to obtain his release from captivity. Guy of Ponthieu was evidently a harsh captor, and the earl would be anxious to obtain his freedom without delay. Threats of war as well as a ransom, were in fact required to effect it.-Eadmer, Hist. Nov., p. 350; Gul. Pict., pp. 85, 107, 108; Malmesbury, lib. ii., pp. 383, 384.