THE tranquility of Britain perished with Constantine the Great. He was survived by three of his sons, all men of worthless, or of infamous characters. It would be time very, ill employed to notify any particulars of their reigns: let the imperial savages, and one or two of their successors pass by nameless and forgotten. Be it sufficient to say, that the ministers and officers whom they appointed, were their exact representatives; haughty tyrants, bloody inquisitors, and rapacious governors. Britain bore the share of burdens imposed upon her by these task-masters; and her inhabitants, like the Israelites, were fruitful, increased abundantly, and waxed exceedingly mighty: otherwise how could they have withstood the inundation of Picts, Scots, Saxons, and Attacotti, who, in the first year of Valentinian, broke in at once, though in different places, upon the Roman territories in Britain.
Historians have not told us in what manner the Britains sustained themselves against such numbers of invaders, till Severus was sent to their relief in the year 368. But neither Severus, nor his successor Jovinus were able to vye with the barbarians, who were now dispersed throughout the whole kingdom, and had made great devastations in the city of London. Valentinian saw an immediate necessity for a reinforcement of troops under the conduct of a veteran and experienced commander: he chose Theodosius, as a man of great experience, and of a most martial character. Theodosius lost no time in executing his commission: he set sail from Boulogne, and landed at Sandwich, with the choicest troops that could be gathered throughout the continent. He marched directly to London, and found the city in the greatest distress. He immediately relieved the metropolis; and, by a division of his army into different parties, surprised the lawless freebooters in several places, and divested them of their plunder, which consisted of captives and herds of cattle. For some time afterwards he chose rather to observe than to molest his adversaries. His caution and sagacity, joined to the force of his arms, at length entirely effected the purposes for which he was deputed into the kingdom. By degrees he drove back the Picts, the Scots, and all the invaders into their own territories: he replaced garrisons to defend the boundaries; he repaired walls, and restored cities; and, at his return to Rome, he left the island in a state of security and peace. He was attended to the shore by vast numbers of Romans and Britons, all full of expressions of regret and sorrow at his departure. He was received by his imperial master with the most public demonstrations of friendship, gratitude, and affection: honours which he most justly deserved.
The emperor Valentinian died in the year 375. He was succeeded in the western empire by his son Gratianus, a young man addicted to pleasures, resigned to favourites, and in every respect unfit for his dignity. As only chance of birth had made him an emperor, and as nature had given him abilities only for a huntsman, he soon found himself under a necessity of summoning a coadjutor to his assistance. He chose Flavius Magnus Theodosius, the son of the Roman general, who, not many years before, had made so considerable a figure in Britain.
At the time when the emperor Gratianus made this choice, Maximus, a Spaniard by birth, of a very noble family, and an officer of great merit and distinction, was at the head of the Roman army in Britain. He was personally beloved by the soldiers, and had rendered himself much esteemed and revered among the Britons. All his military actions had been planned upon the model of that great general Theodosius, by whom he had been left in Britain, in a high post of command. Soon afterwards, probably in the order of succession, he became the captain-general of the Roman and British forces. Maximus was of an ambitious temper, and he was much disgusted at the sudden rise of the younger Theodosius. He complained loudly of the injustice which he suffered by the election of any other emperor than himself: he drew his pretensions from his near degree of affinity to Constantine the Great: and his army, without an examination into the truth or falshood of those pretensions, immediately saluted him Caesar, and offered to him their service and obedience.
In what a state of confusion were the Romans and the Britons at this period? little able to help themselves, much less to assist their allies: two emperors in Italy, and one risen up on a sudden in Britain. The account of these times is very elaborately, although in many points very differently, set forth by the Scotch and English historians. But the prospect we receive from all those commentaries are only melancholy, and various views of rage and bloodshed. Revolutions upon revolutions. Gratianus killed by the troops of Maximus; Maximus put to death by Theodosius; Britain invaded by the Scots and Picts; the Scots extirpated by the Picts from Scotland, and driven into Ireland; in the continent, a declining empire; in our own island, a perpetual civil war; throughout the world, an iron age.
Insidiae (que) et vis, et amor sceleratus habendi.
‘Mix’d with curs’d avarice falshood and rapine shone.’
Such was the dismal scene, some little intervals excepted, during the whole reign of Theodosius, who died in the beginning of the year 395. He left two sons, Arcadius and Honorius. The western empire fell to the lot of Honorius, who was only ten years of age at the death of his father: he was committed to the tuition and conduct of Stilico. Under his government the Saxons, Scots, and Picts, those perpetual invaders of the British territories, were effectually suppressed and repulsed.
But Stilico was called off from his attention to the affairs of Britain, by the appearance of Alaric in Italy at the head of a most numerous army of Goths. The Roman troops were immediately summoned to the continent; as not only the empire, but the whole world seemed to be in danger of ruin, and was afterwards over run by this set of barbarians.
Here, I think, may be dated the end of the Roman government in Britain. Some assistance, some legions were sent now and then, upon the supplication of the Britons in the southern parts of the island, to relieve them from immediate destruction; but such succours were few, uncertain, and at last absolutely withdrawn.
At this particular period, let us endeavour to take a general retrospect of the Britons; their manners, their laws, and their government, as far as the obscurity, and the many chasms of our history will allow the search.
Caesar and many other authors describe the original Britons appearing in the wildest state of nature: savages living upon plunder, inhabiting woods and mountains, and ignorant of all laws and order. The description, I am afraid, is in many instances too true; but however licentious and untamed these barbarians may have been, some form of government certainly subsisted amongst them, especially, as Caesar himself says, that the customs of the Britons were almost the same as the customs of the Gauls. But he speaks indeed there only of the Cantii, who, living nearest to the Gallic shores, were most humanized.
In his account of the Gauls, he tells us in how great a degree of obedience the lower classes of people were held by the nobility; an obedience which could not have been formed or regulated without a complete and acknowledged system of laws. The particulars of those laws are not perfectly ascertained: they were always composed by the Druids, who never suffered any of their institutions to be committed to writing.
Some of them, however, have been handed down to us, and are sufficiently curious to be inserted. They are these:
I. None must be instructed but in the sacred groves.
II. Misletoe must be gathered with reverence, and, if possible, in the sixth moon. It must be cut with a golden bill.
III. Every thing derives its origin from heaven.
IV. The arcana of the sciences must not be committed to writing, but to the memory.
V. Great care is to be taken of the education of children.
VI. The powder of misletoe makes women fruitful.
VII. The disobedient are to be shut out from the sacrifices.
VIII. Souls are immortal.
IX. The soul after death goes into other bodies.
X. If the world is destroyed, it will be by fire and water.
XI. Upon extraordinary emergencies a man must be sacrificed. According as the body falls, or moves after it is fallen: according as the blood flows, or the wound opens, future events are foretold.
XII. Prisoners are to be slain upon the altars, or burnt alive, inclosed in wicker, in honour of the Gods.
XIII. All commerce with strangers must be prohibited.
XIV. He that comes last to the assembly of the states ought to be punished with death.
XV. Children are to be brought up apart from their parents, till they are fourteen years of age.
XVI. Money lent in this world will be repaid in the next.
XVII. There is another world, and they who kill themselves to accompany their friends thither, will live with them there.
XVIII. Letters given to dying persons, or thrown on the funeral piles of the dead, will faithfully be delivered in the other world.
XIX. The moon is a sovereign remedy for all things, as its name in Celtic implies.
XX. Let the disobedient be excommunicated; let him be deprived of the benefit of the law; let him be avoided, and rendered incapable of any employ.
XXI. All masters of families are kings in their own houses: they have a power of life and death over their wives, children, and slaves.
The learning, and the religious tenets of the Druids are specified in various authors. Diogenes Laertius assures us, that their chief precepts were ‘the worship of the Gods; an abstinence from all kinds of evil; and a constant exercise of manly fortitude.’
Pomponius Mela informs us, that the Druids were remarkably expert in geography and astronomy: and Caesar says, that they taught the transmigration of souls, and by that means inspired their disciples with an absolute contempt of death, which, in their articles of faith, was looked upon only as a passage from one body to another; or, as Mr. Rowe expresses it from Lucan’s description of the Druids,
“A stop, which can but for a moment last,
“A point between the present and the past.”
The character of these priests must have appeared extremely venerable, had not their doctrines been attended by the most sanguinary acts of superstition, which certainly augmented, or at least never could suppress the natural savageness and barbarity of the natives. The Bards were a lower order of the Druids: their sacerdotal employments were the celebration of the British heroes in verses, which they sung to the harp; and which were probably composed to excite emulation in the hearers of their poetry. Such a design had an a […] of policy, and might, in some measure, be conducive to tame the ferocious natures of those who listened, either from piety or curiosity, to their songs. There were still a third and inferior o […] of Druids called Eubates: and there were also Druids (not many I presume) of the female […]
The original constitution of Britain was […] monarchical. All authors agree that […] island was divided into colonies, each of […] subject to a particular sovereign. U […] […] and dangerous emergencies, the Britons […] general assembly of their princes, unanimo […] […] one superior chieftain, to whom they […] the command of the army, and the govern […] […]f the state: such were Cassivelaunus, […], Boudicea, Carausius, and Galga […]us. […] these royal magistrates were temporary or […] dictators, is a point that does not seem perfec[…]y cleared up by any of the historians: when they had the power, it is probable they kept it: most, if not all of them, came to sudden and fatal catastrophes. The Britons were subdued by Julius Caesar, and they were treated with great tyranny and oppression by all succeeding Roman empe […]o […]s, governors, legates, and pro-praetors, till Agricola lightened and diversified, if he did not remove the oppression. In the reigns of Nerva and Trajan, the Caledonians and the Britons were most firmly united, and the consequence of their union had almost produced a total extirpation of the Romans. Adrian, probably with a design to sow the seeds of disagreement between the two nations, enlarged the frontiers of the Scots, permitted them to come forwarder towards the south, and resigned to them that portion of lands, which, in the time of the elder Theodosius, was distinguished as a fifth province, and was called Valentia. The Meatae and the Picti settled themselves in this district.
Whatever might be Adrian’s motives, dissension grew up most prosperously, and rooted itself so firmly and deeply in the soil, that no association was afterwards formed between the Britons and the Caledonians. By the Caledonians, I would be understood to mean tbe inhabitants of Scotland; whether distinguished by the names of Picts, Meatae, Scots, Scythians, or any other denominations. To fix the time of their arrival, and their settlement in Great Britain, is difficult, if not impossible: the inquiry is now intirely useless. Their wars, their incursions, their depredations, and their policy are points to reflect some entertainment; their origin, and the fabulous tales that attend it, must in general be despised and forgotten.
The Caledonians, ever a crafty, and a wise nation, had tasted the sweets, and had experienced the advantages arising from frequent inroads into Britain. Their own country was barren and uncultivated: the adjoining territories were rich and fruitful: their gains, consequently, might be great; their losses could only amount to a repulse. Caesar tells us, that the Britons thought it unlawful to taste hares, hens, or geese, of which they kept great plenty for their pleasure and diversion: the Caledonians had no such scruple of taste or conscience. The British fowl, their game of all kinds, and their numerous herds of cattle, were a sort of plunder easily taken, and as easily carried away: and these tempting objects of hostility drew the Saxons and the Hibernians almost annually across the sea, in search of prizes and acquisitions from Britain. They were constantly joined and assisted by the Picts and the Meatae; so that a variety of repeated invasions totally employ the first annals of our history, and leave us scarce any other characteristical idea of our forefathers than their bravery and resistance.
Early in the fifth century, the Romans, now grown so weak as to perceive within themselves evident symptoms of dissolution, took a last farewel of our ancestors; and, like expiring friends, exerted their last efforts, amidst convulsive pangs, to assist and direct the Britons how to build a wall of stone in the same situation where the wall of Severus had formerly stood: and still, as a final instance of their friendship, they advised the natives to practise the art of war, and to become expert and regular in military discipline; but most especially to act upon one general confederate plan, by making use of their own collective strength against the Caledonians and all other invaders. The advice was excellent, and, if pursued with constancy and firmness, might have rendered the Britons for ever impregnable to their enemies. But unanimity among Britons was reserved for distant times, and the happiest age that our island has ever known.
By the departure of the Romans, the Britons looked upon themselves as delivered from their first conquerors: but they little considered that they were still subject to a worse set of tyrants, their own passions and disunion: no people upon earth are formed with more acute sensations, or deeper resentments against each other. These are the causes that fill our history with such frequent revolutions. Our climate is a representation of our nature: it is uncertain, and in the space of one week affords as much variety of weather as is known in other countries throughout a twelvemonth. A single day is often a scene of summer and of winter; and of great heat and of violent cold; of rain and snow; and of warmth and sunshine: so various is the temperature of our air. The temperature of air governs the minds of the inhabitants: we are gloomy or gay, sullen or good-humoured, and sometimes religious or immoral, according to the state and alterations of our atmosphere. What must be the effects arising from such variegated dispositions? continual changes, and continual discontent. Britons left to themselves are like horses unbridled, and let out to pasture: they wince; they roar; they kick their heels towards heaven in all the wantonness of liberty. Their freedom might be perpetual, if they knew how to direct it, or were conscious of their own strength; but they employ their time in self-destruction: they impoliticly tread down the pasture which ought to feed them, and, inconsiderately striking at each other, they become so lame, as to stand in need of assistance from the first aukward farrier who presents himself. Gildas, I think, defines our island as a land steady in nothing, and greedy of every thing new. Such, indeed, it proved after the removal of the Romans: successive royal idols were set up, worshipped, and then taken down, and trampled to pieces. The names of these molten calves are insignificant; their actions, as sovereigns, immaterial and uncertain: they were elected, adored, and destroyed. The reign of Vortigern, indeed, was of longer duration, and of more consequence: it afforded scenes of variety and importance. We are told, that while Vortigern was upon the throne, the Britons, finding themselves overpowered, and almost ruined by invasions from the Scots and Picts, sent a solemn embassy with most submissive letters to implore the assistance, and to require the immediate presence of their old enemies the Saxons. Is it possible to believe our ancestors guilty of so absurd a resolution? That they were factious, discontented, and unversed in the rules of government, is certain; but that they should imagine themselves under a necessity of seeking refuge from Charybdis, because they were close upon the rocks of Scylla, is highly improbable. How indeterminate are the historical accounts of this particular period, when the introduction of the Saxons is recorded in a manner that bears so little resemblance to truth? The Britons might not be willing, or more probably might not be capable to oppose the Saxons, when those invaders were arrived; but it is scarce credible to imagine that the Britons sollicited their arrival. However, by the generality of historians, we are to suppose that the sheep invited the wolves. A modern writer differs from many of his predecessors, and tells us, from Nennius, that the arrival of the Saxons was accidental: the only fact that can be depended upon is, that they arrived. The year cannot be ascertained; in that point the chronologists differ. But of what nation shall we find the chronology ascertained?
The Saxons were commanded by two brothers, Hengist and Horsa, men of judgment and penetration, who, finding their first design of plunder and devastation insupportable, tacitly changed the plan, and offered themselves as friends and confederates to the Britons. At so critical a juncture, they were joyfully received by Vortigern, and were incorporated into the British army. The island of Thanet was assigned for their settlement: their numbers did not exceed fifteen hundred: three ships transported them into Britain.
Hengist and Horsa soon distinguished themselves as allies of consequence. The Picts and Scots were driven back to their several territories; some to Caledonia, others to Ireland; and the Saxons retired to the isle of Thanet with all possible demonstrations of peace.
The articles of compact between the Saxons and the Britons were these: That the Saxons were to fight for the Britons against all foreign enemies, and were to receive the pay and maintenance from the nation for whom they fought. In the general name of Saxons were included the Jutes and the Angles, who had enlisted themselves under the banner of Hengist and Horsa. These two brothers were the direct descendants of Woden, an Asiatic king, who came from Scythia into Europe, and seized those German territories that are now distinguished as Saxony. The Angles were inhabitants of Sweden. The Jutes were a people of Denmark. Whilst the number of these Saxons did not exceed fifteen hundred, the articles of compact were not difficult to be fulfilled. But Hengist and Horsa had farther views than merely a subsistance from the Britons: the isle of Thanet was too limited a circumference for their ambition: a settlement, and some degree of power within the greater island, were the objects upon which they had fixed their eyes. Of the two brothers, Hengist seems to have been particularly vigilant and politic: he considered the fertility of the soil, the inexperience of the inhabitants, and the weak passions of the king; and, from these circumstances, he proposed to himself and to his people, all the future advantages that they could wish, riches, alliance, and a kingdom. In consequence of such a plan, he sent for fresh supplies of his countrymen: and they came over in tribes sufficiently numerous to fill seventeen ships. With them arrived Rowena, the daughter of Hengist: her father had particularly observed the amorous disposition of Vortigern; and, conscious of his daughter’s beauty, he proposed to make her the chief step by which he was to ascend. The effect answered the design: Vortigern saw the fair Saxon, divorced his lawful wife, by whom he had many children, and incontinently married Rowena. In consequence of this marriage, the kingdom of Kent was allotted to the Saxons, and the dominion of that territory was taken away from Guorangonus, the reigning prince, and was bestowed upon Hengist, the father-in-law of the chief sovereign in Britain.
How unhappy must be the state of government, when the king could break through all the bounds of morality, and where the people could tamely submit to see one of their most considerable colonies peremptorily given away to strangers? These instances shew us, that not the least order, and scarce any degree of public courage subsisted at this time in Britain: they shew us that christianity had not as yet taken sufficient root in our island. A religion that was calculated to rescue mankind from the tyranny of fraud and force, and instituted to give a true notion of one God, and to fix right and justice upon a sure and natural foundation, must have little efficacy among a wild and indocile race of men. Some churches, however, were built, and some outward appearances of religion were maintained; but the antiquities of these times are so fabulous, that few authentic commentaries are extant, either of ecclesiastical, or of civil affairs. The facts to be depended upon, are these:
[To be continued.]
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