, king of Scots, among
the number: the Scottish historians either deny the fact, or assert that
their king, if ever he acknowledged himself a vassal to Edgar, did
him homage, not for his crown, but for the dominions which he held in
England.
But the chief means by which Edgar maintained his authority, and
preserved public peace, was the paying of court to Dunstan and the
monks, who had at first placed him on the throne, and who, by their
pretensions to superior sanctity and purity of manners, had acquired an
ascendant over the people. He favored their scheme for dispossessing the
secular canons of all the monasteries;[*****] he bestowed preferment
on none but their partisans; he allowed Dunstan to resign the see of
Worcester into the hands of Oswald, one of his creatures; [******] and
to place Ethelwold, another of them, in that of Winchester;[*******] he
consulted these prelates in the administration of all ecclesiastical
and even in that of many civil affairs; and though the vigor of his own
genius prevented him from being implicitly guided by them, the king and
the bishops found such advantages in their mutual agreement, that they
always acted in concert, and united their influence in preserving the
peace and tranquillity of the kingdom.
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