160 HISTORY OF ENGLAND.

c h n p, It is easy to imagine, that this harangue had then. desired effect; and that, when the king and prelatesthus concurred with the popular prejudices , itwas not long before the monks prevailed , andestablished their new discipline in almost all theconvents.

We may remark T that the declamations againstthe secular clergy are , both here and in all thehistorians, conveyed in general terms; and as thatorder of men are commonly restrained by thedecency of their character , it is difficult to believe,that the complaints against their dissolufe mannerscould be so universally just as is pretended. It ismore probable, that the monks paid court to thepopulace by an affected austerity of life ; and,representing the most innocent liberties, taken bythe other clergy , as great and unpardonableenormities, thereby prepared the way for thejncrease of their own power and influence. Edgar,however, like a true politician, concurred withthe prevailing party; and he even indulged them• in pretensions, which, though they might, whencomplied with, engage the monks to supportroyal authority during his own-reign, provedafterwards dangerous to his successors , and gavedisturbance to the whole civil power. He secondedthe policy of the court of Rome, in granting tosome monasteries an exemption from episcopaljurisdiction : He allowed the convents, even»hose of royal foundation, to usurp the electionof their own abbot : And he admitted their"forgeries of ancient charters, by which , from the

pretended