Edmund Burke

There was nothing which the violence of their passions could not induce them to commit; nothing to which they did not submit to atone for their offences, when reflection gave an opportunity to repent.

Great crimes and extravagant penances, rapine and an entire resignation of worldly goods, rapes and vows of perpetual chastity, succeeded each other in the same persons.

This conflict produced no medium, because they were absolutely contrary, and both operated with almost equal violence.

Their history for a long time shows us a remarkable conflict between their dispositions and their principles.

The manners of the Saxons underwent a notable alteration by this change in their religion: their ferocity was much abated; they became more mild and sociable; and their laws began to partake of the softness of their manners, everywhere…

The science may be false or frivolous; the improvement will be real.

These speculations, however erroneous, were still useful; for, though men err in assigning the causes of natural operations, the works of Nature are by this means brought under their consideration, which cannot be done without enlarging…

He wrote comments upon almost the whole Scripture, and several homilies on the principal festivals of the Church.

An account of his writings is an account of the English learning in that age, taken in its most advantageous view.

The great and justest boast of this monastery is the Venerable Beda, who was educated and spent his whole life there.

He first introduced the study of his native language into this island.

He was a Greek by birth, a man of a high ambitious spirit, and of a mind more liberal and talents better cultivated than generally fell to the lot of the Western prelates.

Through this series of foreign and learned prelates, continual accessions were made to the originally slender stock of English literature.

It is not wholly unworthy of observation, that Providence, which strongly appears to have intended the continual intermixture of mankind, never leaves the human mind destitute of a principle to effect it.

Here the Greeks had not only not discontinued the ancient studies, but they added to the stock of arts many inventions of curiosity and convenience that were unknown to antiquity.

But the scheme of Christianity is such that it almost necessitates an attention to many kinds of learning.

The zeal of the missionaries was also much assisted by their superiority in the arts of civil life.

When kings became monks, a high lustre was reflected upon the monastic state, and great credit accrued to the power of their doctrine, which was able to produce such extraordinary effects upon persons over whom religion has commonly the…

The greatest kings and conquerors frequently resigned their crowns and shut themselves up in monasteries.

For the Saxon kings and ruling men embraced religion with so signal, and in their rank so unusual a zeal, that in many instances they even sacrificed to its advancement the prime objects of their ambition.

Whilst the inferior people were thus insensibly led into a better order, the example and countenance of the great completed the work.

Nothing could have been more prudent than these regulations: they were, indeed, formed from a perfect understanding of human nature.

But as it is not in my design nor inclination, nor indeed in my power, either to establish or refute these stories, it is sufficient to observe, that the reality or opinion of such miracles was the principal cause of the early acceptance…

But the introduction of Christianity, which, under whatever form, always confers such inestimable benefits on mankind, soon made a sensible change in these rude and fierce manners.

Few things discover the state of the arts amongst people more certainly than the presents that are made to them by foreigners.