mould the character of his subjects. If he could not help them in the present distress, he might leave behind him a legacy of hope to support them in the dark days which were coming. Some form of reorganisation he saw was imminent; some transformation of the national life, which was feeble, distracted, impotent; so unlike that life which he had quitted in Normandy, a life which was cruel, hard, unlovely, but full of energy and force, which he failed to find in England. A change must come, a new birth of some sort; and the birth-pangs would be severe, men's hearts would fail them, and they would look here and there for succour. Dreamily, languidly, uncertainly, Edward thought of himself as the shadow of a rock in a thirsty land.
Hence he made no effort to form a policy of his own, or to gather a party. Earl Godwine was in power, and Edward accepted him. He took his daughter to wife, and was rejoiced to find in her traces of like-mindedness with himself. But he was a man whose habits were already formed, and who was dependent on companionship. He welcomed old friends from Normandy, to whom he could talk more freely than to the English. He welcomed above all ecclesiastics who could speak of Church matters from a higher point of view than that with which English prelates were familiar. But he was no judge of men, and easily fell under the influence of the most plausible speaker. He did not care to meddle with matters of the State, but in the affairs of the Church he thought he might exercise a wholesome influence. The secular government of England was beyond him,
