igher and higher
above the nobles, and clothed them more and more with a mysterious
dignity. Above all the religious character of the war against the
northmen gave a religious character to the sovereigns who waged it. The
king, if he was no longer sacred as the son of Woden, became yet more
sacred as "the Lord's Anointed." By the very fact of his consecration he
was pledged to a religious rule, to justice, mercy, and good government;
but his "hallowing" invested him also with a power drawn not from the
will of man or the assent of his subjects but from the will of God, and
treason against him became the worst of crimes. Every reign lifted the
sovereign higher in the social scale. The bishop, once ranked equal with
him in value of life, sank to the level of the ealdorman. The ealdorman
himself, once the hereditary ruler of a smaller state, became a mere
delegate of the national king, with an authority curtailed in every shire
by that of the royal shire-reeves, officers charged with levying the
royal revenues and destined ultimately to absorb judicial authority.
Among the later nobility of the thegns personal service with such a lord
was held not to degrade but to ennoble. "Horse-thegn," and "cup-thegn,"
and "border," the constable, butler, and treasurer, found themselves
officers of state; and the developement of politics, the wider extension
of home and foreign affairs were already transforming these royal
officers into a standing council or ministry for the transaction of the
ordinary administrative business and the reception of judicial appeals.
Such a ministry, composed of thegns or prelates nominated by the king,
and constituting in itself a large part of the Witenagemot when that
assembly was gathered for legislative purposes, drew the actual control
of affairs more and more into the hands of the sovereign himself.

[Sidenote: Growth of Feudalism]

But the king's power was still a personal power. He had to be everywhere
and to see for himself that everything he willed was done. The royal
claims lay still far ahead of the real strength of the Crown. There was a
want of administrative machinery in actual connexion with the government,
responsible to it, drawing its force directly from it, and working
automatically in its name even in moments when the royal power was itself
weak or wavering. The Crown was strong under a king who was strong, whose
personal action was felt everywhere throughout the realm, whose dread la