prelate, at that time in a private station, had
observed in the market-place of Rome some Saxon youth exposed to sale,
whom the Roman merchants, in their trading voyages to Britain, had
bought of their mercenary parents. Struck with the beauty of their
fair complexions and blooming countenances, Gregory asked to what
country they belonged; and being told they were ANGLES, he replied
that they ought more properly to be denominated ANGELS: it were a pity
that the prince of darkness should enjoy so fair a prey, and that so
beautiful a frontispiece should cover a mind destitute of internal
grace and righteousness. Inquiring farther concerning the name of
their province, he was informed that it was Deiri, a district of
Northumberland: DEIRI, replied he, THAT IS GOOD! THEY ARE CALLED TO
THE MERCY OF GOD FROM HIS ANGER, De ira. BUT WHAT IS THE NAME OF THE
KING OF THAT PROVINCE? He was told it was Aella or Alla: ALLELUIAH,
cried he: WE MUST ENDEAVOUR THAT THE PRAISES OF GOD BE SUNG IN THAT
COUNTRY. Moved by these allusions, which appeared to him so happy, he
determined to undertake himself a mission into Britain; and having
obtained the pope's approbation, he prepared for that perilous
journey: but his popularity at home was so great, that the Romans,
unwilling to expose him to such dangers, opposed his design; and he
was obliged, for the present, to lay aside all farther thoughts of
executing that pious purpose [k].
[FN [k] Bede, lib. 2. cap. 1. Spell. Conc. p. 91.]

The controversy between the Pagans and the Christians was not entirely
cooled in that age; and no pontiff before Gregory, had ever carried to
greater excess an intemperate zeal against the former religion. He
had waged war with all the precious monuments of the ancients, and
even with their writings, which, as appears from the strain of his own
wit, as well as from the style of his compositions, he had not taste
or genius sufficient to comprehend. Ambitious to distinguish his
pontificate by the conversion of the British Saxons, he pitched on
Augustine, a Roman monk, and sent him with forty associates to preach
the gospel in this island. These missionaries, terrified with the
dangers which might attend their proposing a new doctrine to so fierce
a people, of whose language they were ignorant, stopped some time in
France, and sent back Augustine to lay the hazards and difficulties
before the pope, and crave his permission to desist from the
undertaking.