FOOTNOTES:
[73] The seven kingdoms founded in England by seven different Saxon invaders. They were Kent, Sussex, Wessex, Essex, Northumbria, East Anglia, and Mercia.
[74] These abuses were common to all the European churches; but the priests in Italy, Spain, and Gaul made some atonement for them by other advantages which they rendered society. For several ages they were almost all Romans, or, in other words, the ancient natives; and they preserved the Roman language and laws, with some remains of the former civility. But the priests in the heptarchy, after the first missionaries, were wholly Saxons, and almost as ignorant and barbarous as the laity. They contributed, therefore, little to the improvement of society in knowledge or the arts.