Thus we have seen the foundation of the Northern government and the orders of their people, which consisted of dependence and confederacy: that the principal end of both was military; that protection and maintenance were due on the part of the chief, obedience on that of the follower; that the followers should be bound to each other as well as to the chief; that this headship was not at first hereditary, but that it continued in the blood by an order of its own, called Tanistry.
All these unconnected and independent parts were only linked together by a common council: and here religion interposed. Their priests, the Druids, having a connection throughout each state, united it. They called the assembly of the people: and here their general resolutions were taken; and the whole might rather be called a general confederacy than a government. In no other bonds, I conceive, were they united before they quitted Germany. In this ancient state we know them from Tacitus. Then follows an immense gap, in which undoubtedly some changes were made by time; and we hear little more of them until we find them Christians, and makers of written laws. In this interval of time the origin of kings may be traced out. When the Saxons left their own country in search of new habitations, it must be supposed that they followed their leaders, whom they so much venerated at home; but as the wars which made way for their establishment continued for a long time, military obedience made them familiar with a stricter authority. A subordination, too, became necessary among the leaders of each band of adventurers: and being habituated to yield an obedience to a single person in the field, the lustre of his command and the utility of the institution easily prevailed upon them to suffer him to form the band of their union in time of peace, under the name of King. But the leader neither knew the extent of the power he received, nor the people of that which they bestowed. Equally unresolved were they about the method of perpetuating it,--sometimes filling the vacant throne by election, without regard to, but more frequently regarding, the blood of the deceased prince; but it was late before they fell into any regular plan of succession, if ever the Anglo-Saxons attained it. Thus their polity was formed slowly; the prospect clears up by little and little; and this species of an irregular republic we see turned into a monarchy as irregular. It is no wonder that the advocates for the several parties among us find something to favor their several notions in the Saxon government, which was never supported by any fixed or uniform principle. To comprehend the other parts of the government of our ancestors, we must take notice of the orders into winch they were classed. As well as we can judge in so obscure a matter, they were divided into nobles or gentlemen, freeholders, freemen that were not freeholders, and slaves. Of these last we have little to say, as they were nothing in the state. The nobles were called Thanes, or servants. It must be remembered that the German chiefs were raised to that honorable rank by those qualifications which drew after them a numerous train of followers and dependants.[55] If it was honorable to be followed by a numerous train, so it was honorable in a secondary degree to be a follower of a man of consideration; and this honor was the greater in proportion to the quality of the chief, and to the nearness of the attendance on his person. When a monarchy was formed, the splendor of the crown naturally drowned all the inferior honors; and the attendants on the person of the king were considered as the first in rank, and derived their dignity from their service. Yet as the Saxon government had still a large mixture of the popular, it was likewise requisite, in order to raise a man to the first rank of thanes, that he should have a suitable attendance and sway amongst the people. To support him in both of these, it was necessary that he should have a competent estate. Therefore in this service of the king, this attendance on himself, and this estate to support both, the dignity of a thane consisted. I understand here a thane of the first order.