THE COUNCIL OF WHITBY (A.D. 664).--With a view to settling the quarrel Oswy, king of Northumbria, called a synod composed of representatives of both parties, at the monastery of Whitby. The chief question of debate, which was argued before the king by the ablest advocates of both Churches, was the proper time for the observance of Easter. Finally Wilfred, the speaker for the Roman party, happening to quote the words of Christ to Peter, "To thee will I give the keys of the kingdom of heaven," the king asked the Celtic monks if these words were really spoken by Christ to that apostle, and upon their admitting that they were, Oswy said, "He being the door-keeper,... I will in all things obey his decrees, lest when I come to the gates of the kingdom of heaven, there should be none to open them." [Footnote: Bede's _Eccl. Hist._ III. 25.] The decision of the prudent Oswy gave the British Isles to Rome; for not only was all England quickly won to the Roman side, but the Celtic churches and monasteries of Wales and Ireland and Scotland soon came to conform to the Roman standard and custom. "By the assistance of our Lord," says the pious Latin chronicler, "the monks were brought to the canonical observation of Easter, and the right mode of the tonsure." THE ROMAN VICTORY FORTUNATE FOR ENGLAND.--There is no doubt but that it was very fortunate for England that the controversy turned as it did. For one of the most important of the consequences of the conversion of Britain was the re-establishment of that connection of the island with Roman civilization which had been severed by the calamities of the fifth century. As Green says,--he is speaking of the embassy of St. Augustine,-- "The march of the monks as they chanted their solemn litany was in one sense a return of the Roman legions who withdrew at the trumpet call of Alaric.... Practically Augustine's landing renewed that union with the western world which the landing of Hengest had destroyed. The new England was admitted into the older Commonwealth of nations. The civilization, art, letters, which had fled before the sword of the English conquerors returned with the Christian faith." Now all this advantage would have been lost had Iona instead of Rome won at Whitby. England would have been isolated from the world, and would have had no part or lot in that rich common life which was destined to the European peoples as co-heirs of the heritage bequeathed to them by the dying empire.