Their countrymen on the continent long retained the original character of their nation. During many ages they continued preeminent for their bloodthirsty disposition and savage manners. _Charlemagne_ subdued them, after a thirty years war, and forced them to become converts to _his_ Christianity, and submit to baptism; but their ferocity he did not subdue, nor had their conversion any effect towards humanizing them. They were, however, _called Christians_: which was like calling evil, good, or Satan, an angel of light. These Saxon Christians, in the twelfth century, quarrelled with the _Venedi_, a neighbouring nation, because they objected against embracing _their_ Christianity, and refused to renounce their own paganism, which they seemed to prefer, for its cheapness. The former they found to be an institution attended with an expence which they could but ill support. Bishoprics were to be erected, with large revenues, Monasteries to be endowed, and an annual tribute, under the name of tithes, to be paid by the whole country. Against this the Venedi remonstrated, to Bernard Duke of Saxony, the christian champion. They protested that they were very poor, and unable to bear any heavy burden, such as providing for the maintenance of priests, and especially for the dignity and parade of mitred prelates; that they were fully determined to suffer any extremity, even to abandon their country and state, rather than submit to so tyrannical an oppression. This firm opposition of theirs to the will of the christian potentate, or rather the Saxon tyrant, involved them in a long and bloody war, the final issue of which was, their utter extirpation, by Henry Duke of Saxony, surnamed the Lion, the great champion of the church on that occasion. The cruelty with which he disgraced his victory, was horrible. Few revolutions in history were attended with such circumstances of barbarity, or proved so destructive to the ancient inhabitants. {232} Even Charlemagne, after he had subdued the Saxons, by a long and bloody war, did not attempt to destroy their whole race, but only transplanted a part, and the remainder he endeavoured to reconcile to his empire by the establishment of his Christianity. But the Saxons, by far more cruel than the Francs, were of all conquerors the most destructive, extending the utmost rigour of the sword against those who dared to contend with them for liberty or empire.