After having been so long subject to a foreign dominion, there was among the Britons no royal family, no respected order in the state, none of those titles to government, confirmed by opinion and long use, more efficacious than the wisest schemes for the settlement of the nation. Mere personal merit was then the only pretence to power. But this circumstance only added to the misfortunes of a people who had no orderly method of election, and little experience of merit in any of the candidates. During this anarchy, whilst they suffered the most dreadful calamities from the fury of barbarous nations which invaded them, they fell into that disregard of religion, and those loose, disorderly manners, which are sometimes the consequence of desperate and hardened wretchedness, as well as the common distempers of ease and prosperity. At length, after frequent elections and deposings, rather wearied out by their own inconstancy than, fixed by the merit of their choice, they suffered Vortigern to reign over them. This leader had made some figure in the conduct of their wars and factious. But he was no sooner settled on the throne than he showed himself rather like a prince born of an exhausted stock of royalty in the decline of empire than one of those bold and active spirits whose manly talents obtain them the first place in their country, and stamp upon it that character of vigor essential to the prosperity of a new commonwealth. However, the mere settlement, in spite of the ill administration of government, procured the Britons some internal repose, and some temporary advantages over their enemies, the Picts. But having been long habituated to defeats, neither relying on their king nor on themselves, and fatigued with the obstinate attacks of an enemy whom they sometimes checked, but could never remove, in one of their national assemblies it was resolved to call in the mercenary aid of the Saxons, a powerful nation of Germany, which had been long by their piratical incursions terrible not only to them, but to all the adjacent countries. This resolution has been generally condemned. It has been said, that they seem to have through mere cowardice distrusted a strength not yet worn down, and a fortune sufficiently prosperous. But as it was taken by general counsel and consent, we must believe that the necessity of such a step was felt, though the event was dubious. The event, indeed, might be dubious: in a state radically weak, every measure vigorous enough for its protection must endanger its existence.