Their ancient protection withdrawn, the people became stupefied with terror and despair.

They petition the emperor for succor in the most moving terms.

The emperor, protesting his weakness, commits them to their own defence, absolves them from, their allegiance, and confers on them a freedom which they have no longer the sense to value nor the virtue to defend.

The princes whom after this desertion they raised and deposed with a stupid inconstancy were styled Emperors.

So hard it is to change ideas to which men have been long accustomed, especially in government, that the Britons had no notion of a sovereign who was not to be emperor, nor of an emperor who was not to be master of the Western world.