It was plain that his great ruling motive was a true and honest desire to promote the welfare and prosperity of his people, and the internal peace, and order, and happiness of his realm, without any selfish or sinister aims of his own.
In fact, it seemed as if there were no selfish or sinister ends that possessed any charms for Alfred's mind.

He had no fondness or taste for luxury or pleasure, or for aggrandizing himself in the eyes of others by pomp and parade.

It is true that, as was stated in a former chapter, he was charged in early life with a tendency to some kinds of wrong indulgence; but these charges, obscure and doubtful as they were, pertained only to the earliest periods of his career, before the time of his seclusion.

Through all the middle and latter portions of his life, the sole motive of his conduct seems to have been a desire to lay broad, and deep, and lasting foundations for the permanent welfare and prosperity of his realm.
It resulted from the nature of the measures which Alfred undertook to effect, that they brought upon him daily a vast amount of labor as such measures always involve a great deal of minute detail.

Alfred could only accomplish this great mass of duty by means of the most unremitting industry, and the most systematic and exact division of time.