Did the Anglo-Saxons Have a Social Conscience Like Us?

Abstract

Consideration of whether there was any pre-Conquest social legislation, whether, in fact, the Anglo-Saxons had a social conscience, are questions that arose from discussion after a paper on aspects of Anglo-Saxon law I had given without attending to such matters of importance in legal and administrative institutions as are now current, and to the thinking that underlies them: social awareness, manifesting itself in Old English expressions of such concepts as pity, compassion, mercy, as being wretched or poor, and therefore deserving of support, of almsgiving, and of bewailing the lot of those in need. The evidence is to be found in the religious writings and in the laws and charitable provisions of the Anglo-Saxons. Compassionate expressions occur variously in their writings. What emerges clearly is that the acts of charity, to which the Anglo-Saxons were exhorted, are forcefully connected with the hope of eternal reward, whereas a lack of charitable compassion is seen to carry with it the fear of eternal damnation. It follows that, though the Anglo-Saxons show in their writings that they have a social conscience, it is different in essentials from the kind that informs modern ideas. Their social conscience is not like ours.