The period 1307–40 was one of the most productive for political prophecy in England. Many of the texts which became most popular in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries made their first appearance at this time, whether they were written in England or imported from the Continent. This was due, in part, to the political circumstances of these years, and was in part a result of the political and literary legacy of Edward I. Edward had both nurtured and harnessed English national feeling by all the means at his disposal, including political prophecy. In his lifetime the optimism of the prophecies would have appeared well-founded. Edward was committed to the crusading ideal, and had been successful in both Wales and Scotland. There was no reason why he should not have settled the questions of sovereignty in Scotland, or have mended relations with the king of France over Gascony. That done, he might have been the natural leader of a great crusade. After Edward's death this hope did not die; the fact that Bruce was unbeaten and the English government in debt did not weigh as heavily with contemporaries as it does with modern historians. The immediate prospects for Edward II did not appear as gloomy as might, with hindsight, be supposed.