Chapter XIII, of Cassells Illustrated History of England, Volume 1 page 2

The monks were bound in gratitude to make a suitable return for the service Edgar had done them; and, accordingly, their historians have endeavoured, by their excessive commendations, to make him pass for a real saint. But whether from want of attention, or some other reason, they have related some particulars of his life which certainly do not tend to sustain that idea of him. If, indeed, his political actions are only considered, it must be confessed he was a great prince; but a great king and a great saint are two very different characters. For instance, it would be very difficult to justify by the Gospel a massacre perpetrated by his order in the Isle of Thanet, upon a very slight occasion, as historians allow; and what might not these said historians have said of his vicious inclination to women, who published to the world that the soul of his brother Edwy was about to be dragged into hell for having had a single mistress?

Edgar died in 975, in the thirty-second year of his age. He was afterwards canonised, and miracles are said to have been worked at his shrine.