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Is this Ascension-day? Did not the prophet
Say, that before Ascension-day at noon

My crown I should give off? Even so I have:
I did suppose it should be on constraint

But, heaven be thank'd, it is but voluntary.'

As a perpetual memorial of this surrender it was agreed that the country should be bound to pay to the See of Rome an annual tribute of a thousand marks, seven hundred for England and three hundred for Ireland.' The royal charter, signed at Dover in the presence of Pandulph on 15th May, the eve of the Ascension, 1213, states that John gave to the pope "the entire kingdoms of England and Ireland and all their rights," etc., "with the common consent" of his barons. The same day, the archbishop of Dublin, the bishop of Norwich and several of the nobility attest the deed and that of the act of homage made by King John to the legate. In this second document the king acknowledged that England and Ireland now form part of the patrimony of St. Peter, the rights of which he was bound to defend against all men.

The terms of the papal nuncio's certificate of absolution are, if possible, even more explicit at least, of what Pope Innocent III understood by the king's act. "Let all men know,” it runs, "that by God's grace the king has become another man, since he has adopted the Roman Church as his mother. He has subjected England and Ireland to the Holy Roman Church and has given his territories aforesaid to God, to His holy Apostles Peter and Paul, and to the Lord Pope as a patrimony. He and his heirs are to hold them of the Lord Pope and his successors. Publicly, and before every one, he has done fealty to the Holy Roman 1 1 King John, Act V. 2 Annales Monastici, i. p. 60.

3 Rymer, Foedera (ed. 1816), i. 111-112.

Church and sworn homage on the Gospels, and by his Charter which he has already sent by his messengers to Rome." This being so, Pandulph, the nuncio, charged the English barons and all others to serve the king faithfully, under threat of excommunication should they show themselves disloyal. In the pope's name also, the king of France was ordered not to proceed with hostilities against the English king, as he had been invited to do, because, by the grace of God, John had now become "a son of holy Church."

It is by no means clear that the king's assertion, that he had had the full assent of his people in making his submission, is quite correct. It is hard to see how such an assent could have been obtained, and there is little doubt that to many churchmen, like Cardinal Langton, the surrender of England to any "overlord," even were he the pope himself, was eminently distasteful. Moreover, in after years, it was plainly asserted that the nation had never consented to King John's act, and "that even Stephen (Langton) the archbishop had stood against it." This, no doubt, refers to the cardinal's subsequent action, as, of course, he was not in England at the time of the submission itself. If we are to accept the evidence of Matthew Paris, the people generally regarded the surrender of their country, to form part of the patrimony of St. Peter, as "famosa" rather than as "formosa"-an "astounding rather than a "pleasing" event. This is probably not far from the truth. The act of submission was acquiesced in for the sake of peace. That it was approved by anyone is extremely doubtful: as indeed how could it be? Probably even John himself did not understand at the time what would be the effect of his submission, and only looked

1 Bartholomeus de Cotton, Historia Anglicana (Rolls ed.), p. 125.
Matthæus Parisiensis, Hist. Majora (Rolls ed.), ii. 509.

upon it as a ready expedient to bring to an end a very undesirable state of things in the kingdom. To John the humiliation of surrender to the legate brought relief from the deposition, at the hands of the French king, which threatened him. This gain was the main point, and it is hardly likely that he was either serious in his promises, or had any intention of binding himself to the conditions of his absolution if it should suit his purposes to cast them aside. To the clergy and barons also the king's action brought relief from the pressure of the papal interdict, which now for a long period had seriously affected all classes of society, and the punitive effect of which was felt in every parish and every home throughout the country. They were not likely to inquire too minutely into the meaning of any act of homage on the part of their sovereign, which restored the ordinary practices of religion and the rights of a Christian country to England. Whatever the king may have intended, however, and whatever his subjects may have thought, by John's act of homage a new position was created for the English king, which was well recognised in those days of feudalism. Of this position the king was not slow to avail himself when he needed the help, which, as vassal of the pope, he could now demand from his overlord to enable him to cope with his old opponents, the barons.

The submission made by the king in May, 1213, was renewed on 3rd October of the same year, under more solemn circumstances. John again formally proclaimed the resignation of his kingdom to Pope Innocent, and recorded his oath of fealty to the Holy See, in a Charter sealed with a golden "bulla." This document was attested by Archbishop Langton, now in England, by four other bishops and several of the chief nobles.' It is this deed of gift which the Rymer, i. 115. It was apparently at this same time that Archbishop

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pope recites in his subsequent letter of acceptance, dated 2nd November, and which is countersigned by all the Cardinals in Curia.' After pointing out that those "kings alone have a right to reign who strive to serve God aright," Innocent III goes on to speak of John's submission. By God's inspiration, " in whose hands are the hearts of kings and who directs them wheresoever He wills," he says, "you the English king have elected to submit yourself and your realm, even in things temporal to me, to whom previously you had acknowledged yourself subject in spiritual matters. In this way in the one person of the Vicar of Christ the body and soul, as it were, that is, the temporal kingdom and the priesthood are united to the great benefit and increased power of both. He, therefore, who is the Alpha and Omega, has deigned to accomplish this. He has finished what He began, and so brought what He had begun to its ending, in such a way that the country, which of old acknowledged the Holy Roman Church as the ruler in spiritual matters, should now have it as its real master even in temporals." For by the common consent of the English barons, the king has given over for ever the kingdoms of England and Ireland to God, to His holy Apostles Peter and Paul, to the Holy Roman Church, and to the pope and his successors "as a right and possession." Then after quoting textually John's Charter and oath of fealty, the pope declares them to be approved and ratified, and adds: We take

Langton, at the meeting of bishops and nobles in St. Paul's, produced a Charter of Henry I renewing the "laws of St. Edward," and obtained King John's assent to the same, and his pledge to keep it. The French historian, M. A. Luchaire, sees in the act of the archbishop and barons in thus founding their claims for right government upon previous grants, " the beginning of that constitutional rule which in the modern world has become the political law of civilised nations" (E. Lavisse, Histoire de France, iii. 201).

1 Rymer, i. 117.

3 In jus et proprietatem.

2 Regnum et sacerdotium.

"under the protection of St. Peter and Ours your person and the persons of your heirs together with your kingdoms and all that pertains to them." Finally he declares that, by the consent of the Cardinals, he bestows upon the king the kingdoms of England and Ireland, to be held henceforth as a fief "according to the prescribed form," and directs that his heirs, on succeeding to the crown, shall publicly acknowledge themselves to be vassals of the pope and take an oath of fealty to him.'

The peace between King John and his subjects, which followed upon his submission to Rome, was not of long duration. Difficulties soon began again to arise between the bishops and the Crown as to certain ecclesiastical appointments. The tension almost reaching the snapping-point, Archbishop Langton summoned his suffragans, the abbots, and other prelates of the province of Canterbury, to meet him at Dunstable in the early part of January, 1214. Their grievances were found to have a deeper foundation than a natural irritation caused by any royal whim. The council complained that the Apostolic legate, Nicholas, bishop of Tusculum, had in several instances set aside the rights of canonical election, and had appointed prelates to vacant churches at the king's wish, whom they considered not fitted to such positions. At the request of the assembly Langton sent a formal prohibition to the papal legate, forbidding him henceforth to act in this way against the rights of the Church of England. The legate Nicholas did not reply to this remonstrance, but at once sent off his associate Pandulph to Rome, to give his version of facts likely to come ultimately to the knowledge of the Curia. Pandulph faith

1 Wilkins, Concilia, i. 544. For some reason this same letter was again issued in the following February (Rymer, i. 119).

2 Minus sufficiens.

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