[Illustration: 86.jpg HENRY I.]
HENRY I.
{1100.} After the adventurers in the holy war were assembled on the
banks of the Bosphorus, opposite to Constantinople, they proceeded on
their enterprise; but immediately experienced those difficulties which
their zeal had hitherto concealed from them, and for which, even if they
had foreseen them, it would have been almost impossible to provide
a remedy. The Greek emperor, Alexis Comnenus, who had applied to the
western Christians for succor against the Turks, entertained hopes, and
those but feeble ones, of obtaining such a moderate supply as, acting
under his command, might enable him to repulse the enemy; but he was
extremely astonished to see his dominions overwhelmed on a sudden by
such an inundation of licentious barbarians, who, though they pretended
friendship, despised his subjects as unwarlike, and detested them
as heretical. By all the arts of policy, in which he excelled, he
endeavored to divert the torrent; but while he employed professions,
caresses, civilities, and seeming services towards the leaders of the
crusade, he secretly regarded those imperious allies as more dangerous
than the open enemies by whom his empire had been formerly invaded.
Having effected that difficult point of disembarking them safely in
Asia, he entered into a private correspondence with Soliman, emperor
of the Turks; and practised every insidious art which his genius, his
power, or his situation enabled him to employ, for disappointing the
enterprise, and, discouraging the Latins from making thenceforward any
such prodigious migrations. His dangerous policy was seconded by the
disorders inseparable from so vast a multitude, who were not united
under one head, and were conducted by leaders of the most independent,
intractable spirit, unacquainted with military discipline, and
determined enemies to civil authority and submission. The scarcity of
provisions, the excess of fatigue, the influence of unknown climates,
joined to the want of concert in their operations, and to the sword of
a warlike enemy, destroyed the adventurers by thousands, and would have
abated the ardor of men impelled to war by less powerful motives. Their
zeal, however, their bravery, and their irresistible force still carried
them forward, and continually advanced them to the great end of their
enterprise. After an obstinate siege, they took Nice, the seat of the
Turkish empire; they defeated Soliman in two great battles; they made
themselves masters of Antioch; and entirely broke the force of the
Turks, who had so long retained those countries in subjection. The
soldan of Egypt, whose alliance they had hitherto courted, recovered, on
the fall of the Turkish power, his former authority in Jerusalem; and
he informed them by his ambassadors, that if they came disarmed to
that city, they might now perform their religious vows, and that all
Christian pilgrims, who should thenceforth visit the holy sepulchre,
might expect the same good treatment which they had ever received from
his predecessors. The offer was rejected; the soldan was required to
yield up the city to the Christians; and on his refusal, the champions
of the cross advanced to the siege of Jerusalem, which they regarded
as the consummation of their labors. By the detachments which they had
made, and the disasters which they had undergone, they were diminished
to the number of twenty thousand foot and fifteen hundred horse; but
these were still formidable from their valor, their experience, and the
obedience which, from past calamities, they had learned to pay to their
leaders. After a siege of five weeks, they took Jerusalem by assault;
and, impelled by a mixture of military and religious rage, they put the
numerous garrison and inhabitants to the sword, without distinction.
Neither arms defended the valiant, nor submission the timorous; no age
or sex was spared; infants on the breast were pierced by the same blow
with their mothers, who implored for mercy; even a multitude, to the
number of ten thousand persons, who had surrendered themselves prisoners
and were promised quarter, were butchered in cold blood by those
ferocious conquerors.[*] The streets of Jerusalem were covered with dead
bodies;[**] and the triumphant warriors, after every enemy was subdued
and slaughtered, immediately turned themselves, with the sentiments of
humiliation and contrition, towards the holy sepulchre.
[* Vertot, vol. i. p. 57.]
[** M. Paris, p. 34. Order.]
They threw aside their arms, still streaming with blood; they advanced
with reclined bodies, and naked feet and heads, to that sacred monument;
they sung anthems to their Savior, who had there purchased their
salvation by his death and agony; and their devotion enlivened by the
presence of the place where he had suffered, so overcame their fury,
that they dissolved in tears, and bore the appearance of every soft and
tender sentiment. So inconsistent is human nature with itself! and so
easily does the most effeminate superstition ally, both with the most
heroic courage and with the fiercest barbarity!
This great event happened on the fifth of July in the last year of
the eleventh century. The Christian princes and nobles, after choosing
Godfrey of Bouillon king of Jerusalem, began to settle themselves in
their new conquests; while some of them returned to Europe, in order
to enjoy at home that glory which their valor had acquired them in this
popular and meritorious enterprise. Among these was Robert, duke of
Normandy, who, as he had relinquished the greatest dominions of any
prince that attended the crusade, had all along distinguished himself
by the most intrepid courage, as well as by that affable disposition and
unbounded generosity which gain the hearts of soldiers, and qualify a
prince to shine in a military life. In passing through Italy, he became
acquainted with Sibylla, daughter of the count of Conversana, a young
lady of great beauty and merit, whom he espoused: indulging himself in
this new passion, as well as fond of enjoying ease and pleasure after
the fatigues of so many rough campaigns, he lingered a twelvemonth in
that delicious climate; and though his friends in the north looked every
moment for his arrival, none of them knew when they could with certainty
expect it. By this delay he lost the kingdom of England, which the
great fame he had acquired during the crusades, as well as his undoubted
title, both by birth and by the preceding agreement with his deceased
brother, would, had he been present, have infallibly secured to him.
Prince Henry was hunting with Rufus in the new forest, when intelligence
of that monarch’s death was brought him, and being sensible of the
advantage attending the conjuncture he hurried to Winchester, in order
to secure the royal treasure, which he knew to be a necessary implement
for facilitating his designs on the crown. He had scarcely reached the
place when William de Breteuil, keeper of the treasure, arrived, and
opposed himself to Henry’s pretensions. This nobleman, who had been
engaged in the same party of hunting, had no sooner heard of his
master’s death, than he hastened to take care of his charge; and he told
the prince, that this treasure, as well as the crown, belonged to his
elder brother, who was now his sovereign; and that he himself, for his
part, was determined, in spite of all other pretensions, to maintain
his allegiance to him. But Henry, drawing his sword, threatened him
with instant death if he dared to disobey him; and as others of the late
king’s retinue, who came every moment to Winchester, joined the prince’s
party, Breteuil was obliged to withdraw his opposition, and to acquiesce
in this violence.[*]
[* Order. Vitalis, p. 782.]
Henry, without losing a moment, hastened with the money to London;
and having assembled some noblemen and prelates, whom his address, or
abilities, or presents, gained to his side, he was suddenly elected, or
rather saluted king; and immediately proceeded to the exercise of
royal authority. In less than three days after his brother’s death, the
ceremony of his coronation was performed by Maurice, bishop of London,
who was persuaded to officiate on that occasion;[**] and thus, by his
courage and celerity, he intruded himself into the vacant throne.
[** Chron. Sax. p. 208. Order.]
No one had sufficient spirit or sense of duty to appear in defence
of the absent prince; all men were seduced or intimidated; present
possession supplied the apparent defects in Henry’s title, which was
indeed founded on plain usurpation; and the barons, as well as the
people, acquiesced in a claim, which, though it could neither be
justified nor comprehended, could now, they found, be opposed through
the perils alone of civil war and rebellion.
But as Henry foresaw that a crown usurped against all rules of justice
would sit unsteady on his head, he resolved, by fair professions at
least, to gain the affections of all his subjects. Besides taking the
usual coronation oath to maintain the laws and execute justice, he
passed a charter, which was calculated to remedy many of the grievous
oppressions which had been complained of during the reigns of his father
and brother.[*] He there promised, that, at the death of any bishop or
abbot, he never would seize the revenues of the see or abbey during the
vacancy, but would leave the whole to be reaped by the successor; and
that he would never let to farm any ecclesiastical benefice, nor dispose
of it for money. After this concession to the church, whose favor was
of so great importance, he proceeded to enumerate the civil grievances
which he purposed to redress. He promised that, upon the death of any
earl, baron, or military tenant, his heir should be admitted to the
possession of his estate, on paying a just and lawful relief, without
being exposed to such violent exactions as had been usual during the
late reigns: he remitted the wardship of minors, and allowed guardians
to be appointed, who should be answerable for the trust: he promised
not to dispose of any heiress in marriage but by the advice of all the
barons; and if any baron intended to give his daughter sister, niece,
or kinswoman in marriage, it should only be necessary for him to consult
the king, who promised to take no money for his consent, nor ever to
refuse permission, unless the person to whom it was purposed to marry
her should happen to be his enemy: he granted his barons and military
tenants the power of bequeathing by will their money or personal
estates; and if they neglected to make a will, he promised that their
heirs should succeed to them: he renounced the right of imposing
moneyage, and of levying taxes at pleasure on the farms which the barons
retained in their own hands:[**] he made some general professions of
moderating fines: he offered a pardon for all offences; and he remitted
all debts due to the crown: he required that the vassals of the barons
should enjoy the same privileges which he granted to his own barons; and
he promised a general confirmation and observance of the laws of King
Edward. This is the substance of the chief articles contained in that
famous charter.[***]
[* Chron. Sax. p. 208. Sim. Dunelm. p. 225.]
[** See Appendix II.]
[*** Mr Paris, p. 38. Hoveden, p. 468. Brompton, p. 1021.
Haguistadt, p. 310.]
To give greater authenticity to these concessions, Henry lodged a copy
of his charter in some abbey of each county, as if desirous that
it should be exposed to the view of all his subjects, and remain a
perpetual rule for the limitation and direction of his government: yet
it is certain that, after the present purpose was served, he never once
thought, during his reign, of observing one single article of it; and
the whole fell so much into neglect and oblivion, that, in the following
century, when the barons, who had heard an obscure tradition of it,
desired to make it the model of the Great Charter which they exacted
from King John, they could with difficulty find a copy of it in the
kingdom. But as to the grievances here meant to be redressed, they were
still continued in their full extent; and the royal authority, in all
those particulars, lay under no manner of restriction. Reliefs of heirs,
so capital an article, were never effectually fixed till the time of
Magna Charta;[*] and it is evident that the general promise here given,
of accepting a just and lawful relief, ought to have been reduced to
more precision, in order to give security to the subject. The oppression
of wardship and marriage was perpetuated even till the reign of Charles
II.; and it appears from Glanville,[**] the famous justiciary of Henry
II., that in his time, where any man died intestate--an accident which
must have been very frequent when the art of writing was so little
known--the king, or the lord of the fief, pretended to seize all the
movables, and to exclude every heir, even the children of the deceased;
a sure mark of a tyrannical and arbitrary government.
[* Glanv. lib. ii. cap. 36.]
[** Lib. vii. cap. 15.]
The Normans, indeed, who domineered in England, were, during this age,
so licentious a people, that they may be pronounced incapable of any
true or regular liberty; which requires such improvement in knowledge
and morals, as can only be the result of reflection and experience, and
must grow to perfection during several ages of settled and established
government. A people so insensible to the rights of their sovereign, as
to disjoint, without necessity, the hereditary succession, and permit
a younger brother to intrude himself into the place of the elder, whom
they esteemed, and who was guilty of no crime but being absent, could
not expect that. What is called a relief in the Conqueror’s laws,
preserved by Ingulf, seems to have been the heriot; since reliefs, as
well as the other burdens of the feudal law, were unknown in the age
of the Confessor, whose laws these originally were. This practice was
contrary to the laws of King Edward, ratified by the Conqueror, as
we learn from Ingulf, p. 91. But laws had at that time very little
influence: power and violence governed every thing. Prince would pay any
greater regard to their privileges, or allow his engagements to fetter
his power, and debar him from any considerable interest or convenience.
They had indeed arms in their hands, which prevented the establishment
of a total despotism, and left their posterity sufficient power,
whenever they should attain a sufficient degree of reason, to assume
true liberty; but their turbulent disposition frequently prompted them
to make such use of their arms, that they were more fitted to obstruct
the execution of justice, than to stop the career of violence and
oppression. The prince, finding that greater opposition was often made
to him when he enforced the laws than when he violated them, was apt
to render his own will and pleasure the sole rule of government; and on
every emergency to consider more the power of the persons whom he might
offend, than the rights of those whom he might injure. The very form of
this charter of Henry proves, that the Norman barons (for they, rather
than the people of England, are chiefly concerned in it,) were totally
ignorant of the nature of limited monarchy, and were ill qualified to
conduct, in conjunction with their sovereign, the machine of government.
It is an act of his sole power, is the result of his free grace,
contains some articles which bind others as well as himself, and is
therefore unfit to be the deed of any one who possesses not the
whole legislative power, and who may not at pleasure revoke all his
concessions.
Henry, further to increase his popularity, degraded and committed
to prison Ralph Flambard, bishop of Durham, who had been the chief
instrument of oppression under his brother.[*] But this act was followed
by another, which was a direct violation of his own charter, and was a
bad prognostic of his sincere intentions to observe it: he kept the
see of Durham vacant for five years, and during that time retained
possession of all its revenues. Sensible of the great authority which
Anselm had acquired by his character of piety, and by the persecutions
which he had undergone from William, he sent repeated messages to him at
Lyons, where he resided, and invited him to return and take possession
of his dignities.[**] On the arrival of the prelate, he proposed to him
the renewal of that homage which he had done his brother, and which had
never been refused by any English bishop; but Anslem had acquired
other sentiments by his journey to Rome, and gave the king an absolute
refusal.
[* Chron. Sax. p. 208. W. Malms, p. 156. M. Paris, p. 39.
Alured. Beverl. p. 144.]
[** Chron. Sax. p. 208. Order. Vitalis, p. 783. M. Paris, p.
39 C. Judon, p 273.]
He objected the decrees of the council of Bari, at which he himself
had assisted; and he declared, that, so far from doing homage for
his spiritual dignity, he would not so much as communicate with any
ecclesiastic who paid that submission, or who accepted of investitures
from laymen. Henry, who expected, in his present delicate situation, to
reap great advantages from the authority and popularity of Anselm, durst
not insist on his demand;[*] he only desired that the controversy might
be suspended, and that messengers might be sent to Rome, in order to
accommodate matters with the pope, and obtain his confirmation of the
laws and customs of England.
There immediately occurred an important affair, in which the king was
obliged to have recourse to the authority of Anselm. Matilda, daughter
of Malcolm III., king of Scotland, and niece to Edgar Atheling, had,
on her father’s death, and the subsequent revolutions in the Scottish
government, been brought to England, and educated under her aunt
Christina, in the nunnery of Rumsey. This princess Henry purposed to
marry; but as she had worn the veil, though never taken the vows, doubts
might arise concerning the lawfulness of the act; and it behoved him to
be very careful not to shock, in any particular, the religious prejudges
of his subjects. The affair was examined by Anselm, in a council of
the prelates and nobles, which was summoned at Lambeth; Matilda there
proved, that she had put on the veil, not with a view of entering into
a religious life, but merely in consequence of a custom familiar to the
English ladies who protected their chastity from the brutal violence of
the Normans by taking shelter under that habit,[**] which, amidst the
horrible licentiousness of the times, was yet generally revered. The
council, sensible that even a princess had otherwise no security for her
honor, admitted this reason as valid: they pronounced that Matilda was
still free to marry;[***] and her espousals with Henry were celebrated
by Anselm with great pomp and solemnity.[****] No act of the king’s
reign rendered him equally popular with his English subjects, and tended
more to establish him on the throne. Though Matilda, during the life of
her uncle and brothers, was not heir of the Saxon line, she was become
very dear to the English on account of her connections with it; and that
people, who, before the conquest, had fallen into a kind of indifference
towards their ancient royal family, had felt so severely the tyranny
of the Normans, that they reflected with extreme regret on their former
liberty, and hoped for a more equal and mild administration, when the
blood of their native princes should be mingled with that of their new
sovereigns.[*****]
[* W. Malms, p. 225.]
[** Eadmer, p. 57.]
[*** Eadmer p. 57.]
[**** Hoveden, p. 468.]
[***** M. Paris, p. 40.]
But the policy and prudence of Henry, which, if time had been allowed
for these virtues to produce their full effect, would have secured him
possession of the crown, ran great hazard of being frustrated by the
sudden appearance of Robert, who returned to Normandy about a month
after the death of his brother William. {1101.} He took possession,
without opposition, of that duchy; and immediately made preparations
for recovering England, of which, during his absence, he had, by Henry’s
intrigues, been so unjustly defrauded. The great fame which he had
acquired in the East forwarded his pretensions, and the Norman barons,
sensible of the consequences, expressed the same discontent at the
separation of the duchy and kingdom, which had appeared on the accession
of William. Robert de Belesme, earl of Shrewsbury and Arundel, William
de Warrenne, earl of Surrey, Arnulf de Montgomery, Walter Giffard,
Robert de Pontefract, Robert de Mallet, Yvo de Grentmesnil, and many
others of the principal nobility,[*] invited Robert to make an attempt
upon England, and promised on his landing to join him with all their
forces.
[* Order. Vitalis, p. 785]
Even the seamen were affected with the general popularity of his name,
and they carried over to him the greater part of a fleet which had been
equipped to oppose his passage. Henry, in this extremity, began to be
apprehensive for his life, as well as for his crown and had recourse to
the superstition of the people, in order to oppose their sentiment of
justice. He paid diligent court to Anselm, whose sanctity and wisdom
he pretended to revere. He consulted him in all difficult emergencies;
seemed to be governed by him in every measure; promised a strict regard
to ecclesiastical privileges; professed a great attachment to Rome, and
a resolution of persevering in an implicit obedience to the decrees of
councils, and to the will of the sovereign pontiff. By these caresses
and declarations he entirely gained the confidence of the primate, whose
influence over the people, and authority with the barons, were of the
utmost service to him in his present situation. Anselm scrupled not to
assure the nobles of the king’s sincerity in those professions which he
made, of avoiding the tyrannical and oppressive government of his father
and brother: he even rode through the ranks of the army, recommended
to the soldiers the defence of their prince, represented the duty
of keeping their oaths of allegiance, and prognosticated to them the
greatest happiness from the government of so wise and just a sovereign.
By this expedient, joined to the influence of the earls of Warwick and
Mellent, of Roger Bigod, Richard de Redvers, and Robert Fitz-Hamon,
powerful barons, who still adhered to the present government, the army
was retained in the king’s interests, and marched, with seeming union
and firmness, to oppose Robert, who had landed with his forces at
Portsmouth.
The two armies lay in sight of each other for some days without coming
to action; and both princes, being apprehensive of the event, which
would probably be decisive, hearkened the more willingly to the counsels
of Anselm and the other great men, who mediated an accommodation between
them. After employing some negotiation, it was agreed, that Robert
should resign his pretensions to England, and receive, in lieu of
them, an annual pension of three thousand marks; that, if either of the
princes died without issue, the other should succeed to his dominions;
that the adherents of each should be pardoned, and restored to all their
possessions either in Normandy or England; and that neither Robert nor
Henry should thenceforth encourage, receive, or protect the enemies of
the other.[*]
[* Chron. Sax. p. 209. W. Malms, p. 156.]
{1102.} This treaty, though calculated so much for Henry’s advantage, he
was the first to violate. He restored indeed the estates of all Robert’s
adherents; but was secretly determined, that noblemen so powerful and
so ill affected, who had both inclination and ability to disturb his
government, should not long remain unmolested in their present opulence
and grandeur. He began with the earl of Shrewsbury, why was watched
for some time by spies, and then indicted on a charge, consisting of
forty-five articles. This turbulent nobleman, knowing his own guilt, as
well as the prejudices of his judges and the power of his prosecutor,
had recourse to aims for defence; but being soon suppressed by the
activity and address of Henry, he was banished the kingdom, and
his great estate was confiscated. His ruin involved that of his two
brothers, Arnulf de Montgomery, and Roger, earl of Lancaster. Soon after
followed the prosecution and condemnation of Robert de Pontefract
and Robert de Mallet, who had distinguished themselves among Robert’s
adherents. William de Warrenne was the next victim; {1103.} even
William, earl of Cornwall, son of the earl of Mortaigne, the king’s
uncle, having given matter of suspicion against him, lost all the vast
acquisitions of his family in England. Though the usual violence and
tyranny of the Norman barons afforded a plausible pretence for those
prosecutions, and it is probable that none of the sentences pronounced
against these noblemen was wholly iniquitous, men easily saw, or
conjectured, that the chief part of their guilt was not the injustice or
illegality of their conduct Robert, enraged at the fate of his friends,
imprudently ventured to come into England; and he remonstrated with his
brother, in severe terms, against this breach of treaty; but met with so
bad a reception, thai he began to apprehend danger to his own liberty,
and was glad to purchase an escape by resigning his pension.
The indiscretion of Robert soon exposed him to more fatal injuries.
This prince, whose bravery and candor procured him respect while at a
distance, had no sooner attained the possession of power and enjoyment
of peace, than all the vigor of his mind relaxed; and he fell into
contempt among those who approached his person, or were subjected to his
authority. Alternately abandoned to dissolute pleasures and to womanish
superstition, he was so remiss, both in the care of his treasure and the
exercise of his government, that his servants pillaged his money with
impunity, stole from him his very clothes, and proceeded thence to
practise every species of extortion on his defenceless subjects. The
barons, whom a severe administration alone could have restrained,
gave way to their unbounded rapine upon their vassals, and inveterate
animosities against each other; and all Normandy, during the reign of
this benign prince, was become a scene of violence and depredation.
The Normans at last, observing the regular government which Henry,
notwithstanding his usurped title, had been able to establish in
England, applied to him, that he might use his authority for the
suppression of these disorders and they thereby afforded him a pretence
for interposing in the affairs of Normandy. Instead of employing his
mediation to render his brother’s government respectable, or to redress
the grievances of the Normans, he was only attentive to support his
own partisans, and to increase their number by every art of bribery,
intrigue, and insinuation. Having found, in a visit which he made to that
duchy, that the nobility were more disposed to pay submission to him
than to their legal sovereign, he collected, by arbitrary extortions on
England a great army and treasure, and returned next year to Normandy,
in a situation to obtain, either by violence or corruption, the dominion
of that province. {1105.} He took Baieux by storm, after an obstinate
siege; he made himself master of Caen, by the voluntary submission of
the inhabitants; but being repulsed at Falaise, and obliged, by the
winter season, to raise the siege, he returned into England; after
giving assurances to his adherents, that he would persevere in
supporting and protecting them.
{1106.} Next year he opened the campaign with the siege of Tenchebray;
and it became evident, from his preparations and progress, that he
intended to usurp the entire possession of Normandy. Robert was at last
roused from his lethargy; and being supported by the earl of Mortaigne
and Robert de Belesme, the king’s inveterate enemies, he raised a
considerable army, and approached his brother’s camp, with a view of
finishing, in one decisive battle, the quarrel between them. He was
now entered on that scene of action in which alone he was qualified to
excel; and he so animated his troops by his example, that they threw the
English into disorder, and had nearly obtained the victory,[*] when the
flight of Belesme spread a panic among the Normans, and occasioned their
total defeat. Henry, besides doing great execution on the enemy, made
near ten thousand prisoners; among whom was Duke Robert himself, and all
the most considerable barons, who adhered to his interests.[**]
[* H. Hunting, p. 379. M. Paris, p. 48. Brompton,
p. 1002.]
[** Eadmer, p, 90. Chron. Sax. p. 214. Order.
Vitalis p. 821.]
This victory was followed by the final reduction of Normandy: Rouen
immediately submitted to the conqueror: Falaise, after some negotiation,
opened its gates; and by this acquisition, besides rendering himself
master of an important fortress, he got into his hands Prince William,
the only son of Robert: he assembled the states of Normandy; and having
received the homage of all the vassals of the duchy, having settled the
government, revoked his brother’s donations, and dismantled the castles
lately built, he returned into England and carried along with him the
duke as prisoner. That unfortunate prince was detained in custody during
the remainder of his life, which was no less than twenty-eight years,
and he died in the castle of Cardiff in Glamorganshire; happy, if,
without losing his liberty, he could have relinquished that power which
he was not qualified either to hold or exercise. Prince William was
committed to the care of Helie de St. Saen, who had married Robert’s
natural daughter, and who, being a man of probity and honor, beyond what
was usual in those ages, executed the trust with great affection and
fidelity, Edgar Atheling, who had followed Robert in the expedition
to Jerusalem, and who had lived with him ever since in Normandy, was
another illustrious prisoner taken in the battle of Tenchebray.[*] Henry
gave him his liberty, and settled a small pension on him, with which he
retired; and he lived to a good old age in England, totally neglected
and forgotten. This prince was distinguished by personal bravery; but
nothing can be a stronger proof of his mean talents in every other
respect, than that, notwithstanding he possessed the affections of the
English, and enjoyed the only legal title to the throne, he was allowed,
during the reigns of so many violent and jealous usurpers, to live
unmolested, and go to his grave in peace.
[* Chron. Sax. p. 214. Annal. Waverl. p. 144]
{1107.} A little after Henry had completed the conquest of Normandy, and
settled the government of that province, he finished a controversy which
had been long depending between him and the pope, with regard to the
investitures in ecclesiastical benefices; and though he was here obliged
to relinquish some of the ancient rights of the crown, he extricated
himself from the difficulty on easier terms than most princes, who in
that age were so unhappy as to be engaged in disputes with the apostolic
see. The king’s situation in the beginning of his reign, obliged him to
pay great court to Anselm: the advantages which he had reaped from the
zealous friendship of that prelate, had made him sensible how prone
the minds of his people were to superstition, and what an ascendant the
ecclesiastics had been able to assume over them. He had seen, on the
accession of his brother Rufus, that though the rights of primogeniture
were then violated, and the inclinations of almost all the barons
thwarted, yet the authority of Lanfranc, the primate, had prevailed
over all other considerations: his own case, which was still more
unfavorable, afforded an instance in which the clergy had more evidently
shown their influence and authority. These recent examples, while they
made him cautious not to offend that powerful body, convinced him, at
the same time, that it was extremely his interest to retain the former
prerogative of the crown in filling offices of such vast importance, and
to check the ecclesiastics in that independence to which they visibly
aspired. The choice which his brother, in a fit of penitence, had made
of Anselm, was so far unfortunate to the king’s pretensions, that this
prelate was celebrated for his piety and zeal, and austerity of manners;
and though his monkish devotion and narrow principles prognosticated no
great knowledge of the world or depth of policy, he was, on that very
account, a more dangerous instrument in the hands of politicians, and
retained a greater ascendant over the bigoted populace. The prudence
and temper of the king appear in nothing more conspicuous than in the
management of this delicate affair; where he was always sensible that
it had become necessary for him to risk his whole crown, in order to
preserve the most invaluable jewel of it.[*]
Anselm had no sooner returned from banishment, than his refusal to do
homage to the king raised a dispute, which Henry evaded at that critical
juncture, by promising to send a messenger, in order to compound the
matter with Pascal II, who then filled the papal throne. The messenger,
as was probably foreseen, returned with an absolute refusal of the
king’s demands;[**] and that fortified by many reasons which were well
qualified to operate on the understandings of men in those ages. Pascal
quoted the Scriptures to prove that Christ was the door; and he thence
inferred that all ecclesiastics must enter into the church through
Christ alone, not through the civil magistrate, or any profane
laymen.[***]
[* Eadmer, p. 56.]
[** W Malms, p. 225]
[*** Eadmer, p. 60. This topic is further enforced
in p. 73, 74. See also W. Malms, p. 163.]
“It is monstrous,” added the pontiff, “that a son should pretend to
beget his father, or a man to create his God: priests are called gods in
Scripture, as being the vicars of God; and will you, by your abominable
pretensions to grant them their investiture, assume the right of
creating them?”[*]
But how convincing soever these arguments, they could not persuade Henry
to resign so important a prerogative; and perhaps, as he was possessed
of great reflection and learning, he thought that the absurdity of a
man’s creating his God, even allowing priests to be gods, was not urged
with the best grace by the Roman pontiff. But as he desired still to
avoid, at least to delay, the coming to any dangerous extremity with
the church, he persuaded Anselm that he should be able, by further
negotiation, to attain some composition with Pascal; and for that
purpose he despatched three bishops to Rome, while Anselm sent
two messengers of his own, to be more fully assured of the pope’s
intentions.[**] Pascal wrote back letters equally positive and arrogant,
both to the king and primate, urging to the former that, by assuming the
right of investitures, he committed a kind of spiritual adultery with
the church, who was the spouse of Christ, and who must not admit of such
a commerce with any other person;[***] and insisting with the latter,
that the pretension of kings to confer benefices was the source of all
simony; a topic which had but too much foundation in those ages.[****]
Henry had now no other expedient than to suppress the letter addressed
to himself, and to persuade the three bishops to prevaricate, and
assert, upon their episcopal faith, that Pascal had assured them in
private of his good intentions towards Henry, and of his resolution
not to resent any future exertion of his prerogative in granting
investitures, though he himself scrupled to give this assurance under
his hand, lest other princes should copy the example and assume a like
privilege.[*****]
[* Eadmer, p. 61. I much suspect that this text of
Scripture is a forgery of his holiness; for I have not been
able to find it. Yet it passed current in those ages, and
was often quoted by the clergy as the foundation of their
power. See Epist. St. Thorn, p. 169.]
[** Eadmer, p. 62. W. Malms, p. 225.]
[*** Eadmer, p. 63]
[**** Eadmer, p. 64, 66.]
[***** Eadmer, p. 65. W. Malms, p. 225]
Anselm’s two messengers, who were monks, affirmed to him that it was
impossible this story could have any foundation; but their word was
not deemed equal to that of three bishops; and the king, as if he had
finally gained his cause, proceeded to fill the sees of Hereford and
Salisbury, and to invest the new bishops in the usual manner.[*] But
Anselm, who, as he had good reason, gave no credit to the asseveration
of the king’s messengers, refused not only to consecrate them, but
even to communicate with them; and the bishops’ themselves, finding how
odious they were become, returned to Henry the ensigns of their dignity.
The quarrel every day increased between the king and the primate. The
former, notwithstanding the prudence and moderation of his temper, threw
out menaces against such as should pretend to oppose him in exerting
the ancient prerogatives of his crown; and Anselm, sensible of his own
dangerous situation, desired leave to make a journey to Rome, in order
to lay the case before the sovereign pontiff. Henry, well pleased to rid
himself without violence of so inflexible an antagonist, readily granted
him permission. The prelate was attended to the shore by infinite
multitudes, not only of monks and clergymen, but people of all ranks,
who scrupled not in this manner to declare for their primate against
their sovereign, and who regarded his departure as the final abolition
of religion and true piety in the kingdom.[**] The king, however, seized
all the revenues of his see; and sent William de Warelwast to negotiate
with Pascal, and to find some means of accommodation in this delicate
affair.
The English minister told Pascal, that his master would rather lose
his crown than part with the right of granting investitures. “And I,”
replied Pascal, “would rather lose my head than allow him to retain
it.”[***] Henry secretly prohibited Anselm from returning, unless he
resolved to conform himself to the laws and usages of the kingdom; and
the primate took up his residence at Lyons, in expectation that the king
would at last be obliged to yield the point which was the present object
of controversy between them. Soon after, he was permitted to return to
his monastery at Bec, in Normandy; and Henry, besides restoring to him
the revenues of his see, treated him with the greatest respect, and held
several conferences with him, in order to soften his opposition, and
bend him to submission.[****]
[* Eadmer, p. 66. W. Malms, p. 225. Hoveden, p.
469. Sim. Dunelm. p. 228.]
[** Eadmer, p. 71.]
[*** Eadmer, p. 73 W. Malms, p. 226. M. Paris, p.
40]
[**** Hoveden, p. 471]
The people of England, who thought all differences now accommodated,
were inclined to blame their primate for absenting, himself so long
from his charge; and he daily received letters from his partisans
representing the necessity of his speedy return. The total extinction,
they told him, of religion and Christianity was likely to ensue from the
want of his fatherly care: the most shocking customs prevail in England;
and the dread of his severity being now removed, sodomy and the practice
of wearing long hair gain ground among all ranks of men, and these
enormities openly appear every where, without sense of shame or fear of
punishment.[*]
[* Eadmer, p. 81.]
The policy of the court of Rome has commonly been much admired; and men,
judging by success, have bestowed the highest eulogies on that prudence
by which a power, from such slender beginnings, could advance, without
force of arms, to establish a universal and almost absolute monarchy
in Europe. But the wisdom of so long a succession of men who filled
the papal throne, and who were of such different ages, tempers, and
interests, is not intelligible, and could never have place in nature.
The instrument, indeed, with which they wrought, the ignorance and
superstition of the people, is so gross an engine, of such universal
prevalence, and so little liable to accident or disorder, that it may be
successful even in the most unskilful hands; and scarce any indiscretion
can frustrate its operations. While the court of Rome was openly
abandoned to the most flagrant disorders, even while it was torn with
schisms and factions, the power of the church daily made a sensible
progress in Europe; and the temerity of Gregory and caution of Pascal
were equally fortunate in promoting it. The clergy, feeling the
necessity which they lay under of being protected against the violence
of princes, or rigor of the laws, were well pleased to adhere to a
foreign head, who, being removed from the fear of the civil authority,
could freely employ the power of the whole church in defending her
ancient or usurped properties and privileges, when invaded in any
particular country. The monks, desirous of an independence on their
diocesans, professed a still more devoted attachment to the triple
crown; and the stupid people possessed no science or reason which they
could oppose to the most exorbitant pretensions. Nonsense passed for
demonstration: the most criminal means were sanctified by the piety of
the end: treaties were not supposed to be binding, where the interests
of God were concerned: the ancient laws and customs of states had no
authority against a divine right: impudent forgeries were received as
authentic monuments of antiquity: and the champions of holy church, if
successful, were celebrated as heroes; if unfortunate, were worshipped
as martyrs; and all events thus turned out equally to the advantage of
clerical usurpations. Pascal himself, the reigning pope, was, in the
course of this very controversy concerning investitures, involved in
circumstances, and necessitated to follow a conduct which would
have drawn disgrace and ruin on any temporal prince that had been so
unfortunate as to fail into a like situation. His person was seized by
the emperor Henry V., and he was obliged, by a formal treaty, to resign
to that monarch the right of granting investitures, for which they
had so long contended.[*] In order to add greater solemnity to this
agreement, the emperor and pope communicated together on the same
host; one half of which was given to the prince, the other taken by the
pontiff. The most tremendous imprecations were publicly denounced on
either of them who should violate the treaty; yet no sooner did Pascal
recover his liberty, than he revoked all his concessions, and pronounced
the sentence of excommunication against the emperor, who, in the end,
was obliged to submit to the terms required of him, and to yield up all
his pretensions, which he never could resume.[**]
The king of England had very nearly fallen into the same dangerous
situation: Pascal had already excommunicated the earl of Mallent, and
the other ministers of Henry who were instrumental in supporting
his pretensions:[***] he daily menaced the king himself with a like
sentence, and he suspended the blow only to give him leisure to prevent
it by a timely submission. The malecontents waited impatiently for
the opportunity of disturbing his government by conspiracies and
insurrections:[****] the king’s best friends were anxious at the
prospect of an incident which would set their religious and civil duties
at variance; and the countess of Blois, his sister, a princess of piety,
who had great influence over him, was affrightened with the danger of
her brother’s eternal damnation.[*****]
[* W. Malms, p. 167.]
[** Padre Paolo, sopra Benef. Eccles. p. 112. W.
Malms, p. 179 Chron. Abb St. Petri de Burgo, p. 63. Sim.
Dunelm. p. 233.]
[*** Eadmer p. 79.]
[**** Eadmer, p. 80.]
[***** Eadmer, p. 79.]
Henry, on the other hand, seemed determined to run all hazards, rather
than resign a prerogative of such importance, which had been enjoyed by
all his predecessors; and it seemed probable from his great prudence
and abilities, that he might be able co sustain his rights, and finally
prevail in the contest. While Pascal and Henry thus stood mutually in
awe; of each other, it was the more easy to bring about an accommodation
between them, and to find a medium in which they might agree.
Before bishops took possession of their dignities, they had formerly
been accustomed to pass through two ceremonies: they received from the
hands of the sovereign a ring and crosier, as symbols of their office;
and this was called their investiture: they also made those submissions
to the prince which were required of vassals by the rites of the feudal
law, and which received the name of homage. And as the king might refuse
both to grant the investiture and to receive the homage, though the
chapter had, by some canons of the middle age, been endowed with the
right of election, the sovereign had in reality the sole power of
appointing prelates. Urban II. had equally deprived laymen of the rights
of granting investiture and of receiving homage:[*] the emperors never
were able, by all their wars and negotiations, to make any distinction
be admitted between them: the interposition of profane laymen, in any
particular, was still represented as impious and abominable; and the
church openly aspired to a total independence on the state. But Henry
had put England, as well as Normandy, in such a situation as gave
greater weight to his negotiations, and Pascal was for the present
satisfied with his resigning the right of granting investitures, by
which the spiritual dignity was supposed to be conferred; and he
allowed the bishops to do homage for their temporal properties
and privileges.[**] The pontiff was well pleased to have made this
acquisition, which, he hoped, would in time involve the whole; and the
king, anxious to procure an escape from a very dangerous situation,
was content to retain some, though a more precarious authority, in the
election of prelates.
[* Eadmer, p. 91. W. Malms, p. 163. Sim. Dunelm.
p. 230.]
[** Eadmer, p. 91. W Malms, p. 164. 227. Hoveden,
p. 471, M. Paris, p. 43. T. Rudborne, p. 274. Brompton. p.
1000. Wilkins, p. 303, Chron. Dunst. p. 21.]
After the principal controversy was accommodated, it was not difficult
to adjust the other differences. If the pope allowed Anselm to
communicate with the prelates who had already received investitures from
the crown; and he only required of them some submissions for their past
misconduct.[*] He also granted Anselm a plenary power of remedying every
other disorder, which, he said, might arise from the barbarousness of he
country.[**] Such was the idea which the popes then entertained of the
English; and nothing can be a stronger proof of the miserable ignorance
in which that people were then plunged, than that, a man who sat on
the papal throne, and who subsisted by absurdities and nonsense, should
think himself entitled to treat them as barbarians.
During the course of these controversies, a synod was held at
Westminster, where the king, intent only on the mam dispute, allowed
some canons of less importance to be enacted, which tended to promote
the usurpations of the clergy. The celibacy of priests was enjoined; a
point which it was still found very difficult to carry into execution;
and even laymen were not allowed to marry within the seventh degree of
affinity.[***] By this contrivance, the pope augmented the profits which
he reaped from granting dispensations, and likewise those from divorces.
For as the art of writing was then rare, and parish registers were not
regularly kept, it was not easy to ascertain the degrees of affinity
even among people of rank; and any man, who had money sufficient to
pay for it, might obtain a divorce, on pretence that his wife was more
nearly related to him than was permitted by the canons. The synod also
passed a vote, prohibiting the laity from wearing long hair.[****] The
aversion of the clergy to this mode was not confined to England. When
the king went to Normandy, before he had conquered that province, the
bishop of Seeze, in a formal harangue, earnestly exhorted him to redress
the manifold disorders under which the government labored, and to oblige
the people to poll their hair in a decent form. Henry, though he would
not resign his prerogatives to the church willingly parted with his
hair: he cut it in the form which they required of him, and obliged all
the courtiers to imitate his example.[*****]
[* Eadmer, p. 87.]
[** Eadmer, p. 91.]
[*** Eadmer, p 67, 68. Spel. Concil. vol. ii. p.
22.]
[**** Eadmer, p 68. ]
[***** Order. Vitalis, p 816.]
The acquisition of Normandy was a great point of Henry’s ambition; being
the ancient patrimony of his family, and the only territory winch,
while in his possession, gave him any weight or consideration on the
continent: but the injustice of his usurpation was the source of great
inquietude, involved him in frequent wars, and obliged him to impose on
his English subjects those many heavy and arbitrary taxes, of which all
the historians of that age unanimously complain.[*] His nephew William
was but six years of age when he committed him to the care of Helie
de St. Saen; and it is probable that his reason for intrusting that
important charge to a man of so unblemished a character, was to prevent
all malignant suspicions, in case any accident should befall the life
of the young prince, {1110.} He soon repented of his choice; but when
he desired to recover possession of William’s person, Helie withdrew his
pupil, and carried him to the court of Fulk, count of Anjou, who gave
him protection.[**]
[* Eadmer, p. 83. Chron. Sax. p. 211, 212, 213,
219, 220, 228. H Hunting. p. 380. Hoveden, p. 470. Aimal.
Waverl. p. 143.]
[** Ordei Vitalis, p 837.]
In proportion as the prince grew up to man’s estate, he discovered
virtues becoming his birth; and wandering through different courts of
Europe, he excited the friendly compassion of many princes, and raised a
general indignation against his uncle, who had so unjustly bereaved him
of his inheritance. Lewis the Gross son of Philip, was at this time king
of France, a brave and generous prince, who, having been obliged, during
the lifetime of his father, to fly into England, in order to escape the
persecutions of his step-mother Gertrude, had been protected by Henry,
and had thence conceived a personal friendship for him. But these
ties were soon dissolved after the accession of Lewis, who found his
interests to be, in so many particulars opposite to those of the English
monarch, and who became sensible of the danger attending the annexation
of Normandy to England. He joined, therefore, the counts of Anjou and
Flanders in giving disquiet to Henry’s government; and this monarch, in
order to defend his foreign dominions, found himself obliged to go over
to Normandy, where he resided two years. The war which ensued among
those princes was attended with no memorable event, and produced only
slight skirmishes on the frontiers, agreeably to the weak condition of
the sovereigns in that age, whenever their subjects were not roused by
some great and urgent occasion. Henry, by contracting his eldest
son, William, to the daughter of Fulk, detached that prince from the
alliance, and obliged the others to come to an accommodation with him.
This peace was not of long duration. His nephew William retired to the
court of Baldwin, earl of Flanders, who espoused his cause; and the king
of France, having soon after, for other reasons, joined the party, a new
war was kindled in Normandy, which produced no event more memorable than
had attended the former. {1118.} At last the death of Baldwin, who was
slain in an action near Eu, gave some respite to Henry, and enabled him
to carry on war with more advantage against his enemies.
Lewis, finding himself unable to wrest Normandy from the king by force
of arms, had recourse to the dangerous expedient of applying to the
spiritual power, and of affording the ecclesiastics a pretence to
interpose in the temporal concerns of princes. {1019.} He carried young
William to a general council, which was assembled at Rheims, by Pope
Calixtus II., presented the Norman prince to them, complained of the
manifest usurpation and injustice of Henry, craved the assistance of the
church for reinstating the true heir in his dominions, and represented
the enormity of detaining in captivity so brave a prince as Robert,
one of the most eminent champions of the cross, and who, by that very
quality, was placed under the immediate protection of the holy see.
Henry knew how to defend the rights of his crown with vigor, and yet
with dexterity. He had sent over the English bishops to this synod;
but at the same time had warned them, that, if any further claims were
started by the pope or the ecclesiastics, he was determined to adhere
to the laws and customs of England and maintain the prerogatives
transmitted to him by his predecessors. “Go,” said he to them, “salute
the pope in my name; hear his apostolical precepts; but take care to
bring none of his new inventions into my kingdom.” Finding, however,
that it would be easier for him to elude than oppose the efforts of
Calixtus, he gave his ambassadors orders to gain the pope and his
favorites by liberal presents and promises. The complaints of the Norman
prince were thenceforth heard with great coldness by the council; and
Calixtus confessed, after a conference which he had the same sunaaier
with Henry, and when that prince probably renewed his presents, that,
of all men whom he had ever yet been acquainted with, he was, beyond
comparison, the most eloquent and persuasive.
The warlike measures of Lewis proved as ineffectual as his intrigues.
He had laid a scheme for surprising Noyon; but Henry, having received
intelligence of the design, marched to the relief of the place, and
suddenly attacked the French at Brenneville, as they were advancing
towards it. A sharp conflict ensued, where Prince William behaved with
great bravery, and the king himself was in the most imminent danger. He
was wounded in the head by Crispin, a gallant Norman officer, who had
followed the fortunes of William;[*] but being rather animated than
terrified by the blow, he immediately beat his antagonist to the ground,
and so encouraged his troops by the example, that they put the French to
total rout, and had very nearly taken their king prisoner. The dignity
of the persons engaged in this skirmish rendered it the most memorable
action of the war; for in other respects it was not of great importance.
There were nine hundred horsemen who fought on both sides, yet were
there only two persons slain. The rest were defended by that heavy armor
worn by the cavalry in those times.[**] An accommodation soon after
ensued between the kings of France and England, and the interests of
young William were entirely neglected in it.
[* H. Hunting, p. 381. M. Paris, p 47. Diceto, p.
503.]
[** Order. Vitalis, p. 854.]
{1120.} But this public prosperity of Henry was much overbalanced by
a domestic calamity, which befell him. His only son, William, had now
reached his eighteenth year; and the king, from the facility with which
he himself had usurped the crown, dreading that a like revolution might
subvert his family, had taken care to have him recognized successor by
the states of the kingdom, and had carried him over to Normandy, that he
might receive the homage of the barons of that duchy. The king, on his
return, set sail from Barfleur, and was soon carried by a fair wind
out of sight of land. The prince was detained by some accident; and his
sailors, as well as their captain, Thomas Fitz-Stephens, having spent
me interval in drinking, were so flustered, that, being in a hurry to
follow the king, they heedlessly carried the ship on a rock, where she
immediately foundered. William was put into the long boat, and had got
clear of the ship, when, hearing the cries of his natural sister, the
countess of Perche, he ordered the seamen to row back, in hopes of
saving her: but the numbers who then crowded in, soon sunk the boat;
and the prince with all his retinue perished. Above a hundred and forty
young noblemen, of the principal families of England and Normandy, were
lost on this occasion. A butcher of Rouen was the only person on board
who escaped:[*] he clung to the mast, and was taken up next morning by
fishermen. Fitz-Stephens also took hold of the mast; but being informed
by the butcher that Prince William had perished, he said that he
would not survive the disaster; and he threw himself headlong into the
sea.[**] Henry entertained hopes for three days that his son had put
into some distant port of England; but when certain intelligence of the
calamity was brought him, he fainted away; and it was remarked, that
he never after was seen to smile, nor ever recovered his wonted
cheerfulness.[***]
The death of William may be regarded, in one respect, as a misfortune
to the English; because it was the immediate source of those civil
wars which, after the demise of the king, caused such confusion in the
kingdom; but it is remarkable, that the young prince had entertained a
violent aversion to the natives; and had been heard to threaten, that
when he should be king he would make them draw the plough, and would
turn them into beasts of burden. These prepossessions he inherited from
his father; who, though he was wont, when it might serve his purpose, to
value himself on his birth, as a native of England,[****] showed, in the
course of his government, an extreme prejudice against that people. All
hopes of preferment to ecclesiastical as well as civil dignities were
denied them during this whole reign; and any foreigner, however
ignorant or worthless, was sure to have the preference in every
competition.[*****] As the English had given no disturbance to the
government during the course of fifty years, this inveterate antipathy
in a prince of so much temper as well as penetration, forms a
presumption that the English of that age were still a rude and barbarous
people even compared to the Normans, and impresses us with no very
favorable idea of the Anglo-Saxon manners.
Prince William left no children; and the king had not now any legitimate
issue, except one daughter, Matilda, whom, in 1110, he had betrothed,
though only eight years of age,[******] to the emperor Henry V., and
whom he had then sent over to be educated in Germany.[*******] [13]
[* Sim. Dunelm. p. 242. Alured. Beverl. p. 148.]
[** Order. Vitalis, p. 868.]
[*** Hoveden, p. 476. Order. Vitalis, p. 869.]
[**** Gul. Neubr. lib. i. cap, 3.]
[***** Eadmer, p 110.]
[****** Chron, Sax. p. 215. W. Malms, p. 166.
Order. Vitalis, p 83]
[******* See note M, at the end of the volume.]
But as her absence from the kingdom, and her marriage into a foreign
family, might endanger the succession, Henry, who was now a widower,
was induced to marry, in hopes of having male heirs; and he made his
addresses to Adelais, daughter of Godfrey, duke of Lovainc, and niece
of Pope Calixtus, a young princess of an amiable person.[*] {1121.} But
Adelais brought him no children; and the prince who was most likely to
dispute the succession, and even the immediate possession of the crown,
recovered hopes of subverting his rival, who had successively seized all
his patrimonial dominions. William, the son of Duke Robert, was still
protected in the French court; and as Henry’s connections with the count
of Anjou were broken off by the death of his son, Fulk joined the party
of the unfortunate prince, gave him his daughter in marriage, and aided
him in raising disturbances in Normandy. But Henry found the means
of drawing off the count of Anjou, by forming anew with him a nearer
connection than the former, and one more material to the interests of
that count’s family. {1127.} The emperor, his son-in-law, dying without
issue, he bestowed his daughter on Geoffrey, the eldest son of Fulk, and
endeavored to insure her succession, by having her recognized heir to
all his dominions, and obliging the barons both of Normandy and England
to swear fealty to her. He hoped that the choice of this husband would
be more agreeable to all his subjects than that of the emperor; as
securing them from the danger of falling under the dominion of a great
and distant potentate, {1128.} who might bring them into subjection,
and reduce their country to the rank of a province; but the barons were
displeased that a step so material to national interests had been taken
without consulting them;[**] and Henry had too sensibly experienced
the turbulence of their disposition not to dread the effects of their
resentment.
[* Chron. Sax. p. 223. W. Malms, p. 165.]
[** W. Malms, p. 175. The Annals of (Waverly p.
150) say that the king asked and obtained the consent of all
the barons.]
It seemed probable that his nephew’s party might gain force from the
increase of the malecontents; an accession of power, which that prince
acquired a little after, tended to render his pretensions still more
dangerous. Charles, earl of Flanders, being assassinated during the
celebration of divine service, King Lewis immediately put the young
prince in possession of that county, to which he had pretensions in the
right of his grandmother Matilda, wife to the Conqueror. But William
survived a very little time this piece of good fortune, which seemed to
open the way to still further prosperity. He was killed in a skirmish
with the landgrave of Alsace, his competitor for Flanders; and his death
put an end, for the present, to the jealousy and inquietude of Henry.
The chief merit of this monarch’s government consists in the profound
tranquillity which he established and maintained throughout all his
dominions during the greater part of his reign. The mutinous barons were
retained in subjection; and his neighbors, in every attempt which they
made upon him, found him so well prepared that they were discouraged
from continuing or renewing their enterprises. In order to repress the
incursions of the Welsh, he brought over some Flemings in the year
1111, and settled them in Pembrokeshire, where they long maintained
a different language, and customs, and manners, from their neighbors.
Though his government seems to have been arbitrary in England, it was
judicious and prudent; and was as little oppressive as the necessity
of his affairs would permit. He wanted not attention to the redress
of grievances; and historians mention in particular the levying of
purveyance, which he endeavored to moderate and restrain. The tenants
in the king’s demesne lands were at that time obliged to supply, gratis,
the court with provisions, and to furnish carriages on the same hard
terms, when the king made a progress, as he did frequently, into any
of the counties. These exactions were so grievous, and levied in so
licentious a manner, that the farmers, when they heard of the approach
of the court, often deserted their houses, as if an enemy had invaded
the country;[*] and sheltered their persons and families in the
woods, from the insults of the king’s retinue. Henry prohibited those
enormities, and punished the persons guilty of them by cutting off their
hands, legs, or other members.[**] But the prerogative was perpetual;
the remedy applied by Henry was temporary; and the violence itself of
this remedy, so far from giving security to the people, was only a proof
of the ferocity of the government, and threatened a quick return of like
abuses.
[* Eadmer, p. 94. Chron. Sax., p. 212.]
[** Eadmer, p. 94.]
One great and difficult object of the king’s prudence was the guarding
against the encroachments of the court of Rome, and protecting the
liberties of the church of England. The pope, in the year 1101, had sent
Guy, archbishop of Vienne, as legate into Britain; and though he was the
first that for many years had appeared there in that character, and
his commission gave general surprise,[*] the king, who was then in the
commencement of his reign, and was involved in many difficulties, was
obliged to submit to this encroachment on his authority. But in the
year 1116, Anselm, abbot of St. Sabas, who was coming over with a like
legantine commission, was prohibited from entering the kingdom;[**]
and Pope Calixtus, who in his turn was then laboring under many
difficulties, by reason of the pretensions of Gregory, an antipope,
was obliged to promise that he never would for the future, except
when solicited by the king himself, send any legate into England.[***]
Notwithstanding this engagement, the pope, as soon as he had suppressed
his antagonist, granted the cardinal De Crema a legantine commission
over that kingdom; and the king, who, by reason of his nephew’s
intrigues and invasions, found himself at that time in a
dangerous situation, was obliged to submit to the exercise of this
commission.[****] A synod was called by the legate at London; where,
among other canons, a vote passed enacting severe penalties on the
marriages of the clergy.[*****] The cardinal, in a public harangue,
declared it to be an unpardonable enormity, that a priest should dare to
consecrate and touch the body of Christ immediately after he had risen
from the side of a strumpet; for that was the decent appellation which
he gave to the wives of the clergy. But it happened, that the very next
night the officers of justice, breaking into a disorderly house, found
the cardinal in bed with a courtesan;[******] an incident which threw
such ridicule upon him, that he immediately stole out of the kingdom;
the synod broke up; and the canons against the marriage of clergymen
were worse executed than ever.[*******]
[* Eadmer, p. 58.]
[** Hoveden, p. 474.]
[*** Eadmer, p. 125, 137, 138.]
[**** Chron. Sax. p. 229.]
[***** Spel. Concil. vol. ii. p. 34.]
[****** Hoveden, p. 478. M. Paris. p. 48.]
[******* M. West. ad ann 1125. H. Hunting. p. 382.]
It is remarkable that this last writer, who was a clergyman as well as
the others, makes an apology for using such freedom with the fathers of
the church; but says, that the fact was notorious, and ought not to be
concealed.
Henry, in order to prevent this alternate revolution of concessions
and encroachments, sent William, then archbishop of Canterbury, to
remonstrate with the court of Rome against those abuses, and to assert
the liberties of the English church. It was a usual maxim with every
pope, when he found that he could not prevail in any pretension, to
grant princes or states a power which they had always exercised, to
resume at a proper juncture the claim which seemed to be resigned, and
to pretend that the civil magistrate had possessed the authority only
from a special indulgence of the Roman pontiff. After this manner,
the pope, finding that the French nation would not admit his claim
of granting investitures, had passed a bull, giving the king that
authority; and he now practised a like invention to elude the complaints
of the king of England. He made the archbishop of Canterbury his legate,
renewed his commission from time to time, and still pretended that
the rights which that prelate had ever exercised as metropolitan, were
entirely derived from the indulgence of the apostolic see. The English
princes, and Henry in particular, who were glad to avoid any immediate
contest of so dangerous a nature, commonly acquiesced by their silence
in these pretensions of the court of Rome.[*] [14]
[* See note N, at the end of the volume.]
{1131.} As every thing in England remained in tranquillity, Henry took
the opportunity of paying a visit to Normandy, to which he was invited,
as well by his affection for that country as by his tenderness for his
daughter the empress Matilda, who was always his favorite. Some time
after, that princess was delivered of a son, {1132.} who received the
name of Henry; and the king, further to insure her succession, made all
the nobility of England and Normandy renew the oath of fealty, {1135.}
which they had already sworn to her.[*] The joy of this event, and
the satisfaction which he reaped from his daughter’s company, who
bore successively two other sons, made his residence in Normandy very
agreeable to him;[**] and he seemed determined to pass the remainder of
his days in that country, when an incursion of the Welsh obliged him to
think of returning into England. He was preparing for the journey, but
was seized with a sudden illness at St. Dennis le Forment, from eating
too plentifully of lampreys, a food which always agreed better with his
palate than his constitution.[***]
[* W. Malms, p. 177.]
[** H. Hunting, p. 315.]
[*** H. Hunting, p. 385. M. Paris p. 50.]
He died in the sixty-seventh year of his age and the thirty-fifth year
of his reign, leaving by will his daughter Matilda heir of all his
dominions, without making any mention of her husband, Geoffrey, who had
given him several causes of displeasure.[*]
[* W. Malms, p. 178.]
This prince was one of the most accomplished that has filled the English
throne, and possessed all the great qualities both of body and mind,
natural and acquired, which could fit him for the high station to which
he attained. His person was manly, his countenance engaging, his eyes
clear serene, and penetrating. The affability of his address encouraged
those who might be overawed by the sense of his dignity or of his
wisdom; and though he often indulged his facetious humor, he knew how to
temper it with discretion, and ever kept at a distance from all indecent
familiarities with his courtiers. His superior eloquence and judgment
would have given him an ascendant, even had he been born in a private
station; and his personal bravery would have procured him respect,
though it had been less supported by art and policy. By his great
progress in literature, he acquired the name of ‘Beauclerk,’ or the
scholar; but his application to those sedentary pursuits abated nothing
of the activity and vigilance of his government; and though the learning
of that age was better fitted to corrupt than improve the understanding,
his natural good sense preserved itself untainted both from the pedantry
and superstition which were then so prevalent among men of letters. His
temper was susceptible of the sentiments as well of friendship as of
resentment; and his ambition, though high, might be deemed moderate and
reasonable, had not his conduct towards his brother and nephew showed
that he was too much disposed to sacrifice to it all the maxims of
justice and equity. But the total incapacity of Robert for government
afforded his younger brother a reason or pretence for seizing the
sceptre both of England and Normandy; and when violence and usurpation
are once begun, necessity obliges a prince to continue in the same
criminal course, and engages him in measures which his better judgment
and sounder principles would otherwise have induced him to reject with
warmth and indignation.
King Henry was much addicted to women; and historians mention no less
than seven illegitimate sons and six daughters born to him.[*] Hunting
was also one of his favorite amusements; and he exercised great rigor
against those who encroached on the royal forests, which were augmented
during his reign,[**] though their number and extent were already too
great. To kill a stag was as criminal as to murder a man: he made all
the dogs be mutilated which were kept on the borders of his forests; and
he sometimes deprived his subjects of the liberty of hunting on their
own lands, or even cutting their own woods. In other respects he
executed justice, and that with rigor; the best maxim which a prince
in that age could follow. Stealing was first made capital in this
reign;[***] false coining, which was then a very common crime, and by
which the money had been extremely debased, was severely punished by
Henry.* Near fifty criminals of this kind were at one time hanged or
mutilated; and though these punishments seem to have been exercised in
a manner somewhat arbitrary, they were grateful to the people, more
attentive to present advantages than jealous of general laws. There is
a code which passes under the name of Henry I.; but the best antiquaries
have agreed to think it spurious. It is, however, a very ancient
compilation, and may be useful to instruct us in the manners and customs
of the times. We learn from it, that a great distinction was then made
between the English and Normans, much to the advantage of the latter.*
The deadly feuds and the liberty of private revenge, which had been
avowed by the Saxon laws, were still continued, and were not yet wholly
illegal.[****]
Among the laws granted on the king’s accession, it is remarkable that
the reunion of the civil and ecclesiastical courts, as in the Saxon
times, was enacted.[*****] But this law, like the articles of his
charter, remained without effect, probably from the opposition of
Archbishop Anselm.
[Footnonte * Sim. Dunelm. p. 231. Brompton, p. 1000. Flor. Wigorn. p.
653 Hoveden, p. 471.]
[Footnonte ** Sim. Dunelm. p. 231. Brompton, p. 1000. Hoveden, p. 471
Annal. Waverl. p. 149.]
[Footnonte *** LL. Hen. I. sect. 18, 75.]
[Footnonte **** LL. Hen. I. sect. 82.]
[Footnonte ***** Spel. p. 305. Blackstone, vol. iii. p. 63. Coke, 2
Inst. 70.]
Henry, on his accession, granted a charter to London, which seems to
have been the first step towards rendering that city a corporation. By
this charter, the city was empowered to keep the farm of Middlesex at
three hundred pounds a year, to elect its own sheriff and justiciary,
and to bold pleas of the crown; and it was exempted from scot,
danegelt, trials by combat, and lodging the king’s retinue These, with
a confirmation of the privileges of their court of hustings, wardmotes,
and common halls, and their liberty of hunting in Middlesex and Surrey,
are the chief articles of this charter.[*]
It is said [**] that this prince, from indulgence to his tenants,
changed the rents of his demesnes, which were formerly paid in kind,
into money, which was more easily remitted to the exchequer. But the
great scarcity of coin would render that commutation difficult to be
executed, while at the same time provisions could not be sent to a
distant quarter of the kingdom. This affords a probable reason why the
ancient kings of England so frequently changed their place of abode:
they carried their court from one place to another, that they might
consume upon the spot the revenue of their several demesnes.
[Footnonte * Lambardi Archaionomia, ex edit. Twisden.
Wilkins, p. 385.]
[Footnonte ** Dail. de Scaocario, lib. i. cap. 7.]