Separation
of England
and Normandy.
Thus then, after a union of a hundred and forty years, Normandy was separated from England. During a portion of those years,—the reigns of William Rufus and part of that of Henry I.,—they had been under different rulers, but they had been administered on the same principles and for the same interest all the time. The English had been ruled by Norman lords; their laws, institutions, customs, had been remodeled under Norman influences. But they had grown under and through the discipline. So far as English and Normans united, the Norman element gave strength, order, discipline to the English; so far as they were in opposition the Norman tyranny had called forth in the English patience, perseverance, and a sense of nationality which they had not shown before. The people had had to make common cause with the king against the Norman feudalism, and they had done this until their support became absolutely necessary to the royal power. Gradually the baronage were learning the like lesson; disciplined and educated under the royal training, they were finding that they were one in interest with the people; and that, as the royal power was becoming too great for either, the two might in time combine to curb it. They were becoming themselves more English—more English perhaps in blood, more English in the possession of English lands and by the gradual devolution of Norman lands into other hands; ready to be quite English when once they lost their Norman incumbrances. So when the time came for the barons who had lands in both countries to make their choice between John and Philip, the division was effected with little noise and less trouble. The Norman barons and prelates gave up their English lands, and the English—for henceforth these have a right to the name of English—barons and prelates gave up their Norman lands. There was very little internal division in Normandy itself, and Walter of Coutances, who had been Richard’s prime minister and justiciar, died a contented subject of Philip. The separation did much for England. Henceforth the king is mainly if not solely King of England, and the welfare of England the main if not the sole object of English counsels. It was Normandy that, by the exchange of masters, lost the share of the benefits won from John. Yet Normandy was for ages freer than the rest of France, in consequence of her early discipline under the house of Rollo, one part of which was the policy which made her run in harness with the English people. But to detail all the benefits of the separation would be to anticipate very much of the later history.
Hubert
Walter.
No sooner was Normandy lost than John’s ecclesiastical troubles began; and they began in the most dangerous way, for the very event that caused them robbed him of the only counsellor he had who could have guided him safely through them. Hubert Walter, the Archbishop of Canterbury—whose career we have traced first as a chaplain to Henry II., then as Bishop of Salisbury, counsellor, captain and chaplain to the third Crusade; then as Chief Justiciar of England, Archbishop of Canterbury, and legate, making laws and canons, leading armies, administering justice, collecting taxes, under Richard; and lastly, acting as Chancellor to John from the coronation to his death—Hubert Walter died on July 12, 1205.
Disputed
election
at Canterbury.
The appointment to the archbishopric had been for many years a vexed question. The monks of Christ Church, Canterbury, claimed the right of free election; they were the chapter of the cathedral, and had the same right as any other chapter to elect their prelate. It was a right that was distinctly recognised by the canon law, had been granted by Stephen’s charter, and had been so far made good at each change in the primacy that certain forms of election by them had been required as needful to the validity of the appointment. But the bishops of the province of Canterbury, whose chief and judge the archbishop was, also claimed a right in the election, partly on mere grounds of equity, but partly also on the ground of a prescription which, based on the precedent of the Anglo-Saxon councils, had given them an active influence on each occasion since the reign of Henry I. And besides these the king had his right; the Archbishop of Canterbury was his chief constitutional counsellor, the counsellor of whom he could not rid himself without breaking at once with religion and state custom. The king had generally since the Conquest nominated the archbishop, sometimes with and sometimes without the co-operation of the other two bodies, but always practically by his own fiat; and the pacification between Henry I. and Anselm had contained an admission that the homage of the archbishop elect to the king was necessary to the full right to exercise his constitutional power. Usually, however, as was generally done where the canon law and national law ran counter or overlapped one another, the end in view was secured by adroit management, saving the rights of each party, for the time. The quarrel on this occasion began with the monks of Canterbury.
Election of
the sub-prior.
This famous convent, which deserves on more than one occasion credit for having set a courageous example of opposition to tyranny, was a very ambitious and disorderly body; and just at this moment, having compelled Archbishop Hubert to pull down his grand new church at Lambeth, they, or a part of them, were quite intoxicated with conceit. It was always a great object with them to have a monk for archbishop; such a leader would extend their privileges and foster their ideas of independence. So now, during the night following Hubert’s death, the younger monks—no doubt a majority of the body—elected the sub-prior, Reginald, as archbishop, and, without asking the royal consent, sent him off at once to Rome to ask for the archiepiscopal pall and consecration. No sooner had Reginald crossed the Channel than, forgetting the promise of secrecy with which his electors had bound him, he gave out that he was the new archbishop, and the news came back to England.
Nomination
of John de
Gray.
John was very angry; he had intended his minister John de Gray, Bishop of Norwich, to be Hubert’s successor; the bishops were angry because their prescriptive and equitable right was disregarded; the senior monks were angry because they had been betrayed by the juniors, and the juniors because Reginald by his imprudent vanity had caused the premature discovery of their schemes. So all parties appealed to the Pope; and John, without waiting to hear what became of the appeal, had his nominee elected and put in possession of the estates of the see.