Source.—Eadmer, Historia Novorum in Anglia, ed. Rule, pp. 119, 128, 131, 134. (Rolls Series.)

A few days after his return, Anselm came to the king at Salisbury and was welcomed by him; he accepted the king’s excuse for having assumed the royal dignity without waiting for the benediction of him whose right he knew it to be, and was thereupon required to do homage to the king according to the custom of his ancestors, and to receive the archbishopric from the king’s hand. He answered that in no wise either would he or could he consent so to do, and when asked why, he immediately set forth in plain words what he had agreed to on these and certain other matters in the council at Rome, saying in conclusion, “If the lord the king will accept these terms, and accepting, observe them, there shall surely be a firm peace between us; but if not, I do not see that my remaining in England will be either useful or honest; especially as, if he has granted any bishoprics or abbacies, I must altogether reject communion both with him and with those who have accepted them. I have not returned to England to dwell there, unless the king will obey the Pope of Rome. Therefore I beg that the king will make what order he will, that I may know which way to turn.” The king, on hearing this, was gravely disturbed. It seemed to him a serious matter to lose the investitures of churches and the homage of prelates, but not less serious to suffer Anselm to leave the realm before he himself was fully established on the throne. On the one hand he thought he would be losing as it were half the realm, and on the other he feared that Anselm would go to his brother Robert, who had by that time returned to Normandy from Jerusalem, and persuading him to submit to the apostolic see, which he knew to be a most easy thing to do, would make him king of England. A truce, therefore, from controversy on either side was asked for until Easter.... To this Anselm consented....

Not long after ... a friendly letter was sent by the king to him.... asking him to come to the king, who wished the matter to be settled and had another plan. Hoping to hear that God of his grace had touched the king’s heart, he went, as he was ordered, to Winchester. There the bishops and chief men of the realm were gathered together, and by their common assent Anselm agreed that ... envoys should be sent by both parties to Rome to explain to the Roman pontiff face to face that either he must abandon his original decision, or submit to the expulsion of Anselm and his party from England and lose the submission of the whole realm and the profits which he was accustomed to derive yearly from the same. Two monks therefore were sent by Anselm, to wit, Baldwin of Bec and Alexander of Canterbury, not indeed to urge the Roman pontiff in any way to abate the rigour of justice on Anselm’s behalf, but partly to bear testimony of the threats of the court which the Pope must straightway believe, and partly to bring back to Anselm a final decision from the apostolic see. To accomplish the same purpose the king sent three bishops, Gerard of Hereford, lately made archbishop of York, Herbert of Thetford and Robert of Chester....

The journey at length accomplished, the envoys reached Rome together, and announced the cause of their coming to the apostolic ears, each party presenting its own case, and humbly asked for the Pope’s counsel to put an end to the quarrel. He heard their story and found no words in which to express his amazement. But when he was urgently pressed by the bishops to consult his own interests and mitigate the strictness of his predecessor’s rigid decision, that peace might everywhere abound, he declared that he would not do it even to ransom his person. “Shall one man’s threats,” he asked with indignation, “drive me to annul the decrees and institutes of the holy fathers?” That was the end of the matter. Hereupon he sent letters to the king and Anselm, one to each ... which we set out before our readers’ eyes, the better to reveal their contents:

“Paschal the bishop, servant of the servants of God, to his dear son Henry, king of the English, greeting and apostolic benediction.

“We give thanks to the Lord, the King of kings, who by the grace of His goodwill has raised you to the throne, and by the grace of His goodwill and of His ineffable mercy has watched over you as a Christian king. We ask, therefore, that He may make the good beginnings of your reign grow to better things, and to the end watch over His gifts bestowed upon you. For you have repudiated the impiety of the king your brother, which, as you see, has been terribly avenged by the divine judgment; you have restored the churches to freedom, you have begun to honour the clergy and to reverence their heads, the bishops, and in them Christ the Lord. We are therefore confident that you will be equally wise to the end and persevere in the same excellence; except that there are men of perverse spirit who strive to prepare your royal heart for divine wrath through the investiture of bishops and abbots. Their counsels in this behalf should be shunned by you like poison, that you offend not Him by whom kings reign and the mighty decree justice. If you propitiate Him, of a truth your reign will be blessed, and you will win undisputed power and riches. But if, which God forbid, you offend Him, neither the counsels of barons, nor the aid of knights, nor arms nor riches will avail to help you when He shall begin to overthrow you. In the honour of God, in the liberty of the church, you shall have in us a friend and helper. Be sure that no man shall wrest you from our friendship, if you abstain from investitures, if you yield to the church due honour and preserve its freedom ordained by God. Indeed, by the judgment of the Holy Ghost, we prohibit kings and princes and all laymen alike from investitures of churches. It is not fit that a mother should be sold into slavery by a son, receiving a spouse whom she has not chosen. For her Spouse she has our King and Lord, and may He keep you of His mercy in power and piety, and lead you from an earthly to a heavenly kingdom. Amen.”

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“Paschal the bishop, servant of the servants of God, to his venerable brother and fellow-bishop, Anselm, greeting and apostolic benediction.

“You are not ignorant that it is by the counsel of the divine will that your piety presides over the realm of England. For when, to avoid the hatred of a perverse king, you chose to withdraw and to dwell by yourself far from the turmoil of England, living unto God, Almighty God wrought an awful judgment upon the perverse king. But by the vehement demand of the whole people and by the wonderful devoutness of the new king, you have been recalled to the primacy which for God’s sake you abandoned. Thanks be to God that episcopal authority ever abides in you, and that though you are set among a barbarous folk, you cease not to proclaim truth in spite of the violence of tyrants and the favour of the mighty, in spite of the kindled fire and the outstretched hand. We ask therefore that what you are doing, you continue to do, that what you proclaim, you proclaim to the end. For the inspiration of Him, Who in the beginning was the Word, shall not be wanting to our words and works. Nor will we be wanting to Him Who is the power of God and the wisdom of God. For we believe that we have the same inspiration as our fathers, wherefore also we now speak.... In the truth thereof we will guard against the lies of men. Wherefore in the late Lateran council we re-enacted the famous decrees of our fathers, proclaiming and prohibiting that no clerk whatsoever accept churches or ecclesiastical gifts from the hand of a layman; for this is the root of the vice of simony, when fools strive to win the favour of secular persons in order to receive the honours of the church. Therefore the reverend majesty of holy councils has decreed that ecclesiastical elections shall be guarded from the power of secular princes, in order that, as through Christ only is the door of the church first opened to eternal life in baptism and at the last in death, so through Christ only shall be appointed the door-keeper of Christ’s fold, by whom Christ’s sheep, not for hire but for Christ, shall be led in and out to life eternal. These things, dear brother, might be treated at greater length both in speech and argument, but it is enough to have set forth a few considerations to your wisdom, which abounds in divine utterances and is familiar with ecclesiastical arguments. Teach these things, as you know befits your primacy, which, moreover, we confirm to you as fully and entirely as it was ever held by your predecessors, adding for ourselves that so long as the divine mercy shall preserve your piety in the realm of England, you shall not be subject to the judgment of any legate, but only of ourself.”

... On the return of the bishops and others who, as we have said, were sent to Rome, the king, summoning the chief men of the realm to London, called on Anselm by messenger according to wont, either no longer to oppose him and the customs of his predecessors, or to give up his primacy of the realm. He replied, “Let the king be pleased to permit examination of the letters which have been brought, and, saving my honour and my obedience to the apostolic see, I will do all in my power to submit to his will.” The king replied, “Let his own be examined, if he chooses, but mine shall certainly not be shown at present.” He answered, “When it shall please the king to show it at another time, he shall find me ready to meet his present demands.” The king rejoined, “I have no concern with letters, nor will I; let him say in plain speech whether he will obey my will in all things.” On hearing this many were filled with a great wonder, arguing that if the letter had coincided with the king’s wishes, he would have made the contents public of his own will, without any reference to Anselm. At that time they were not known to us, yet the more anxiously their secrecy was then preserved, the more openly were their contents known a few days later. When the letter to Anselm had been read and read again before all who would hear it, the bishops who had come from Rome asserted that they had received from the Pope at Rome a verbal assurance quite contrary to the tenour of that letter and even to the letter which they had brought to the king. Asked what it was, they declared on their word as bishops that the Pope himself had sent a message for the king’s private ears, that as long as he lived the life of a good prince in other ways, he would willingly bear with him on the matter of investitures of churches, and would refrain from imposing the ban of excommunication if he should invest religious persons by the gift of the pastoral staff. He had refused to entrust to writing the honour of a concession so great in case it should be brought to the knowledge of other princes, who might usurp the same privilege and despise the authority of the Roman pontiff....

On the first of August (1107) a council of the bishops, abbots and chief men of the realm was held at London in the king’s palace, and for three whole days the question of the investitures of churches was discussed by the king and the bishops in Anselm’s absence, some urging upon him to maintain the practice of his father and brother in defiance of the apostolic command. For the Pope, taking a firm stand upon the decree which had been published thereon, had conceded the homage which Pope Urban had prohibited equally with investitures, and thereby secured the king’s consent to his view of the investitures.... Afterwards, in the presence of Anselm, and the whole council standing, the king agreed and ordained that from that time forward no man should be invested in any bishopric or abbey by the king or the hand of any layman in England by the giving of the pastoral staff or ring, Anselm on his side granting that no man elected to be a prelate should be deprived of consecration to the dignity he had received, by reason of the homage which he should do to the king. Upon this settlement of the dispute, institutions were made by the king, without investiture of the pastoral staff or ring, by the counsel of Anselm and the chief men of the realm, to almost all the churches of England, so long bereft of their pastors.