Million Book Collection - The Fishers of Men Ministries

142 ST. ANSELM AND
propounded what the i royal bounty expected from
him. For a moment Anselm was lost in astonishment,
for it might have appeared to him as if even
Rome was siding against him. But his line of conduct
soon became clear. Not only did he absolutely
refuse to buy the king's favour for the much-desired
pallium ; he maintained, further, that he could not
receive this emblem of spiritual office from the royal
hands. And once more William was foiled. The
cardinal placed the pallium on the high altar of
Canterbury Cathedral, and the archbishop took it
himself quasi "*"" de manic beati Petri.1
When, in the spring of 1097, William returned
victorious < from his Welsh campaign, Anselm was
watching the moment to bring once again
*
before him
the deplorable * spiritual state of England. " In the
autumn of the same year things had come to so bad
a pass, and there seemed so little prospect of reformation,
that the archbishop announced his definite
intention of seeking counsel of the Holy See, with
or without the king's permission. The bishops he
had found weak reeds, and as time went on they
grew in servility and abjectness. Four of them in
the king's council-chamber expressed the mind of
their brethren. " My lord and father in God," they
said to their primate, I" we know you to be a religious
and holy man; we know that your conversation is
in heaven. WTe, on the other hand, are hampered
by kinsmen who depend on us for subsistence, and
1 Rule, * ii. 85.
"