310 ANNALS OF ROGER BE HOVEBEN. A.B. 1167. bishops, and other great men of the kingdom, having been adjured thereupon by their faith and their hopes in God, after having been informed upon the usage in time past, the required immunities were openly discussed and published upon the testimony of the chief men throughout the kingdom. This, then, is the cruelty of our lord the king towards the Church of God which has been so loudly exclaimed against throughout the whole kingdom, this is his persecution, this is his malignity, the reports of which have been spread abroad among ourselves as well as in all other quarters. Still, in all these, if there is anything contained that is dangerous to the soul, anything offensive to the Church, he has promised all along, and does most steadfastly promise, that, advised and moved thereto by your authority, he will, with the most holy duteousness, by reason of his reverence for Christ, and for the honor whieh he professes to pay to the Holy Church, whom he confesses to be his mother, and for the salvation of his own soul, correct the same, according to the advice of the Church of his realm. And, indeed, our father, our aspirations for peace, would, as we hope, before this have obtained their wished-fbr end, if the asperity of our father, the lord archbishop of Canterbury, had not kindled afresh the anger that was now subdued and almost extinguished. Por he, from whose long-suffering we had hitherto hoped for peace, from whose moderation a renewal of his favour, has most harshly and irreverently made an attack upon him whom he ought to have softened with his admonitions, and to have subdued by well-deserving and meekness, by means of grievous and threatening letters, little savouring of the devotedness of the father or the long-suffering of the priest, upon the occasion of his lately taking proceedings against certain disturbers of the peace. He has most bitterly threatened sentence of excommunication against him, and the penalties of interdict against his kingdom. H, then, his humility is thus rewarded, what is to be done with him when he is contumacious? If ready duteousness and obedience are thus esteemed, in what way will punishment be inflicted upon obstinate perverseness ? To these grievous threats, things more grievous have been added. Por upon certain faithful and familiar friends of our lord the king, the first nobles of the realm, who especially take part in the private counsels of the king, and by whose hands the sovereign's intentions and the business of the kingdom are carried out, he