with all speed. He heard and approved of the advice already given to the king; the holy man was brought to the bedside of the royal sinner; he bade him make a clean confession of his misdeeds, solemnly promise amendment if he should recover, and promptly perform it. The king confessed, and pledged his faith that if he recovered he would rule with justice and mercy. He took the bishops to be witnesses of his promise, and to record it before the altar. Further, a proclamation was issued under the royal seal, promising all manner of reforms, ecclesiastical and civil. But the great men of the realm urged on him the duty of proving his repentance by doing immediate justice to the long vacant see of Canterbury. The sick man signified his willingness. He was asked to name the man whom he deemed worthy of such an office. He raised himself with an effort on his arm in the bed, and, pointing to Anselm, said, ‘I choose yonder holy man’ (Will. Malm. Gest. Pont. i. 48). A shout of joy rang through the chamber. When Anselm heard it he trembled and turned pale, and when the bishops tried to drag him to the king to receive the pastoral staff at his hands he resisted with all his force. The bishops took him aside and remonstrated with him. Anselm pleaded that he was an old man, unused to worldly affairs, and unfitted for the duties of so burdensome an office. Moreover, he was the subject of another realm, and he owed allegiance not only to the Duke of Normandy but to the archbishop of Rouen, and to the chapter of his own abbey. These pleas, however, were all made light of, and he was again taken to the bedside of William, who besought him by his friendship for his father and mother to yield to the general wish. Anselm was inflexible. At the king's bidding they fell down at his feet, but Anselm prostrated himself also, and could not be persuaded. Then they lost patience; they partly pushed and partly pulled him to the king's bedside. The king presented the pastoral staff; they held out Anselm's hand to take it, but he kept his hand tightly clenched; they tried to force it open till he cried aloud with pain. At length they succeeded in unclosing his forefinger, and thrust the staff in between that and the other clenched fingers. Anselm was borne rather than led into the neighbouring church, still protesting and exclaiming, ‘It is nought that ye do.’ ‘It would have been difficult,’ he says, in a letter to the monks at Bec, ‘for a looker-on to say whether a sane man was being dragged by a crowd of madmen, or whether sane men were dragging a madman along’ (Ep. iii. 1). After some ceremony in the church, Anselm went back to the king and renewed his protest in the shape of a prophecy. ‘I tell thee, my lord king, that thou wilt not die of this sickness; therefore thou mayest undo what thou hast done in my case, for I have not consented, nor do I now consent, to its being ratified.’ Then, turning to the bishops, he told them they did not know what they were doing: they were yoking an untamed bull with a weak old sheep to the plough of the church, which ought to be drawn by two strong oxen. He then burst into tears, and, faint with fatigue and distress, retired to his lodging. (Eadmer, Vit. Ans. ii. 1, 2; Hist. Nov. i. 18, 19). All this took place on the first day of Lent, 6 March 1093. The king gave orders that Anselm should be inducted without delay into the temporal possessions of the see, and that meanwhile he should reside on some of the archiepiscopal manors under the care of his friend Gundulf, bishop of Rochester. The consent of Robert, duke of Normandy, and of the archbishop of Rouen to the appointment of Anselm was easily obtained, but the monks of Bec were very reluctant to part with their beloved abbot, and it was after a long debate and by a very narrow majority that they acquiesced in the appointment (Epist. iii. 3, 6).
Meanwhile the Red King recovered, and repented of his repentance. His last state was worse than the first, and the ill which he had done before seemed good in comparison with the evil which he did now. And when Bishop Gundulf remonstrated with him he swore by his favourite oath, the holy face of Lucca, that he would never requite good for the ill which God had done to him (Eadmer, Hist. Nov. i. 19 B). He did not, however, revoke the appointment of Anselm.
In the course of the summer of 1093 William, returning from a conference at Dover with the count of Flanders, met Anselm at Rochester. Anselm then told him that he was still hesitating whether he would accept the archbishopric, but if he did it must be on three conditions: (1) that all the lands belonging to the see in the time of Lanfranc should be restored without any lawsuit or dispute, (2) that the king should see justice done in respect of lands upon which the see had a long-standing claim, (3) that in matters pertaining to God the king should take him for his counsellor and spiritual father, as he on his part would acknowledge the king as his earthly lord. Lastly he warned the king that of the two rival claimants to the papacy, Clement and Urban, he himself, in common with the
