96 SOLDIERS AND SAILORS
The career of William as a warrior and conqueror occupies of necessity the largest space in his life ; but his fame as a statesman and administrator is not less than that which he won on the battle-field. This is not the place to discuss the results of the Conquest, but the policy of the Conqueror in regard to Church and State cannot be overlooked. An orthodox churchman, a supporter of union under the successor of Peter against the schismatic tendencies of the English Church, he nevertheless repelled any claim on the part of Rome to interference with his political sovereignty. He allowed Peter's pence to be collected, but re- fused to pay tribute to the Pope. While recognizing him as head of the Church, he declined to hold his kingdom as his vassal, nor would he permit papal bulls to enter England or excommunications to be issued against any of his subjects with- out his leave. He controlled all appointments to important ecclesiastical digni- ties ; he made laws for the Church ; he dealt justice to ecclesiastics, high and low, in his own courts. At the same time he had no desire to humiliate the Church ; on the contrary, he sought to elevate it to a higher position in the State, to make it a more potent agent of civilization. A weaker statesman might have seen his own advantage in encouraging the rivalry between Canterbury and York ; William strengthened the Church by forcing the younger to give way to the elder see. With the same object, that of increasing the efficiency of ecclesiastical organization, he severed the temporal and spiritual jurisdictions and furthered the enforcement of clerical celibacy. Finally, the trust which he reposed in Lanfranc from the time of his appointment to the see of Canterbury in 1070 shows not only his insight into character but his respect for the head of the English Church. In regard to temporal affairs William was rather an administrator than a law- giver. His reign is not marked by a series of legislative acts like those of Henry II. or Edward I.; but his work was the indispensable preliminary to theirs, for a strong monarchy was the first requisite of the state. To establish the power of the crown was William's principal care. The disintegrating tendencies of feudal- ism had already been visible under the Anglo-Saxon kings. William, while he established fully developed feudalism as a social, territorial, and military system in his new dominions, took measures to prevent it from undermining his own au- thority. He scattered the estates of his great vassals, so as to hinder them from building up provincial principalities ; he maintained the higher popular courts against the encroachments of manorial jurisdictions ; he prevented the claims of feudal lordship from standing between himself and the mass of his subjects, by exacting an oath from every landholder at the meeting of Salisbury plain ; finally, by the great survey which resulted in " Domesday Book " he not only asserted his right to make a general inquisition into property, but laid the firm basis of knowl- edge which was indispensable to centralized government and taxation. The care which he took to maintain English laws and institutions is part of the same policy. He balanced the two nationalities over which he ruled, and obliged each to depend upon him as its leader or protector against the other. __ He ruled as an English king ; his feudal council was the witenagemot with a new qualifica-
