not of the grievances which produced
it. It asserted that the taxes levied by the Pope amounted to five times
the amount of those levied by the king; that by reservations during the
life of actual holders the Pope disposed of the same bishoprick four or
five times over, receiving each time the first-fruits. "The brokers of the
sinful city of Rome promote for money unlearned and unworthy caitiffs to
benefices to the value of a thousand marks, while the poor and learned
hardly obtain one of twenty. So decays sound learning. They present aliens
who neither see nor care to see their parishioners, despise God's services,
convey away the treasure of the realm, and are worse than Jews or Saracens.
The Pope's revenue from England alone is larger than that of any prince in
Christendom. God gave his sheep to be pastured, not to be shaven and
shorn." At the close of this reign indeed the deaneries of Lichfield,
Salisbury, and York, the archdeaconry of Canterbury, which was reputed the
wealthiest English benefice, together with a host of prebends and
preferments, were held by Italian cardinals and priests, while the Pope's
collector from his office in London sent twenty thousand marks a year to
the Papal treasury.

[Sidenote: Protest of the Parliament]

But the greed of the Popes was no new grievance, though the increase of
these exactions since the removal to Avignon gave it a new force. What
alienated England most was their connexion with and dependence on France.
From the first outset of the troubles in the North their attitude had been
one of hostility to the English projects. France was too useful a supporter
of the Papal court to find much difficulty in inducing it to aid in
hampering the growth of English greatness. Boniface the Eighth released
Balliol from his oath of fealty, and forbade Edward to attack Scotland on
the ground that it was a fief of the Roman See. His intervention was met by
a solemn and emphatic protest from the English Parliament; but it none the
less formed a terrible obstacle in Edward's way. The obstacle was at last
removed by the quarrel of Boniface with Philip the Fair; but the end of
this quarrel only threw the Papacy more completely into the hands of
France. Though Avignon remained imperial soil, the removal of the Popes to
this city on the verge of their dominions made them mere tools of the
French kings. Much no doubt of the endless negotiation which the Papal
court carried on with Edward the T