untouched the question, how far it is right to annex a free people against their will? It must be remembered that the submission of Scotland had been made by the nobility only, who were in fact Normans, and many of them English Barons. [Sidenote: Refusal of the clergy to grant subsidies. Nov. 3. 1296.] [Sidenote: Clergy outlawed.] Freed from danger on the side of Scotland, Edward was now at liberty to turn his attention towards France. But his late exertions had caused great expenditure, to which had been added the subsidies by which he had been compelled to purchase the alliance of the Princes on the north-east of France. To meet this necessity, a Parliament was summoned at Bury St. Edmunds, at which the Barons and Commons gave fresh grants. But the clergy, driven to extremity by the King’s late demands upon them, found themselves in a position to refuse. Benedict of Gaita had lately been elected Pope, under the title of Boniface VIII., and had at once entered upon a policy resembling that of the great Popes of the twelfth century. He had issued a Bull known by the name of “Clericis Laicos,” in which he had forbidden the clergy to pay taxes to their temporal sovereign. Backed by this authority, Archbishop Winchelsea refused in the name of the clergy to make any grant to Edward. The clergy, it was said, owed allegiance to two sovereigns--the one temporal, the other spiritual. Their obedience was due first to their spiritual chief. An exemption from taxation of the Church, which had rapidly been growing enormously wealthy, would have crippled Edward’s resources. He had already accepted the principle, that all should be consulted and all pay in matters touching the advantage of all. He proceeded at once, therefore, to meet the claim in his usual legal fashion. If the clergy would not help him, he would not protect the clergy. The Chief Justice was ordered to announce publicly from the bench in Westminster Hall, that no justice would be done the clergy in the King’s Court, but would nevertheless be done to all manner of persons who had any complaint against them. Nor was this sentence of outlawry a vain one; the tenants began at once to refuse to pay their rents, the Church property was seized, and the owners could get no redress. This severe treatment induced many of the clergy to make their submission, but the Archbishop still held out. [Sidenote: Barons too refuse to help Edward.] [Sidenote: Compromise with the clergy.] [Sidenote: Edward secures an illegal grant.]