While the power of the State was almost disappearing, that of the Church, apart from the particular acts of violence of which she was often the victim, continued to grow. Her jurisdiction gained ground, since her procedure was reasonable and comparatively scientific (except that she admitted to a certain extent compurgation by oath and the _judicia Dei_, with the exception of trial by combat). Not only was the privilege of clergy, by which accused clerks were brought under her jurisdiction, almost absolute, but she had cognizance of a number of causes in which laymen only were concerned, marriage and everything nearly or remotely affecting it, wills, crimes and offences against religion; and even contracts, when the two parties wished it or when the agreement was made on oath, came within her competence. Such, then, were the ecclesiastical or Christian courts (_cours d'eglise, course de chretiente_). The Church, moreover, remained in close connexion with the crown, the king preserving a quasi-ecclesiastical character, while the royal prerogatives with regard to the election of bishops were maintained more successfully than the rights of the crown, though in many of the great fiefs they none the less passed to the count or the duke. It was at this time too that the Church tried to break the last ties which still kept her more or less dependent on the civil power; this was the true import of the Investiture Contest (see INVESTITURE, and CHURCH HISTORY), though this was not very acute in France. The feudal monarchy. Roman law. The customs.