When Hubert Walter, Archbishop of Canterbury--the old Justiciar of Richard I.--ended his long life of public service on July 12th, A.D. 1205, King John exclaimed, with frank satisfaction, “Now for the first time I am King of England!” As long as Hubert was alive there was one man strong enough to restrain the king, and the primate and William the Marshall together had done something to guard England against the foulest and most ruthless tyranny of all its kings. To the end William the Marshall was a brave and patriotic statesman, but he served the crown rather than the people. On Hubert’s death John meant to have for archbishop a creature of his will, and he was defeated by Pope Innocent III., who, dismissing the appeal of the monks of Canterbury for Reginald, their subprior, and John’s appeal for his nominee, John de Gray, Bishop of Norwich, proposed the English-born Cardinal, Stephen Langton, “than whom there was no man greater in the Roman court, nor was there any equal to him in character and in learning.” The monks consented to Stephen’s appointment, but John’s reply was a flat refusal, and when on June 7th, 1207, Pope Innocent proceeded to consecrate Stephen Langton Archbishop of Canterbury, the king’s rage broke out. Innocent’s wise judgment gave England one of its noblest and greatest archbishops, and the service wrought by Langton for the liberties of England’s people was of deep and lasting value. But the immediate price to be paid for later profit was heavy. John met Langton’s consecration by seizing the estates of Canterbury, driving the chapter into exile, and proclaiming that anyone who acknowledged Stephen as archbishop should be accounted a public enemy. The remonstrances and warnings of the pope were disregarded, and in March, 1208, all England was laid under an interdict, and there was an end to the public ministrations of religion in the country for six years--to the bitter distress of the common people. Immediately the interdict came into force, John declared all the property of the clergy, secular or monastic, to be confiscated, and there was no one to stay his hand from speedy spoliation. For the barons were willing enough to see the clergy robbed and the king’s treasury filled at the expense of the Church, and of the bishops only two were left in England--Peter des Roches, of Winchester, and John de Gray, of Norwich--and both these were willing tools of the king. Never did John enjoy his royal will and pleasure with such unhindered ferocity as in that year 1209. Had the barons stood by the Church they might have saved England unspeakable miseries, and as it was the laity were soon in as sorry a plight as the clergy, “and it seemed as though the king was courting the hatred of every class of his subjects, so burdensome was he to both rich and poor.”[27]