And as the Popes passed over Metropolitans in order to obtain a direct hold on the suffragans, so they went on in course of time to pass over the bishop in every diocese by claiming the disposition of individual benefices. Such a claim began in the first half of the twelfth century in letters of recommendation and petitions for the appointment of papal favourites to prebends or benefices. But so quickly did this system develop that where Hadrian IV recommended Alexander III commanded, and the mandates of Innocent III were enforced by specially appointed officers. Clement IV lays it down that ancient custom has specially reserved to the Roman pontiff the collation of churches and offices which become vacant through the death of the holder at Rome, but that this is only part of the greater right which is known to belong to Rome and gives to the Pontiff the full disposal (_plenaria dispositio_) of all offices and benefices both at the time of vacancy and by provision beforehand. But so flagrant was the abuse of this power of appointment that it roused the indignant remonstrance of the most ardent supporters of the papal authority in the Church. England under Henry III was so much exploited by its papal guardian as to gain the name of the "Milch-cow of the Papacy"; but there were many protests. Robert Grossteste, Bishop of Lincoln, the most revered English Churchman of the thirteenth century, was bidden by Innocent IV to find a canonry in his cathedral for a nominee of the Pope, who, moreover, was still a child. He answered in a rebuke of such severity and dignity as can have rarely been addressed to Rome by one devoted to its service. "Next to the sin of Lucifer," he tells the Pope, "there is not, there cannot be, any kind of sin so adverse and contrary to the evangelical doctrine of the Apostles as the destruction of souls by defrauding them of the duty and service of a pastor." He adds that the most holy Apostolic See cannot command anything that tends to a sin of such a kind except by some defect or abuse of its plenary power: that no faithful servant of the Papacy would comply with a command of that kind "even if it issued from the highest order of angels"; and he therefore, _filialiter et obedienter_, flatly refuses to obey. Scarcely less severe were the strictures of Louis IX's ambassadors, who laid the grievances of the French bishops and barons before the same Pope. They tell Innocent IV that the devotion which the French people have hitherto felt towards the Roman Church is now not only extinguished, but is turned into vehement hate and rancour, and that the claim for subsidies and tribute for every necessity of Rome--a claim which was enforced by the threat of excommunication--was unheard of in previous ages. [Sidenote: The Pope as supreme legislator.]