[Footnote 24:  The lance passed through or under the ball of his thumb into his wrist.  The wound gangrening, he died within five days. [D.S.]]

This one slight inconsiderable accident did, in all probability, put a stop to very great events; for if that young prince had survived his victory, it is hardly to be doubted but through the justness of his cause, the reputation of his valour, and the assistance of the King of France, he would in a little time have recovered Normandy, and perhaps his father’s liberty, which were the two designs he had in agitation; nor could he well have missed the crown of England after the King’s death, who was now in his decline, when he had so fair a title, and no competitors in view but a woman and an infant.

  1129.

Upon the King’s return from Normandy, a great council of the clergy was held at London, for the punishing of priests who lived in concubinage, which was the great grievance of the Church in those ages, and had been condemned by several canons.  This assembly thinking to take a more effectual course against that abomination, as it was called, decreed severe penalties upon those who should be guilty of breaking it, entreating the King to see the law put in execution; which he very readily undertook, but performed otherwise than was expected, eluding the force of the law by an evasion to his own advantage:  for exacting fines of the delinquent priests, he suffered them to keep their concubines without further disturbance.  A very unaccountable step in so wise a body for their own concernments, as the clergy of those times is looked upon to have been; and although perhaps the fact be not worth recording, it may serve as a lesson to all assemblies never to trust the execution of a law in the hands of those who will find it more to their interests to see it broken than observed.

  1132.

The Empress Maud was now happily delivered of a son, who was afterwards King of England by the name of Henry the Second:  and the King calling a Parliament, had the oath of fealty repeated by the nobles and clergy to her and her issue, which in the compass of three years they all broke or forgot.

  1134.

I think it may deserve a place in this history to mention the last scene of Duke Robert’s life, who, either through the poorness or greatness of spirit, having outlived the loss of his honour, his dominions, his liberty, his eyesight, and his only son, was at last forced to sink under the load of eighty years, and must be allowed for the greatest example either of insensibility or contempt of earthly things, that ever appeared in a sovereign or private person.  He was a prince hardly equalled by any in his time for valour, conduct, and courtesy; but his ruin began from the easiness of his nature, which whoever knew how to manage, were sure to be refused nothing they could ask.  By such profusion he was reduced to those unhappy expedients of remitting his rights for