he not be fit for the office, and therefore in a sense the right of the patron was no longer absolute. He might present, but his presentation did not hold good until it was accepted by the bishop. After many struggles this position was accepted by the great lords in England. But just as the bishops had succeeded in asserting their claim to supervise the nominations of patrons, the Pope, when he took possession of England as a papal fief, claimed absolutely to override the rights of the episcopate. In other words, no sooner did the Church of the land make good its spiritual position than that spiritual power was at once ruined by papal interference. The local patron had begun by regarding the right of presentation merely as a piece of property, but at the very moment when an attempt was made to rectify this abuse, in stepped the Pope, and treated it again as property, the only difference being that it became property which had passed from lay hands to his own. He, in fact, claimed the right of appointing to any benefice, overriding the rights of patrons, giving the benefices to whom he would, chiefly to Italians and other foreigners, who seldom, if ever, resided on their benefices.
Now Grosseteste was resolved to prevent improper presentations to livings, whether on the part of patrons, or on the part of the Pope, and the chief energy of his reforming activities at the beginning of his episcopate was directed to this end. Even before he was consecrated, he was asked to confirm the appointment of a man presented to him, who was in bearing a layman, and looked more like a soldier than anything
