Comparison with his father.
His alleged firmness of purpose.
His caprice. taken away. As long as his father lived, he had little power to do evil; as long as Lanfranc lived, he was kept within some kind of bounds by respect for the man to whom he owed so much. When Lanfranc was gone, he either was corrupted by prosperity, or else, like Tiberius,[1] his natural character was now for the first time able to show itself in the absence of restraint. His character then stood out boldly, and men might compare him with his father. William the Red may pass for William the Great with all his nobler qualities, intellectual and moral, left out.[2] He could be, when he chose, either a great captain or a great ruler; but it was only by fits and starts that he chose to be either. His memory was strong; he at least never forgot an injury; he had also a kind of firmness of purpose; that is, he was earnest in whatever he undertook for good or for evil, and could not easily be turned from his will.[3] But he lacked that true steadiness of purpose, that power of waiting for the right time, that unfailing adaptation of means to ends, which lends somewhat of moral dignity even torex foras expressit quod in suo pectore, illo vivente, confotum habuit." In any case we may say, "postremo in scelera simul ac dedecora prorupit, postquam, remoto pudore et metu, suo tantum ingenio utebatur." The change in William after Lanfranc's death is most strongly brought out by Matthew Paris, Hist. Angl. i. 38.]
- ↑ A great part of the description of Tiberius given by Tacitus (Ann. vi. 51) applies to William Rufus; only we cannot make out quite so many stages in the moral downfall of the Red King. "Egregium vita famaque quoad privatus vel in imperiis sub Augusto fuit; occultum et subdolum fingendis virtutibus donec Germanicus ac Drusus superfuere: idem inter bona malaque mixtus, incolumi matre." These are words of almost the same meaning as some of the expressions of Eadmer and William of Malmesbury. See specially Eadmer, Hist. Nov. 14; "Confestim [after Lanfranc's death
- ↑ This is well drawn out by Dean Church, Anselm, 156, 157.
- ↑ Ord. Vit. 680 A. "Tenacis memoriæ, et ardentis ad bonum seu malum voluntatis erat." Nearly to the same effect are the words of the Hyde writer (299); "Erat quidem operibus levis, sed verbis, ut aiunt, in tantum stabilis ut, si cui bonum vel malum promisisset, certus inde satis exsistere posset."
