decide between two claimants for the English crown strengthened
Gregory not a little in his daring claim to dispose of the crowns
of Rome, of Italy, and of Germany. Still this recognition of Roman
claims led more directly to the humiliation of William's successor
in his own kingdom. Moreover William's successful attempt to
represent his enterprise as a holy war, a crusade before crusades
were heard of, did much to suggest and to make ready the way for
the real crusades a generation later. It was not till after
William's death that Urban preached the crusade, but it was during
William's life that Gregory planned it.

The appeal was strangely successful. William convinced, or seemed
to convince, all men out of England and Scandinavia that his claim
to the English crown was just and holy, and that it was a good work
to help him to assert it in arms. He persuaded his own subjects;
he certainly did not constrain them. He persuaded some foreign
princes to give him actual help, some to join his muster in person;
he persuaded all to help him so far as not to hinder their subjects
from joining him as volunteers. And all this was done by sheer
persuasion, by argument good or bad. In adapting of means to ends,
in applying to each class of men that kind of argument which best
suited it, the diplomacy, the statesmanship, of William was
perfect. Again we ask, How far was it the statesmanship of
William, how far of Lanfranc? But a prince need not do everything
with his own hands and say everything with his own tongue. It was
no small part of the statesmanship of William to find out Lanfranc,
to appreciate him and to trust him. And when two subtle brains
were at work, more could be done by the two working in partnership
than by either working alone.