But nothing forwarded this confederacy so much as the concurrence of
Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury; a man whose memory, though he was
obtruded on the nation by a palpable encroachment of the see of Rome,
ought always to be respected by the English. This prelate--whether he
was moved by the generosity of his nature and his affection to public
good or had entertained an animosity against John, on account of the
long opposition made by that prince to his election, or thought that
an acquisition of liberty to the people would serve to increase and
secure the privileges of the Church--had formed the plan of reforming
the government. In a private meeting of some principal barons at
London, he showed them a copy of Henry I's charter, which, he said, he
had happily found in a monastery; and he exhorted them to insist on
the renewal and observance of it. The barons swore that they would
sooner lose their lives than depart from so reasonable a demand.

The confederacy began now to spread wider, and to comprehend almost
all the barons in England; and a new and more numerous meeting was
summoned by Langton at St. Edmundsbury, under color of devotion. He
again produced to the assembly the old charter of Henry; renewed his
exhortations of unanimity and vigor in the prosecution of their
purpose; and represented, in the strongest colors, the tyranny to
which they had so long been subjected, and from which it now behooved
them to free themselves and their posterity. The barons, inflamed by
his eloquence, incited by the sense of their own wrongs, and
encouraged by the appearance of their power and numbers, solemnly took
an oath, before the high altar, to adhere to each other, to insist on
their demands, and to make endless war on the King till he should
submit to grant them. They agreed that, after the festival of
Christmas, they would prefer in a body their common petition; and in