In what I have said already about the Western Church as a whole, I have tried to make it clear that, while there was no difference of opinion as to the unity of the Church and the papal headship of the Church, there was considerable doubt as to the meaning to be attached to headship, as to the extent of papal authority, and therefore as to the details of ecclesiastical law. The English Church after the Conquest was controlled by men who came from, and brought their ideas from, the Continent; it was not in these respects distinct from the other Churches in Europe. Previous to the Conquest, it had, in its isolation, been tending to develop certain distinctive characteristics; the chief peculiarities that survived the Conquest were the monastic control of certain cathedrals and the payment of Peter's Pence, but there was nothing which gave a particularly English flavour to ecclesiastical administration and legislation. The features which do tend to differentiate it from other Churches are almost entirely of post-Conquest growth, and mainly of a political rather than an ecclesiastical nature; at any rate their origin must be sought rather on the Continent than in England.

This is not surprising when we consider the condition of the English Church at the time of the Conquest. The bishops were mostly uneducated and secularised, the lower clergy hopelessly ignorant; ecclesiastical synods and ecclesiastical law had fallen into disuse, and there was no separate ecclesiastical jurisdiction.