As it was not the interest or the intention of his Holiness to allow matters to be carried to extremities, the vigilant pope saw his time was come to interfere. Two legates, Pandulph and Durand, were sent over with the final demands of Innocent to John. They assured him that the King of France was ready to invade England with a great host and a powerful fleet, and that he would be accompanied with the archbishops, bishops, and clergy, whom John had banished; that they would transfer their allegiance to his rival Philip, and place the crown upon his head. With many such-like statements, they terrified the king, who lost all self-possession, and threw himself and his kingdom into the hands of the legates without reserve. With a meanness of spirit almost exceeding belief, and an abject submission which knew no bounds, he laid his crown at the feet of the haughty legate, resigned England and Ireland into the hands of the pope, swore homage to him as his liege lord, and took an oath of fealty to his successors. The terms of this remarkable oath are rather long and wordy, but the following is the substance of it, as given in the Encyclopedia Britannica.
"I John, by the grace of God King of England and Lord of Ireland, in order to expiate my sins, from my own free will and the advice of my barons, give to the Church of Rome, to Pope Innocent and his successors, the kingdom of England and all other prerogatives of my crown. I will hereafter hold them as the pope's vassal. I will be faithful to God, to the Church of Rome, to the pope my master, and to his successors legitimately elected. I promise to pay him a tribute of 1000 merks; to wit, 700 for the kingdom of England, and 300 for the kingdom of Ireland." This memorable submission took place on the 15th of May, 1213, in the fourteenth year of his reign, at the house of the Templars, not far from Dover.
This oath was taken by the King kneeling before all the people, and with his hands held up between those of the legate. The attesting witnesses were, one archbishop, one bishop, nine earls, four barons. Having then agreed to install Langton in the primacy, he received the crown which he had been supposed to have forfeited. The wary and politic Panduiph, having received the fealty of the King of England, and eighty thousand sterling as compensation for the exiled bishops, hastily gathered up his charter and his money-bags, and hurried to rejoin the banished prelates in Normandy and divide the money. He next hastened to the camp of King Philip Augustus, and finding the army on the point of embarkation for England, he coolly informed the King, "that there was now no further need for his services; and that in fact any attempt to invade the kingdom, or to annoy the King of England, must be highly offensive to the holy See, inasmuch as that kingdom was now part and parcel of the patrimony of the church: it was therefore his duty to dismiss his army, and himself to return home in peace." When Philip discovered that he had been so thoroughly duped, he broke out in a storm of indignant invectives against the pope. "He had been drawn into enormous expense; he had called forth the whole strength of his dominions, under the delusive promise of a kingdom and the remission of his sins; all this he had done at the earnest entreaty of the pope. And was all the chivalry of France, in arms around their sovereign, to be dismissed like hired menials when there was no more use for their services?" But the King's fury was met by a cool repetition of the order, "Desist from hostilities against the vassal of the Holy See."
Philip's disappointment and mortification were great; but not daring to offend the pope and unwilling to disband his army without attempting some enterprise, he made a descent on Flanders. Ferrand, the earl, though a peer of France, having entered into a secret league with John, gave Philip a fair pretext for turning his arms against his revolted vassal. But the fleets of England joined the Flemings, and the attempted conquest of Flanders ended in disgraceful defeat. The English captured three hundred vessels, and destroyed about a hundred more: whilst Philip, finding it impossible to prevent the rest from falling into the hands of the enemy, set fire to them himself, and thus abandoned the enterprise. Such was the heavy loss and discomfiture of Philip through the deep laid plot of Innocent.