[1] So struck was the king by his ability that on the death of the Polish chancellor in 1503 he passed over the vice-chancellor Macics Dzewicki and confided the great seal to Łaski.

As chancellor Łaski supported the szlachta, or country-gentlemen, against the lower orders, going so far as to pass an edict excluding henceforth all plebeians from the higher benefices of the church.

[1] In 1511, the chancellor, who ecclesiastically was still only a canon of Kraków, obtained the coveted dignity of archbishop of Gnesen which carried with it the primacy of the Polish church.

In the long negotiations with the restive and semi-rebellious Teutonic Order, Łaski rendered Sigismund most important political services, proposing as a solution of the question that Sigismund should be elected grand master, while Łaski should surrender the primacy to the new candidate of the knights, Albert, Duke in Prussia, a solution which would have been far more profitable to Poland than the ultimate settlement of 1525.

In 1513, Łaski was sent to the Lateran council, convened by Pope Julius II, to plead the cause of Poland against the knights, where both as an orator and as a diplomatist he brilliantly distinguished himself.