It was in this time of waiting and suspense that Robert Bacon, one of the new order of friar preachers or Dominicans who had been chosen to preach before the king and his assembled bishops, had the boldness to tell Henry to his face that he would never enjoy lasting peace until he had banished Peter des Roches (Petrum de Rupibus) and his fellows from his councils.
"Nay, my lord," answered the clerk, "I will tell thee — Petræ et Rupes" ("Rocks and Cliffs") — a bitter allusion to Peter des Roches.
Moreover, as there is clear evidence that the first half of this story (which on the best manuscript authority belongs to Robert) has been attributed to Roger Bacon by later mediaeval writers, we can hardly be wrong if we bear Fuller's[who?]
Robert Bacon, then, was a Dominican friar in 1233, and to this fact we may add that although an old man upon entering that order he did not desist from his public lectures.
Matthew Paris considers their decease worthy of a place in his history, adding that it was the common opinion of that age that no contemporary writers surpassed or even equalled these two, whether in theology or other branches of learning, and paying a final tribute to their great zeal in the work of public preaching.
It is probable that it is to Robert Bacon and not to Roger that Thomas de Eccleston alludes[1] as having entered the order of friar preachers on the first day without a year's novitiate.
In any case Robert Bacon, the first Dominican writer in England,[2] can hardly fail to have been a friend of Grosseteste, the great patron of the new orders; nor this last to have been acquainted with one who was, as Trivet tells us, the ruling theological power at Oxford.