In the second year of his seclusion, when he found that the King's heart

was still hardened, the fire, not, we are assured by his followers, of

resentment, but of parental love, not zeal for vengeance but for

justice, burned within his soul. Henry was at this time in France. Three

times the exile cited his sovereign with the tone of a superior to

submit to his censure. Becket had communicated his design to his

followers:--"Let us act as the Lord commanded his steward:[97] 'See, I

have set thee over the nations, and over the kingdoms, to root out and

to pull down, and to destroy, and to hew down, to build and to

plant.'"[98] All his hearers applauded his righteous resolution. In the

first message the haughty meaning was veiled in the blandest words,[99]

and sent by a Cistercian of gentle demeanor, named Urban.[100] The King

returned a short and bitter answer. The second time Becket wrote in

severer language, but yet in the spirit, 'tis said, of compassion and

leniency.[101] The King deigned no reply. His third messenger was a

tattered, barefoot friar. To him Becket, it might seem, with studied

insult, not only intrusted his letter to the King, but authorized the

friar to speak in his name. With such a messenger the message was not

likely to lose in asperity. The King returned an answer even more

contemptuous than the address.[102]

[SN: Nov. 11, 1165.]

But this secret arraignment of the King did not content the unquiet

prelate. He could now dare more, unrestrained, unrebuked. Pope Alexander

had been received at Rome with open arms: at the commencement of the

present year all seemed to favor his cause. The Emperor, detained by

wars in Germany, was not prepared to cross the Alps. In the free cities

of Italy, the anti-imperialist feeling, and the growing republicanism,

gladly entered into close confederacy with a Pope at war with the

Emperor. The Pontiff (secretly it should seem, it might be in defiance

or in revenge for Henry's threatened revolt and for the acts of his

ambassadors at Wurtzburg[103]) ventured to grant to Becket a legatine

power over the King's English dominions, except the province of York.

Though it was not in the power of Becket to enter those dominions, it

armed him, as it was thought, with unquestionable authority over Henry

and his subjects. At all events it annulled whatever restraint the Pope,

by counsel or by mandate, had placed on the proceedings of Becket.[104]

The Archbishop took his determination alone.[105] As though to throw an

awful mystery about his plan, he called his wise friends together, and

consulted them on the propriety of resigning his see. With one voice

they rejected the timid counsel. Yet though his most intimate followers

were in ignorance of his designs, some intelligence of a meditated blow

was betrayed to Henry. The King summoned an assembly of prelates at

Chinon. The Bishops of Lisieux and Seez, whom the Archbishop of Rouen,

Rotran, consented to accompany as a mediator, were dispatched to

Pontigny, to anticipate by an appeal to the Pope, any sentence which

might be pronounced by Becket. They did not find him there: he had

already gone to Soissons, on the pretext of a pilgrimage to the shrine

of St. Drausus, a saint whose intercession rendered the warrior

invincible in battle. Did Becket hope thus to secure victory in the

great spiritual combat? One whole night he passed before the shrine of

St. Drausus: another before that of Gregory the Great, the founder of

the English Church, and of the see of Canterbury; and a third before

that of the Virgin, his especial patroness.

[SN: Becket at Vezelay.]

From thence he proceeded to the ancient and famous monastery of

Vezelay.[106] The church of Vezelay, if the dismal decorations of the

architecture are (which is doubtful) of that period, might seem

designated for that fearful ceremony.[107] There, on the feast of the

Ascension,[108] when the church was crowded with worshipers from all

quarters, he ascended the pulpit, and with the utmost solemnity,

condemned and annulled the Constitutions of Clarendon, declared

excommunicate all who observed or enforced their observance, all who had

counseled, and all who had defended them; absolved all the bishops from

the oaths which they had taken to maintain them. This sweeping anathema

involved the whole kingdom. But he proceeded to excommunicate by name

the most active and powerful adversaries: John of Oxford, for his

dealings with the schismatic partisans of the Emperor and of the

Antipope, and for his usurpation of the deanery of Salisbury; Richard of

Ilchester Archdeacon of Poitiers, the colleague of John in his

negotiations at Wurtzburg (thus the cause of Becket and Pope Alexander

were indissolubly welded together); the great Justiciary, Richard de

Luci, and John of Baliol, the authors of the Constitutions of Clarendon;

Randulph de Broc, Hugo de Clare, and others, for their forcible

usurpation of the estates of the see of Canterbury. He yet in his mercy

spared the King (he had received intelligence that Henry was dangerously

ill), and in a lower tone, his voice, as it seemed, half choked with

tears, he uttered his Commination. The whole congregation, even his own

intimate followers, were silent with amazement.

This sentence of excommunication Becket announced to the Pope, and to

all the clergy of England. To the latter he said, "Who presumes to doubt

that the priests of God are the fathers and masters of kings, princes,

and all the faithful?" He commanded Gilbert, Bishop of London, and his

other suffragans, to publish this edict throughout their dioceses. He

did not confine himself to the bishops of England; the Norman prelates,

the Archbishop of Rouen, were expressly warned to withdraw from all

communion with the excommunicate.[109]

[SN: Anger of the King.]

The wrath of Henry drove him almost to madness. No one dared to name

Becket in his presence.[110] Soon after, on the occasion of some

discussion about the King of Scotland, he burst into a fit of passion,

threw away his cap, ungirt his belt, stripped off his clothes, tore the

silken coverlid from his bed, and crouched down on the straw, gnawing

bits of it with his teeth.[111] Proclamation was issued to guard the

ports of England against the threatened interdict. Any one who should be

apprehended as the bearer of such an instrument, if a regular, was to

lose his feet; if a clerk, his eyes, and suffer more shameful

mutilation; a layman was to be hanged; a leper to be burned. A bishop

who left the kingdom, for fear of the interdict, was to carry nothing

with him but his staff. All exiles were to return on pain of losing

their benefices. Priests who refused to chant the service were to be

mutilated, and all rebels to forfeit their lands. An oath was to be

administered by the sheriffs to all adults, that they would respect no

ecclesiastical censure from the Archbishop.

[SN: Becket driven from Pontigny.]

A second time Henry's ungovernable passion betrayed him into a step

which, instead of lowering, only placed his antagonist in a more

formidable position. He determined to drive him from his retreat at

Pontigny. He sent word to the general of the Cistercian order that it

was at their peril, if they harbored a traitor to his throne. The

Cistercians possessed many rich abbeys in England; they dared not defy

at once the King's resentment and rapacity. It was intimated to the

Abbot of Pontigny, that he must dismiss his guest. The Abbot

courteously communicated to Becket the danger incurred by the Order. He

could not but withdraw; but instead now of lurking in a remote

monastery, in some degree secluded from the public gaze, he was received

in the archiepiscopal city of Sens; his honorable residence was prepared

in a monastery close to the city; he lived in ostentatious communication

with the Archbishop William, one of his most zealous partisans.[112]

[SN: Controversy with English clergy.]

But the fury of haughtiness in Becket equaled the fury of resentment in

the King: yet it was not without subtlety. Just before the scene at

Vezelay, it has been said, the King had sent the Archbishop of Rouen and

the Bishop of Lisieux to Pontigny, to lodge his appeal to the Pope.

Becket, duly informed by his emissaries at the court, had taken care to

be absent. He eluded likewise the personal service of the appeal of the

English clergy. An active and violent correspondence ensued. The

remonstrance, purporting to be from the Primate's suffragans and the

whole clergy of England, was not without dignified calmness. With covert

irony, indeed, they said that they had derived great consolation from

the hope that, when abroad, he would cease to rebel against the King and

the peace of the realm; that he would devote his days to study and

prayer, and redeem his lost time by fasting, watching, and weeping; they

reproached him with the former favors of the King, with the design of

estranging the King from Pope Alexander; they asserted the readiness of

the King to do full justice, and concluded by lodging an appeal until

the Ascension-day of the following year.[113] Foliot was no doubt the

author of this remonstrance, and between the Primate and the Bishop

of London broke out a fierce warfare of letters. With Foliot Becket

kept no terms. "You complain that the Bishop of Salisbury has been

excommunicated, without citation, without hearing, without judgment.

Remember the fate of Ucalegon. He trembled when his neighbor's house was

on fire." To Foliot he asserted the pre-eminence, the supremacy, the

divinity of the spiritual power without reserve. "Let not your liege

lord be ashamed to defer to those to whom God himself defers, and calls

them 'Gods.'"[114] Foliot replied with what may be received as the

manifesto of his party, and as the manifesto of a party to be received

with some mistrust, yet singularly curious, as showing the tone of

defence taken by the opponents of the Primate among the English

clergy.[115]

The address of the English prelates to Pope Alexander was more moderate,

and drawn with great ability. It asserted the justice, the obedience to

the Church, the great virtue and (a bold assertion!) the conjugal

fidelity of the King. The King had at once obeyed the citation of the

Bishops of London and Salisbury, concerning some encroachments on the

Church condemned by the Pope. The sole design of Henry had been to

promote good morals, and to maintain the peace of the realm. That peace

had been restored. All resentments had died away, when Becket fiercely

recommenced the strife; in sad and terrible letters had threatened the

King with excommunication, the realm with interdict. He had suspended

the Bishop of Salisbury without trial. "This was the whole of the

cruelty, perversity, malignity of the King against the Church, declaimed

on and bruited abroad throughout the world."[116]

[SN: John of Oxford at Rome.]

The indefatigable John of Oxford was in Rome, perhaps the bearer of this

address. Becket wrote to the Pope, insisting on all the cruelties of the

King; he calls him a malignant tyrant, one full of all malice. He dwelt

especially on the imprisonment of one of his chaplains, for which

violation of the sacred person of a clerk, the King was _ipso facto_

excommunicate. "Christ was crucified anew in Becket."[117] He complained

of the presumption of Foliot, who had usurped the power of primate;[118]

warned the Pope against the wiles of John of Oxford; deprecated the

legatine mission, of which he had already heard a rumor, of William of

Pavia. And all these letters, so unsparing to the King, or copies of

them, probably bought out of the Roman chancery, were regularly

transmitted to the King.

John of Oxford began his mission at Rome by swearing undauntedly, that

nothing had been done at Wurtzburg against the power of the Church or

the interests of Pope Alexander.[119] He surrendered his deanery of

Salisbury into the hands of the Pope, and received it back again.[120]

John of Oxford was armed with more powerful weapons than perjury or

submission, and the times now favored the use of these more irresistible

arms. The Emperor Frederick was levying, if he had not already set in

motion, that mighty army which swept, during the next year, through

Italy, made him master of Rome, and witnessed his coronation and the

enthronement of the Antipope.[121] Henry had now, notwithstanding his

suspicious--more than suspicious--dealings with the Emperor, returned to

his allegiance to Alexander. Vast sums of English money were from this

time expended in strengthening the cause of the Pope. The Guelfic cities

of Italy received them with greedy hands. By the gold of the King of

England, and of the King of Sicily, the Frangipani and the family of

Peter Leonis were retained in their fidelity to the Pope. Becket, on the

other hand, had powerful friends in Rome, especially the Cardinal

Hyacinth, to whom he writes, that Henry had boasted that in Rome

everything was venal. [SN: Dec. 1166.] It was, however, not till a

second embassy arrived, consisting of John Cummin and Ralph of Tamworth,

that Alexander made his great concession, the sign that he was not yet

extricated from his distress. He appointed William of Pavia, and Otho,

Cardinal of St. Nicholas, his legates in France, to decide the

cause.[122] Meantime all Becket's acts were suspended by the papal

authority. At the same time the Pope wrote to Becket, entreating him at

this perilous time of the Church to make all possible concessions, and

to dissemble, if necessary, for the present.[123]

If John of Oxford boasted prematurely of his triumph (on his return

to England he took ostentatious possession of his deanery of

Salisbury[124]), and predicted the utter ruin of Becket, his friends,

especially the King of France,[125] were in utter dismay at this change

in the papal policy. John, as Becket had heard (and his emissaries were

everywhere), on his landing in England, had met the Bishop of Hereford

(one of the wavering bishops), prepared to cross the sea in obedience to

Becket's citation. To him, after some delay, John had exhibited letters

of the Pope, which sent him back to his diocese. On the sight of these

same letters, the Bishop of London had exclaimed in the fullness of his

joy, "Then our Thomas is no longer archbishop!" "If this be true," adds

Becket, "the Pope has given a death-blow to the Church."[126] To the

Archbishop of Mentz, for in the empire he had his ardent admirers, he

poured forth all the bitterness of his soul.[127] Of the two cardinals

he writes, "The one is weak and versatile, the other treacherous and

crafty." He looked to their arrival with indignant apprehension. They

are open to bribes, and may be perverted to any injustice.[128]

John of Oxford had proclaimed that the cardinals, William of Pavia, and

Otho, were invested in full powers to pass judgment between the King and

the Primate.[129] But whether John of Oxford had mistaken or exaggerated

their powers, or the Pope (no improbable case, considering the change of

affairs in Italy) had thought fit afterwards to modify or retract them,

they came rather as mediators than judges, with orders to reconcile the

contending parties, rather than to decide on their cause. The cardinals

did not arrive in France till the autumn of the year.[130] Even before

their arrival, first rumors, then more certain intelligence had been

propagated throughout Christendom of the terrible disaster which had

befallen the Emperor. Barbarossa's career of vengeance and conquest had

been cut short. [SN: A. D. 1167. Flight of Frederick.] The Pope a

prisoner, a fugitive, was unexpectedly released, restored to power, if

not to the possession of Rome.[131] The climate of Rome, as usual, but

in a far more fearful manner, had resented the invasion of the city by

the German army. A pestilence had broken out, which in less than a month

made such havoc among the soldiers, that they could scarcely find room

to bury the dead. The fever seemed to choose its victims among the

higher clergy, the partisans of the Antipope; of the princes and nobles,

the chief victims were the younger Duke Guelf, Duke Frederick of Swabia,

and some others; of the bishops, those of Prague, Ratisbon, Augsburg,

Spires, Verdun, Liege, Zeitz; and the arch-rebel himself, the

antipope-maker, Reginald of Cologne.[132] Throughout Europe the clergy

on the side of Alexander raised a cry of awful exultation; it was God

manifestly avenging himself on the enemies of the Church; the new

Sennacherib (so he is called by Becket) had been smitten in his pride;

and the example of this chastisement of Frederick was a command to the

Church to resist to the last all rebels against her power, to put forth

her spiritual arms, which God would as assuredly support by the same or

more signal wonders. The defeat of Frederick was an admonition to the

Pope to lay bare the sword of Peter, and smite on all sides.[133]

[SN: Becket against the legates.]

There can be no doubt that Becket so interpreted what he deemed a sign

from heaven. But even before the disaster was certainly known he had

determined to show no submission to a judge so partial and so corrupt as

William of Pavia.[134] That cardinal had urged the Pope at Sens to

accept Becket's resignation of his see. Becket would not deign to

disguise his contempt. He wrote a letter so full of violence that John

of Salisbury,[135] to whom it was submitted, persuaded him to destroy

it. A second was little milder; at length he was persuaded to take a

more moderate tone. Yet even then he speaks of the "insolence of princes

lifting up their horn." To Cardinal Otho, on the other hand, his

language borders on adulation.

[SN: Meeting near Gisors.]

The cardinal Legates traveled in slow state. They visited first Becket

at Sens, afterwards King Henry at Rouen. At length a meeting was agreed

on to be held on the borders of the French and English territory,

between Gisors and Trie. The proud Becket was disturbed at being hastily

summoned, when he was unable to muster a sufficient retinue of horsemen

to meet the Italian cardinals. The two kings were there. Of Henry's

prelates the Archbishop of Rouen alone was present at the first

interview. Becket was charged with urging the King of France to war

against his master. [SN: Octave of St. Martin. Nov. 23.] On the

following day the King of France said in the presence of the cardinals,

that this impeachment on Becket's loyalty was false. To all the

persuasions, menaces, entreaties of the cardinals[136] Becket declared

that he would submit, "saving the honor of God, and of the Apostolic

See, the liberty of the Church, the dignity of his person, and the

property of the churches. As to the Customs he declared that he would

rather bow his neck to the executioner than swear to observe them. He

peremptorily demanded his own restoration at once to all the honors and

possessions of his see." The third question was on the appeal of the

bishops. Becket inveighed with bitterness on their treachery towards

him, their servility to the King. "When the shepherds fled all Egypt

returned to idolatry." Becket interpreted these "shepherds" as the

clergy.[137] He compares them to the slaves in the old comedy; he

declared that he would submit to no judgment on that point but that of

the Pope himself.

[SN: The Cardinals before the King.]

The Cardinals proceeded to the King. They were received but coldly at

Argences, not far from Caen, at a great meeting with the Norman and

English prelates. The Bishop of London entered at length into the King's

grievances and his own; Becket's debt to the King,[138] his usurpations

on the see of London. At the close Henry, in tears, entreated the

cardinals to rid him of the troublesome churchman. William of Pavia

wept, or seemed to weep from sympathy. Otho, writes Becket's emissary,

could hardly suppress his laughter. The English prelates afterwards at

Le Mans solemnly renewed their appeal. Their appeal was accompanied

with a letter, in which they complain that Becket would leave them

exposed to the wrath of the King, from which wrath he himself had

fled;[139] of false representations of the Customs, and disregard of all

justice and of the sacred canons in suspending and anathematizing the

clergy without hearing and without trial. William of Pavia gave notice

of the appeal for the next St. Martin's Day (so a year was to elapse),

with command to abstain from all excommunication and interdict of the

kingdom till that day.[140] Both cardinals wrote strongly to the Pope in

favor of the Bishop of London.[141]

[SN: Dec. 29.]

At this suspension Becket wrote to the Pope in a tone of mingled grief

and indignation.[142] He described himself as the most wretched of men;

applied the prophetic description of the Saviour's unequaled sorrow to

himself. He inveighed against William of Pavia:[143] he threw himself on

the justice and compassion of the Pope. But this inhibition was

confirmed by the Pope himself, in answer to another embassage of Henry,

consisting of Clarembold, Prior elect of St. Augustine's, the

Archdeacon of Salisbury, and others.[144] This important favor was

obtained through the interest of Cardinal John of Naples, who expresses

his hope that the insolent Archbishop must at length see that he had no

resource but in submission.

[SN: May 19. Becket to the Pope.]

Becket wrote again and again to the Pope, bitterly complaining that the

successive ambassadors of the King, John of Oxford, John Cummin, the

Prior of St. Augustine's, returned from Rome each with larger

concessions.[145] The Pope acknowledged that the concessions had been

extorted from him. The ambassadors of Henry had threatened to leave the

Papal Court, if their demands were not complied with, in open hostility.

The Pope was still an exile in Benevento,[146] and did not dare to

reoccupy Rome. The Emperor, even after his discomfiture, was still

formidable; he might collect another overwhelming Transalpine force. The

subsidies of Henry to the Italian cities and to the Roman partisans of

the Pope could not be spared. The Pontiff therefore wrote soothing

letters to the King of France and to Becket. He insinuated that these

concessions were but for a time. "For a time!" replied Becket in an

answer full of fire and passion: "and in that time the Church of England

falls utterly to ruin; the property of the Church and the poor is

wrested from her. In that time prelacies and abbacies are confiscated to

the King's use: in that time who will guard the flock when the wolf is

in the fold? This fatal dispensation will be a precedent for all ages.

But for me and my fellow exiles all authority of Rome had ceased

forever in England. There had been no one who had maintained the Pope

against kings and princes." His significant language involves the Pope

himself in the general and unsparing charge of rapacity and venality

with which he brands the court of Rome. "I shall have to give an account

at the last day, where gold and silver are of no avail, nor gifts which

blind the eyes even of the wise."[147] [SN: To the Cardinals.] The same

contemptuous allusions to that notorious venality transpire in a

vehement letter addressed to the College of Cardinals, in which he urges

that his cause is their own; that they are sanctioning a fatal and

irretrievable example to temporal princes; that they are abrogating all

obedience to the Church. "Your gold and silver will not deliver you in

the day of the wrath of the Lord."[148] On the other hand, the King and

the Queen of France wrote in a tone of indignant remonstrance that the

Pope had abandoned the cause of the enemy of their enemy. More than one

of the French prelates who wrote in the same strain declared that their

King, in his resentment, had seriously thought of defection to the

Antipope, and of a close connexion with the Imperial family.[149]

Alexander determined to make another attempt at reconciliation; at least

he should gain time, that precious source of hope to the embarrassed and

irresolute. His mediators were the Prior of Montdieu and Bernard de

Corilo, a monk of Grammont.[150] It was a fortunate time, for just at

this juncture, peace and even amity seemed to be established between the

Kings of France and England. Many of the great Norman and French

prelates and nobles offered themselves as joint mediators with the

commissioners of the Pope.

[SN: Meeting at Montmirail.]

A vast assembly was convened on the day of the Epiphany in the plains

near Montmirail, where in the presence of the two kings and the barons

of each realm the reconciliation was to take place. Becket held a long

conference with the mediators. He proposed, instead of the obnoxious

phrase "saving my order," to substitute "saving the honor of God;"[151]

the mediators of the treaty insisted on his throwing himself on the

King's mercy absolutely and without reservation. With great reluctance

Becket appeared at least to yield: his counselors acquiesced in silence.

With this distinct understanding the Kings of France and England met at

Montmirail, and everything seemed prepared for the final settlement of

this long and obstinate quarrel. [SN: Jan. 6, 1169.] The Kings awaited

the approach of the Primate. But as he was on his way, De Bosham (who

always assumes to himself the credit of suggesting Becket's most haughty

proceedings) whispered in his ear (De Bosham himself asserts this) a

solemn caution, lest he should act over again the fatal scene of

weakness at Clarendon. Becket had not time to answer De Bosham: he

advanced to the King and threw himself at his feet. Henry raised him

instantly from the ground. Becket, standing upright, began to solicit

the clemency of the King. He declared his readiness to submit his whole

cause to the judgment of the two Kings and of the assembled prelates and

nobles. After a pause he added, "Saving the honor of God."[152]

[SN: Treaty broken off.]

At this unexpected breach of his agreement the mediators, even the most

ardent admirers of Becket, stood aghast. Henry, thinking himself duped,

as well he might, broke out into one of his ungovernable fits of anger.

He reproached the Archbishop with arrogance, obstinacy, and ingratitude.

He so far forgot himself as to declare that Becket had displayed all his

magnificence and prodigality as chancellor only to court popularity and

to supplant his king in the affections of his people. Becket listened

with patience, and appealed to the King of France as witness to his

loyalty. Henry fiercely interrupted him. "Mark, Sire (he addressed the

King of France), the infatuation and pride of the man: he pretends to

have been banished, though he fled from his see. He would persuade you

that he is maintaining the cause of the Church, and suffering for the

sake of justice. I have always been willing, and am still willing, to

grant that he should rule his Church with the same liberty as his

predecessors, men not less holy than himself." Even the King of France

seemed shocked at the conduct of Becket. The prelates and nobles, having

in vain labored to bend the inflexible spirit of the Primate, retired in

sullen dissatisfaction. He stood alone. Even John of Poitiers, his most

ardent admirer, followed him to Etampes, and entreated him to yield.

"And you, too," returned Becket, "will you strangle us, and give triumph

to the malignity of our enemies?"[153]

The King of England retired, followed by the Papal Legates, who, though

they held letters of Commination from the Pope,[154] delayed to serve

them on the King. Becket followed the King of France to Montmirail. He

was received by Louis; and Becket put on so cheerful a countenance as to

surprise all present. On his return to Sens, he explained to his

followers that his cause was not only that of the Church, but of

God.[155] He passed among the acclamations of the populace, ignorant of

his duplicity. "Behold the prelate who stood up even before two kings

for the honor of God."

[SN: War of France and England.]

Becket may have had foresight, or even secret information of the

hollowness of the peace between the two kings. Before many days, some

acts of barbarous cruelty by Henry against his rebellious subjects

plunged the two nations again in hostility. The King of France and his

prelates, feeling how nearly they had lost their powerful ally, began

to admire what they called Becket's magnanimity as loudly as they had

censured his obstinacy. The King visited him at Sens: one of the Papal

commissioners, the Monk of Grammont, said privately to Herbert de

Bosham, that he had rather his foot had been cut off than that Becket

should have listened to his advice.[156]

[SN: Excommunication.]

Becket now at once drew the sword and cast away the scabbard. "Cursed is

he that refraineth his sword from blood." This Becket applied to the

spiritual weapon. On Ascension Day he again solemnly excommunicated

Gilbert Foliot Bishop of London, Joscelin of Salisbury, the Archdeacon

of Salisbury, Richard de Luci, Randulph de Broc, and many other of

Henry's most faithful counselors. He announced this excommunication to

the Archbishop of Rouen,[157] and reminded him that whosoever presumed

to communicate with any one of these outlaws of the Church by word, in

meat or drink, or even by salutation, subjected himself thereby to the

same excommunication. The appeal to the Pope he treated with sovereign

contempt. He sternly inhibited Roger of Worcester, who had entreated

permission to communicate with his brethren.[158] "What fellowship is

there between Christ and Belial?" He announced this act to the Pope,

entreating, but with the tone of command, his approbation of the

proceeding. An emissary of Becket had the boldness to enter St. Paul's

Cathedral in London, to thrust the sentence into the hands of the

officiating priest, and then to proclaim with a loud voice, "Know all

men, that Gilbert Bishop of London is excommunicate by Thomas

Archbishop of Canterbury and Legate of the Pope." He escaped with some

difficulty from ill-usage by the people. Foliot immediately summoned

his clergy; explained the illegality, injustice, nullity of an

excommunication without citation, hearing, or trial, and renewed his

appeal to the Pope. The Dean of St. Paul's and all the clergy, excepting

the priests of certain monasteries, joined in the appeal. The Bishop of

Exeter declined, nevertheless he gave to Foliot the kiss of peace.[159]

[SN: Henry's intrigues in Italy.]

King Henry was not without fear at this last desperate blow. He had not

a single chaplain who had not been excommunicated, or was not

virtually under ban for holding intercourse with persons under

excommunication.[160] He continued his active intrigues, his subsidies

in Italy. He bought the support of Milan, Pavia, Cremona, Parma,

Bologna. The Frangipani, the family of Leo, the people of Rome,

were still kept in allegiance to the Pope chiefly by his lavish

payments.[161] He made overtures to the King of Sicily, the Pope's ally,

for a matrimonial alliance with his family: and finally, he urged the

tempting offer to mediate a peace between the Emperor and the Pope.

Reginald of Salisbury boasted that, if the Pope should die, Henry had

the whole College of Cardinals in his pay, and could name his

Pope.[162]

[SN: New Legatine Commission. Mar. 10, 1169.]

But no longer dependent on Henry's largesses to his partisans,

Alexander's affairs wore a more prosperous aspect. He began, yet

cautiously, to show his real bias. He determined to appoint a new

legatine commission, not now rapacious cardinals and avowed partisans of

Henry. The Nuncios were Gratian, a hard and severe canon lawyer, not

likely to swerve from the loftiest claims of the Decretals; and Vivian,

a man of more pliant character, but as far as he was firm in any

principle, disposed to high ecclesiastical views. At the same time he

urged Becket to issue no sentences against the King or the King's

followers; or if, as he hardly believed, he had already done so, to

suspend their powers.

[SN: English prelates waver.]

The terrors of the excommunication were not without their effect in

England. Some of the Bishops began gradually to recede from the King's

party, and to incline to that of the Primate. Hereford had already

attempted to cross the sea. Henry of Winchester was in private

correspondence with Becket: he had throughout secretly supplied him with

money.[163] Becket skillfully labored to awaken his old spirit of

opposition to the Crown. He reminded Winchester of his royal descent,

that he was secure in his powerful connexions; "the impious one would

not dare to strike him, for fear lest his kindred should avenge his

cause."[164] Norwich, Worcester, Chester, even Chichester, more than

wavered. This movement was strengthened by a false step of Foliot, which

exposed all his former proceedings to the charge of irregular ambition.

He began to declare publicly not only that he never swore canonical

obedience to Becket, but to assert the independence of the see of London

and the right of the see of London to the primacy of England. Becket

speaks of this as an act of spiritual parricide: Foliot was another

Absalom.[165] He appealed to the pride and the fears of the Chapter of

Canterbury: he exposed, and called on them to resist, these machinations

of Foliot to degrade the archiepiscopal see. At the same time he warned

all persons to abstain from communion with those who were under his ban;

"for he had accurate information as to all who were guilty of that

offence." Even in France this proceeding strengthened the sympathy with

Becket. The Archbishop of Sens, the Bishops of Troyes, Paris, Noyon,

Auxerre, Boulogne, wrote to the Pope to denounce this audacious impiety

of the Bishop of London.

[SN: Interview of the new Legates with the King. Aug. 23.]

The first interview of the new Papal legates, Gratian and Vivian, with

the King, is described with singular minuteness by a friend of

Becket.[166] On the eve of St. Bartholomew's Day they arrived at

Damport. On their approach, Geoffrey Ridel and Nigel Sackville stole out

of the town. The King, as he came in from hunting, courteously stopped

at the lodging of the Legates: as they were conversing the Prince rode

up with a great blowing of horns from the chase, and presented a whole

stag to the Legates. The next morning the King visited them, accompanied

by the Bishops of Seez and of Rennes. Presently John of Oxford, Reginald

of Salisbury, and the Archdeacon of Llandaff were admitted. The

conference lasted the whole day, sometimes in amity, sometimes in

strife. Just before sunset the King rushed out in wrath, swearing by the

eyes of God that he would not submit to their terms. Gratian firmly

replied, "Think not to threaten us; we come from a court which is

accustomed to command Emperors and Kings." The King then summoned his

barons to witness, together with his chaplains, what fair offers he had

made. He departed somewhat pacified. The eighth day was appointed for

the convention, at which the King and the Archbishop were again to meet

in the presence of the Legates.

[SN: Aug. 31.]

It was held at Bayeux. With the King appeared the Archbishops of Rouen

and Bordeaux, the Bishop of Le Mans, and all the Norman prelates. The

second day arrived one English bishop--Worcester. John of Poitiers kept

prudently away. The Legates presented the Pope's preceding letters in

favor of Becket. The King, after stating his grievances,[167] said, "If

for this man I do anything, on account of the Pope's entreaties, he

ought to be very grateful." The next day at a place called Le Bar, the

King requested the Legates to absolve his chaplains without any oath: on

their refusal, the King mounted his horse, and swore that he would never

listen to the Pope or any one else concerning the restoration of Becket.

The prelates interceded; the Legates partially gave way. The King

dismounted and renewed the conference. At length he consented to the

return of Becket and all the exiles. He seemed delighted at this, and

treated of other affairs. He returned again to the Legates, and demanded

that they, or one of them, or at least some one commissioned by them,

should cross over to England to absolve all who had been excommunicated

by the Primate. Gratian refused this with inflexible obstinacy.

The King was again furious: "I care not an egg for you and your

excommunications." He again mounted his horse, but at the earnest

supplication of the prelates he returned once more. He demanded that

they should write to the Pope to announce his pacific offers. The

Bishops explained to the King that the Legates had at last produced a

positive mandate of the Pope, enjoining their absolute obedience to his

Legates. The King replied, "I know that they will lay my realm under an

interdict, but cannot I, who can take the strongest castle in a day,

seize any ecclesiastic who shall presume to utter such an interdict?"

Some concessions allayed his wrath, and he returned to his offers of

reconciliation. Geoffry Ridel and Nigel Sackville were absolved on the

condition of declaring, with their hands on the Gospels, that they would

obey the commands of the Legates. The King still pressing the visit of

one of the Legates to England, Vivian consented to take the journey. The

bishops were ordered to draw up the treaty; but the King insisted on a

clause "Saving the honor of his Crown." They adjourned to a future day

at Caen. The Bishop of Lisieux, adds the writer, flattered the King; the

Archbishop of Rouen was for God and the Pope.

Two conferences at Caen and at Rouen were equally inconclusive; the King

insisted on the words, "saving the dignity of my Crown." Becket

inquired if he might add "saving the liberty of the Church."[168]

The King threw all the blame of the final rupture on the Legates, who

had agreed, he said, to this clause,[169] but through Becket's influence

withdrew from their word.[170] He reminded the Pope that he had in his

possession letters of his Holiness exempting him and his realm from all

authority of the Primate till he should be received into the royal

favor.[171] "If," he adds, "the Pope refuses my demands, he must

henceforth despair of my good will, and look to other quarters to

protect his realm and his honor." Both parties renewed their appeals,

their intrigues in Rome; Becket's complaints of Rome's venality became

louder.[172]

Becket began again to fulminate his excommunications. Before his

departure Gratian signified to Geoffry Ridel and Nigel Sackville that

their absolution was conditional; if peace was not ratified by

Michaelmas, they were still under the ban. Becket menaced some old, some

new victims, the Dean of Salisbury, John Cummin, the Archdeacon of

Llandaff, and others.[173] But he now took a more decisive and terrible

step. [SN: Nov. 2, 1170.] He wrote to the bishops of England,[174]

commanding them to lay the whole kingdom under interdict; all divine

offices were to cease except baptism, penance, and the viaticum, unless

before the Feast of the Purification the King should have given full

satisfaction for his contumacy to the Church. This was to be done with

closed doors, the laity expelled from the ceremony, with no bell

tolling, no dirge wailing; all church music was to cease. The act was

specially announced to the chapters of Chichester, Lincoln, and Bath. Of

the Pope he demanded that he would treat the King's ambassadors,

Reginald of Salisbury and Richard Barre, one as actually excommunicate,

the other as contaminated by intercourse with the excommunicate.[175]

The menace of the Interdict, with the fear that the Bishops of England,

all but London and Salisbury, might be overawed into publishing it in

their dioceses, threw Henry back into his usual irresolution. There

were other alarming signs. Gratian had returned to Rome, accompanied

by William, Archbishop of Sens, Becket's most faithful admirer.

Rumors spread that William was to return invested in full legatine

powers--William, not only Becket's friend, but the head of the French

hierarchy. If the Interdict should be extended to his French dominions,

and the Excommunication launched against his person, could he depend on

the precarious fidelity of the Norman prelates? Differences had again

arisen with the King of France.[176] Henry was seized with an access of

devotion. [SN: Henry at Paris.] He asked permission to offer his prayers

at the shrines and at the Martyrs' Mount (Montmartre) at Paris. The

pilgrimage would lead to an interview with the King of France, and offer

an occasion of renewing the negotiations with Becket. [SN: Nov. 1169.]

Vivan was hastily summoned to turn back. His vanity was flattered by

the hope of achieving that reconciliation which had failed with Gratian.

He wrote to Becket requesting his presence. Becket, though he suspected

Vivian, yet out of respect to the King of France, consented to approach

as near as Château Corbeil. After the conference with the King of

France, two petitions from Becket, in his usual tone of imperious

humility, were presented to the King of England. The Primate

condescended to entreat the favor of Henry, and the restoration of the

Church of Canterbury, in as ample a form as it was held before his

exile. The second was more brief, but raised a new question of

compensation for loss and damage during the archbishop's absence from

his see.[177] [SN: Negotiations renewed.] Both parties mistrusted each

other; each watched the other's words with captious jealousy. Vivian,

weary of those verbal chicaneries of the King, declared that he had

never met with so mendacious a man in his life.[178] Vivian might have

remembered his own retractations, still more those of Becket on former

occasions. He withdrew from the negotiation; and this conduct, with the

refusal of a gift from Henry (a rare act of virtue), won him the

approbation of Becket. But Becket himself was not yet without mistrust;

he had doubts whether Vivian's report to the Pope would be in the same

spirit. "If it be not, he deserves the doom of the traitor Judas."

Henry at length, agreed that on the question of compensation he would

abide by the sentence of the court of the French King, the judgment of

the Gallican Church, and of the University of Paris.[179] This made so

favorable an impression that Becket could only evade it by declaring

that he had rather come to an amicable agreement with the King than

involve the affair in litigation.

[SN: Kiss of peace.]

At length all difficulties seemed yielding away, when Becket demanded

the customary kiss of peace, as the pledge of reconciliation. Henry

peremptorily refused; he had sworn in his wrath never to grant this

favor to Becket. He was inexorable; and without this guarantee Becket

would not trust the faith of the King. He was reminded, he said, by the

case of the Count of Flanders, that even the kiss of peace did not

secure a revolted subject, Robert de Silian, who, even after this sign

of amity, had been seized and cast into a dungeon. Henry's conduct, if

not the effect of sudden passion or ungovernable aversion, is

inexplicable. Why did he seek this interview, which, if he was insincere

in his desire for reconciliation, could afford but short delay? and from

such oaths he would hardly have refused, for any great purpose of his

own, to receive absolution.[180] On the other hand, it is quite clear

that Becket reckoned on the legatine power of William of Sens and the

terror of the English prelates, who had refused to attend a council in

London to reject the Interdict. He had now full confidence that he could

exact his own terms and humble the King under his feet.[181]

[SN: King's proclamation.]

But the King was resolved to wage war to the utmost. Geoffry Ridel,

Archdeacon of Canterbury, was sent to England with a royal proclamation

containing the following articles:--I. Whosoever shall bring into the

realm any letter from the Pope or the Archbishop of Canterbury is guilty

of high treason. II. Whosoever, whether bishop, clerk, or layman, shall

observe the Interdict, shall be ejected from all his chattels, which are

confiscate to the Crown. III. All clerks absent from England shall

return before the feast of St. Hilary, on pain of forfeiture of all

their revenues. IV. No appeal is to be made to the Pope or Archbishop of

Canterbury under pain of imprisonment and forfeiture of all chattels.

V. All laymen from beyond seas are to be searched, and if anything be

found upon them contrary to the King's honor, they are to be imprisoned;

the same with those who cross to the Continent. VI. If any clerk or monk

shall land in England without passport from the King, or with anything

contrary to his honor, he shall be thrown into prison. VII. No clerk or

monk may cross the seas without the King's passport. The same rule

applied to the clergy of Wales, who were to be expelled from all schools

in England. Lastly, VIII. The sheriffs were to administer an oath to all

freemen throughout England, in open court, that they would obey these

royal mandates, thus abjuring, it is said, all obedience to Thomas,

Archbishop of Canterbury.[182] The bishops, however, declined the oath;

some concealed themselves in their dioceses. Becket addressed a

triumphant or gratulatory letter to his suffragans on their firmness.

"We are now one, except that most hapless Judas, that rotten limb

(Foliot of London), which is severed from us."[183] Another letter is

addressed to the people of England, remonstrating on their impious

abjuration of their pastor, and offering absolution to all who had sworn

through compulsion and repented of their oath.[184] The King and the

Primate thus contested the realm of England.

[SN: The Pope still dubious.]

But the Pope was not yet to be inflamed by Becket's passions, nor quite

disposed to depart from his temporizing policy. John of Oxford was at

the court in Benevento with the Archdeacons of Rouen and Seez. From that

court returned the Archdeacon of Llandaff and Robert de Barre with a

commission to the Archbishop of Rouen and the Bishop of Nevers to make

one more effort for the termination of the difficulties. On the one hand

they were armed with powers, if the King did not accede to his own terms

within forty days after his citation (he had offered a thousand marks as

compensation for all losses), to pronounce an interdict against his

continental dominions; on the other, Becket was exhorted to humble

himself before the King; if Henry was inflexible and declined the

Pope's offered absolution from his oath, to accept the kiss of peace

from the King's son. The King was urged to abolish in due time the

impious and obnoxious Customs. And to these prelates was likewise

intrusted authority to absolve the refractory Bishops of London and

Salisbury.[185] This, however, was not the only object of Henry's new

embassy to the Pope. He had long determined on the coronation of his

eldest son; it had been delayed for various reasons. He seized this

opportunity of reviving a design which would be as well humiliating to

Becket as also of great moment in case the person of the King should be

struck by the thunder of excommunication. The coronation of the King of

England was the undoubted prerogative of the Archbishops of Canterbury,

which had never been invaded without sufficient cause, and Becket was

the last man tamely to surrender so important a right of his see. John

of Oxford was to exert every means (what those means were may be

conjectured rather than proved) to obtain the papal permission for the

Archbishop of York to officiate at that august ceremony.

The absolution of the Bishops of London and Salisbury was an astounding

blow to Becket. He tried to impede it by calling in question the power

of the archbishop to pronounce it without the presence of his colleague.

The archbishop disregarded his remonstrance, and Becket's sentence was

thus annulled by the authority of the Pope. Rumors at the same time

began to spread that the Pope had granted to the Archbishop of York

power to proceed to the coronation. Becket's fury burst all bounds. He

wrote to the Cardinal Albert and to Gratian: "In the court of Rome, now

as ever, Christ is crucified and Barabbas released. The miserable and

blameless exiles are condemned, the sacrilegious, the homicides, the

impenitent thieves are absolved, those whom Peter himself declares that

in his own chair (the world protesting against it) he would have no

power to absolve.[186] Henceforth I commit my cause to God--God alone

can find a remedy. Let those appeal to Rome who triumph over the

innocent and the godly, and return glorying in the ruin of the Church.

For me I am ready to die." Becket's fellow exiles addressed the Cardinal

Albert, denouncing in vehement language the avarice of the court of

Rome, by which they were brought to support the robbers of the Church.

It is no longer King Henry alone who is guilty of this six years'

persecution, but the Church of Rome.[187]

The coronation of the Prince by the Archbishop of York took place in the

Abbey of Westminster on the 15th of June.[188] The assent of the clergy

was given with that of the laity. The Archbishop of York produced a

papal brief, authorising him to perform the ceremony.[189] An inhibitory

letter, if it reached England, only came into the King's hand, and was

suppressed; no one, in fact (as the production of such papal letter, as

well as Becket's protest to the archbishop and to the bishops

collectively and severally, was by the royal proclamation high treason

or at least a misdemeanor) would dare to produce them.

The estrangement seemed now complete, the reconciliation more remote

than ever. The Archbishop of Rouen and the Bishop of Nevers, though

urged to immediate action by Becket and even by the Pope, admitted delay

after delay, first for the voyage of the King to England, and secondly

for his return to Normandy. Becket seemed more and more desperate, the

King more and more resolute. Even after the coronation, it should seem,

Becket wrote to Roger of York,[190] to Henry of Worcester, and even to

Foliot of London, to publish the Interdict in their dioceses. The latter

was a virtual acknowledgment of the legality of his absolution, which in

a long letter to the Bishop of Nevers he had contested:[191] but the

Interdict still hung over the King and the realm; the fidelity of the

clergy was precarious.

[SN: Treaty of Fretteville.]

The reconciliation at last was so sudden as to take the world by

surprise. The clue to this is found in Fitz-Stephen. Some one had

suggested by word or by writing to the King that the Primate would be

less dangerous within than without the realm.[192] The hint flashed

conviction on the King's mind. The two Kings had appointed an interview

at Fretteville, between Chartres and Tours. The Archbishop of Sens

prevailed on Becket to be, unsummoned, in the neighborhood. Some days

after the King seemed persuaded by the Archbishops of Sens and Rouen

and the Bishop of Nevers to hold a conference with Becket.[193] As soon

as they drew near the King rode up, uncovered his head, and saluted the

Prelate with frank courtesy, and after a short conversation between the

two and the Archbishop of Sens, the King withdrew apart with Becket.

Their conference was so long as to try the patience of the spectators,

so familiar that it might seem there had never been discord between

them. Becket took a moderate tone; by his own account he laid the faults

of the King entirely on his evil counselors. After a gentle admonition

to the King on his sins, he urged him to make restitution to the see of

Canterbury. He dwelt strongly on the late usurpation on the rights of

the primacy, on the coronation of the King's son. Henry alleged the

state of the kingdom and the necessity of the measure; he promised that

as his son's queen, the daughter of the King of France, was also to be

crowned, that ceremony should be performed by Becket, and that his son

should again receive his crown from the hands of the Primate.

At the close of the interview Becket sprung from his horse and threw

himself at the King's feet. The King leaped down, and holding his

stirrup compelled the Primate to mount his horse again. In the most

friendly terms he expressed his full reconciliation not only to Becket

himself, but to the wondering and delighted multitude. There seemed an

understanding on both sides to suppress all points which might lead to

disagreement. The King did not dare (so Becket writes triumphantly to

the Pope) to mutter one word about the Customs.[194] Becket was equally

prudent, though he took care that his submission should be so vaguely

worded as to be drawn into no dangerous concession on his part. [SN:

July.] He abstained, too, from all other perilous topics; he left

undecided the amount of satisfaction to the church of Canterbury; and on

these general terms he and the partners of his exile were formally

received into the King's grace. If the King was humiliated by this quiet

and sudden reconcilement with the imperious prelate, to outward

appearance at least he concealed his humiliation by his noble and kingly

manner. If he submitted to the spiritual reproof of the prelate, he

condescended to receive into his favor his refractory subject. Each

maintained prudent silence on all points in dispute. Henry received, but

he also granted pardon. If his concession was really extorted by fear,

not from policy, compassion for Becket's six years' exile might seem not

without influence. If Henry did not allude to the Customs, he did not

annul them; they were still the law of the land. The kiss of peace was

eluded by a vague promise. Becket made a merit of not driving the King

to perjury, but he skillfully avoided this trying test of the King's

sincerity.

[SN: Becket's schemes of vengeance.]

But Becket's revenge must be satisfied with other victims. If the

worldly King could forget the rancor of this long animosity, it was not

so easily appeased in the breast of the Christian Prelate. No doubt

vengeance disguised itself to Becket's mind as the lofty and rightful

assertion of spiritual authority. The opposing prelates must be at his

feet, even under his feet. The first thought of his partisans was not

his return to England with a generous amnesty of all wrongs, or a gentle

reconciliation of the whole clergy, but the condign punishment of those

who had so long been the counselors of the King, and had so recently

officiated in the coronation of his son.

The court of Rome did not refuse to enter into these views, to visit the

offence of those disloyal bishops who had betrayed the interests and

compromised the high principles of churchmen.[195] It was presumed that

the King would not risk a peace so hardly gained for his obsequious

prelates. [SN: Dated Sept. 10.] The lay adherents of the King, even the

plunderers of Church property were spared, some ecclesiastics about his

person, John of Oxford himself escaped censure: but Pope Alexander sent

the decree of suspension against the Archbishop of York, and renewed the

excommunication of London and Salisbury, with whom were joined the

Archdeacon of Canterbury and the Bishop of Rochester, as guilty of

special violation of their allegiance to the Archbishop of Canterbury,

the Bishop of St. Asaph, and some others. Becket himself saw the policy

of altogether separating the cause of the bishops from that of the King.

He requested that some expressions relating to the King's excesses, and

condemnatory of the bishops for swearing to the Customs, should be

suppressed; and the excommunication grounded entirely on their

usurpation of the right of crowning the King.[196]

[SN: Interview at Tours.]

About four months elapsed between the treaty of Fretteville and the

return of Becket to England. They were occupied by these negotiations at

Rome, Veroli, and Ferentino; by discussions with the King, who was

attacked during this period with a dangerous illness; and by the mission

of some of Becket's officers to resume the estates of the see. Becket

had two personal interviews with the King: the first was at Tours,

where, as he was now in the King's dominions, he endeavored to obtain

the kiss of peace. The Archbishop hoped to betray Henry into this favor

during the celebration of the mass, in which it might seem only a part

of the service.[197] Henry was on his guard, and ordered the mass for

the dead, in which the benediction is not pronounced. The King had

received Becket fairly; they parted not without ill-concealed

estrangement. At the second meeting the King seemed more friendly; he

went so far as to say, "Why resist my wishes? I would place everything

in your hands." Becket, in his own words, bethought him of the tempter,

"All these things will I give unto thee, if thou wilt fall down and

worship me."

The King had written to his son in England that the see of Canterbury

should be restored to Becket, as it was three months before his exile.

But there were two strong parties hostile to Becket: the King's officers

who held in sequestration the estates of the see, and seem to have

especially coveted the receipt of the Michaelmas rents; and with these

some of the fierce warrior nobles, who held lands or castles which were

claimed as possessions of the Church of Canterbury. Randulph De Broc,

his old inveterate enemy, was determined not to surrender his castle of

Saltwood. It was reported to Becket, by Becket represented to the King,

that De Broc had sworn that he would have Becket's life before he had

eaten a loaf of bread in England. The castle of Rochester was held on

the same doubtful title by one of his enemies. The second party was that

of the bishops, which was powerful, with a considerable body of the

clergy and laity. They had sufficient influence to urge the King's

officers to take the strongest measures, lest the Papal letters of

excommunication should be introduced into the kingdom.

It is perhaps vain to conjecture, how far, if Becket had returned to

England in the spirit of meekness, forgiveness, and forbearance, not

wielding the thunders of excommunication, nor determined to trample on

his adversaries, and to exact the utmost even of his doubtful rights,

he might have resumed his see, and gradually won back the favor of the

King, the respect and love of the whole hierarchy, and all the

legitimate possessions of his church. But he came not in peace, nor was

he received in peace.[198] [SN: Becket prepares for his return.] It was

not the Archbishop of Rouen, as he had hoped, but his old enemy John of

Oxford, who was commanded by the King to accompany him, and reinstate

him in his see. The King might allege that one so much in the royal

confidence was the best protector of the Archbishop. The money which had

been promised for his voyage was not paid; he was forced to borrow £300

of the Archbishop of Rouen. He went, as he felt, or affected to feel,

with death before his eyes, yet nothing should now separate him from his

long-divided flock. Before his embarkation at Whitsand in Flanders,

he received intelligence that the shores were watched by his enemies,

it was said with designs on his life,[199] but assuredly with

the determination of making a rigid search for the letters of

excommunication.[200] [SN: Letters of excommunication sent before him.]

To secure the safe carriage of one of these perilous documents, the

suspension of the Archbishop of York, it was intrusted to a nun named

Idonea, whom he exhorts, like another Judith, to this holy act, and

promises her as her reward the remission of her sins.[201] Other

contraband letters were conveyed across the Channel by unknown hands,

and were delivered to the bishops before Becket's landing.

The prelates of York and London were at Canterbury when they received

these Papal letters. When the fulminating instruments were read before

them, in which was this passage, "we will fill your faces with

ignominy," their countenances fell. They sent messengers to complain to

Becket, that he came not in peace, but in fire and flame, trampling his

brother bishops under his feet, and making their necks his footstool;

that he had condemned them uncited, unheard, unjudged. "There is no

peace," Becket sternly replied, "but to men of good will."[202] It was

said that London was disposed to humble himself before Becket; but

York,[203] trusting in his wealth, boasted that he had in his power the

Pope, the King, and all their courts.

[SN: Lands at Sandwich. Dec. 1.]

Instead of the port of Dover, where he was expected, Becket's vessel,

with the archiepiscopal banner displayed, cast anchor at Sandwich. Soon

after his landing, appeared in arms the Sheriff of Kent, Randulph de

Broc, and others of his enemies. They searched his baggage, fiercely

demanded that he should absolve the bishops, and endeavored to force the

Archdeacon of Sens, a foreign ecclesiastic, to take an oath to keep the

peace of the realm. John of Oxford was shocked, and repressed their

violence. On his way to Canterbury the country clergy came forth with

their flocks to meet him; they strewed their garments in his way,

chanting, "Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord." [SN: At

Canterbury.] Arrived at Canterbury, he rode at once to the church with a

vast procession of clergy, amid the ringing of the bells, and the

chanting of music. He took his archiepiscopal throne, and afterwards

preached on the text, "Here we have no abiding city." The next morning

came again the Sheriff of Kent, with Randulph de Broc, and the

messengers of the bishops, demanding their absolution.[204] Becket

evaded the question by asserting that the Excommunication was not

pronounced by him, but by his superior the Pope; that he had no power to

abrogate the sentence. This declaration was directly at issue with the

bull of excommunication: if the bishops gave satisfaction to the

Archbishop, he had power to act on behalf of the Pope.[205] But to the

satisfaction which, according to one account, he did demand, that they

should stand a public trial, in other words place themselves at his

mercy, they would not, and hardly could submit. They set out immediately

to the King in Normandy.

The restless Primate was determined to keep alive the popular fervor,

enthusiastically, almost fanatically, on his side. [SN: Goes to

London.] On a pretext of a visit to the young King at Woodstock, to

offer him the present of three beautiful horses, he set forth on a

stately progress. Wherever he went he was received with acclamations and

prayers for his blessings by the clergy and the people. In Rochester

he was entertained by the Bishop with great ceremony. In London

there was the same excitement: he was received in the palace by

the Bishop of Winchester in Southwark. Even there he scattered some

excommunications.[206] The Court took alarm, and sent orders to the

prelate to return to his diocese. Becket obeyed, but alleged as the

cause of his obedience, not the royal command, but his own desire to

celebrate the festival of Christmas in his metropolitan church. The

week passed in holding sittings in his court, where he acted with his

usual promptitude, vigor, and resolution against the intruders into

livings, and upon the encroachments on his estates; and in devotions

most fervent, mortifications most austere.[207]

His rude enemies committed in the mean time all kinds of petty

annoyances, which he had not the loftiness to disdain. Randulph de Broc

seized a vessel laden with rich wine for his use, and imprisoned the

sailors in Pevensey Castle. An order from the court compelled him to

release ship and crew. They robbed the people who carried his

provisions, broke into his park, hunted his deer, beat his retainers;

and, at the instigation of Randulph's brother, Robert de Broc, a

ruffian, a renegade monk, cut off the tail of one of his state horses.

On Christmas day Becket preached on the appropriate text, "Peace on

earth, good will towards men." The sermon agreed ill with the text. He

spoke of one of his predecessors, St. Alphege, who had suffered

martyrdom. "There may soon be a second." He then burst out into a

fierce, impetuous, terrible tone, arraigned the courtiers, and closed

with a fulminating excommunication against Nigel de Sackville, who had

refused to give up a benefice into which, in Becket's judgment, he had

intruded, and against Randulph and Robert de Broc. The maimed horse was

not forgotten. He renewed in the most vehement language the censure on

the bishops, dashed the candle on the pavement in token of their utter

extinction, and then proceeded to the mass at the altar.[208]

[SN: The bishops with the King.]

In the mean time the excommunicated prelates had sought the King in the

neighborhood of Bayeux; they implored his protection for themselves and

the clergy of the realm. "If all are to be visited by spiritual

censures," said the King, "who officiated at the coronation of my son,

by the eyes of God, I am equally guilty." The whole conduct of Becket

since his return was detailed, and no doubt deeply darkened by the

hostility of his adversaries. All had been done with an insolent and

seditious design of alienating the affections of the people from the

King. Henry demanded counsel of the prelates; they declared themselves

unable to give it. But one incautiously said, "So long as Thomas lives,

you will never be at peace." The King broke out into one of his terrible

constitutional fits of passion; and at length let fall the fatal words,

"Have I none of my thankless and cowardly courtiers who will relieve me

from the insults of one low-born and turbulent priest?"

[SN: The King's fatal words.]

These words were not likely to fall unheard on the ears of fierce, and

warlike men, reckless of bloodshed, possessed with a strong sense of

their feudal allegiance, and eager to secure to themselves the reward of

desperate service. Four knights, chamberlains of the King, Reginald

Fitz-Urse, William de Tracy, Hugh de Moreville, and Reginald Brito,

disappeared from the court.[209] On the morrow, when a grave council was

held, some barons are said, even there, to have advised the death of

Becket. Milder measures were adopted: the Earl of Mandeville was sent

off with orders to arrest the Primate; and as the disappearance of these

four knights could not be unmarked, to stop them in the course of any

unauthorized enterprise.

But murder travels faster than justice or mercy. They were almost

already on the shores of England. It is said that they met in Saltwood

Castle. On the 28th of December, having, by the aid of Randulph de Broc,

collected some troops in the streets of Canterbury, they took up their

quarters with Clarembold, Abbot of St. Augustine's.

The assassination of Becket has something appalling, with all its

terrible circumstances seen in the remote past. What was it in its own

age? The most distinguished churchman in Christendom, the champion of

the great sacerdotal order, almost in the hour of his triumph over the

most powerful king in Europe; a man, besides the awful sanctity inherent

in the person of every ecclesiastic, of most saintly holiness; soon

after the most solemn festival of the Church, in his own cathedral, not

only sacrilegiously, but cruelly murdered, with every mark of hatred and

insult. Becket had all the dauntlessness, none of the meekness of the

martyr; but while his dauntlessness would command boundless admiration,

few, if any, would seek the more genuine sign of Christian martyrdom.

[SN: The knights before Becket.]

The four knights do not seem to have deliberately determined on their

proceedings, or to have resolved, except in extremity, on the murder.

They entered, but unarmed, the outer chamber.[210] The Archbishop had

just dined, and withdrawn from the hall. They were offered food, as was

the usage; they declined, thirsting, says one of the biographers, for

blood. The Archbishop obeyed the summons to hear a message from the

King; they were admitted to his presence. As they entered, there was no

salutation on either side, till the Primate having surveyed, perhaps

recognized them, moved to them with cold courtesy. Fitz-Urse was the

spokesman in the fierce altercation which ensued. Becket replied with

haughty firmness. Fitz-Urse began by reproaching him with his

ingratitude and seditious disloyalty in opposing the coronation of the

King's son, and commanded him, in instant obedience to the King, to

absolve the prelates. Becket protested that so far from wishing to

diminish the power of the King's son, he would have given him three

crowns and the most splendid realm. For the excommunicated bishops he

persisted in his usual evasion that they had been suspended by the Pope,

by the Pope alone could they be absolved; nor had they yet offered

proper satisfaction. "It is the King's command," spake Fitz-Urse, "that

you and the rest of your disloyal followers leave the kingdom."[211] "It

becomes not the King to utter such command: henceforth no power on earth

shall separate me from my flock." "You have presumed to excommunicate,

without consulting the King, the King's servant's and officers." "Nor

will I ever spare the man who violates the canons of Rome, or the rights

of the Church." "From whom do you hold your archbishopric?" "My

spirituals from God and the Pope, my temporals from the King." "Do you

not hold all from the King?" "Render unto Cæsar the things that are

Cæsar's, and unto God the things that are God's." "You speak in peril of

your life!" "Come ye to murder me? I defy you, and will meet you front

to front in the battle of the Lord." He added, that some among them had

sworn fealty to him. At this, it is said, they grew furious, and gnashed

with their teeth. The prudent John of Salisbury heard with regret this

intemperate language: "Would it may end well!" Fitz-Urse shouted aloud,

"In the King's name I enjoin you all, clerks and monks, to arrest this

man, till the King shall have done justice on his body." They rushed

out, calling for their arms.

His friends had more fear for Becket than Becket for himself. The gates

were closed and barred, but presently sounds were heard of those

without, striving to break in. The lawless Randulph de Broc was hewing

at the door with an axe. All around Becket was the confusion of terror:

he only was calm. Again spoke John of Salisbury with his cold

prudence--"Thou wilt never take counsel: they seek thy life." "I am

prepared to die." "We who are sinners are not so weary of life." "God's

will be done." The sounds without grew wilder. All around him entreated

Becket to seek sanctuary in the church. He refused, whether from

religious reluctance that the holy place should be stained with his

blood, or from the nobler motive of sparing his assassins this deep

aggravation of their crime. They urged that the bell was already tolling

for vespers. He seemed to give a reluctant consent; but he would not

move without the dignity of his crosier carried before him. [SN: Becket

in the Church.] With gentle compulsion they half drew, half carried him

through a private chamber, they in all the hasty agony of terror, he

striving to maintain his solemn state, into the church. The din of the

armed men was ringing in the cloister. The affrighted monks broke off

the service; some hastened to close the doors; Becket commanded them to

desist--"No one should be debarred from entering the house of God." John

of Salisbury and the rest fled and hid themselves behind the altars and

in other dark places. The Archbishop might have escaped into the dark

and intricate crypt, or into a chapel in the roof. There remained only

the Canon Robert (of Merton), Fitz-Stephen, and the faithful Edward

Grim. Becket stood between the altar of St. Benedict and that of the

Virgin.[212] It was thought that Becket contemplated taking his seat on

his archiepiscopal throne near the high altar.

[SN: The murder.]

Through the open door of the cloister came rushing in the four, fully

armed, some with axes in their hands, with two or three wild followers,

through the dim and bewildering twilight. The knights shouted aloud,

"Where is the traitor?"--No answer came back.--"Where is the

Archbishop?" "Behold me, no traitor, but a priest of God!" Another

fierce and rapid altercation followed: they demanded the absolution of

the bishops, his own surrender to the King's justice. They strove to

seize him and to drag him forth from the church (even they had awe of

the holy place), either to kill him without, or to carry him in bonds to

the King. He clung to the pillar. In the struggle he grappled with De

Tracy, and with desperate strength dashed him on the pavement. His

passion rose; he called Fitz-Urse by a foul name, a pander. These were

almost his last words (how unlike those of Stephen and the greater than

Stephen!) He taunted Fitz-Urse with his fealty sworn to himself. "I owe

no fealty but to my King!" returned the maddened soldier, and struck the

first blow. Edward Grim interposed his arm, which was almost severed

off. The sword struck Becket, but slightly, on the head. Becket received

it in an attitude of prayer--"Lord, receive my spirit," with an

ejaculation to the Saints of the Church. Blow followed blow (Tracy seems

to have dealt the first mortal wound), till all, unless perhaps De

Moreville, had wreaked their vengeance. The last, that of Richard de

Brito, smote off a piece of his skull. Hugh of Horsea, their follower, a

renegade priest surnamed Mauclerk, set his heel upon his neck, and

crushed out the blood and brains. "Away!" said the brutal ruffian,

"it is time that we were gone." They rushed out to plunder the

archiepiscopal palace.

[SN: The Body.]

The mangled body was left on the pavement; and when his affrighted

followers ventured to approach to perform their last offices, an

incident occurred which, however incongruous, is too characteristic to

be suppressed. Amid their adoring awe at his courage and constancy,

their profound sorrow for his loss, they broke out into a rapture of

wonder and delight on discovering not merely that his whole body was

swathed in the coarsest sackcloth, but that his lower garments were

swarming with vermin. From that moment miracles began. Even the populace

had before been divided; voices had been heard among the crowd denying

him to be a martyr; he was but the victim of his own obstinacy.[213] The

Archbishop of York even after this dared to preach that it was a

judgment of God against Becket--that "he perished, like Pharaoh, in his

pride."[214] But the torrent swept away at once all this resistance. The

Government inhibited the miracles, but faith in miracles scorns

obedience to human laws. The Passion of the Martyr Thomas was saddened

and glorified every day with new incidents of its atrocity, of his holy

firmness, of wonders wrought by his remains.

[SN: Effects of the murder.]

The horror of Becket's murder ran throughout Christendom. At first, of

course, it was attributed to Henry's direct orders. Universal hatred

branded the King of England with a kind of outlawry, a spontaneous

excommunication. William of Sens, though the attached friend of Becket,

probably does not exaggerate the public sentiment when he describes

this deed as surpassing the cruelty of Herod, the perfidy of Julian,

the sacrilege of the traitor Judas.[215]

It were injustice to King Henry not to suppose that with the dread as to

the consequences of this act must have mingled some reminiscences of the

gallant friend and companion of his youth and of the faithful minister,

as well as religious horror at a cruel murder, so savagely and impiously

executed.[216] He shut himself for three days in his chamber,

obstinately refused all food and comfort, till his attendants began to

fear for his life. He issued orders for the apprehension of the

murderers,[217] and dispatched envoys to the Pope to exculpate himself

from all participation or cognizance of the crime. His ambassadors found

the Pope at Tusculum: they were at first sternly refused an audience.

The afflicted and indignant Pope was hardly prevailed on to permit the

execrated name of the King of England to be uttered before him. The

cardinals still friendly to the King with difficulty obtained knowledge

of Alexander's determination. It was, on a fixed day, to pronounce with

the utmost solemnity, excommunication against the King by name, and an

interdict on all his dominions, on the Continent as well as in England.

The ambassadors hardly obtained the abandonment of this fearful purpose,

by swearing that the King would submit in all things to the judgment of

his Holiness. With difficulty the terms of reconciliation were arranged.

[SN: Reconciliation at Avranches.]

In the Cathedral of Avranches in Normandy, in the presence of the

Cardinals Theodin of Porto, and Albert the Chancellor, Legates for that

especial purpose, Henry swore on the Gospels that he had neither

commanded nor desired the death of Becket; that it had caused him

sorrow, not joy; he had not grieved so deeply for the death of his

father or his mother.[218] He stipulated--I. To maintain two hundred

knights at his own cost in the Holy Land. II. To abrogate the Statutes

of Clarendon, and all bad customs introduced during his reign.[219] III.

That he would reinvest the Church of Canterbury in all its rights and

possessions, and pardon and restore to their estates all who had

incurred his wrath in the cause of the Primate. IV. If the Pope should

require it, he would himself make a crusade against the Saracens in

Spain. [SN: Ascension Day, May 22, 1172.] In the porch of the church he

was reconciled, but with no ignominous ceremony.

Throughout the later and the darker part of Henry's reign the clergy

took care to inculcate, and the people were prone enough to believe,

that all his disasters and calamities, the rebellion of his wife and of

his sons, were judgments of God for the persecution if not the murder

of the Martyr Thomas. The strong mind of Henry himself, depressed by

misfortune and by the estrangement of his children, acknowledged with

superstitious awe the justice of their conclusions. Heaven, the Martyr

in Heaven, must be appeased by a public humiliating penance. The deeper

the degradation the more valuable the atonement. In less than three

years after his death the King visited the tomb of Becket, by this time

a canonized saint, renowned not only throughout England for his

wonder-working powers, but to the limits of Christendom. [SN: Penance at

Canterbury. Friday, July 12, 1174.] As soon as he came near enough to

see the towers of Canterbury, the King dismounted from his horse, and

for three miles walked with bare and bleeding feet along the flinty

road. The tomb of the Saint was then in the crypt beneath the church.

The King threw himself prostrate before it. The Bishop of London

(Foliot) preached; he declared to the wondering multitude that on his

solemn oath the King was entirely guiltless of the murder of the Saint:

but as his hasty words had been the innocent cause of the crime, he

submitted in lowly obedience to the penance of the Church. The haughty

monarch then prayed to be scourged by the willing monks. From the one

end of the church to the other each ecclesiastic present gratified his

pride, and thought that he performed his duty, by giving a few

stripes.[220] The King passed calmly through this rude discipline, and

then spent a night and a day in prayers and tears, imploring the

intercession in Heaven of him whom, he thought not now on how just

grounds, he had pursued with relentless animosity on earth.[221]

Thus Becket obtained by his death that triumph for which he would

perhaps have struggled in vain through a long life. He was now a Saint,

and for some centuries the most popular Saint in England: among the

people, from a generous indignation at his barbarous murder, from the

fame of his austerities and his charities, no doubt from admiration of

his bold resistance to the kingly power; among the clergy as the

champion, the martyr of their order. Even if the clergy had had no

interest in the miracles at the tomb of Becket, the high-strung faith of

the people would have wrought them almost without suggestion or

assistance. Cures would have been made or imagined; the latent powers of

diseased or paralyzed bodies would have been quickened into action.

Belief, and the fear of disbelieving, would have multiplied one

extraordinary event into a hundred; fraud would be outbid by zeal; the

invention of the crafty, even if what may seem invention was not more

often ignorance and credulity, would be outrun by the demands of

superstition. There is no calculating the extent and effects of these

epidemic outbursts of passionate religion.[222]

[SN: Becket martyr of the clergy.]

Becket was indeed the martyr of the clergy, not of the Church; of

sacerdotal power, not of Christianity; of a caste, not of mankind.[223]

From beginning to end it was a strife for the authority, the immunities,

the possessions of the clergy.[224] The liberty of the Church was the

exemption of the clergy from law; the vindication of their separate,

exclusive, distinctive existence from the rest of mankind. It was a

sacrifice to the deified self; not the individual self, but self as the

centre and representative of a great corporation. Here and there in the

long full correspondence there is some slight allusion to the miseries

of the people in being deprived of the services of the exiled bishops

and clergy:[225] "there is no one to ordain clergy, to consecrate

virgins:" the confiscated property is said to be a robbery of the poor:

yet in general the sole object in dispute was the absolute immunity of

the clergy from civil jurisdiction,[226] the right of appeal from the

temporal sovereign to Rome, and the asserted superiority of the

spiritual rulers in every respect over the temporal power. There might,

indeed, be latent advantages to mankind, social, moral, and religious,

in this secluded sanctity of one class of men; it might be well that

there should be a barrier against the fierce and ruffian violence of

kings and barons; that somewhere freedom should find a voice, and some

protest be made against the despotism of arms, especially in a

newly-conquered country like England, where the kingly and aristocratic

power was still foreign: above all, that there should be a caste, not an

hereditary one, into which ability might force its way up, from the most

low-born, even from the servile rank; but the liberties of the Church,

as they were called, were but the establishment of one tyranny--a

milder, perhaps, but not less rapacious tyranny--instead of another; a

tyranny which aspired to uncontrolled, irresponsible rule, nor was above

the inevitable evil produced on rulers as well as on subjects, from the

consciousness of arbitrary and autocratic power.

[SN: Verdict of posterity.]

Reflective posterity may perhaps consider as not the least remarkable

point in this lofty and tragic strife that it was but a strife for

power. Henry II. was a sovereign who, with many noble and kingly

qualities, lived, more than even most monarchs of his age, in direct

violation of every Christian precept of justice, humanity, conjugal

fidelity. He was lustful, cruel, treacherous, arbitrary. But throughout

this contest there is no remonstrance whatever from Primate or Pope

against his disobedience to the laws of God, only to those of the

Church. Becket _might_, indeed, if he had retained his full and

acknowledged religious power, have rebuked the vices, protected the

subjects, interceded for the victims of the King's unbridled passions.

It must be acknowledged by all that he did not take the wisest course to

secure this which might have been beneficent influence. But as to what

appears, if the King would have consented to allow the churchmen to

despise all law--if he had not insisted on hanging priests guilty of

homicide as freely as laymen--he might have gone on unreproved in his

career of ambition; he might unrebuked have seduced or ravished the

wives and daughters of his nobles; extorted, without remonstrance of the

Clergy any revenue from his subjects, if he had kept his hands from the

treasures of the Church. Henry's real tyranny was not (would it in any

case have been?) the object of the churchman's censure, oppugnancy, or

resistance. The cruel and ambitious and rapacious King would doubtless

have lived unexcommunicated and died with plenary absolution.