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Abp. Cant.

BECKET, church; but finding they could not do it without difficulty, they murdered him there. When he perceived what they were resolved on, he stooped his head to their swords; and, though he received several wounds before he was dispatched, he neither gave a groan nor offered to avoid a stroke; but one Edward Grimfere, a clergyman, belonging to the cathedral, when he perceived one of them make a blow at the archbishop's head, interposed his arm, and had it almost cut off 5.

Chronic. Gervas. col. 1414, 1415. Hoveden, fol. 298.

The murderers,

The assassins, after the murder, were afraid they had gone too far, and durst not return to the king's court in Normandy; they chose rather to retire to Knaresborough, in Yorkshire, a town of Hugh Morvill's; here they continued till they found themselves the aversion and contempt of the country, for everybody avoided their conversation, and would neither eat nor drink with them; at last, being tired everybody, with solitude and disregard, and struck with remorse of conscience, they took a voyage to Rome; and being admitted to penance by pope Alexander III., they went to Jerusalem, and, according to the pope's order, spent their lives in penitential austerities, and died in the Black Mountain. They were buried at Jerusalem, without the

avoided by

repent.

46

The tragical fate of Becket was the natural effect of the dissension and hostility that had so long embroiled the papal and royal authorities. Such vehement antagonisms could hardly fail to produce a crisis of this fatal character, whenever there was a king impetuous, or a primate haughty and ambitious, as Henry and his archbishop. A stricter attention to the great rule of ecclesiastical policy in Europe would have prevented so dreadful a result. The doctrine, “ that what the pope is to the Italian states of the Church that are emperors and kings to their own particular dominions," would have prohibited this interference on one side, and retaliation on the other. The pernicious sophistry, which represented the British crown as a merely secular power, was the occasion of all these disorders— the premises being intensely false, the conclusion was intensely disastrous. Thank God, the reverential loyalty which the Bible enjoins towards the monarch is once more recovering its ascendancy, and the more enlightened writers are setting forth the true theory of our constitution with great honesty and perseverance. From one of them we quote the following declaration:-"The queen, as head of the Church in Britain, is above and prior to all sectarian manifestations of religion. She is, in fact, the visible head of religion in the British empire. It is here that the true responsibility of the monarch begins, and here, therefore, that the personal supremacy of the monarch comes into play. Woe be to him who would here attempt to control the monarch's will. Here the monarch is only responsible to conscience and to God. Here is the true sphere of the monarch's responsibility. Our monarchs have been made to feel it here, and here alone. Witness the shades of Charles I. and James II. Both condescended to party, and became the sacrifice. Maintain an independence of party and the monarch is safe."

church door belonging to the Templars; with this inscrip- HENRY

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"Hic jacent miseri qui martyrizaverunt Beatum Thomam archiepiscopum Cantuariensem."

"Here lie the wretches who assassinated St. Thomas, archbishop of Canterbury."

II.

K. of Eng

Hoveden, fol. 299.

Becket's ex

part of his

371.

A word or two concerning this archbishop's extraction, Archbishop and the first part of his life, yet unmentioned, may not be traction, unacceptable to the reader. Thomas Becket, then, was the and the first son of Gilbert, sheriff of London. He had the first part of life. his education in that city, and was afterwards sent to Paris for farther improvement. Upon his return he was made townclerk, which office he managed to general satisfaction. Being Fitz-Stephen, p. 1. a person of proficiency and parts, he was recommended to Theobald, archbishop of Canterbury. This prelate sent him to Bononia, in Italy, to study the civil law, and afterwards made use of him in several employments to the court of Rome. After some time, he was ordained deacon by archbishop Theobald, and preferred to the archdeaconry of Canterbury; which then, next to bishopricks and abbacies, was reckoned the best Church preferment in England, being valued at a hundred pounds per annum. I have already mentioned by what interest Becket was preferred to the king's favour, and made chancellor of England; and shall only add, that he was very popular in this office. His house was a kind of prince's court, whither many persons of the highest quality sent their sons for education; several noble- Idem, p. men, and abundance of knights did homage to him for their estates. He was very generous and openhanded. His hospitality and splendid entertainment were such, that he was extremely beloved by all sorts of people.

Idem, p. 7.

service he

When king Henry set up his claim to the earldom of Toulouse, in right of Eleanor, his queen, and marched his army into that country, he took Becket along with him. In this The great expedition the chancellor had seven hundred knights, or did the gentlemen, in his retinue, well mounted. Over and above king in the war against these, he had twelve hundred other horse in his pay, besides France. four thousand servientes, entertained for a month, whether phen, p. 8. horse or foot is somewhat uncertain. Had the king of Eng- Idem, p. 9.

Fitz-Ste

Ibid.

BECKET, land followed the chancellor's advice, he had made himself Abp. Cant. master of the capital, Toulouse, and taken the king of France prisoner. But being a homager to the crown of France for the duchy of Normandy and several earldoms in that kingdom, he was overruled by an excessive regard to king Lewis's person, would by no means besiege his sovereign, and so a great opportunity of ending the war was lost. However, king Henry took the city of Cahors, and several castles in the neighbourhood of Toulouse. But the earls in his army refused to stay with their forces and undertake the government of these new acquisitions, none but Henry of Essex, the constable of England, and the chancellor, remaining upon the spot. These two great men, after the king had marched back into Normandy, took three castles which seemed impregnable. And here the chancellor appeared in a military character, was always in the action, and, after the taking of the three castles, passed the Garonne, reduced all that country, and then, waiting on the king, was received with extraordinary marks of esteem. In this war, the chancellor, tilting with one Engelram de Trie, a French knight, dismounted him, and brought off his horse. It was likewise observed that the chancellor's troops were always the most forward to charge the enemy, and venture upon the boldest service. The rest of Becket's life has been mentioned already, and therefore I shall proceed no farIdem, p. 9. ther.

The controversy be

tween the

king and

archbishop briefly en

As to the dispute which made so much noise in Europe, and proved the occasion of the archbishop's death, I shall not pretend to determine that point; most of the authors who wrote in his time, or near it, justify his conduct quired into. throughout, make him a glorious martyr, and flourish mightily about the miracles wrought by him after his death. Harpsfield, Baronius, and Alford, are much of this sentiment. On the other hand, Jocelin, Fox, Fuller, and Prinne, sink his character to a great disadvantage, and give Prinne's a dark complexion to his memory. Now, to assist the Records, vol. 2 and 3. reader to disentangle the difficulty a little, and form something of a judgment upon the case, I shall make some brief observations; from these, I conceive, the truth will be found betwixt the two extremes, and that he was neither so great a saint as the first, nor so great a sinner as the latter

Antiquit.
Britan. in
Becket,

II.

would make him. And that, as one side strained the privi- HENRY leges of the Church too high, so the others seem prepossessed K. of Eng. in favour of the crown, and laid too much weight in the secular scale.

To give some farther light, therefore, into this matter, I shall touch upon these three points:

First, I shall briefly examine the beginning of the controversy, relating to the trying of clerks in the king's

courts.

Secondly, I shall remark something with reference to the Constitutions of Clarendon.

Thirdly, I shall consider archbishop Becket's conduct upon the farther progress of the dispute between the king and him.

First, the beginning of the controversy between the king and the archbishop was this. The king required, that clerks guilty of felony, or any other crimes against the government, should be first degraded by their ordinary, and then put in the hands of the secular magistrate, to be tried in the king's courts. The archbishop thought this method Vid. supra. a breach of the canons, and an oppression of the liberties of the Church. For this reason he insistedt hat, for the Fitz-Stephen, p. first fault, they might be secured in the bishop's prison, 15, 16. tried in his court, forfeit their character upon conviction, and be put under what farther discipline he should think fit. And in case they proved malefactors a second time, they were to lose their former protection, and be prosecuted Hoveden, in the king's courts.

fol. 282.

to be con

To bring this question to an issue, we are to consider The clergy the clergy under their two capacities; first, as they are part sidered unof the hierarchy, and, secondly, as they are members of the der two cacommonwealth.

If any dispute touches them under their first distinction; if any objection is brought against the validity of their orders; if they are charged with heterodoxy, or any misbehaviour in their function, the cause, without doubt, will lie within the spiritual jurisdiction: they must be tried by those who gave them their character, and to whom our Saviour has intrusted the government of the Church.

That this was the practice of the primitive Church, appears by abundance of instances. To mention some few of

VOL. II.

Y

pacities.

372.

Abp. Cant.

Neque

atque usur

tent se cau

corum. Hi

stant.

bros. vid.

De Marca

Sacerd. et

c. 7. Ambros.

plead an ex

BECKET, them: St. Hilary, in his remonstrance to the emperor Constantius, puts him in mind, that the governors of provinces posthac and secular judges were only to concern themselves with the præsumant business of the government; that they were bound in conpent et pu- science not to encroach upon spiritual jurisdiction, nor take sas cognos- cognizance of the clergy in matters relating to their function. cere cleri- Thus Valentinian, in his rescript, declares expressly, where lar. ad Con- points of faith are in dispute, or any other matter within the Apud Am- ecclesiastical function, the cause ought to be tried by none but those of the same character and distinction. To the de Concord. same purpose Honorius, in a letter to his brother, the emImper. 1. 2. peror Arcadius, complaining of the banishment of St. Chrysostom by that prince, suggests, by way of expostulation, Ep. 32. that when the controversy concerns religion, the bishops They cannot were to determine the dispute. "The settling these matters," emption says he, "belongs to them; they are the proper interpreters of the divine will. As for us, we are to acquiesce in their decisions, and practise accordingly." To this we may add the govern- a testimony from the general council of Chalcedon, where it is affirmed, that when articles relating to the breach of the canons are under trial, no secular judges, nor any of the rum inter- laity, ought to sit upon the bench. The emperor Justinian pretatio; ad is entirely of the same opinion, and points at the ground and religionis reason of the law. "If," says he, "the crime happens to be obsequium. Epist. Ho- against the discipline, doctrine, or government of the nor. ad Ar- Church, the bishop must try the cause; neither are the proConcil. vincial judges to intermeddle in the matter; for we will not Chalcedon, allow the secular magistracy to take cognizance of things of this nature, for such business ought to be left to the spiritual jurisdiction, and the offending persons corrected by ecclesiastical censures. Thus the laws of religion direct, neither is it any discredit to the constitutions of the empire to be Novell. 83. governed by them."

from the civil courts without a

grant from

ment.

Ad illos

enim divi

narum

nos spectat

cad.

Act. 3.

But then, secondly, as the clergy are members of the commonwealth, they are subject to the laws of the realm no less than others. From hence the consequence will be, that in matters of property, and crimes against justice and government, the clergy will be obliged to own the authority of the state, and abide by the sentence of the civil magistrate. I say, they will be obliged to this submission, unless they can plead an exemption granted by the government; this,

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