the secular courts for punishment. He required that the Church would do with such of its own members as had committed murder or any other atrocious breach of the laws, what it was ready and eager to do with them in cases of heresy. And in this quarrelt it was that Becket first bearded his Sovereign! You have candidly admitted that what Henry required on this head was "perhaps very proper;" but you contend that it was contrary to the existing law. And concerning the Constitutions of Clarendon, you adduce Turner as an authority in your favour. "In justice to Becket," says that learned and discriminating writer," it must be admitted that these famous articles completely changed the legal and civil state of the clergy, and were an actual subversion, as far as they went, of the papal policy so boldly introduced by Gregory VII." I am obliged to Mr. * Lyttelton, iv. 16. † Fuller has a characteristic remark upon the assertion that Becket died pro grege. "He did not," says he, " die for feeding his flock, for any fundamental point of religion, or for defending his flock against the wolf of any dangerous doctrine; but merely he died for his flock: namely, that the sheep thereof (though ever so scabbed) might not be dressed with tar, and other proper, but sharp and smarting medicines."-Church History, b. iii. p. 35. + Page 86. Townsend for remarking that you have quoted one half only of this passage to prove a point which is confuted by the remainder. For the upright historian whom you have alleged, proceeds to say, "these new constitutions abolished that independence on the legal tribunals of the country, which William had unwarily permitted,† and they again subjected the clergy, as in the Anglo-Saxon times, to the common law of the land." And I have shown that these constitutions were drawn up as a recognition of the laws in use under Henry I., the object being by that recognition to put an end to immunities which had been usurped. I pass over for the present your curious remarks upon the "penitential austerities" which Becket practised immediately after his consecration. A more fitting opportunity for commenting upon that subject will occur hereafter. Some questions which you have put, Sir, it is not necessary to answer, because they can only have arisen from a misapprehension of the passage in the Book of the Church to which they allude. But when you§ demand with a tone of triumph, "whose memory should the present * Accusations of History against the Church of Rome, p. 75. Note. prelacy of the Established Church of England most respect,.. the memory of Becket, who preserved the possessions of his see; or the memory of those prelates so eloquently praised by you in a further part of your work, who in the reigns of Edward VI. and Elizabeth so liberally complimented away large portions of them to their Sovereign?"..I can only wonder at the question, and suppose that he who accuses those prelates of complimenting away the possessions of their sees to the crown, must be very little acquainted with the records of those times. Their vindication is to be found in their history, as it appears in the faithful compilations of good old John Strype, one of those humble and happy-minded men who, by diligently labouring in the fields of literature, find while they live an enjoyment from which time takes away nothing of its relish, and secure for themselves an honourable and lasting remembrance in the gratitude of posterity. "Some candid Protestants," you say, "have done justice to Becket's memory." Some candid Romanists will include me, Sir, in such an acknowledgement. Having always endeavoured in my historical writings to render honour where honour is due, and always allowed full weight to those motives by which men are deceived, or seek to deceive themselves, when they are way acting ill, I had in this place almost expected from Mr. Butler, an admission that no Protestant could represent Becket, on the whole, more favourably. Could the most zealous advocate for the papal power have spoken in higher terms of his magnanimity, or expressed a stronger condemnation of the King's conduct on those occasions in which Henry acted with injustice and cruelty? When I compare my statement with yours,..when I look at the in which you have summed up the second part of the contest, keeping out of sight whatever was violent, whatever was offensive on Becket's part,..in fact all the circumstances which led to his fate, and may truly be said to have provoked it,..I do not wonder you should have abstained from all detail as foreign to your subject; and can only regret that with so much courtesy there should be so little candour,.. that with so much ingenuity there should be so little ingenuousness. * One remark more will suffice for winding up this division of our argument. In no part of his conduct is Becket less excusable than for accepting the Primacy under the circumstances in which it was offered to him. The manner of his promotion was irregular; the motive for *Page 87. it is known to have been a persuasion on the King's part that he would co-operate with him in those plans of necessary reform which had been concerted certainly with his knowledge, and in all likelihood with his counsel. For proof of this I refer you to Turner; by whom also you will find it stated, that when he told the King the effect of this promotion must be to make him lose his favour, or sacrifice his own duty as a servant of God, he spake with a smile; so that, whether intentionally or not, the manner conveyed a meaning which invalidated the words. I need not say to you, Sir, that our friend is an historian who may be trusted in his references. The indefatigable diligence which has enabled him to throw so much light on Anglo-Saxon and English history is accompanied in him with perfect candour, with unimpeachable fidelity, and with a true spirit of Christian charity, as enlightened as it is enlarged. It cannot, I think, be pretended that Becket was urged by a sense of duty to this dissimulation: if it be, Heaven save us from a religion which teaches such morality! But if it became his duty afterwards, as a Prelate of the Romish Church, to oppose the King in those very measures for the promotion of which he had with his own full knowledge been pre |