and in resentment at the deception practised upon him, Henry gave loose to the natural violence of his disposition. The threats which he uttered of banishment, and even of death, if they did not make the Primate tremble for himself, made others tremble for him. The Bishops entreated him, even with tears, to submit. The Earls of Leicester and Cornwall told him they were ordered to use force if he persisted in his refusal, and they implored him not to urge on a catastrophe, which, if it took place, would be calamitous and disgraceful to them all. Two Knights Templars, men of great ability and in the King's favour, were desired to use their influence; and they weeping supplicated him on their knees to have some regard to himself, and some pity for his clergy. It was manifest that Henry, exasperated as he was, was now determined upon carrying his point, by whatever means; for the clash of arms was heard, and men were seen in the adjoining apartments brandishing swords and battle-axes, ready at a word to have used them. Becket's heart was not susceptible of fear: but in this case the generous anxiety concerning him which was expressed, and an apprehension that if the signal for violence were given, the blow might fall on others as well as on himself, moved him; and yielding a second time, he promised on the word of truth that he would observe the ancient customs of the realm. The other Prelates followed his example. It was then ordered that such of the assembly as knew the customs best should put them in writing: a list of the elders was made out to whom this task was assigned; and at Becket's motion the business was prorogued till the morrow.

The customs which were now reduced to writing were called the Constitutions of Clarendon; the most important articles which they contained relating to ecclesiastical matters were, That disputes concerning the advowsons and presentations of churches should be tried and determined in the King's courts; that ecclesiastics should answer in the secular courts for matters there cognizable, and in the spiritual ones for cases within the spiritual jurisdiction; so that the King's justiciary should send to the court of holy Church to see in what manner the cause might be tried there; and if a clerk were convicted, or confessed his guilt, the Church should not protect him. No prelate or dignified clergyman might leave the realm without the King's

licence, and when they went the King might demand security that they would not procure any evil or damage to the King or kingdom. No tenant or officer of the King might be excommunicated, nor his land laid under an interdict, unless the King or his justiciary had been apprized of the proceedings. Appeals were to proceed from the Archdeacon to the Bishop, and from the Bishop to the Archbishop: if he failed in doing justice, the cause was to be brought to the King, and by his precept determined in the Archbishop's court, so that it might not be carried farther without the King's consent. If there were any dispute concerning a tenement which on the one part was pretended to be held in frank-almoigne, and on the other as a lay-fee, the question was to be first determined before the King's Chief Justice, by. the verdict of twelve lawful men, and the cause then referred to its proper court. An inhabitant of the King's demesne, refusing to appear if he were cited by the ecclesiastical authorities, might be put under an interdict, but not excommunicated until the King's chief officer of the place should have been required to compel him by course of law to answer: if the officer failed in this duty, he should be at the mercy of the King, and the Bishop might in that case compel the accused person by ecclesiastical censures. Bishoprics and monasteries of royal foundation should be in the hands of the King while vacant, as his own demesne; the elections were to be made in the King's chapel, with his assent, and the advice of such prelates as he might convoke; and the person elected should do homage, saving his order, before he was consecrated.

If these constitutions were in direct opposition to the system of Hildebrand and his successors, and at once removed all those encroachments, which the hierarchy had made in this kingdom during Stephen's contested reign, it should be remembered that they were not new edicts enacted in a spirit of hostility to the Church, but a declaration and recognition of the existing laws.' They were laid before Parliament on the following day, and the Prelates were then required to set their seals to the record. Becket alone demurred. He had pledged his word to observe the

1 Recordatio vel recognitio cujusdam partis consuetudinum, et libertatum, et dignitatum antecessorum suorum, videlicet regis Henrici, avi sui, et aliorum, quæ observari et teneri debent in regno. These are the words of the preamble.

customs, and his name was inserted in the preamble among those who recognised and consented to them: his declaration, therefore, that he had not engaged to confirm them by setting his seal was curiously inconsistent, showing at the same time how lax were his notions of a moral obligation, and how strong his conscientious adherence to the papal cause. He asked time for consideration, and it was granted. Three transcripts of the record were made, one for the royal archives, one for the Archbishop of York, and the third was delivered to Becket, and the Parliament then broke up. Whether he afterwards sealed to it has not been stated. It may be presumed that he did, because when the King some time after sent to the Pope, requesting him to confirm the ancient customs of the kingdom by authority of the apostolic see, Becket joined with the Archbishop of York in writing to support the request. In so doing, he acted with a deceitfulness, for which an excuse can be found only in the convenient casuistry of his own church. For as if he had committed a sin in consenting to these customs, he imposed upon himself the penance of abstaining from the service of the altar forty days. The Pope absolved him from that sin, in consideration of his intentions, and of the compulsion under which he had acted; but he counselled him to be moderate. Difficult as it was for Becket to learn this lesson, it was probably in obedience to the advice, that he repaired to the King's residence at Woodstock, and solicited audience. But Henry had been informed that Becket had spoken contemptuously of his infirm and irritable temper, and as if to prove that he could be steady in a just resentment, he refused to see him.

Such marked displeasure afforded Becket a pretext for taking the course which was most in unison with his own feelings. He sent an agent to the French King, that he might secure for himself a powerful protector, and going by night to the port of Romney, embarked for France. But though he, who had the example of Anselm before his eyes, set at nought the laws which he had pledged his word to observe, the sailors would not expose themselves to danger by carrying him, and he was therefore fain to return to Canterbury. His motions had been watched, and he was just in time to prevent the King's officers who had been sent to seize his possessions. Henry was alarmed at this attempt,

well knowing what embarrassment his former minister might create for him if he were admitted to the counsels of the French King; and when Becket presented himself again at Woodstock, he received him mildly: the only expression of his real feeling was a question, put as it were in sport, whether the reason why he had wished to withdraw from the kingdom, was, because the same land could not contain them both? Each at this time appears to have judged of the other's heart, by the rankling at his own and interested spirits were not wanting on both sides to exasperate their mutual suspicions and ill-will. The Court of Rome expected by an open contest to increase its power, as hitherto it had uniformly done; and there were men about Henry, who, if any confiscation of church property could be brought about, looked for a share in the spoils.

Becket, on returning from the interview, said to his friends that he must either yield with shame or combat manfully. When such appeared to be the alternative, the choice which such a man would make could not be doubtful. He began to act boldly in defiance of the Constitutions of Clarendon, protecting churchmen upon the ground of their assumed immunities, as if no such statutes had existed. Henry was warned by some of his counsellors to take heed, or it would be seen that he whom the Clergy should elect would be King, and reign no longer than it pleased the Primate. The Great Council was summoned at Northampton; and when Becket repaired thither, the King was inaccessible to him the first day, and on the second refused to receive from him the customary kiss of peace. Indeed he could not with propriety have accepted it, for Becket had been cited there to answer for his conduct as an offender and defaulter. The first accusation was, that he had refused justice to a great officer of the household; and that having, upon complaint made to the King, been ordered to appear before him, his answer had been, that he would not obey the summons. A charge of high-treason was founded upon this, such were the notions of feudal obligation! and being held guilty, his goods and chattels were declared to be at the King's mercy. In cases of such forfeiture, a commutation was usually accepted which custom had rendered fixed, and in Kent at the moderate sum of forty shillings; but from the Archbishop five hundred pounds

were exacted a vindictive sentence, neither to be justified by the offence, nor by the disproportion between his property and that of the poorest freeman who could have become amenable to the same law. He gave sureties for the payment, and thus ended the business of the first day.

...

If the King had acted as became him, he would have rested his dispute with Becket upon the Customs, and arraigned him for disregarding the Constitutions of Clarendon. Instead of this, he sought to break his spirit and ruin his fortune by a series of demands not less unjust than ungenerous. On the following day he called upon him for three hundred pounds, which he had received as warden of the King's castles, while he held that trust. He replied that he had expended more than that sum upon them, as the repairs themselves might show; but he would pay it, for money should be no ground of quarrel between him and the King. Such an answer might have disarmed Henry's resentment had his better mind prevailed: in his then temper it mortified him, and increased his irritation. The next demand was for five hundred pounds, which Henry affirmed he had lent him: Becket answered it had been given to him, not lent: his affirmation was not allowed to balance the King's, and for this also he gave surety. There can be little doubt that he had received it as a gift, and that as such it was intended at the time, though the intention may not have been expressed. But Henry's determination to crush the man whom he now regarded as his mortal enemy, was more fully displayed on the third day, when he called upon him for an account of all the monies which he had received during his Chancellorship, and demanded payment of the balance. Becket's conduct at Clarendon was more excusable than Henry's at Northampton: his vacillation and retractations, and the degree of duplicity with which he had acted, rose from a sense of duty, always honourable in itself, even when, as in his case, erroneous both in principle and in action: but the King acted tortuously, in the spirit of hatred and vengeance. The answer was, that he had not been questioned for these monies before his consecration, but on the contrary, Prince Henry, the King's eldest son, and Leicester his Justiciary, had discharged him from all such demands, and as so discharged, the Church received him. To this charge, therefore,