To understand the career of this remarkable man, we must look back a little on the previous history of the Church in Britain. Here, as elsewhere, there was a time when the monasteries were the only strongholds of learning and civilization, and the only places of refuge from the prevailing violence and bloodshed; when the clergy were almost alone in the possession of cultivated minds, and by their higher knowledge, and often higher morality, maintained a great influence over the outside world, standing, as it were, between the poor and their

oppressors.

But very soon a moral decline was visible, increased by the superstitious regard for the clerical order. Sloth and self-indulgence too often sought what was called a religious life, but which sometimes was the very opposite; dignitaries of the church assumed the sword as well as the pastoral staff, and made audacious demands on the submission of the secular powers; terrible vices occasionally disgraced ecclesiastics, and gross crimes, when committed by them, met with no fitting punish

ment.

The claims of the popes grew more and more extravagant; but it did not at all suit William the Norman to submit to them, and he stoutly refused the fealty demanded of him, though he manifested becoming grati tude for the help which the papal sanction had given him in conquering England. His appointments in the Church. were much to his credit. To the see of Canterbury he promoted the renowned scholar, Lanfranc, who won the respect of Englishmen as well as of Normans. His unwilling successor was Anselm, who, like Lanfranc, was an Italian by birth, and, like him, came from a famous monastery in Normandy. Great as a theologian, Anselm was yet greater for his virtues. A righteous man, full of sympathy and kindness for the conquered,

he faced with unyielding courage all the fury of the brutal William Rufus on behalf of what he believed to be the rights of the Church.

Henry I., like his father, contested the papal claims; the subject in dispute being that of investitures. The question was whether the king might invest a bishop with ring and staff as pledges of the latter's fealty to the crown. Anselm took the pope's side, and suffered, as before, exile and vexation for opposing the royal will. It was a noble braving of power for conscience' sake on his part, but if he could have foreseen results, he might have viewed the matter differently. At last Henry made a compromise by giving up the ceremony, but retaining the right of making the great ecclesiastical appointments, which was keeping the substance and losing the shadow.

The enormous pretensions of the pope over kings and princes did not pass unchallenged by Henry II., more than fifty years later. At that time most of the prelates in England, far from contenting themselves with spiritual weapons, were armed soldiers; while the holder of the humblest office in the Church claimed to be safe from the punishment of death, whatever his crimes.

It was then that Thomas à Becket, the handsome courtier-like churchman and scholar, attracted the king's notice. Conscious of Becket's eminent abilities, he' made him chancellor, or chief minister of state, in addition to the several livings which he held, and he stood first and foremost in his sovereign's favour. He lived in a style of magnificence second only to that of royalty; his revenues were immense, and he spent them most lavishly. When Henry was fighting in France, Becket accompanied him with a troop of cavalry, and took part in several sieges. He travelled in great state, so that Frenchmen marvelled what the monarch must be whose minister displayed such grandeur.

Henry was intent upon humbling the clergy, and with this in view he resolved to make Becket Archbishop o

Canterbury, thinking thus to have a friend and helper in the high places of the Church. The chancellor had the honesty, it is said, to warn his master that in that position he could not do the royal pleasure: but the king would have his way. No sooner was Becket installed than he wholly changed his manner of life. The revelry and feasting, the gorgeous apparel, the kingly splendour were all laid aside for ever.

The battle soon began. In 1164, Henry summoned a council, or parliament, to meet him at his manor of Clarendon in Wiltshire, that they might enact what are known as the Constitutions of Clarendon, which he declared to be in harmony with old English law. They were sixteen in number, and were all intended to strengthen the authority of the king, and to weaken that of the pope. One most important clause withdrew from the clergy the disgraceful privilege which prevented those among them who were guilty of crimes being punished like other men. Henry had previously, though with much difficulty, induced the bishops to agree to this act of justice.

After Becket had accepted the constitutions, he retracted his consent, and did penance, because he had yielded in a moment of weakness. He attempted to leave the kingdom, but was stopped and required to appear before the king and his council at Northampton, where several charges were brought against him, plainly with the intention to work his ruin. He received an adverse sentence with much dignity; and then, seeing the hopelessness of his position, secretly fled to France, where he was welcomed by the French monarch.

The pope having condemned the Constitutions of Clarendon, gave Becket leave to try the effect of ecclesiastical thunders, and the archbishop pronounced a curse on all who should obey those enactments. Next he tried excommunication and interdict; but Henry did not care for these things, nor did he refrain from exerting his power to injure the archbishop, whose great

wealth he confiscated, and banished all his relations and connections, even the most distant, so that those who thus suffered were four hundred in number. At last a reconciliation was patched up between them, and in 1170, Becket returned to England. The year

But a new cause of offence had arisen.

before, Henry had had his eldest son crowned, and in the absence of the primate, the Archbishop of York had performed the ceremony. Becket treated this as an insult, and denounced the bishops who had taken part in the coronation; he also failed to keep some of the conditions of his restoration. On the other hand he met with provocation, and the quarrel was started afresh.

The bishops who were excommunicated for obedience to the king's orders, fled to him in Normandy. Their account irritated him to the last degree, and he fell into one of those storms of passion which were common to his family. The wild words in which he uttered his wish to be rid of his enemy, were eagerly laid hold of by four knights as the expression of a deliberate command, and they hastened away to Canterbury.

There, in the time-honoured cathedral, when the gloom of a December evening hung over the dimly-lighted aisles, the deed of darkness was done; for there the unarmed archbishop, disdaining flight, and fearless to the last, met the murderers with flashing eye and unbending brow. There he fell beneath their fatal blows, and the marble pavement was defiled with the blood so foully shed.

Becket was but fifty-two when he thus perished. Haughty, self-willed, and domineering, he acted in accordance with his temper and wishes, yet doubtless with some belief of right on his side. It has been truly said that he was "the martyr of the clergy, not of the Church; of priestly power, not of Christianity." But the inalienable curse which clings to murder, and for ever causes it to defeat its own ends, was manifest in this instance. Becket's influence was greater in death

D

than in life. He was declared to be a saint; Henry performed penance at his tomb; thousands of pilgrims resorted to Canterbury as to a sacred spot, while miracles of healing were thought to be performed at his shrine.

To us, Henry's demands appear just and reasonable; but if we would hold the balance fairly between him and Becket, we must own that if the archbishop strove to lodge supreme power wholly with the clergy, the king wanted to rule without check in Church and State alike. Both sought an absolute authority which would not have been safe in the hands of either. The contest between them was an incident in the struggle against the papacy which often engaged the attention of Europe during the middle ages, and in which it gradually declined until it received its severest shock in the Reformation of the sixteenth century.

QUESTIONS.-Who was Becket? Why did Henry make him archbishop? What were the Constitutions of Clarendon ? Give particulars of the struggle between Becket and the king. Give an account of Becket's death.

THE CONQUEST OF IRELAND.

THE Celtic inhabitants of Ireland were converted to Christianity by the great missionary St. Patrick, in the earlier part of the fifth century. He was first brought thither as a slave, but after regaining his freedom he devoted much time to study, and returned to Ireland as a bishop. So fruitful were his labours and those of his disciples who immediately followed him, that not only did the doctrines of Christianity spread rapidly, but monasteries were founded all over the country, which became known as the Isle of Saints.

These establishments were of a remarkable character; not exactly like anything before or since, it is said. They