spirit, refreshened by sleep, comes re-created, as it were, from the hand of its Maker, and feels (notwithstanding their familiarity) "all things to be good." Like this is youth, our "morning of life," when the intentions and workmanship of the Divine Artist appear plain and unworn upon us, and his spirit of a blissful and eternal nature, envelopes and possesses us, clearly displaying our origin and our destination.

These declarations of our original are gradually obscured by the world, whose spirit almost overwhelms us, and that bright light which we brought with us, and in which we first "lived and moved, and had our being," is with difficulty retained in the strife and debasement of earthly intercourse. Yet to preserve it is the voice of nature and the direction of Christianity; and to revert to those early scenes when the light of heaven shone happily before us and around us, must tend to strengthen our hope and conviction, that that which once has been, shall not altogether, and for ever, have passed away. I never witness the presence, and the gay and innocent delight of boys, in their Christmas and Summer holidays, when let loose upon society from their little monasteries of concealment, but they seem to me as two gleams of splendour appointed to appear twice every year, spreading themselves over the world to cheer and irradiate the living landscape of good and evil, and to keep alive the remembrance of that unclouded, unanxious, and happy spirit, which is our true inheritance. To view it as Gray has done in the latter part of his Ode on Eton, is to anticipate and dwell upon a temporary absence of it only, and a transient and casual eclipse by the vices and evils of the world, which, though falling, in a certain degree, on all who pass through it, yet is so far from a genuine consequence, and probable termination, a priori, of the character and promises of early life, that it stands there as in contradiction, and most unnatural dissimilarity to them. Gray has considered vice and suffering (for the sake of the pathos and contrast in his poem) as if they were the fulfilment of our being, which, in truth, are only its accident and its perversion.*

He who received and knew our nature, has declared that Sin and Death are permitted to dwell with us only for a while, and that they shall not in the end prevail. If we listen to him in obedience, we shall find that these prompt and spontaneous notices of our opening life are appointed, all of them, to endure and to triumph, and that the bright promises of boyhood are to re

"God made not death: neither hath he pleasure in the destruction of the living. For he created all things that they might have their being: and the generations of the world were healthful: and there is no poison of destruction in them; nor the kingdom of death upon the earth. For righteousness is immortal. But ungodly men with their works and words called it unto them."-Wisdom of Solomon, ch. i. v. 13—16.

ceive their natural growth and fulfilment " for of such is the kingdom of heaven.

That life of happiness and light of truth, which arose so enchantingly upon us, shall then have an end assimilated in harmony to its early expectations, and the song of the poet, when he witnesses or adverts to the scenes of youth and its enjoyments, shall not be the anticipation of evil and of sorrow, but the earnests and convictions of beauty, immortality, and joy:

"Pure to the soul and pleasing to the eyes,

:

Like angels youthful, and like angels wise."

T.

THOMAS A BECKET.

Continued from Vol. II. p. 459.

MEANS USED TO SECURE HIS ELECTION AS ARCHBISHOP.

We now come to the remaining point which we stated our intention to notice the means used to secure Becket's election to the archbishopric; and that we may not be suspected of under-stating the arguments for the view which we question, we will give them in the words of Lord Lyttleton :

"Him, [Becket] therefore, he [the king] resolved to advance to that dignity [the archbishopric] at this critical time. Becket himself much desired it, if we may believe Gilbert Foliot, Bishop of London, who, in a letter which he wrote to him afterwards, and on another occasion, affirms that his eyes were watchfully fixed on the archbishopric before Theobald died, and that he did all he could to secure it to himself on that event.' As this prelate [Gilbert Foliot] then [when the letter was sent] possessed the confidence of the king, he might be assured of the fact from the mouth of that prince; and without such information, or other very strong evidence, it is not probable that he would have ventured to charge Becket with it in such positive terms. Some friends of the latter, in their accounts of his life, assert indeed that when Henry first acquainted him with his intention of making him archbishop, he gave that monarch a fair warning that it would certainly produce a quarrel between them, because his conscience would not allow him to suffer many things which he knew the king would require, and even already presumed to do in ecclesiastical matters.' They add, that as he foresaw that by accepting this offer he should lose the favour either of God or of the king, he would fain have refused it, and was with great difficulty prevailed upon to accept it by the pope's legate.

"But that any part of this apology for him is true, I greatly doubt, as it stands contradicted by the affirmation of Gilbert Foliot, which in this particular is evidence of far greater credit than the word of Becket himself, and as it ill agrees with the methods which were undeniably taken to procure his election-methods he must have

known to be very inconsistent with the canons of the church, and what was then called its freedom.

"It appears from an epistle sent to Becket afterwards by all the bishops and clergy of England, that, as far as they durst, they signified at this time their disapprobation of the king's desire to promote him to Canterbury; and that in spite of the popularity which he so much affected, the whole nation cried out against it. We are also assured by the same evidence, which can hardly be rejected, that Matilda did her utmost to dissuade her son from it. But though upon other occasions Henry paid her the greatest respect, he determined to act in this matter by his own judgment; and having taken his part, as he believed on good reasons, his passions were heated by the opposition he met with, and his affection for his favourite concurred with the pride of royal dignity to make him adhere to his purpose.

"Nor was Becket himself less eager than his master in this affair, if we may believe the testimony of the Bishop of London, who says in the letter I have quoted before, that as soon as the death of archbishop Theobald was known to that minister, he hastened to England in order to procure the vacant See for himself. Yet he found such unwillingness in the electors, that notwithstanding all his power, and the address which he always shewed in the conduct of business, he was not elected till above a twelvemonth after his predecessor's decease.

Henry at last growing impatient of so long a delay, sent over from Normandy his justiciary, Rich. de Luci, to bear his royal mandate to all the monks of Canterbury and suffragan bishops, that without further deliberation they should immediately elect his chancellor, Becket, to be their archbishop. So great a minister who brought such an order from a king, whom no person in his realm had ever disobeyed,except the Lord Mortimer, whose rebellion had ended so disgracefully to himself, could hardly be resisted by ecclesiastics. Yet the Bishop of London had the courage to resist him; and, if we may believe what he himself avers in his letter to Becket, did not give way till banishment and proscription had been denounced against himself and all his relations by the justiciary of the kingdom. The same threats, he tells us, were used to the other electors: all were made to understand that if they refused to comply, they would be deemed the king's enemies, and treated as such with the utmost rigour. The sword of the king,' says the above mentioned prelate to Becket, was in your hands, ready to turn its edge against any on whom you should frown; that sword which you had before plunged into the bowels of your holy mother, the church.' He explains these last words to mean the wound which had been given to the privileges of the church by the imposition which the chancellor had laid on the clergy for the war of Toulouse; and concludes these severe remonstrances on the irregularity of his election with the following words: That if, as he had himself asserted in a letter to which this was an answer, the liberty of the church was the life of the church, he then had left her

lifeless.' It was, indeed, a more violent and arbitrary proceeding than any that had hitherto been known in this reign. For though Henry ever since his accession to the crown had maintained the indisputable prerogative of it, not to let any archbishop or bishop be chosen without his recommendation, which the chapters and others concerned had always obeyed, yet still some appearance of a free election was kept; the electors were influenced rather than compelled, or at least the compulsion which they were really under was decently hidden. But in this instance all the terrors of power were employed without disguise, and even beyond the bounds of justice." Such is Lord Lyttleton's account of Becket's election; which, as will have been observed, is drawn entirely from two sources.

1. A letter to Becket from the bishops and clergy of the province of Canterbury-" evidence which can hardly be rejected."

And, 2. A letter written shortly after the former, by Gilbert Foliot, who "might" have derived his information from the king, and who, "without such information, or other very strong evidence," would never "have ventured to charge Becket in such positive terms." Indeed, whose "affirmation" is sufficient to set aside the united testimony of all Becket's historians, since " in this particular it is an evidence of far greater credit than that of Becket himself" ?

The first of these letters, the "evidence which can hardly be rejected," is brought forward to prove the unpopularity of Becket's election with both clergy and laity, and the opposition of the empress Matilda. The first of these charges is so vague, and the second so immaterial, that we do not feel much concerned about the "evidence," whether it can be " rejected" or no. It may, however, be just worth while to state the circumstances under which this letter was written.

It is a well known fact, that in the year 1165, all the clergy who ventured to take part with Becket were, with their relations, obliged to leave the kingdom; and that those who remained were entirely under the control of Henry. For some time things went on very smoothly. Becket's own authority, unsupported by the pope, was not sufficient to compel the obedience of his suffragans; and as long as the state of Alexander's affairs was such as to render Henry's displeasure an object of fear with him, Becket, who, as was said of him at the time," only barked when he was prepared to bite," thought it prudent to remain inactive. This state of things continued till the spring of 1166, at which time the Pope felt himself in a condition to authorise effective measures, and gave Becket permission to excommunicate all those of the king's officers who had taken a decided part against him; to suspend the Bishop of Salisbury, for an act of insubordination; and if these measures failed, to come to extremities with the king himself. Of this the king's party obtained speedy intelligence; and since, according to the ecclesiastical law of the time, an appeal against a sentence of excommunication was only valid if made before the sentence was pronounced, the Bishop of Lisieux and other messengers of consequence, were immediately dispatched to Pontigni, to give Becket formal notice that they appealed VOL. III.-Jan. 1833.

F

against him as a suspected judge. They arrived just too late to effect their purpose. Becket had that very day left Pontigni with a secret and very singular object; and before they were able to convey their message to him, had pronounced the dreaded sentence in the church of Vezelay.

In the mean time orders had been sent to all the ports along the coast of England and Normandy to search the person of every one who passed from one country to the other; and to inflict the severest punishment on any one on whom letters should be found either from the Pope or Becket. But here, too, the vigilance of the king's party proved ineffectual; the sentences were formally delivered to the Bishop of London, with orders to forward them to all the bishops of the province of Canterbury: and the result was, that an evasive answer was returned to Becket, either really or nominally, from the collective body of the clergy.

This letter is Lord Lyttleton's unquestionable evidence, written, as it professes to be, (1) by a body of persons from among whom all Becket's friends had been banished-(2) who had no option left them of neutrality-(3) who had just been balked in a twofold attempt to evade his authority-(4) who could find no apology for their own conduct except in disparaging his.

The other letter, that of Gilbert Foliot, is of much greater importance, and charges Becket with having been accessory to proceedings very inconsistent with his subsequent professions.

Now we cannot deny that Gilbert Foliot "might" have derived his information from the King. But that "without such information or other very strong evidence, he would never have ventured to charge Becket in such definite terms" does, we own, seem to us a much more questionable proposition.

This Gilbert Foliot was supposed by Becket to have been the real author of the letter above alluded to, which was nominally sent from the whole body of the clergy, and he had in consequence received a severe reprimand: in answer to it he wrote the letter, or rather pamphlet, we now speak of. The reason he assigns for writing it may in some measure affect our views of its credibility. He says

"Cum Ecclesiam Dei subvertere, fas nefasque confundere &c., emissis publicè scriptis denotemur, difficile est ut sileamus, et hanc adversum nos opinionem vel a præsentibus admitti, vel indefensam futura posteritati transmitti, confessionem innuente silentio, permit

tamus.'

This letter, then, was no private affair between Gilbert and Becket, which must depend upon its truth for its poignancy. It was a published pamphlet, to vindicate his conduct in the eyes of his own generation and posterity-an ex-parte statement, addressed to persons who had no other source of information, and who, if they could be deceived without it, could be deceived by it. Moreover, it was an ex-parte statement which could hardly be answered; for the coast was at this time so strictly blockaded, that without great danger to the bearer, no letter from Becket could reach England; and it was not