Henry also granted a charter of that kind, confirming that of his grandfather; but as his situation was very
different
from that of his predecessors, his charter was different,- reserved, short, dry, conceived in general terms, - a gift, not a bargain.
Edmund Burke
?
?
?
ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
383
ferment, nor the right of bestowing it, were sought
with great ambition. Bishops were then elected, and
often against their desire, by their clergy and the
people: the subordinate ecclesiastical districts were
provided for in the same manner. After the Roman
Empire became Christian, this usage, so generally established, still maintained its ground. However, in
the principal cities, the Emperor frequently exercised
the privilege of giving a sanction to the choice, and
sometimes of appointing the bishop; though, for the
most part, the popular election still prevailed. But
when the Barbarians, after destroying the Empire,
had at length. submitted their necks to the Gospel,
their kings and great men, full of zeal and gratitude
-to their instructors, endowed the Church with large
territories and great privileges. In this case it was
but natural that they should be the patrons of those
dignities and nominate to that power which arose
from their own free bounty. Hence the bishoprics
in the greatest part of Europe became in effect, whatever some few might have been in appearance, merely donative. ' And as the bishoprics formed so many seigniories, when the feudal establishment was completed, they partook of the feudal nature, so far as
they were subjects capable of it; homage and fealty
were required on the part of the spiritual vassal;
the king, on his part, gave the bishop the investiture,
or livery and seizin of his temporalities, by the delivery of a ring and staff. This was the original manler
of granting feudal property, and something like it is
still practised in our base-courts. Pope Adrian confirmed this privilege to Charlemagne by an express
grant. The clergy of that time, ignorant, but inquisitive, were very ready at finding types and mysteries
? ? ? ? 384 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
in. every ceremony: they construed the staff into an
emblem of the pastoral care, and the ring into a type
of the bishop's allegorical marriage to his church,
and therefore supposed them designed as emblems of
a jurisdiction merely spiritual. The Papal pretensions increased with the general ignorance and superstition; and the better to support these pretensions, it was necessary at once to exalt the clergy extremely,
and, by breaking off all ties between them and their
natural sovereigns, to attach them wholly to the Roman see. In pursuance of this project, the Pope first
strictly forbade the clergy to receive investitures from
laymen, or to do them homage. A council held at
Rome entirely condemned this practice; and the condemnation was the less unpopular, because the investiture gave rise to frequent and flagrant abuses, especially in England, where the sees were on this
pretence with much scandal long held inll the king's
hands, and afterwards as scandalously and publicly
sold to the highest bidder. So it had been in the last
reign, and so it continued in this.
Henry, though vigorously attacked, with great res:
olution maintained the rights of his crown with regard to investitures, whilst he saw the Emperor, who
claimed a right of investing the Pope himself, subdued by the thunder of the Vatican. His chief
opposition was within his own kingdom. Anselm,
Archbishop of Canterbury, a man of unblamable life,
and of learning for his time, but blindly attached to
the rights of the Church, real or supposed, refused to
consecrate those who received investitures from tie
king. The parties appealed to Rome. Rome, unwilling either to recede from her pretensions or to
provoke a powerful monarch, gives a dubious an
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 385
swer. . Meanwhile the contest grows hotter. Anselm
is obliged to quit the kingdom, but is still inflexible.
At last, the king, who, from the delicate situation of
his affairs in the beginning of his reign, had been
obliged to temporize for a long time, by his usual
prudent mixture of management with force obliged
the Pope to a temperament which seemed extremely
judicious. The king received homage and fealty
from his vassal; the investiture, as it was generally
understood to relate to spiritual jurisdiction, was
given up, and on this equal bottom peace was established. The secret of the Pope's moderation was this:.
he was at that juncture close pressed by the Emperor,
and it might be highly dangerous to contend with two
such enemies at once; and he'was much more ready
to yield to Henry, who had no reciprocal demands on
him,: than to the Emperor, who had many and just
ones, and to whom he could not yield any one point
without' giving up an infinite number of others very
material and interesting.
As the king extricated himself happily from so
great an affair, so all the other difficulties of his
reign only exercised, without endangering him. The
efforts of France in favor of the son of Robert were
late, desultory, and therefore unsuccessful. That
youth, endued with equal virtue and more prudence
than his father, after exerting many useless acts of
unfortunate bravery, fell in battle, and freed Henry'from all disturbance on the side of France. The incursions of the Welsh in this reign only gave him all opportunity of confining that people within narrower
bounds. At home he was well obeyed by his subjects;
abroad he dignified his family by splendid alliances.
His daughter Matilda he married to the Emperor. .
VOL. VII. 25
? ? ? ? 386 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
But his private fortunes did not flow with so even a
course as his public affairs. His only son,
William, with a natural daughter, and many
of the flower of the young nobility, perished at sea
between Normandy and England. From that fatal
accident the king was never seen to smile. He
sought in vain from a second marriage to provide a
A. D. 1127. male successor; but when he saw all prospect of this at an end, he called a great
council of his barons and prelates. His daughter
Matilda, after the decease of the Emperor, he had
given in marriage to Geoffrey Plantagenet, Count of
Anjou. As she was his only remaining issue, he
caused her to be acknowledged as his successor by
the great council; he enforced this acknowledgment
by solemn oaths of fealty, --a sanction which he
weakened rather than confirmed by frequent repetition: vainly imagining that on his death any ties would bind to the respect of a succession so little respected by himself, and by the violation of which he had procured his crown. Having taken these measures in favor of his daughter, he died in Normandy, but in a good old age, and in the thirty-sixth year of
a prosperous reign.
CHAPTER V.
REIGN OF STEPHEN.
ALTHOUGH the authority of the crown had
a. D. 1136.
been exercised with very little restraint during the three preceding reigns, the succession to it,
or even the principles of the succession, were but ill
ascertained: so that a doulbt might justly have arisen,
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 387
whether the crown was not in a great measure elective. This uncertainty exposed the nation, at the
death of every king, to all the calamities of a civil
war; but it was a circumstance favorable to the designs of Stephen, Earl of Boulogne, who was son of
Stephen, Earl of Blois, by a daughter of the Conqueror. The late king had raised him to great employments, and enriched'him by the grant of several
lordships. His brother had been made Bishop of
Winchester; and by adding to it the place of his
chief justiciary, the king gave him an opportunity of
becoming one of the richest subjects in Europe, and
of extending an unlimited influence over the clergy
and the people. Henry trusted, by the promotion of
two persons so near him in blood, and so bound by
benefits, that he had formed an impenetrable fence
about the succession; but he only inspired into Stephen the design of seizing on the crown by bringing him so near it. The opportunity was favorable. The king died abroad. ; Matilda was absent with her husband; and the Bishop of Winchester,
by his universal credit, disposed the churchmen to
elect his brother, with the concurrence of the greatest part of the nobility, who forgot their oaths, and
vainly hoped. that a bad title would necessarily produce a good government. Stephen, in the flower
of youth, bold, active, and courageous, full of generosity and a noble affability, that seemed to reproach
the state and avarice of the preceding kings, was not
wanting to his fortune. He seized immediately the
immense treasures of Henry, and by distributing
them with a judicious profusion removed all doubts
concerning his title to them. He did hot spare even
the royal demesne, but secured himself a vast number
? ? ? ? 888 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
of adherents by involving their guilt and interest in
his own. He raised a considerable army of Flemings, in order to strengthen himself against another
turn of the same instability which had raised him to
the throne; and, in imitation of the measures of the
late king, he concluded all by giving a charter of liberties as ample as the people at that time aspired to.
This charter contained a renunciation of the forests
made by his predecessor, a'grant to the ecclesiastics
of a jurisdiction over their own vassals, and to the
people in general an immunity from unjust tallages
and exactions. It is remarkable, that the oath of allegiance taken by the nobility on this occasion was
conditional: it was to be observed so long as the king
observed the terms of his charter,- a condition which
added no real security to the rights of the subject,
but which proved a fruitful source of dissension, tumult, and civil violence.
The measures which the king hitherto pursued
were dictated by sound policy; but he took another
step to secure his throne, which in fact took away allits security, and at the same time brought the country to extreme misery, and to the brink of utter ruin. At the Conquest there were very few fortifications
in the kingdom. William:found it necessary for his
security to erect several. During the struggles of the
English, the Norman nobility were permitted (as in
reason it could rot be refused) to fortify their own
houses. It was, however, still understood that no
new fortress could be erected without the king's special license. These private castles began very early
to embarrass the government. The royal castles were
scarcely less troublesome: for, as everything was then
in tenure, the governor held his place by the tenure
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF- ENGLISH HISTORY. 389
of castle-guard; and thus, instead of a simple officer,
subject to his pleasure, the king had to deal with a
feudal tenant, secure against him by law, if he performed his services, and by force, if he was unwilling to perform them. Every resolution of government required a sort of civil war to put it in execution. The two last kings had taken and demolished several of
these castles; but when they found the reduction of
any of them difficult, their custom frequently was, to
erect another close by it, tower against tower, ditch
against ditch: these were called Malvoisins, from
their purpose and situation. Thus, instead of removing, they in fact doubled the mischief. Stephen, perceiving the passion of the barons for these castles, among other popular acts in the beginning of his reign, gave a general license for erecting them. Then
was seen to arise in every corner of the kingdom, in
every petty seigniory, an inconceivable multitude of
strongholds, the seats of violence, and the receptacles
of murderers, felons, debasers of the coin, and all
manner of desperate and abandoned villains. Eleven
hundred and fifteen of these: castles were built in this
single reign. The barons, having thus shut out the.
law, made continual inroads upon each other, and
spread war, rapine, burning, and desolation throughout the whole kingdom. . They infested the high-: roads,- and put a stop to all trade by plundering the
merchants and travellers. :. Those who dwelt in the
open country they forced into their castles, and after
pillaging them of all their visible substance, these tyrants held them in dungeons, and tortured them with a thousand cruel inventions to extort a discovery of
their hidden wealth. The lamentable representation
given by history of those barbarous times justifies the:
? ? ? ? 390 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
pictures in the old romances of the castles of giants
and magicians. A great part of Europe was in the
same deplorable condition. It was then that some
gallant spirits, struck with a generous indignation at
the tyranny of these miscreants, blessed solemnly by
the bishop, and followed by the praises and vows of
the people, sallied forth to vindicate the chastity of
women and to redress the wrongs of travellers and
peaceable men. The adventurous humor inspired by
the Crusade heightened and extended this spirit; and
thus the idea of knight-errantry was formed.
A. D. 1138 Stephen felt personally these inconveniences; but because the evil was too stubborn to be redressed at once, he resolved to proceed gradually, and to begin with the castles of the bishops, - as they evidently held them, not only against
the interests of the crown, but against the canons
of the Church. From the nobles he expected no
opposition to this design: they beheld With envy the
pride of these ecclesiastical fortresses, whose battlements seemed to insult the poverty of the lay barons.
This disposition, and a want of unanimity among the
clergy themselves, enabled Stephen to succeed in his
attempt against the Bishop of Salisbury, one of the
first whom he attacked, and whose castles, from their
strength and situation, were of the greatest importance. But the affairs of this prince were so circumstanced that he could pursue no council that was not dangerous. His breach with the clergy let in the party of his rival, Matilda. This party was supported by
Robert, Earl of Gloucester, natural son to the late king,
-a man powerful by his vast possessions, but more
formidable through his popularity, and the courage and
abilities by which he had acquired it. Several other
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 391
circumstances weakened the cause of Stephen. The
charter, and the other favorable acts, the scaffolding
of his ambitioni, when he saw the structure raised, he
threw down and contemned. In order to maintain
his troops, as well as to attach men to his cause,
where no principle bound them, vast and continual
largesses became necessary: all his legal revenue had
been dissipated; and he was therefore obliged to
have recourse to such methods of raising money as
were evidently illegal. These causes every day gave
some accession of strength to the party against him;
the friends of Matilda were encouraged to. 113
appear in arms; a civil war ensued, long
and bloody, prosecuted as chance or a blind rage directed, by mutual acts of cruelty and treachery, by
frequent surprisals and assaults of castles, and by a
number of battles and skirmishes fought to no determinate end, and in which nothing of the military
art appeared, but the destruction which it caused.
Various, on this occasion, were the reverses of fortune, while Stephen, though embarrassed by the weakness of his title, by the scantiness of his finances, and all the disorders which arose from both, supported
his tottering throne with wonderful activity and courage; but being at length defeated and made
prisoner under the walls of Lincoln, the
clergy openly declare for Matilda. The city of London, though unwillingly, follows the example of the
clergy. The defection from Stephen was growing universal.
But Matilda, puffed up with a greatness which as
yet had no solid foundation and stood merely in personal favor, shook it in the minds of all men by assuming, together with the insolence of conquest, the
? ? ? ? 892 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
haughty rigor of an established dominion. Her title
appeared but too good in the resemblance she bore
to the pride of the former kings. This made the first
illsuccess in her affairs fatal. Her great support,
the Earl of Gloucester, was in his turn made prisoner. In exchange for his liberty that of Stephen
was procured, who renewed the war with his usual
vigor. As he apprehended an attempt from Scotland in favor of Matilda, descended from the blood
royal of that nation, to balance this weight, he persuaded the King of France to declare in his favor,
alarmed as he was by the progress of Henry, the
son of Matilda, and Geoffrey, Count of Anjou. This
prince, no more than sixteen years of age, after receiving knighthood from David, King of Scotland,
began to display a courage and capacity destined to
the greatest things. Of a complexion which strongly
inclined to pleasure, he listened to nothing but, ambition; at an age which is usually given up to passion, he submitted delicacy to politics, and even in
his marriage only remembered the interests of a sovereign, - for, without examining too scrupulously into her character, he married Eleanor, the heiress of Guienne,'though divorced from her husband for her
supposed gallantries in the -Holy Land. He made use
of the accession of power which he acquired by this
match to assert his birthright to Normandy. This
he did with great success, because he was favored by
the general inclination of the people for the blood of
their ancient lords. Flushed with this prosperous
beginning, he aspired to greater things;;he obliged
the King of France to submit to a. truce; and then
he turned his arms to support the rights of his family
in England, from whence Matilda retired, unequal-to
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 393
the troublesome part she had long acted. Worn out
with age, and the clashing of furious factions, she
shut herself up in a monastery, and left to:her son the
succession of a civil war. . Stephen was now pressed
with renewed vigor. Henry had rather the advantage in the field; Stephen had the possession of the government. Their fortunes appearing nearly balallced, and the fuel of dissension being consumed by
a continual and bloody war of thirteen years, an
accommodation was proposed and accepted. Henry
found it dangerous to refuse his consent, as the bishops and barons, even of his own party, dreaded the consequences, if a prince, in the prime of an ambitious youth, should establish an hereditary title by
the force of foreign arms. This treaty, A. D1153.
signed at Wallingford, left the possession
of the crown for his life to Stephen, but secured
the succession to Henry, whom that prince adopted.
The castles erected in this reign were to be demolished; the exorbitant grants of the royal demesne to
be resumed. To the son of Stephen all his private
possessions were secured.
Thus ended this tedious and ruinous civil war.
Stephen survived it near two years; and now, finding himself more secure as the lawful tenant than he had been as the usurping proprietor of the crown, he
no longer governed on the maxims of necessity. He
made no new attempts in favor of his family, but
spent the remainder of his. reign in correcting the
disorders which arose from his steps in its commencement, and in healing the wounds of so long and cruel a war. Thus he left the kingdom in peace to his
successor, but his character, as it is usual where
party is concerned, greatly disputed. Wherever
? ? ? ? 394 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
his natural dispositions had room to exert themselves, they appeared virtuous and princely; but
the lust to reign, which often attends great virtues,
was fatal to his, frequently hid them, and always rendered them suspected.
CHAPTER VI.
REIGN OF HENRY II.
THE death of Stephen left an undisputed
succession for the first time since the death
of Edward the Confessor. Henry, descended equally
from the Norman Conqueror and the old English
kings, adopted by Stephen, acknowledged by the
barons, united in himself every kind of title. It
was grown into a custom for the king to grant a
charter of liberties on his accession to the crown.
Henry also granted a charter of that kind, confirming that of his grandfather; but as his situation was very different from that of his predecessors, his charter was different,- reserved, short, dry, conceived in general terms, - a gift, not a bargain. And, indeed,
there seems to have been at that juncture but little
occasion to limit a power which seemed not more
than sufficient to correct all the evils of an unlimited
liberty. Henry spent the beginning of his reign in
repairing the ruins of the royal authority, and in restoring to the kingdom peace and order, along with its ancient limits; and he may well be considered as
the restorer of the English monarchy. Stephen had
sacrificed the demesne of the crown, and many of its
rights, to his subjects; and the necessity of the times
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 395
obliged both that prince and the Empress Matilda to
purchase, in their turns, the precarious friendship of
the King of Scotland by a cession of almost all the
country north of the Humber. But'Henry obliged
the King of Scotland to restore his acquisitions, and
to renew his homage. He took the same methods
with his barons. Not sparing the grants of his
mother, he resumed what had been so lavishly
squandered by both of the contending parties, who,
to establish their claims, had given away almost
everything that made them valuable. There never
was a prince in Europe who better understood the
advantages to be derived from its peculiar constitution, in which greater acquisitions of dominion are made by judicious marriages than by success in war:
for, having added to his patrimonial territories of Anjou and Normandy the Duchy of Guienne by his own marriage, the male issue of the Dukes of Brittany
failing, he took the opportunity of marrying A. . 11m.
his third son, Geoffrey, then an infant,. to
the heiress of that important province, an infant also;
and thus uniting by so strong a link his northern to
his southern dominions, he possessed in his own name,
or in those of his wife and son, all that fine and extensive country that is washed by the Atlantic Ocean, from Picardy quite to the foot of the Pyrenees.
Henry, possessed of such extensive territories, and
aiming at further acquisitions, saw with indignation
that the sovereign authority in all of them, especially
in England, had been greatly diminished. By his
resumptions he had, indeed, lessened the greatness
of several of the nobility. He had by force of arms
reduced those who forcibly held the crown lands,
and deprived them of their own estates for their
? ? ? ? 396 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
rebellion. He demolished many castles, those perpetual resources of rebellion and disorder. ,But the great aim of his policy was to break the power of
the clergy, which each of his predecessors, since Edward, had alternately strove to raise and to depress, - at first in order to gain that potent body to their
interests, and then to preserve them in subjection
to the authority which they had conferred. The
clergy had elected Stephen; they had deposed Stephen, and. elected Matilda; and in the instruments which they used on these- occasions they affirmed
in themselves a general right of electing the kings
of England. Their share both in the elevation and
depression of that prince showed that they possessed
a power inconsistent with the safety and dignity
of the state. The immunities which they enjoyed
seemed no less prejudicial to the civil economy,and the rather, as, in the confusion of Stephen's
reign, many, to protect themselves from the prevailing violence of the time, or to sanctify their own disorders, had taken refuge in the clerical character.
The Church was never so full of scandalous persons, who, being accountable only in the ecclesiastical courts, where no crime is punished with death, were
guilty of every crime. A priest had about this time
committed a murder attended with very aggravating circumstances. The king, willing at once to
restore order and to depress the clergy, laid hold
of this favorable opportunity to convoke the cause to
his own court, when the atrociousness of the crime
made all men look with an evil eye upon the claim
of any privilege which might prevent the severest
justice. The nation in general seemed but little
inclined to controvert so useful a regulation with
so potent a prince.
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF. ENGLISH HISTORY. 397.
Amidst this general acquiescence one man was
found bold enough to oppose him, who for: eight
years together embroiled all his affairs, poisoned his
satisfactions, endangered his dominions, and at length
in his death triumphed over all the power and policy
of this wise and potent monarch. This was Thomas
a-Becket, a man memorable for the great glory and
the bitter reproaches he has met with from posterity.
This person was the son of a respectable citizen of
London. He was bred to the study of the civil and
canon law, the education then used to qualify a man
for. public affairs, in which he soon made a distinguished figure. By the royal favor and his own abilities, he rose, in a rapid succession through several considerable employments, from an office under the
sheriff of London, to be High Chancellor of the kingdom. In this high post. he showed a spirit as elevated; but it was rather a military spirit than that
of the. gownman, - magnificent to excess in his living and appearance, and. distinguishing himself in
the tournaments and other martial sports of that age
with much ostentation of courage and expense. The
king, who. favored him greatly, and expected a suitable return, on the vacancy, destined Becket, yet a
layman, to the see of. Canterbury, and hoped to find
in him. a warm promoter of the_ reformation he intended. Hardly a priest, he was made the
A. D. 1162.
first prelate in the kingdom. But no sooner. .
was he invested. with the clerical character than the
whole tenor of his conduct was seen to change all at
once: of his pompous retinue a. few plain servants
only remained; a monastic temperance regulated his
table; and his life, in all respects formed to the most
rigid austerity,- seemed. to prepare him for that supe
? ? ? ? 398 ABRIDGMENT OP ENGLISH HISTORY.
riority he was resolved to assume, and the conflicts he
foresaw he must. undergo in this attempt.
It will not be unpleasing to pause a moment at this
remarkable period, ill order to view in what consisted
that greatness of the clergy, which enabled them to
bear so very considerable a sway in all public affairs,
what foundations supported the weight of so vast a
power, - whence it had its origin, -- what was the
nature, and what the ground, of the immunities they
claimed, - that we may the more fully enter into this
important controversy, and- may not judge, as some
have inconsiderately done, of the affairs of those
times by ideas taken from the present manners and
opinions.
It is sufficiently known, that the first Christians,
avoiding the Pagan tribunals, tried most even of their
civil causes before the bishop, who, though he had
no direct coercive power, yet, wielding the sword
of excommunication, had wherewithal to enforce the
execution of his judgments. Thus the bishop had
a considerable sway in temporal affairs, even before
he was owned by the temporal power. But the Emperors no sooner became Christian than, the idea of profaneness being removed from the secular tribunals, the causes of the Christian laity naturally passed to that resort where those of the generality
had been before. But the reverence for the bishop
still remained, and the remembrance of his former
jurisdiction. It was not thought decent, that he,
who had been a judge in his own court, should become a suitor in the court of another. The body of the clergy likewise, who were supposed to have
no secular concerns for which they could litigate,
and removed by their character from all suspicion
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 399
of violence, were left to be tried by their own ecclesiastical superiors. This was, with a little variation, sometimes in extending, sometimes in restraining the
bishops' jurisdiction, the condition of things whilst
the Roman Empire subsisted. But though their immunities were great and their possessions ample, yet, living under an absolute form of government, they
were powerful only by influence. No jurisdictions
were annexed to their lands; they had no place in
the senate; they were no order in the state.
From the settlement of the Northern nations the
clergy must be considered in another light. The
Barbarians gave them large landed possessions; and
by giving them land, they gave them jurisdiction,
which, according to their notions, was inseparable
from it. They made them an order in the state;
and as all the orders had their privileges, the clergy
had theirs, and were no less steady to'preserve and
ambitious to extend them. Our ancestors, having
united the Church dignities to the secular dignities
of baronies, had so blended the ecclesiastical with
the temporal power in the same persons that it
became almost impossible to separate them. The
ecclesiastical was, however, prevalent in this composition, drew to it the other, supported it, and was supported by it. But it was not the devotion only,
but the necessity of the times, that raised the clergy
to the excess of this greatness. The' little learning
which then subsisted remained wholly in their hands.
Few among the laity could even read; consequently
the clergy alone were proper for public affairs. They
were the statesmen, they were the lawyers; from
them were often taken the bailiffs of the seigneurial
courts, sometimes the sheriffs of counties, and almost
? ? ? ? 400 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
constantly the justiciaries of the kingdom. * The Norman kings, always jealous of their order, were always
forced to employ them. In abbeys the law was studied; abbeys were the palladiums of the public liberty by the cusody of the royal charters and most of the records. Thus, necessary to the great by their
knowledge, venerable to the poor by their hospitality,
dreadful to all by the power of excommunication, the
character of the clergy was exalted above everything
in the state; and it could no more be otherwise in
those days than it is possible it should be so in ours.
William the Conqueror made it one principal point
of his politics to reduce the clergy; but all the steps
he took in it were not equally well calculated to answer this intention. When he subjected the Church
lands to military service, the clergy complained bitterly, as it lessened their revenue: but I imagine it did
not lessen their power in proportion; for by this regulation they came, like other great lords, to have their
military vassals, who owed them homage and fealty;
and this rather increased their consideration amongst
so martial a people. The kings who succeeded him,
though they also aimed at reducing the ecclesiastical
power, never pursued their scheme on a great or
legislative principle. They seemed rather desirous of
enriching themselves by the abuses in the Church
than earnest to correct them. One day they plundered
and the next day they founded monasteries, as their
rapaciousness or their scruples chanced. to predominate; so that every attempt of that. kind, having rather
the air of tyranny than reformation, could never be
heartily approved or seconded by the body of the
people.
* Seld. Tithes, p. 482.
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 401
The bishops Inust always be considered in the
double capacity of clerks and barons. Their courts,
therefore, had a double jurisdiction: over-the clergy
and laity of their diocese for the cognizance of crimes
against ecclesiastical law, and over the vassals of their
barony as lords paramount. But these two departments, so different in their nature, they frequently confounded, by making use of the spiritual weapon
of excommunication to enforce the judgments of
both; and this sentence, cutting off the party from
the common society of mankind, lay equally heavy on
all ranks: for, as it deprived the lower sort of the.
fellowship of their equals and the protection of their
lord, so it deprived the lord of the services of his
vassals, whether he or they lay under the sentence. .
This was one of the grievances which the king proposed to redress.
As some sanction of religion is mixed with almost
every concern of civil life, and as the ecclesiastical
court took cognizance of all religious matters, it drew
to itself not only all questions relative to tithes and
advowsons, but whatever related to marriages, wills,
the estate of intestates, the breaches of oaths and
contracts, -in a word, everything which did not
touch life or feudal property.
The ignorance of the bailiffs in lay courts, who
were only possessed of some feudal maxims and the
traditions of an uncertain custom, made this recourse
to the spiritual courts the more necessary, where they
could judge with a little more exactness by the lights
of the canon and civil laws.
This jurisdiction extended itself by connivance, by
necessity, by custom, by abuse, over lay persons and,
affairs. But the immunity of the clergy from lay cogVOL. VII. 26
? ? ? ? 402 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
nizances was claimed, not onlly as a privilege essential
to the dignity of their order, supported by the canons,
and countenanced by the Roman law, but as a right
confirmed by all the ancient laws of England.
Christianity, coming into England out of the bosom
of the Roman Empire, brought along with it all those
ideas of immunity. The first trace we can find of
this exemption from lay jurisdiction in England is
in the laws of Ethelred;* it is more fully established
in those of Canute; t but in the code of Henry I. it is
twice distinctly affirmed. t -This immunity from the
secular jurisdiction, whilst it seemed to encourage
acts of violence in the clergy towards others, encouraged also the violence of others against them. The
murder of a clerk could not be punished at this time
by death; it was against a spiritual person, an offence
wholly spiritual, of which the secular courts took no
sort of cognizance. In the Saxon times two circumstances made such an exemption less a cause of jealousy: the sheriff sat with the bishop, and the spiritual jurisdiction was, if not under the control, at least
under the inspection of the lay officer; and then, as
neither laity nor clergy were capitally punished for
any offence, this privilege did not create so invidious
and glaring a distinction between them. Such was
the power of the clergy, and such the immunities,
which the king proposed to diminish.
Becket, who had punished the ecclesiastic for his
* LL. Ethelred. Si presbyter homicida fieret, &c.
t LL. Cnuti, 38, De Ministro Altaris Homicida. Idem, 40, De
Ordinato Capitis reo.
t LL. H. I. 57, De Querela Vicinorum; and 56 [66? ]. De Ordi
nato qui Vitam forisfaciat, in Feed. Alured. et Guthurn. , apud Spel
Concil. 376, 1st vol. ; LL. Edw. et Guthurn. , 3, De Correctione Ordi.
natorum.
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 403
crime by ecclesiastical law, refused to deliver him over
to the secular judges for further punishment, on the
principle of law, that no man ought to be twice questioned for the same offence. The king, pro- A. D. 1164.
voked at this opposition, summoned a council of the barons and bishops at Clarendon; and here,
amongst others of less moment, the following were
unanimously declared to be the ancient prerogatives
of the crown. And it is something remarkable, and
certainly makes much for the honor of their moderation, that the bishops and abbots who must have composed so large and weighty a part of the great council seem not only to have made no opposition to regulations which so remarkably contracted their jurisdiction, but even seem to have forwarded them.
1st. A clerk accused of any crime- shall appear in
the king's court, that it may be judged whether he
belongs to ecclesiastical or secular cognizance. If
to the former, a deputy shall go into the bishop's
court to observe the trial; if the clerk be convicted,
he shall be delivered over to the king's justiciary to
be punished.
2nd. All causes concerning presentation, all causes concerning Frankalmoign, all actions concerning
breach of faith, shall be tried in the king's court.
3rd. The king's tenant in capite shall not be excommunicated without the king's license.
4th. No clerk shall go out of the kingdom without
giving security that he will do nothing to the prejudice of the king or nation. And all appeals shall be
tried at home.
These are the most material of the Constitutions or
Assizes of Clarendon, famous for having been the first
legal check given to the power of the clergy in Eng
? ? ? ? 404 ABRIDGMENT OF'ENGLISH HISTORY.
land. To give these constitutions the greater weight,
it was thought proper that they should be confirmed
by a bull from the Pope. By this step the king
seemed to doubt the entireness of his own authority
in his dominions; and by calling in foreign aid when
it served: his purpose, he gave it a force and a sort of
legal sanction when it came to be employed against
himself. But as: no negotiation had prepared the
Pope in favor of laws designed in reality to abridge
his own power, it was no wonder that he rejected
them with indignation. Becket, who had not been
prevailed on to accept them but with infinite reluctance, was no sooner apprised of the Pope's disapprobation than he openly declared his own; he did penance in the humblest manner for: his former
acquiescence, and resolved to make amends for it by
opposing the new constitutions with the utmost zeal.
In this disposition the king saw that the Archbishop
might be more easily ruined than humbled, and his
ruin was resolved. Immediately a number of suits,
on various pretences, were commenced against him, in
every one of which he was sure to be foiled; but these
making no deadly blow at his fortunes, he was called
to account for thirty thousand pounds which he: was
accused of having embezzled during his chancellorship. It was in vain that he pleaded a full acquittance from the king's son, and Richard de Lucy, the guardian and justiciary:of the kingdom, on his resignation of the seals; he saw it was already determined
against him. Far from yielding under these repeated,
blows, he raised still higher the ecclesiastical pretensions, now become necessary to his own protection.
He refused to answer to the charge, and appealed to
the Pope, to whom alone he seemed to acknowledge
? ?
ferment, nor the right of bestowing it, were sought
with great ambition. Bishops were then elected, and
often against their desire, by their clergy and the
people: the subordinate ecclesiastical districts were
provided for in the same manner. After the Roman
Empire became Christian, this usage, so generally established, still maintained its ground. However, in
the principal cities, the Emperor frequently exercised
the privilege of giving a sanction to the choice, and
sometimes of appointing the bishop; though, for the
most part, the popular election still prevailed. But
when the Barbarians, after destroying the Empire,
had at length. submitted their necks to the Gospel,
their kings and great men, full of zeal and gratitude
-to their instructors, endowed the Church with large
territories and great privileges. In this case it was
but natural that they should be the patrons of those
dignities and nominate to that power which arose
from their own free bounty. Hence the bishoprics
in the greatest part of Europe became in effect, whatever some few might have been in appearance, merely donative. ' And as the bishoprics formed so many seigniories, when the feudal establishment was completed, they partook of the feudal nature, so far as
they were subjects capable of it; homage and fealty
were required on the part of the spiritual vassal;
the king, on his part, gave the bishop the investiture,
or livery and seizin of his temporalities, by the delivery of a ring and staff. This was the original manler
of granting feudal property, and something like it is
still practised in our base-courts. Pope Adrian confirmed this privilege to Charlemagne by an express
grant. The clergy of that time, ignorant, but inquisitive, were very ready at finding types and mysteries
? ? ? ? 384 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
in. every ceremony: they construed the staff into an
emblem of the pastoral care, and the ring into a type
of the bishop's allegorical marriage to his church,
and therefore supposed them designed as emblems of
a jurisdiction merely spiritual. The Papal pretensions increased with the general ignorance and superstition; and the better to support these pretensions, it was necessary at once to exalt the clergy extremely,
and, by breaking off all ties between them and their
natural sovereigns, to attach them wholly to the Roman see. In pursuance of this project, the Pope first
strictly forbade the clergy to receive investitures from
laymen, or to do them homage. A council held at
Rome entirely condemned this practice; and the condemnation was the less unpopular, because the investiture gave rise to frequent and flagrant abuses, especially in England, where the sees were on this
pretence with much scandal long held inll the king's
hands, and afterwards as scandalously and publicly
sold to the highest bidder. So it had been in the last
reign, and so it continued in this.
Henry, though vigorously attacked, with great res:
olution maintained the rights of his crown with regard to investitures, whilst he saw the Emperor, who
claimed a right of investing the Pope himself, subdued by the thunder of the Vatican. His chief
opposition was within his own kingdom. Anselm,
Archbishop of Canterbury, a man of unblamable life,
and of learning for his time, but blindly attached to
the rights of the Church, real or supposed, refused to
consecrate those who received investitures from tie
king. The parties appealed to Rome. Rome, unwilling either to recede from her pretensions or to
provoke a powerful monarch, gives a dubious an
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 385
swer. . Meanwhile the contest grows hotter. Anselm
is obliged to quit the kingdom, but is still inflexible.
At last, the king, who, from the delicate situation of
his affairs in the beginning of his reign, had been
obliged to temporize for a long time, by his usual
prudent mixture of management with force obliged
the Pope to a temperament which seemed extremely
judicious. The king received homage and fealty
from his vassal; the investiture, as it was generally
understood to relate to spiritual jurisdiction, was
given up, and on this equal bottom peace was established. The secret of the Pope's moderation was this:.
he was at that juncture close pressed by the Emperor,
and it might be highly dangerous to contend with two
such enemies at once; and he'was much more ready
to yield to Henry, who had no reciprocal demands on
him,: than to the Emperor, who had many and just
ones, and to whom he could not yield any one point
without' giving up an infinite number of others very
material and interesting.
As the king extricated himself happily from so
great an affair, so all the other difficulties of his
reign only exercised, without endangering him. The
efforts of France in favor of the son of Robert were
late, desultory, and therefore unsuccessful. That
youth, endued with equal virtue and more prudence
than his father, after exerting many useless acts of
unfortunate bravery, fell in battle, and freed Henry'from all disturbance on the side of France. The incursions of the Welsh in this reign only gave him all opportunity of confining that people within narrower
bounds. At home he was well obeyed by his subjects;
abroad he dignified his family by splendid alliances.
His daughter Matilda he married to the Emperor. .
VOL. VII. 25
? ? ? ? 386 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
But his private fortunes did not flow with so even a
course as his public affairs. His only son,
William, with a natural daughter, and many
of the flower of the young nobility, perished at sea
between Normandy and England. From that fatal
accident the king was never seen to smile. He
sought in vain from a second marriage to provide a
A. D. 1127. male successor; but when he saw all prospect of this at an end, he called a great
council of his barons and prelates. His daughter
Matilda, after the decease of the Emperor, he had
given in marriage to Geoffrey Plantagenet, Count of
Anjou. As she was his only remaining issue, he
caused her to be acknowledged as his successor by
the great council; he enforced this acknowledgment
by solemn oaths of fealty, --a sanction which he
weakened rather than confirmed by frequent repetition: vainly imagining that on his death any ties would bind to the respect of a succession so little respected by himself, and by the violation of which he had procured his crown. Having taken these measures in favor of his daughter, he died in Normandy, but in a good old age, and in the thirty-sixth year of
a prosperous reign.
CHAPTER V.
REIGN OF STEPHEN.
ALTHOUGH the authority of the crown had
a. D. 1136.
been exercised with very little restraint during the three preceding reigns, the succession to it,
or even the principles of the succession, were but ill
ascertained: so that a doulbt might justly have arisen,
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 387
whether the crown was not in a great measure elective. This uncertainty exposed the nation, at the
death of every king, to all the calamities of a civil
war; but it was a circumstance favorable to the designs of Stephen, Earl of Boulogne, who was son of
Stephen, Earl of Blois, by a daughter of the Conqueror. The late king had raised him to great employments, and enriched'him by the grant of several
lordships. His brother had been made Bishop of
Winchester; and by adding to it the place of his
chief justiciary, the king gave him an opportunity of
becoming one of the richest subjects in Europe, and
of extending an unlimited influence over the clergy
and the people. Henry trusted, by the promotion of
two persons so near him in blood, and so bound by
benefits, that he had formed an impenetrable fence
about the succession; but he only inspired into Stephen the design of seizing on the crown by bringing him so near it. The opportunity was favorable. The king died abroad. ; Matilda was absent with her husband; and the Bishop of Winchester,
by his universal credit, disposed the churchmen to
elect his brother, with the concurrence of the greatest part of the nobility, who forgot their oaths, and
vainly hoped. that a bad title would necessarily produce a good government. Stephen, in the flower
of youth, bold, active, and courageous, full of generosity and a noble affability, that seemed to reproach
the state and avarice of the preceding kings, was not
wanting to his fortune. He seized immediately the
immense treasures of Henry, and by distributing
them with a judicious profusion removed all doubts
concerning his title to them. He did hot spare even
the royal demesne, but secured himself a vast number
? ? ? ? 888 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
of adherents by involving their guilt and interest in
his own. He raised a considerable army of Flemings, in order to strengthen himself against another
turn of the same instability which had raised him to
the throne; and, in imitation of the measures of the
late king, he concluded all by giving a charter of liberties as ample as the people at that time aspired to.
This charter contained a renunciation of the forests
made by his predecessor, a'grant to the ecclesiastics
of a jurisdiction over their own vassals, and to the
people in general an immunity from unjust tallages
and exactions. It is remarkable, that the oath of allegiance taken by the nobility on this occasion was
conditional: it was to be observed so long as the king
observed the terms of his charter,- a condition which
added no real security to the rights of the subject,
but which proved a fruitful source of dissension, tumult, and civil violence.
The measures which the king hitherto pursued
were dictated by sound policy; but he took another
step to secure his throne, which in fact took away allits security, and at the same time brought the country to extreme misery, and to the brink of utter ruin. At the Conquest there were very few fortifications
in the kingdom. William:found it necessary for his
security to erect several. During the struggles of the
English, the Norman nobility were permitted (as in
reason it could rot be refused) to fortify their own
houses. It was, however, still understood that no
new fortress could be erected without the king's special license. These private castles began very early
to embarrass the government. The royal castles were
scarcely less troublesome: for, as everything was then
in tenure, the governor held his place by the tenure
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF- ENGLISH HISTORY. 389
of castle-guard; and thus, instead of a simple officer,
subject to his pleasure, the king had to deal with a
feudal tenant, secure against him by law, if he performed his services, and by force, if he was unwilling to perform them. Every resolution of government required a sort of civil war to put it in execution. The two last kings had taken and demolished several of
these castles; but when they found the reduction of
any of them difficult, their custom frequently was, to
erect another close by it, tower against tower, ditch
against ditch: these were called Malvoisins, from
their purpose and situation. Thus, instead of removing, they in fact doubled the mischief. Stephen, perceiving the passion of the barons for these castles, among other popular acts in the beginning of his reign, gave a general license for erecting them. Then
was seen to arise in every corner of the kingdom, in
every petty seigniory, an inconceivable multitude of
strongholds, the seats of violence, and the receptacles
of murderers, felons, debasers of the coin, and all
manner of desperate and abandoned villains. Eleven
hundred and fifteen of these: castles were built in this
single reign. The barons, having thus shut out the.
law, made continual inroads upon each other, and
spread war, rapine, burning, and desolation throughout the whole kingdom. . They infested the high-: roads,- and put a stop to all trade by plundering the
merchants and travellers. :. Those who dwelt in the
open country they forced into their castles, and after
pillaging them of all their visible substance, these tyrants held them in dungeons, and tortured them with a thousand cruel inventions to extort a discovery of
their hidden wealth. The lamentable representation
given by history of those barbarous times justifies the:
? ? ? ? 390 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
pictures in the old romances of the castles of giants
and magicians. A great part of Europe was in the
same deplorable condition. It was then that some
gallant spirits, struck with a generous indignation at
the tyranny of these miscreants, blessed solemnly by
the bishop, and followed by the praises and vows of
the people, sallied forth to vindicate the chastity of
women and to redress the wrongs of travellers and
peaceable men. The adventurous humor inspired by
the Crusade heightened and extended this spirit; and
thus the idea of knight-errantry was formed.
A. D. 1138 Stephen felt personally these inconveniences; but because the evil was too stubborn to be redressed at once, he resolved to proceed gradually, and to begin with the castles of the bishops, - as they evidently held them, not only against
the interests of the crown, but against the canons
of the Church. From the nobles he expected no
opposition to this design: they beheld With envy the
pride of these ecclesiastical fortresses, whose battlements seemed to insult the poverty of the lay barons.
This disposition, and a want of unanimity among the
clergy themselves, enabled Stephen to succeed in his
attempt against the Bishop of Salisbury, one of the
first whom he attacked, and whose castles, from their
strength and situation, were of the greatest importance. But the affairs of this prince were so circumstanced that he could pursue no council that was not dangerous. His breach with the clergy let in the party of his rival, Matilda. This party was supported by
Robert, Earl of Gloucester, natural son to the late king,
-a man powerful by his vast possessions, but more
formidable through his popularity, and the courage and
abilities by which he had acquired it. Several other
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 391
circumstances weakened the cause of Stephen. The
charter, and the other favorable acts, the scaffolding
of his ambitioni, when he saw the structure raised, he
threw down and contemned. In order to maintain
his troops, as well as to attach men to his cause,
where no principle bound them, vast and continual
largesses became necessary: all his legal revenue had
been dissipated; and he was therefore obliged to
have recourse to such methods of raising money as
were evidently illegal. These causes every day gave
some accession of strength to the party against him;
the friends of Matilda were encouraged to. 113
appear in arms; a civil war ensued, long
and bloody, prosecuted as chance or a blind rage directed, by mutual acts of cruelty and treachery, by
frequent surprisals and assaults of castles, and by a
number of battles and skirmishes fought to no determinate end, and in which nothing of the military
art appeared, but the destruction which it caused.
Various, on this occasion, were the reverses of fortune, while Stephen, though embarrassed by the weakness of his title, by the scantiness of his finances, and all the disorders which arose from both, supported
his tottering throne with wonderful activity and courage; but being at length defeated and made
prisoner under the walls of Lincoln, the
clergy openly declare for Matilda. The city of London, though unwillingly, follows the example of the
clergy. The defection from Stephen was growing universal.
But Matilda, puffed up with a greatness which as
yet had no solid foundation and stood merely in personal favor, shook it in the minds of all men by assuming, together with the insolence of conquest, the
? ? ? ? 892 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
haughty rigor of an established dominion. Her title
appeared but too good in the resemblance she bore
to the pride of the former kings. This made the first
illsuccess in her affairs fatal. Her great support,
the Earl of Gloucester, was in his turn made prisoner. In exchange for his liberty that of Stephen
was procured, who renewed the war with his usual
vigor. As he apprehended an attempt from Scotland in favor of Matilda, descended from the blood
royal of that nation, to balance this weight, he persuaded the King of France to declare in his favor,
alarmed as he was by the progress of Henry, the
son of Matilda, and Geoffrey, Count of Anjou. This
prince, no more than sixteen years of age, after receiving knighthood from David, King of Scotland,
began to display a courage and capacity destined to
the greatest things. Of a complexion which strongly
inclined to pleasure, he listened to nothing but, ambition; at an age which is usually given up to passion, he submitted delicacy to politics, and even in
his marriage only remembered the interests of a sovereign, - for, without examining too scrupulously into her character, he married Eleanor, the heiress of Guienne,'though divorced from her husband for her
supposed gallantries in the -Holy Land. He made use
of the accession of power which he acquired by this
match to assert his birthright to Normandy. This
he did with great success, because he was favored by
the general inclination of the people for the blood of
their ancient lords. Flushed with this prosperous
beginning, he aspired to greater things;;he obliged
the King of France to submit to a. truce; and then
he turned his arms to support the rights of his family
in England, from whence Matilda retired, unequal-to
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 393
the troublesome part she had long acted. Worn out
with age, and the clashing of furious factions, she
shut herself up in a monastery, and left to:her son the
succession of a civil war. . Stephen was now pressed
with renewed vigor. Henry had rather the advantage in the field; Stephen had the possession of the government. Their fortunes appearing nearly balallced, and the fuel of dissension being consumed by
a continual and bloody war of thirteen years, an
accommodation was proposed and accepted. Henry
found it dangerous to refuse his consent, as the bishops and barons, even of his own party, dreaded the consequences, if a prince, in the prime of an ambitious youth, should establish an hereditary title by
the force of foreign arms. This treaty, A. D1153.
signed at Wallingford, left the possession
of the crown for his life to Stephen, but secured
the succession to Henry, whom that prince adopted.
The castles erected in this reign were to be demolished; the exorbitant grants of the royal demesne to
be resumed. To the son of Stephen all his private
possessions were secured.
Thus ended this tedious and ruinous civil war.
Stephen survived it near two years; and now, finding himself more secure as the lawful tenant than he had been as the usurping proprietor of the crown, he
no longer governed on the maxims of necessity. He
made no new attempts in favor of his family, but
spent the remainder of his. reign in correcting the
disorders which arose from his steps in its commencement, and in healing the wounds of so long and cruel a war. Thus he left the kingdom in peace to his
successor, but his character, as it is usual where
party is concerned, greatly disputed. Wherever
? ? ? ? 394 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
his natural dispositions had room to exert themselves, they appeared virtuous and princely; but
the lust to reign, which often attends great virtues,
was fatal to his, frequently hid them, and always rendered them suspected.
CHAPTER VI.
REIGN OF HENRY II.
THE death of Stephen left an undisputed
succession for the first time since the death
of Edward the Confessor. Henry, descended equally
from the Norman Conqueror and the old English
kings, adopted by Stephen, acknowledged by the
barons, united in himself every kind of title. It
was grown into a custom for the king to grant a
charter of liberties on his accession to the crown.
Henry also granted a charter of that kind, confirming that of his grandfather; but as his situation was very different from that of his predecessors, his charter was different,- reserved, short, dry, conceived in general terms, - a gift, not a bargain. And, indeed,
there seems to have been at that juncture but little
occasion to limit a power which seemed not more
than sufficient to correct all the evils of an unlimited
liberty. Henry spent the beginning of his reign in
repairing the ruins of the royal authority, and in restoring to the kingdom peace and order, along with its ancient limits; and he may well be considered as
the restorer of the English monarchy. Stephen had
sacrificed the demesne of the crown, and many of its
rights, to his subjects; and the necessity of the times
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 395
obliged both that prince and the Empress Matilda to
purchase, in their turns, the precarious friendship of
the King of Scotland by a cession of almost all the
country north of the Humber. But'Henry obliged
the King of Scotland to restore his acquisitions, and
to renew his homage. He took the same methods
with his barons. Not sparing the grants of his
mother, he resumed what had been so lavishly
squandered by both of the contending parties, who,
to establish their claims, had given away almost
everything that made them valuable. There never
was a prince in Europe who better understood the
advantages to be derived from its peculiar constitution, in which greater acquisitions of dominion are made by judicious marriages than by success in war:
for, having added to his patrimonial territories of Anjou and Normandy the Duchy of Guienne by his own marriage, the male issue of the Dukes of Brittany
failing, he took the opportunity of marrying A. . 11m.
his third son, Geoffrey, then an infant,. to
the heiress of that important province, an infant also;
and thus uniting by so strong a link his northern to
his southern dominions, he possessed in his own name,
or in those of his wife and son, all that fine and extensive country that is washed by the Atlantic Ocean, from Picardy quite to the foot of the Pyrenees.
Henry, possessed of such extensive territories, and
aiming at further acquisitions, saw with indignation
that the sovereign authority in all of them, especially
in England, had been greatly diminished. By his
resumptions he had, indeed, lessened the greatness
of several of the nobility. He had by force of arms
reduced those who forcibly held the crown lands,
and deprived them of their own estates for their
? ? ? ? 396 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
rebellion. He demolished many castles, those perpetual resources of rebellion and disorder. ,But the great aim of his policy was to break the power of
the clergy, which each of his predecessors, since Edward, had alternately strove to raise and to depress, - at first in order to gain that potent body to their
interests, and then to preserve them in subjection
to the authority which they had conferred. The
clergy had elected Stephen; they had deposed Stephen, and. elected Matilda; and in the instruments which they used on these- occasions they affirmed
in themselves a general right of electing the kings
of England. Their share both in the elevation and
depression of that prince showed that they possessed
a power inconsistent with the safety and dignity
of the state. The immunities which they enjoyed
seemed no less prejudicial to the civil economy,and the rather, as, in the confusion of Stephen's
reign, many, to protect themselves from the prevailing violence of the time, or to sanctify their own disorders, had taken refuge in the clerical character.
The Church was never so full of scandalous persons, who, being accountable only in the ecclesiastical courts, where no crime is punished with death, were
guilty of every crime. A priest had about this time
committed a murder attended with very aggravating circumstances. The king, willing at once to
restore order and to depress the clergy, laid hold
of this favorable opportunity to convoke the cause to
his own court, when the atrociousness of the crime
made all men look with an evil eye upon the claim
of any privilege which might prevent the severest
justice. The nation in general seemed but little
inclined to controvert so useful a regulation with
so potent a prince.
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF. ENGLISH HISTORY. 397.
Amidst this general acquiescence one man was
found bold enough to oppose him, who for: eight
years together embroiled all his affairs, poisoned his
satisfactions, endangered his dominions, and at length
in his death triumphed over all the power and policy
of this wise and potent monarch. This was Thomas
a-Becket, a man memorable for the great glory and
the bitter reproaches he has met with from posterity.
This person was the son of a respectable citizen of
London. He was bred to the study of the civil and
canon law, the education then used to qualify a man
for. public affairs, in which he soon made a distinguished figure. By the royal favor and his own abilities, he rose, in a rapid succession through several considerable employments, from an office under the
sheriff of London, to be High Chancellor of the kingdom. In this high post. he showed a spirit as elevated; but it was rather a military spirit than that
of the. gownman, - magnificent to excess in his living and appearance, and. distinguishing himself in
the tournaments and other martial sports of that age
with much ostentation of courage and expense. The
king, who. favored him greatly, and expected a suitable return, on the vacancy, destined Becket, yet a
layman, to the see of. Canterbury, and hoped to find
in him. a warm promoter of the_ reformation he intended. Hardly a priest, he was made the
A. D. 1162.
first prelate in the kingdom. But no sooner. .
was he invested. with the clerical character than the
whole tenor of his conduct was seen to change all at
once: of his pompous retinue a. few plain servants
only remained; a monastic temperance regulated his
table; and his life, in all respects formed to the most
rigid austerity,- seemed. to prepare him for that supe
? ? ? ? 398 ABRIDGMENT OP ENGLISH HISTORY.
riority he was resolved to assume, and the conflicts he
foresaw he must. undergo in this attempt.
It will not be unpleasing to pause a moment at this
remarkable period, ill order to view in what consisted
that greatness of the clergy, which enabled them to
bear so very considerable a sway in all public affairs,
what foundations supported the weight of so vast a
power, - whence it had its origin, -- what was the
nature, and what the ground, of the immunities they
claimed, - that we may the more fully enter into this
important controversy, and- may not judge, as some
have inconsiderately done, of the affairs of those
times by ideas taken from the present manners and
opinions.
It is sufficiently known, that the first Christians,
avoiding the Pagan tribunals, tried most even of their
civil causes before the bishop, who, though he had
no direct coercive power, yet, wielding the sword
of excommunication, had wherewithal to enforce the
execution of his judgments. Thus the bishop had
a considerable sway in temporal affairs, even before
he was owned by the temporal power. But the Emperors no sooner became Christian than, the idea of profaneness being removed from the secular tribunals, the causes of the Christian laity naturally passed to that resort where those of the generality
had been before. But the reverence for the bishop
still remained, and the remembrance of his former
jurisdiction. It was not thought decent, that he,
who had been a judge in his own court, should become a suitor in the court of another. The body of the clergy likewise, who were supposed to have
no secular concerns for which they could litigate,
and removed by their character from all suspicion
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 399
of violence, were left to be tried by their own ecclesiastical superiors. This was, with a little variation, sometimes in extending, sometimes in restraining the
bishops' jurisdiction, the condition of things whilst
the Roman Empire subsisted. But though their immunities were great and their possessions ample, yet, living under an absolute form of government, they
were powerful only by influence. No jurisdictions
were annexed to their lands; they had no place in
the senate; they were no order in the state.
From the settlement of the Northern nations the
clergy must be considered in another light. The
Barbarians gave them large landed possessions; and
by giving them land, they gave them jurisdiction,
which, according to their notions, was inseparable
from it. They made them an order in the state;
and as all the orders had their privileges, the clergy
had theirs, and were no less steady to'preserve and
ambitious to extend them. Our ancestors, having
united the Church dignities to the secular dignities
of baronies, had so blended the ecclesiastical with
the temporal power in the same persons that it
became almost impossible to separate them. The
ecclesiastical was, however, prevalent in this composition, drew to it the other, supported it, and was supported by it. But it was not the devotion only,
but the necessity of the times, that raised the clergy
to the excess of this greatness. The' little learning
which then subsisted remained wholly in their hands.
Few among the laity could even read; consequently
the clergy alone were proper for public affairs. They
were the statesmen, they were the lawyers; from
them were often taken the bailiffs of the seigneurial
courts, sometimes the sheriffs of counties, and almost
? ? ? ? 400 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
constantly the justiciaries of the kingdom. * The Norman kings, always jealous of their order, were always
forced to employ them. In abbeys the law was studied; abbeys were the palladiums of the public liberty by the cusody of the royal charters and most of the records. Thus, necessary to the great by their
knowledge, venerable to the poor by their hospitality,
dreadful to all by the power of excommunication, the
character of the clergy was exalted above everything
in the state; and it could no more be otherwise in
those days than it is possible it should be so in ours.
William the Conqueror made it one principal point
of his politics to reduce the clergy; but all the steps
he took in it were not equally well calculated to answer this intention. When he subjected the Church
lands to military service, the clergy complained bitterly, as it lessened their revenue: but I imagine it did
not lessen their power in proportion; for by this regulation they came, like other great lords, to have their
military vassals, who owed them homage and fealty;
and this rather increased their consideration amongst
so martial a people. The kings who succeeded him,
though they also aimed at reducing the ecclesiastical
power, never pursued their scheme on a great or
legislative principle. They seemed rather desirous of
enriching themselves by the abuses in the Church
than earnest to correct them. One day they plundered
and the next day they founded monasteries, as their
rapaciousness or their scruples chanced. to predominate; so that every attempt of that. kind, having rather
the air of tyranny than reformation, could never be
heartily approved or seconded by the body of the
people.
* Seld. Tithes, p. 482.
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 401
The bishops Inust always be considered in the
double capacity of clerks and barons. Their courts,
therefore, had a double jurisdiction: over-the clergy
and laity of their diocese for the cognizance of crimes
against ecclesiastical law, and over the vassals of their
barony as lords paramount. But these two departments, so different in their nature, they frequently confounded, by making use of the spiritual weapon
of excommunication to enforce the judgments of
both; and this sentence, cutting off the party from
the common society of mankind, lay equally heavy on
all ranks: for, as it deprived the lower sort of the.
fellowship of their equals and the protection of their
lord, so it deprived the lord of the services of his
vassals, whether he or they lay under the sentence. .
This was one of the grievances which the king proposed to redress.
As some sanction of religion is mixed with almost
every concern of civil life, and as the ecclesiastical
court took cognizance of all religious matters, it drew
to itself not only all questions relative to tithes and
advowsons, but whatever related to marriages, wills,
the estate of intestates, the breaches of oaths and
contracts, -in a word, everything which did not
touch life or feudal property.
The ignorance of the bailiffs in lay courts, who
were only possessed of some feudal maxims and the
traditions of an uncertain custom, made this recourse
to the spiritual courts the more necessary, where they
could judge with a little more exactness by the lights
of the canon and civil laws.
This jurisdiction extended itself by connivance, by
necessity, by custom, by abuse, over lay persons and,
affairs. But the immunity of the clergy from lay cogVOL. VII. 26
? ? ? ? 402 ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
nizances was claimed, not onlly as a privilege essential
to the dignity of their order, supported by the canons,
and countenanced by the Roman law, but as a right
confirmed by all the ancient laws of England.
Christianity, coming into England out of the bosom
of the Roman Empire, brought along with it all those
ideas of immunity. The first trace we can find of
this exemption from lay jurisdiction in England is
in the laws of Ethelred;* it is more fully established
in those of Canute; t but in the code of Henry I. it is
twice distinctly affirmed. t -This immunity from the
secular jurisdiction, whilst it seemed to encourage
acts of violence in the clergy towards others, encouraged also the violence of others against them. The
murder of a clerk could not be punished at this time
by death; it was against a spiritual person, an offence
wholly spiritual, of which the secular courts took no
sort of cognizance. In the Saxon times two circumstances made such an exemption less a cause of jealousy: the sheriff sat with the bishop, and the spiritual jurisdiction was, if not under the control, at least
under the inspection of the lay officer; and then, as
neither laity nor clergy were capitally punished for
any offence, this privilege did not create so invidious
and glaring a distinction between them. Such was
the power of the clergy, and such the immunities,
which the king proposed to diminish.
Becket, who had punished the ecclesiastic for his
* LL. Ethelred. Si presbyter homicida fieret, &c.
t LL. Cnuti, 38, De Ministro Altaris Homicida. Idem, 40, De
Ordinato Capitis reo.
t LL. H. I. 57, De Querela Vicinorum; and 56 [66? ]. De Ordi
nato qui Vitam forisfaciat, in Feed. Alured. et Guthurn. , apud Spel
Concil. 376, 1st vol. ; LL. Edw. et Guthurn. , 3, De Correctione Ordi.
natorum.
? ? ? ? ABRIDGMENT OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 403
crime by ecclesiastical law, refused to deliver him over
to the secular judges for further punishment, on the
principle of law, that no man ought to be twice questioned for the same offence. The king, pro- A. D. 1164.
voked at this opposition, summoned a council of the barons and bishops at Clarendon; and here,
amongst others of less moment, the following were
unanimously declared to be the ancient prerogatives
of the crown. And it is something remarkable, and
certainly makes much for the honor of their moderation, that the bishops and abbots who must have composed so large and weighty a part of the great council seem not only to have made no opposition to regulations which so remarkably contracted their jurisdiction, but even seem to have forwarded them.
1st. A clerk accused of any crime- shall appear in
the king's court, that it may be judged whether he
belongs to ecclesiastical or secular cognizance. If
to the former, a deputy shall go into the bishop's
court to observe the trial; if the clerk be convicted,
he shall be delivered over to the king's justiciary to
be punished.
2nd. All causes concerning presentation, all causes concerning Frankalmoign, all actions concerning
breach of faith, shall be tried in the king's court.
3rd. The king's tenant in capite shall not be excommunicated without the king's license.
4th. No clerk shall go out of the kingdom without
giving security that he will do nothing to the prejudice of the king or nation. And all appeals shall be
tried at home.
These are the most material of the Constitutions or
Assizes of Clarendon, famous for having been the first
legal check given to the power of the clergy in Eng
? ? ? ? 404 ABRIDGMENT OF'ENGLISH HISTORY.
land. To give these constitutions the greater weight,
it was thought proper that they should be confirmed
by a bull from the Pope. By this step the king
seemed to doubt the entireness of his own authority
in his dominions; and by calling in foreign aid when
it served: his purpose, he gave it a force and a sort of
legal sanction when it came to be employed against
himself. But as: no negotiation had prepared the
Pope in favor of laws designed in reality to abridge
his own power, it was no wonder that he rejected
them with indignation. Becket, who had not been
prevailed on to accept them but with infinite reluctance, was no sooner apprised of the Pope's disapprobation than he openly declared his own; he did penance in the humblest manner for: his former
acquiescence, and resolved to make amends for it by
opposing the new constitutions with the utmost zeal.
In this disposition the king saw that the Archbishop
might be more easily ruined than humbled, and his
ruin was resolved. Immediately a number of suits,
on various pretences, were commenced against him, in
every one of which he was sure to be foiled; but these
making no deadly blow at his fortunes, he was called
to account for thirty thousand pounds which he: was
accused of having embezzled during his chancellorship. It was in vain that he pleaded a full acquittance from the king's son, and Richard de Lucy, the guardian and justiciary:of the kingdom, on his resignation of the seals; he saw it was already determined
against him. Far from yielding under these repeated,
blows, he raised still higher the ecclesiastical pretensions, now become necessary to his own protection.
He refused to answer to the charge, and appealed to
the Pope, to whom alone he seemed to acknowledge
? ?
