eight, that the contest
between the regale and pontificale was really arrived at a crisis in
England; and it became necessary to determine whether the king or the
priests, particularly the archbishop of Canterbury, should be sovereign
of the kingdom. The aspiring spirit of Henry, which gave inquietude to
all his neighbors, was not likely long to pay a tame submission to
the encroachments of subjects; and as nothing opens the eyes of men
so readily as their interest, he was in no danger of falling, in this
respect, into that abject superstition which retained his people in
subjection. From the commencement of his reign, in the government of his
foreign dominions, as well as of England, he had shown a fixed purpose
to repress clerical usurpations, and to maintain those prerogatives
which had been transmitted to him by his predecessors. During the schism
of the papacy between Alexander and Victor, he had determined, for some
time, to remain neuter; and when informed that the archbishop of Rouen
and the bishop of Mans had, from their own authority, acknowledged
Alexander as legitimate pope, he was so enraged, that, though he spared
the archbishop on account of his great age, he immediately issued orders
for overthrowing the houses of the bishop of Mans and archdeacon of
Rouen;[*] [17] and it was not till he had deliberately examined the
matter, by those views which usually enter into the councils of princes,
that he allowed that pontiff to exercise authority over any of his
dominions.

[* See note Q, at the end of the volume.]

In England, the mild character and advanced years of Theobald,
archbishop of Canterbury, together with his merits in refusing to put
the crown on the head of Eustace, son of Stephen, prevented Henry,
during the lifetime of that primate, from taking any measures against
the multiplied encroachments of the clergy; but after his death, the
king resolved to exert himself with more activity; and that he might be
secure against any opposition, he advanced to that dignity Becket, his
chancellor, on whose compliance he thought he could entirely depend.

Thomas a Becket, the first man of English descent who, since the Norman
conquest, had, during the course of a whole century, risen to any
considerable station, was born of reputable parents in the city of
London; and being endowed both with industry and capacity, he early
insinuated himself into the favor of Archbishop Theobald, and obtained
from that