owever, is not insisted on in any of Becket's
remonstrances: a further proof how little fixed the
constitution was at that time.]

The violent and unjust prosecution of Becket had a natural tendency to
turn the public favor on his side, and to make men overlook his former
ingratitude towards the king and his departure from all oaths and
engagements, as well as the enormity of those ecclesiastical privileges,
of which he affected to be the champion. There were many other reasons
which procured him countenance and protection in foreign countries.
Philip, earl of Flanders,[*] and Lewis, king of France,[**] jealous of
the rising greatness of Henry, were well pleased to give him disturbance
in his government; and forgetting that this was the common cause of
princes, they affected to pity extremely the condition of the exiled
primate; and the latter even honored him with a visit at Soissons, in
which city he had invited him to fix his residence.[***]

[* Epist. St Thom. p. 35.]

[** Epist. St. Thom. p. 36, 37.]

[*** Hist. Quad. p. 76.]

The pope, whose interests were more immediately concerned in supporting
him, gave a cold reception to a magnificent embassy which Henry sent
to accuse him; while Becket himself, who had come to Sens in order to
justify his cause before the sovereign pontiff was received with the
greatest marks of distinction. The king in revenge, sequestered
the revenues of Canterbury; and by conduct which might be esteemed
arbitrary, had there been at that time any regular check on royal
authority, he banished all the primate's relations and domestics, to
the number of four hundred, whom he obliged to swear, before their
departure, that they would instantly join their patron. But this policy,
by which Henry endeavored to reduce Becket sooner to necessity, lost its
effect; the pope, when they arrived beyond sea, absolved them from their
oath, and distributed them among the convents in Franc? and Flanders;
a residence was assigned to Becket himself, in the convent of Pontigny,
where he lived for some years in great magnificence, partly from
a pension granted him on the revenues of that abbey, partly from
remittances made him by the French monarch.

{1165.} The more to ingratiate himself with the pope, Becket resigned
into his hands the see of Canterbury, to which, he affirmed, he had
been uncanonically elected, by the authority of the royal mandate; and
Alexander, in his turn, b