nly that the prince might avoid the blow by a timely repentance.[*****]

[* Epist. St. Thom. p. 63, 105, 194.]

[** Epist St. Thom. p. 29, 30, 31, 226.]

[*** Fitz-Steph. p. 46. Epist. St. Thom. p.
52,148.]

[**** Brady's Append. No. 56. Epist. St. Thom. p.
94,95, 97, 99,197. Roveden, p, 497.]

[***** Fitz-Steph. p.56. Hist. Quad. p. 93. M.
Paris, p. 74. Beaulieu. Vie de St. Thom. p. 213. Erzst. St.
Thom. p. 149, 229. Hoveden p. 499.]

The situation of Henry was so unhappy, that he could employ no expedient
for saving his ministers from this terrible censure, but by appealing to
the pope himself, and having recourse to a tribunal whose authority he
had himself attempted to abridge in this very article of appeals, and
which he knew was so deeply engaged on the side of his adversary. But
even this expedient was not likely to be long effectual. Becket had
obtained from the pope a legantine commission over England; and in
virtue of that authority, which admitted of no appeal, he summoned the
bishops of London, Salisbury, and others to attend him, and ordered,
under pain of excommunication, the ecclesiastics, sequestered on his
account, to be restored in two months to all their benefices. But John
of Oxford, the king's agent with the pope, had the address to procure
orders for suspending this sentence; and he gave the pontiff such hopes
of a speedy reconcilement between the king and Becket, that two legates,
William of Pavia and Otho, were sent to Normandy, where the king then
resided, and they endeavored to find expedients for that purpose. But
the pretensions of the parties were as yet too opposite to admit of an
accommodation: the king required that all the constitutions of Clarendon
should be ratified; Becket, that previously to any agreement, he and his
adherents should be restored to their possessions; and as the legates
had no power to pronounce a definite sentence on either side, the
negotiation soon after came to nothing. The cardinal of Pavia also,
being much attached to Henry, took care to protract the negotiation;
to mitigate the pope by the accounts which he sent of that prince's
conduct, and to procure him every possible indulgence from the see
of Rome. About this time, the king had also the address to obtain a
dispensation for the marriage of his third son, Geoffrey, with the
heiress of Brittany; a concession which, considering Henry's demerits
towards the ch