Page images
PDF
EPUB

stuffed out by the unsuspected shirt of hair that all the world supposed him to be a portly man. He now endeavoured to conform in every respect to the strict rule of the Cistercians, but his mortification was carried on, as it had been at Canterbury, with a studious attempt at concealment. His table was placed by itself in the refectory, so that he was safe from the general observation. Viands suitable to his dignity were served on it, but he privately instructed the monk who waited on him to place among them the coarse and unsavoury pulmentaria of the Cistercian dietary; and to these for a time he restricted himself, allowing the more delicate food to be carried away for beggars—from whom M. Thierry might probably claim a portion for distressed Saxon refugees. Nor did he refuse even to share in the bodily labours of his hosts; for we are told that he made hay and engaged in other agricultural works, which not even sickness could persuade him to intermit. Garnier and Grim add other and more wonderful details of his mortification and devotion, borrowing (we suspect) somewhat too largely from the stock austerities of

197.

Alan, i. 363-4; Herb., vii. | who knew his custom of living on "Videbatur grossior," says bread and water, although dainties Alan, "qui fuit macilentus, sed were served up to him, placed on jocundus facie." The view which the table a cup of water. The the biographers give-that he Pope tasted it, and found it exlooked stout, and was thin-that cellent wine; whereupon, saying he was rigorous in diet, yet seemed "I thought this was water," he to fare sumptuously-is something set it before the Archbishop; almost docetic, and with this and immediately it became water agrees a story of a miracle, told again! Hoved., 298. by Hoveden. One day, as he was dining with Pope Alexander, one

b Grim, i. 57; Herb., vii. 214. c Gervase, 1400.

the hagiologists. It is said that he was wont to lock himself up in an oratory, where he employed his time in exercises which might be guessed at from his loud and frequent groans; that he used to stand for hours chilling himself in a stream; that instead of occupying the bed which was prepared for him, "with clean and costly coverings, as was meet for an archbishop," he spent much of the night in prayer, and then used to rouse his chaplain Robert of Merton, and submit himself to him for discipline; that when the chaplain returned to his couch, weary with exertion and unable to flog any longer, the saint tore his own flesh with his nails, until at length, in a state of exhaustion, he lay down on the bare floor, and, with a stone for his pillow, yielded himself to a short slumber, which the galling cilice and the gnawings of his multitudinous vermin rendered a pain and an additional weariness rather than a refreshment.b

c

That he soon fell ill, is certain; and then, it is said, he was haunted by visions of malignant cardinals bent on plucking out his eyes, of savage men cutting off his tonsured crown, and other such terrible phantasms. Herbert, who does not mention any other cause of his illness than the unwholesome diet, tells us that he himself discovered this cause with some difficulty, and that, in obedience to his remonstrances, the Archbishop re

• Robert was sworn to keep this | given in connexion with his residsecret until after his master's death. ence at Sens, but are, no doubt, to Grim, i. 63. be equally understood of his stay at Pontigny.

b Grim, i. 55, 62-3; Garnier, 102-3. These details are in part

Grim, i. 58; Garnier, 94.

turned to his Canterbury practice of placing his mortification rather in the scantiness than in the plainness of his food,"-eating (we may suppose) his morsel of pheasant and drinking bis sip of wine with abstinence, while the brethren of Stephen Harding and Bernard might be gluttonous over their beech leaves and their bran.b Although, however, the Archbishop's personal habits were thus severe, his general style of living was such that his friend the Bishop of Poitiers thought it necessary to urge on him repeatedly a reduction of his establishment. "Your wisdom," he says, in one of his letters, "ought to know that no one will think the less of you if, in conformity to your circumstances and in condescension to the religious house which entertains you, you content yourself with a moderate number both of horses and of men, such as your necessities require." c

C

d

Much of his time was now given to study, in which his chief associates were Herbert of Bosham and a learned canonist of Piacenza named Lombard, who was afterwards Archbishop of Benevento. Herbert tells us that

a vii. 215-6.

c S. T. C., vi. 250 (cf. ib. 255); Froude, 570. See Appendix XXIII. d Fitzstephen tells us that during his exile he caused copies of many rare books to be executed in French libraries, for the enrichment of that of Canterbury. i, 244.

[ocr errors]

Quadrilogus (p. 157), and the error

b Alan. Altissiod. in Vita Ber- runs through many works, down to nardi, 18 (Patrol. clxxxv.). Mr. Froude's (p. 116). It is corrected by Dr. Giles in the Preface to S. T. C., vol. viii., before seeing which I had myself detected it. (See British Magazine, xxx. 51.) Mr. Morris has adopted another error, that of identifying him with Humbert, afterwards Pope Urban e This person has been con- III. (p. 199.) (Comp. Nos. 2 and founded with Herbert of Bosham, 19 in the Catalogus Eruditorum,' in consequence of a mistake in the | S. T. C., vii. 362-7.)

he occupied himself especially with the Psalter and the Epistles," as being two spiritual eyes, the mystical and the moral: the one perfectly teaching ethics, and the other contemplation." But the main direction of his reading was such as his wisest friend, John of Salisbury, could not regard without fear for the effects which it might be expected to produce on the Archbishop's peculiar temper. "Laws and canons," he wrote, "are indeed useful; but, believe me, these are not what will now be needed

'Non hoc ista sibi tempus spectacula poscit.'

6

Virg. Æn. vi. 37. For in truth they do not so much excite devotion as curiosity. . . . Who ever rises pricked in heart from the reading of laws, or even of canons? I would rather that you should ruminate on the Psalms, and should peruse St. Gregory's books of Morals,' than that you should philosophise after the manner of schoolmen. You would do better to confer on moral subjects with some spiritual man, by whose example you may be kindled, than to pry into and discuss the contentious points of secular learning. God knoweth with what intention, with what devotion, I suggest these things. You will take them as you please." The study of

a 66

218.

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

Theoriam," Herb., vii. 196, 148), but wrongly refers it to the

b Joh. Sarisb., Ep. 138 (written about the beginning of February, 1165). Dr. Lingard seems to agree in thinking that the Archbishop's studies had an unfavourable effect on him, and quotes this letter (ii.

[blocks in formation]

ecclesiastical law as it then was-" developed" by forgery, ignorance of antiquity, and the usurpations of the clergy, which had been advancing for centuries, --and lately reduced to method by Gratian, in accordance with the principles of the False Decretals and with the highest hierarchical pretensions-was especially fitted to bring out the defects of Becket's character, by filling his mind with exaggerated notions. And a tutor who was "Lombard by nation as well as by name was likely, from republican as well as from ecclesiastical feeling, to give especial prominence to whatever might lead to the depreciation of the royal power; while the Archbishop's rigid manner of life would arm him with a stern determination to carry out his ideas of duty, without abating in any point of what he conceived to be his dignities and the rights of the Church.

About this time the

copious and important.

" a

correspondence becomes very Unhappily, however, the editors have done little for it; nay, the late editor appears to have done all that was in his power to prevent the possibility of reading it with ease or pleasure, and even to throw impediments in the way of understanding it. Alan of Tewkesbury, indeed, in making his collection, attempted "with labour and study," as Herbert says, to

tion in good part. He excommunicated Joscelin, Bishop of Salisbury, and John (of Oxford), Dean of Salisbury; but John of Salisbury was his steady adherent, and was not a bishop until after Becket's death.

rows the quotation from Mr. Turner | seem to have taken the expostulawithout acknowledgment, says, still more pointedly, that John "was excommunicated for his pains,” i. e. for writing the letter (i. 86). This misstatement is very injurious to Becket, who, if we may judge by the freedom with which John continued to admonish him, would

a Herb., vii. 362.

« PreviousContinue »