Sermon V. The Restoration of the Church of St. Thomas

In San Carlo, Borne, 1864.

THE RESTORATION OF THE CHURCH OF ST. THOMAS.

And of His kingdom there shall be no end. ST. LUKE i. 33.

I AM commissioned to lay before you the reasons for rebuilding the ancient Church of St. Thomas of Canterbury, which stood by the side of the English College. It was destroyed by the great revolution which, at the beginning of this century, passed over Italy and Rome.

First is this fact, that of all the leading nations of Europe, England alone possesses no church in Rome. The Church of all nations recognises and cherishes the Christian and Catholic nationalities, which are its own offspring. In Rome all meet as in a common home. Distinct in accent and in history, they are all one; for ' of one He hath made all nations on the earth.' The revelation of Pentecost has made them to be of one faith, though of many tongues. It is only the spurious nationalism which generates the pride of disobedience, and by this"

both heresy and schism, against which the Church in its authority and unity arrays itself. And now that England has entered once more into closer relations with the Holy See, and the concourse of our ' countrymen in Kome is becoming every year greater, it is necessary that there should be a church with pastors of our race and speech, for the many who — though they may learn the language of other countries enough for the common uses of life — never attain to such a command as is necessary for the ministrations of the Church, especially in the time of sickness, or the hour of death. There is, moreover, a sympathy of kindred, and a homely sense of charity and trust between pastor and flock of the same race and people, which is not easily found among those who have not this common bond.

Already France, Austria, Spain, Portugal, Piedmont, Belgium, Poland, Sclavonia, Greece, Ireland, Scotland, Naples, Sicily, Lombardy, Venice, Lucca, Genoa, the United States, the Armenians, the Maronites, the Copts, the Kuthenians, and others, have their churches in Kome. It would not be well that England alone should be absent from such a family of nations.

But this is only the first, and I may say the least, motive to this work. The restoration of the church is due to our great Martyr for his own sake, and for the cause for which he died. And it is to this that I would now ask your thoughts.

The beloved disciple heard in heaven the voices of the Saints, crying: * The kingdom of this world is become our Lord's and His Christ's, and He shall reign for ever and ever.'1

What was this but the fulfilment of the words of promise and of prophecy spoken by the angel to the Mother of God, ' of His kingdom there shall be no end'?2 The kingdom which Jesus founded is not from hence, as He declared, but it is here, as St. Augustine interprets; 'Hie, sednon hinc;' founded on the earth, mingling with all the affairs of men, and directing them, both as individuals and as nations. The Church derives its authority from a fountain in the eternal world — that is, from the bosom of God Himself. It is God reigning amongst men. It derives its existence from Him, so as to be a shadow of His self-existence among the creations of the will of man. It is endowed by Him with supernatural endowments, which make it suffice in all things to itself. It hasan imperishable life, an indestructible outward organisation, an infallible voice, and an indissoluble unity, from which fragments indeed may 1 Apoc. xi. 15. 2 St. Luke i. 33.

fall; but their fall does not impair its absolute and indivisible oneness. And by reason of these prerogatives it is sovereign over the reason and the will of men. It is an inadequate and superficial notion of the Church to conceive of it only in the sphere of intellectual and spiritual ideas, as an ethical and speculative philosophy for the illumination and exercise of the reason, with no relation to the will or to the actions of men, except so far as they are willing to listen to its counsels: a sort of mystical paradise upon earth, in which gentle, unpractical, feminine natures may converse, apart from the destinies of mankind and the government and course of the world. Such was the insolent advice of one who, some years ago, counselled the Vicar of Jesus Christ ' to inhabit peaceably the serene sphere of dogma,' and there, while the nations of the earth are violating the laws of God and of His Church, ' to pray, to bless, and to pardon.' Such has not been the office of the Church, nor of the Vicar of our Lord. The Church descended from the guest-chamber crowned with the sovereignty of the world. The Apostles of Jesus were constituted in one body, possessing a perfect government in itself, independent of all human wills, and of all human authority. The Church possesses in itself a perfect freedom of its own — a freedom of legislation, a freedom of judicial procedure, a freedom of executive power. Its members are subject to it, not only in the matter of their faith, but of their moral conduct; not only in their relations to the life to come, but also to this. It has not only a spiritual, but a civil mission to mankind. It came into contact with the empire of the world, and was declared by the supreme civil authority to be an illicit society, incapable of holding property, incapable even of legal existence. Nevertheless, in the midst of all hostile powers, it not only existed, but possessed; not only possessed, but expanded, and subdued races, nations, and kingdoms to itself. It began to- rule over its own patrimonies, and to elevate them to the highest Christian cultivation. The first Christian society known upon the earth was the creation and offspring of the Christian Church; then followed Christian nations and kingdoms; and finally Christendom, or the world -wide family of nations and kingdoms united in one common faith and law, and under one common head and father, who is not only Pastor over pastors, but even over kings; kingly himself, but more than king, superior to all, by the character and authority of the Vicar of Jesus Christ. Such is the Catholic Church: a true and proper kingdom; not spiritual only; but not earthly, yet on earth; eternal, but also in time; free both by the freedom of its commission and jurisdiction, its doctrine and its discipline within the sphere of its supernatural office, and also by the liberation of its head from all human sovereignties, and by his supreme direction of all other powers upon earth. Such is the freedom of the Church; and such is the source of its immunities or exemptions from many of the laws which govern the natural order of the world.

But to constitute this kingdom, a divine law of suffering was ordained: ' Sine sanguinis effusione non fit remissio;'3 — ' without shedding of blood there is no remission;' and without the Passion of Jesus the kingdom of God was not to be founded on the earth. He was crowned; but it was with thorns; yet the thorns testified to His royalty. He was anointed with the royal unction of His precious Blood. Jesus the King of martyrs upon Calvary has revealed to us the law by which His power is established over the world. So it has ever been from the beginning: He has glorified Himself, His truth, and His laws by the sorrows and the sufferings of His disciples. ' The disciple is not above his master, nor the servant above his Lord.'4 ' If they have persecuted

3 Heb. ix. 22. 4 St. Matt. x. 24.

Me, they will also persecute you.'5 'Wonder not, brethren, if the world hate you.'6 ' Know ye that it hated Me before it hated you;'7 and yet ' pretiosa in conspectu Domini mors sanctorum ejus.' He will not lightly suffer them to be afflicted; not a hair of their head can perish without their Father; and He wills it only so far as it is for the perfection of His Church. Each one has his testimony to bear, and to seal with his sorrows, it may be with his blood. St. Stephen fell asleep under a pitiless storm of stones for the testimony of the Messias; St. Peter and St. Paul witnessed by martyrdom to the universality and unity of the kingdom of Jesus; St. Lawrence bore witness to the sacredness of its gifts and possessions; St. John Nepomucene testified to the inviolable seal of the confessional; St. Thomas to the liberties of the Church — to the great and supernatural immunities which liberate the Church from the supremacy of all earthly power. No more luminous proof of this truth can be found than in the line of the Vicars of Jesus Christ. Forasmuch as the liberty and sovereignty, the purity and the jurisdiction of the Church are especially committed to their charge, they have had most to suffer. The world has warred against them with a special direct - 5 St. John xv. 20. 6 1 St. John iii. 13. 7 St. John xv. 18.

ness and a singular concentration of its enmity. And they have withstood the world with a constancy derived from the patience of their divine Master. A line of Pontiffs has withstood a line of Cassars. The supreme civil power of the day has always found ip. them a limit to its aggression. The Roman, the Greek, the Lombard, the German, have found in their turn that patience is stronger than might, and that to suffer is to reign.

But my purpose is not to enter upon this wide field, beautiful, glorious, and most alluring as it is. We have a special subject for to-day — the restoration of the Church of St. Thomas of Canterbury, and the motives of such an undertaking.

To set this before you, it is necessary that we should appreciate the cause and the martyrdom of this great Saint, and see what claims it has upon us, at all times, and especially at this day. And this it is necessary to do all the more, because St. Thomas has been one of those great champions of the Church about whom men have never ceased to contend. Historians of the world have conspired against him. He was too great, and too explicit in his condemnation of the abuses of worldly power, to escape the especial hostility of the men of this world. Even Catholic historians have, at times, written of him, if not with a hesitation, at least without the glow of enthusiastic devotion which is his due. What I purpose, therefore, is to show that he stood and suffered for the rights and the liberties of justice; that we owe him a singular veneration; and that there are especial motives to urge us to manifest our devotion to him at this day.

It is not my purpose, nor would it nowT be possible, to draw out the history of St. Thomas, and of his contest with Henry II. of England. It will be enough to remind you, in very few words, of the chief heads of the history, and the chief causes of the conflict.

St. Thomas had been seven years Lord High Chancellor of England, when he exchanged that charge for the office of Archbishop of Canterbury. He thereby exchanged one high trust for another; the one he had held of the King, the other he now held from his divine Master. No man better knew than he the nature of both these trusts, their limits and their responsibilities. No man better knew the extent both of the royal and civil jurisdiction, and of the immunities and liberties of the Church. If the Archbishop of Canterbury at that day had been Theodore of Tarsus, or Lanfranc Abbot of Bee, the men of the world then, and historians and controversialists now, would tell us that an ecclesiastical education had narrowed their minds and warped their judgments; or at least, that if they were Saints, they were not jurists or lawyers, and were incapable of discerning the prerogatives and rights of the royal jurisdiction-. None of these things can be said of St. Thomas, than whom no man had bet'ter learned, by the practice of seven years, to know the rights and claims of the Crown and of the Church.

When the guardianship of the Church in England was committed to his trust, he received it with all its liberties, of which I will recite a few, and those which were the chief objects of the hostility of Henry II.

1. First, the Church in England held its possessions or patrimony freely as its own. The Church, as a society divinely instituted, holds its property by the most perfect right of dominion. All other rights are similar but secondary, but the right of possession in the Church is inherently a divine right, and is the exemplar of all other rights. The Church in England at that time was, as in all Christian countries, not only a moral person or corporation in itself, but a legal person or corporation in,the recognition of the public law. It held its own lands, revenues, houses, and goods, independently of all human authority. The kings of the Saxon races had generously and abundantly offered of their possessions to the Church of God, and the faithful of every condition had followed their example. The whole of England was gradually formed into dioceses and parishes, every one of which had its endowment, which endures even to this day. If I were to begin by examples, I should weaken what I say, unless I were to enumerate all the ecclesiastical foundations of Saxon England, which is impossible. Canterbury, Eochester, Winchester, Salisbury, York, and Lichfield, with Westminster, Glastonbury, St. Alban's, Ripon, Whitby, and Croy-land, are representatives of a whole order which covered the land. These foundations were sacred gifts of the faithful, held for God by His Church; they were consecrated by the wills of the departed, which are protected by a peculiar sanctity. They were oblations at the altar, or penitential restitutions to the laws of God, or vows solemnly made in times of danger or in the hour of death. They had passed entirely from the possession of the givers and of the world, to the hand which received them for the service of God. As such they were exempted from the ordinary burdens which fell upon the possessions of the State; but they were charged with the burdens of the ecclesiastical order, which were proportionate; namely, the maintenance of the Episcopate, of the clergy, of the churches, and of the poor. They were, therefore, described as t Vota fidelium, pretia peccatorum, patrimonia pauperum;'7 — vows, restitutions, and the patrimony of the poor; or, as in the capitularies of Charlemagne, as ' offerings upon the altar, penances for sin, the patrimony of Jesus Christ and the poor.' The administration of these possessions belonged absolutely to the ecclesiastical order, and the immunity or exemption of these ecclesiastical possessions was recognised and recorded in every code of law throughout Christian Europe, and especially in England. It was also protected by the canons of many councils in all countries, but also especially in England, where the councils of Becanceld and Berghamsted in the. seventh century, and the councils of London and Winchester in the eleventh, ordered that all who violated the property of the Church should be excommunicated.

2. A second immunity of the Church was the personal exemption of ecclesiastics from all jurisdiction, except that of the Church. It is obvious at once, that in matters of the spiritual order, not only all ecclesiastics, but all men, must be exempt from civil powers, and subject to the Church alone. There is

7 De Vita Contempl. lib. ii. c. 9, ap. Darboy, Vie de S. Thomas Becket, vol. i. pp. 62, 66.

no other kingdom of Jesus Christ but His Church; there is no other divine witness of His person or revelation, no other interpreter of His faith, no other expositor of His law, no other legislator in the spiritual order, no other judge of His people, whether in the internal forum of penance, or in the external forum of ecclesiastical • censure. To the Bishops alone all men alike are subject in matters of the soul. But as soon as the world began to turn to God, the Christians avoided the tribunals of the unbelievers, and submitted their causes to the arbitration of their own brethren. The Emperors invested the Bishops of the Church with a judicial authority even in civil causes; what was at first a paternal arbitration became a true and recognised jurisdiction. Gradually it was extended even to criminal causes; and finally the imperial laws ordained that the Bishops should have jurisdiction over laymen in matters spiritual and civil, but over ecclesiastics in all matters whatsoever, spiritual, civil, and criminal — that is, that the clergy should be exempt from all other jurisdiction, and should be judged only by their own superiors and by their peers. These exemptions were carried by the imperial laws throughout the extent of its jurisdiction, and passed into the legal tradition of Spain, of France, of Germany, and of

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England. The Councils of Becanceld and of Berghamsted, already quoted, in the seventh century, declared these exemptions of the clergy from all civil judges. This immunity is recognised also in the laws of the Saxon and Danish kings, Edgar, Canute, Ethelred, and Alfred, and expressly ordered in those of St. Edward the Confessor. They were acknowledged and confirmed by William the Conqueror, by Henry L, and, what is to our purpose, expressly and solemnly acknowledged by Henry II.

Now it is not necessary to show the Christian ivisdom and the Christian justice of these exemptions. It would be no hard task to do so; but for our present purpose it is enough to establish that such was at that time the public law both of the Church and of the State in England, confirmed by custom, canons, statutes, and royal oaths. Such, then, was the immunity which descended to the charge and trust of St. Thomas. He was not the maker of these liberties, but only their guardian, responsible to God and the Church.

3. A third immunity of the Church is the free election of its pastors. The Church as a spiritual house is built of living stones, and the choice of those stones is vital to its unity, symmetry, and solidity. The guardianship of the truth and law of Jesus Christ requires from those who are intrusted with it a perfect unity of intelligence and will in all that relates to the divine deposit and mission of the Church. 'Labia enirn sacerdotis custodient scientiam.'8 St. Irenaeus says that the Episcopate possesses a special * unction of truth.' The transmission of truth in the world is not by books, but by men; not by parchments and rolls, but by living intelligences and wills formed by the Spirit of God. Written records and formularies of faith are of little avail when the living teachers are in error, or contradict each other. For this reason the Church has been so vigilant and so exact in constituting and preserving the gradation of its orders, the choice, probation, and formation of its clergy. And this care is all the more rigorous and searching in proportion as its ministers ascend nearer to the altar, and to the twofold jurisdiction over the real and the mystical Body of Jesus Christ. By seven slow and deliberate steps His priests ascend the altar. The words, the will, and the example of the Good Shepherd are the laws of the Church in the choice of its pastors. It will suffer no power on earth but its own to create, or to constitute its ministers; no hand but its own to form and to ordain them; no discernment but its own to try and to judge of their 8 Mai. ii. 7.

fitness and of their vocation from God to bear the pastoral charge. What is its right and its duty in the choice of all its ministers, even of the lowest, is far more absolutely and supremely binding in the choice of its highest, that is, in the election of Bishops. And it was precisely in this point that the Church had been compelled to exercise its greatest vigilance and fortitude. Inasmuch as the Episcopate is the highest order, invested with the greatest privileges, endowed with the largest possessions, and in closest contaet with the civil powers, it was there that the influence of the world first began to insinuate itself; and it was there also that the Church had always, with the most inflexible severity of principle, guarded the liberty of its elections. The later Saxon kings and the earlier Norman had both invaded this essential right of the Church. The contest about investiture, which had agitated the whole Church in the time of St. Gregory, extended over two centuries in duration. In England it had been vigorously and successfully maintained by St. Anselm. In order to show in the fewest words the fidelity and inflexibility with which the Church had watched over this divine liberty of its constitution, I need hardly say that in the creation of its Bishops there are three actions: the election, by which the person is freely chosen;

the institution, by which the person chosen is invested with his jurisdiction; and the investiture with the emblems of that jurisdiction, the pastoral staff and ring. When the emperors and princes attempted to reserve this last action to themselves, on the plea that the Bishop by entering upon his temporal possessions entered also into a new and important position in the civil order, the Church endured two centuries of suffering, with every form of warfare and affliction, rather than consent to imply by the lightest shadow of appearance, that the choice and commission of its pastors is derived from any fountain of right or jurisdiction but its own. The Councils of the Church, and especially those of Bari and of Kome, at which St. Anselm was present, inflicted excommunication upon all, both giver and receiver, who should violate the immunity of investitures. Such, again, was the trust which devolved to the custody of St. Thomas.

4. Once more — for I will only briefly mention two other points — not only the divine law, but the light of reason is enough to show that it is essential to the Church to possess inviolate the liberty and the power of declaring judicially who do or do not belong to its unity and its communion. Else how could it exist? A body which cannot cut off those who vitiate its purity is in anarchy and dissolution. Without the power of excommunication in its fullest freedom of exercise, how shall these words he verified: ' Whatsoever thou shalt bind upon earth, it shall he hound also in heaven; whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, it shall be loosed also in heaven'?9 In the.exercise of the power of the keys the Church owes an account only to its divine Head. To recognise any other will or law in its jurisdiction over souls would be a betrayal of its divine Master. From this jurisdiction none is exempted. Persons, races, nations, princes, with all who surround them or serve them, all alike are subject to the judgment and sentence of the Church.

5. And lastly, the liberty of every member of the Church to cast himself at the feet of the Vicar of Jesus Christ, is inalienably in every soul born again by water and the Spirit. It may cost him his life, but he would be a martyr for the liberty of the sons of God. And if the humblest of the children of God has the inherent right to forsake father and mother, houses and lands, for Christ's sake, and to seek the presence of him who represents the Person and the authority of the Son of God on earth, especially if he suffer any wrong or affliction, much more those who bear the ministry of the Church, and are bound 9 St. Matthew xvi. 19.

by a special bond of dependence and responsibility to their spiritual Head. If the flock may freely seek the chief Pastor upon earth, how much more the shepherds. If the laity possess an indefeasible personal right to come from all parts of the world, and to kneel at the feet of the Sovereign Pontiff, how much more the priests of the Church, most of all the, Bishops. And yet what is this but the liberty of appeal to Eome? — a right instituted by the divine Founder of the Church, ordered by councils, and incorporated in the public law of Christendom. The whole Church, in all its members and in all its pastors, possesses universally this right. The free relations between all its parts with the centre can never be crossed or impeded without a violation of its divine constitution; and to judge of the necessity of such appeals must also belong to the Church, which alone can declare, or discern, when any of its own laws, principles, or responsibilities, enter as an element in the subjects of contention. It is an inherent prerogative of its judicial power, which cannot be surrendered: nor can it depend upon any will but that of God and of His Church. To yield this would be to abdicate its divine office as the expositor of the truth and law of Jesus Christ, in its contact with the world, and in its application to the actions of men. Above all, this must be self-evident, when the matter in dispute is the exercise of the pastoral office of its Bishops. Their conduct can be judged only by their brethren in the Episcopate, and by the supreme Pastor upon earth.

Now these five liberties or immunities of the Church of God — the liberty of its patrimony, of its personal exemption, of its episcopal elections, of its powers of excommunication, and of its appeals to Kome — had been for centuries recognised and freely and fully exercised in England. From time to time the Church had suffered from the violence and usurpation of princes, of whom some were not Christian even in name: but its rights were incorporated in the whole order of Saxon England, and had been recognised by the most usurping of its Norman kings. And such was the liberty which the divine Head of the Church intrusted with the pastoral staff and ring to the hands of St. Thomas, to be kept without spot, inviolate, unto the day of His appearing.

It would be a long and intricate task to enumerate the acts of usurpation by which the king of England violated these liberties of the Church. It might seem also that I were speaking under the bias of indignation, and that I gave a colour and exaggeration to the facts. Happily we are spared the task of seeking out our evidence. We have it full and concise in a document framed hy the king and his advisers. No more is needed to convict him of a systematic violation of the laws of England, as well as of the immunities of the Church. The document of which I speak is the formula known as the Constitutions of Clarendon, that is, the claims of the king as proposed to the Bishops, in the council held at Clarendon, to he accepted of them as laws. They are sixteen in numher. I will recite only those against which St. Thomas protested; they are six, and run as follows:

The first, that all questions respecting the patronage and presentation to churches should be decided before the king's courts.

The third, that the clergy should be subject to the king's courts.

The fourth, that no archbishop, bishop, or dignitary, should leave the kingdom, that is, go to the sovereign Pontiff, without the king's leave.

The seventh, that no tenant or officer of the king should be excommunicated without notice first given to the king, or in his absence to his officers, that is, to obtain the king's leave.

The eighth, that all appeals should lie to the king, and not be carried to Kome without the king's leave.

The twelfth, that during the vacancy of archbishoprics, bishoprics, abbeys, and priories, all the revenues should fall to the king; 'and,' as the words run, ' when it shall be necessary to provide for a vacant church, the king will call to him certain principal persons, and the election shall take place in his chapel, by his consent, and by the counsel of the persons whom he shall have commissioned; and the person elected shall there, before he is consecrated, do homage to the king, and promise to put at his service his life, limbs, and temporal dignity, saving his order.'

This last claim would have three effects: the first, that the king should have an indefinite enjoyment of the revenues of vacant sees. William Rufus held at one time two archbishoprics, four bishoprics, and eleven abbeys. The second, that he should have an indefinite power of prolonging the vacancies. The same king prolonged the vacancy of Canterbury, after the death of St. Anselm, for five years. The third, that the whole liberty of election, consecration, and investiture, should be subjected to the will of the king.

It is not necessary that I should make a word of comment. It is evident, under the king's own hand, that he claimed a right to violate all the immunities of which I have spoken, and to make the Crown supreme as the ultimate judge in all questions affecting the possessions, privileges, offices, and jurisdiction of the Church. No man hetter knew the falsehood of these pretensions, or the injustice of these usurpations, than the man who, as I have said, had only ceased to be Lord High Chancellor of England to become Archbishop of Canterbury. It was evident, therefore, that concession or compromise there could be none.

We can only glance over the chief passages in this great contest. But they will show how great and how glorious St. Thomas was, not only in courage and in martyrdom, but in the spirit of peace and reconciliation.

Not many months had passed since he entered upon the see of Canterbury, when the encroachments of the courtiers and officers of the king compelled him to vindicate the rights of the Church.

The king, being incensed, summoned the Bishops to a council at Westminster; and demanded, first, that all ecclesiastics should be tried by the jurisdiction of the royal courts, and next, that the ' royal customs' should be observed. These (customs' were, in fact, the abuses and violations of the ecclesiastical liberties, which, from time to time, his predecessors had endeavoured to establish. St. Thomas stood firm; but all his suffragans forsook him, saying, 'Let the liberty of the Church perish, lest we perish ourselves.' Nevertheless, they all, by the Archbishop's direction, with one only exception, promised to observe the customs, ' saving their order.' This clause so enraged the king, that after many threats he left London. This was the first open collision.

The Bishops then forsook St. Thomas. He stood alone in perfect isolation, with the certainty of a new and more formidable conflict near at hand, without help, except in God and the Vicar of Jesus Christ. Day by day he was besieged by persons of all kinds, beseeching him to yield. Finally came a Cistercian Abbot, bearing, as he asserted, the recommendation of Pope Alexander that the Archbishop should yield for the sake of peace. The Archbishop had been represented to the Pontiif as unbending, and the causes in contest had never been truly laid before him.

After a while, the king, in anger, proceeded to a farther aggression. On the 29th of January 1164, that is, this very day seven hundred years ago, the Council of Clarendon assembled. Signs of violence were openly shown, armed men filled the council-chamber, and a panic fell on all except St. Thomas. The Bishops of Salisbury and Worcester implored him with tears to yield. The Earls of Leicester and of Cornwall came, declaring that the king was ready to proceed to extremities. St. Thomas answered, ' It would not be a new thing to die for the Church.' Then came two Knights of the Temple, one the Grand Master of the English Templars, who solemnly pledged themselves that the king would not injure the Church, and that nothing more should be heard of the Constitutions, if only they were suffered to pass. Moved at last by all these entreaties and promises, the Archbishop consulted the Bishops, and with them went to the king, and promised to observe the ' customs,' trusting in the king's prudence and moderation. As yet the Constitutions were not put in writing. They were therefore prepared, and proposed to the council, by St. Thomas's request, the following day. Next day they were read aloud. The Archbishop objected, as I have said, to six of them. The king then demanded that he and the Bishops should affix their seals to these Constitutions, as the authoritative interpretation of the customs they had promised to observe. On this, St. Thomas promptly answered, 'By the Lord Almighty, during my life-time, seal of mine shall never touch them.' Leaving the council, he rode alone, followed by his attendants, towards Win-

Chester. While he rode in silence, they spoke freely of what had passed. His cross-bearer was heard to say, ' During the shepherd's folly, the wolf has scattered the sheep.' St. Thomas asked, ' To whom does this apply?' He answered, ' It applies to you, who have to-day betrayed your conscience and your fame to the overthrow of the liberty of the Church.' The Archbishop, with great anguish of mind, acknowledged his weakness in having so much as promised to obey the * customs,' not knowing what so vague a term might be interpreted to mean. He said, 'By my sins I have brought the Church of England to slavery.' At once he sent to the Pope, who was then at Sens, for absolution of this great fault, and for forty days abstained from offering the holy Sacrifice of the Altar.

After fruitless negotiations, the king summoned a council at Northampton. The Archbishop was cited, not by the king, but as a culprit, by the sheriff of Kent. The king then demanded of the Archbishop the enormous sum of 30,000 marks of silver, on various unreasonable accounts. Eumours were current that violence would be offered to him. All his soldiers and men-at-arms deserted. The Bishops all were against him. He appealed to the Holy See. Long scenes of tumult followed; Bishops and barons came about him, praying him to save them by yielding, or to save himself by flight: then threatening him with spiritual or with civil censures. After long and fruitless conflict, St. Thomas departed, declining the judgment of the king, and placing himself and his Church under the protection of the Pope, and summoning the Bishops who had forsaken him to the presence of the Vicar of Jesus Christ. 'And so,' he said, ' guarded by the authority of the Catholic Church and of the Holy See, I go hence.'

He then left England for Sens, where the Pope was at that time. The Pope condemned eight of the Constitutions of Clarendon, including the six already objected to by the Archbishop, and the Archbishop excommunicated any one who should act on their authority. It was at this time, in the church of Pontigny, that St. Thomas received a foreknowledge of what was to befall him. One day, in his thanksgiving after Mass, before the altar of St. Stephen, he heard a voice saying, ' Thomas! Thomas!' He answered, ' Who art Thou, Lord?' And our Lord said to him, ' I am Jesus Christ, thy Lord, and thy brother: My Church shall be glorified in thy blood, and thou shalt be glorified in Me.' The Abbot of the house, standing by one of the columns of the church, heard all that passed; hut St. Thomas hound him to silence. He also, about this time, had a vision or a dream, in which he saw himself in some church defending his cause before the Pope, when four armed men rushed in, and with swords smote him on the head.

And thus for six long years, with the certainty of martyrdom full before him, he maintained the contest calmly and inflexibly. I pass over the violence and threats, and all the crafty and false attempts by which his enemies endeavoured to entangle or to move him. At length, a hollow reconciliation was made by the king, who would not, however, so much as give him the kiss of peace. Nevertheless, the Archbishop resolved to return to England. All who were about him warned him of his danger. At the moment of embarking at Boulogne, when England was in sight, the Dean of Boulogne strove to keep him back. He answered, ' I see the land, and by God's help I will enter it, though I know for certain that death awaits me.' But I need say no more to Catholics, above all to Englishmen, to whom the name of St. Thomas of Canterbury is a household word of love and of strength, and in whose memory the vision of the martyr, in his pontifical vestments, at vesper-time, in the north transept of Canterbury, is fresh and vivid among the chief glories of our history. He stood there with his head bowed and his hands covering his eyes. At the first blow which struck him, he said, 'Into Thy hands, 0 Lord, I commend my spirit:' and as he wiped the blood from his head, the second blow brought him to his knees. He knelt with his hands still closed, as in prayer, then sunk upon the ground, lying northward, toward the altar of St. Benedict. The last words he breathed were overheard by his cross-bearer, already wounded for his sake. They were: ' For the love of Jesus, and for the defence of the Church, I am ready to die.' Another stroke smote off the crown of the head, which had been anointed in his consecration. And here I may cease; for it is not my office to recite a history, but to remind you of what we owe to the great martyr of the Church of England. He died for the rights of God, for the canons of the Church, for the law of England, for justice, and for duty, for the flock of Christ, and for the spiritual inheritance of the English people.

First, I may say, that St. Thomas, by his blood, vindicated the rights of all nations, and the liber-ties of the universal Church. Eoger of Croyland said of him: ' Since the age of the Apostles, there is no man whose death has given to the Church

L a greater or more salutary victory; for though he seemed to be contending for the Churches in England, it was really the cause of the Church throughout the world for which he was in contest, as the events have proved.'10 The seal which St. Thomas refused to affix to the Constitutions of Clarendon, he set, in his martyrdom, to the liberties of the universal Church. In England the tide turned at once; the oppressors of the Church made their peace with it. The murderers of the martyr made reparation in a life of penance and expiation. The king walked barefoot to his shrine, and received the penitential discipline, kneeling before his tomb. The liberties for which St. Thomas died were consecrated with a new sanction, and established with a firmness which endured for more than a generation without a contest. The impulse was felt throughout Christendom, and a vibration spread through all the Catholic unity. It may be said that the fruits of his martyrdom endure to this day. The Church throughout the world at this hour possesses its liberties, often purchased by the loss of all things, but still inviolably preserved; in the independence of its august Head, in the free choice of its pastors, in the liberty and therefore purity of its doctrine, in its supremacy of spi- 10 Roger Croyland, Vita S. Thorns. Darboy, vol. i. 249.

ritual jurisdiction, and in its power of excommunication. The world has more and more estranged itself from the Church; kings, legislatures, and nations have ceased to obey it, and have destroyed much of the Christian civilisation of Europe. But the liberties of the Church live on inviolate. The violence of revolutions has laid bare and made all the more visible the divine laws of its constitution, as inundations which sweep the shifting soil from the strata of imperishable rock which lie beneath. The cause of St. Thomas triumphed throughout the world; but the cause of Henry II. has triumphed since in England. And yet, even in England, the Church for which St. Thomas died survives in the fulness of the liberty with which Christ has made it free. All the imperial power of our princes, and all the cruelty of three hundred years of penal laws, have failed to extinguish or to enslave the Church in England. But where now is the cause of Henry II.? After a while it revived again, grew strong, and prospered. For four hundred years the royal customs steadily encroached upon the Church, as the sea upon the shore. The two jurisdictions contended, till the spiritual sunk under the tyranny of the so-called Keformation. Henry II. conquered at last, and his victory was inaugurated with a solemnity worthy of his cause. It was a royal judgment, to which even the Councils of Clarendon and Northampton afford no parallel. St. Thomas, the Martyr of Canterbury, after four hundred years of honour upon the altars of Christendom, and of glory before the throne of God, was cited by the authority of the king of England to answer for high treason. The attorney-general filed a quo ivarranto information against him ' for usurping the office of a saint;' and inasmuch as saints are poor, counsel was assigned to him at the public expense. This high judicial process issued in a sentence, that ' Thomas, sometime Archbishop of Canterbury, had been guilty of contumacy, treason, and rebellion; that his bones should be publicly burnt, to admonish the living of their duty by the punishment of the dead;' and, what was more to the purpose — for they were of inestimable wealth, a faint expression of the love and veneration of the Christian world — 'that the offerings made at his shrine should be forfeited to the Crown.' It was ordered farther, ' that he should no longer be called or esteemed a saint.' Whether on earth only, or in heaven also, the process does not declare. ' That all images and pictures of him should be destroyed, the festivals in his honour be abolished, and his name and remembrance erased out of all books, under pain of his majesty's indignation, and imprisonment at his grace and pleasure;' for it was truly judged, that so long as St. Thomas the Martyr was honoured upon the altars, the liberties for which he died, and the principles which were written in his hlood, could never be extinguished. And of this truth we have a twofold proof before us. One is the liberty of the Church, which at this hour, after seven centuries— four of contest and three of persecution — lives on indestructible in its freedom, and invokes him as the patron of the secular clergy of England. The other, the bondage, slavery, and dissolution of all that calls itself a Christian Church, under the supremacy of the English Crown. This is not the time or place to reckon up the moral and spiritual evils which have sprung from the betrayal of the liberties for which St. Thomas died. I can but enumerate a few: first, the development of national egotism, which in England has reached its climax of isolation and of pride. The office of the Church is to harmonise all nations in one family, to subdue the excesses of national antagonism in the unity of the one Fold. Nationalism, in its modern sense, is the source both of schism and of heresy; and Churches, in proportion to the development of their nationalism, fall into bondage to the civil powers. What are Gallicanism, Josephism, Leopoldism, Anglicanism, but so many forms of the national spirit in its encroachment on the liberty of the Church? In no country is this yoke so heavy as in England; for in none has the national spirit heen more anti- Catholic, more oppressive, or more schismatical.

Again, the violation of the immunities of the patrimony of the Church led at once to the sacrilege and spoliation of the sixteenth century. And this robhery of the inheritance of the poor has produced, by a direct cause, the spiritual destitution of England. Nearly one-half of its people, we are told, to use the language of its own statistical books, ' enter no place of worship;' that is, are without pastors, and have no religion.

Again, the violation of the liberties of the Church has led to a violation of its doctrine and discipline. And this has generated the spiritual anarchy, which has no example in history, and no parallel, except in America, which is the offspring of England.

Again, the very basis of Christian society, which endured till the other day, has at length given way. The indissolubility of Christian matrimony exists no more in England. Divorce, borrowed partly from Judaism, and partly from the schismatics of the East, is established by the civil and so-called ecclesiastical law of the English people.

Finally, the supremacy of the material over the moral order of the world has arisen from the violation of the liberties of the Church of God. There was a time when some of the greatest monarchies had hardly a standing army; when the voice of the Vicar of Jesus Christ sufficed to arbitrate in their contentions. But now, more than four millions of men are perpetually under arms, gazing in defiance and in fear on each other's motions, waiting to ward or to strike the first blow. The world is drifting to a collision, of which all former strife is but a faint shadow. And wonderful and beautiful it was, the other day, to see the Vicar of Jesus Christ, to whom in St. Peter the whole world was put in charge, stretch out his hands of peace and benediction between the great armies which rend America asunder, and with the voice of the Prince of Peace call them to reconciliation. None but he has been listened to; for none but he had the authority to come between the weapons of their conflict. Such was once the fountain of justice and of peace to the nations of Christendom; and may be so once more. But not until the violence of the material order has learned to submit to the supremacy of the moral order established by God upon the earth. All these moral and spiritual miseries descend from one source — the usurpations of the world over the Church of God; they are the scourges and the penalties of its rebellion against the kingdom of unity and justice. The stone on which King Henry knelt when he was absolved of his sin is still shown at Avranches. It is the threshold of the ancient Cathedral, of which not another stone was left by the great revolution. But England has repeated his rebellion, and has not repented. The discipline which King Henry bore at Becket's tomb is a token of the chastisements which have fallen upon England. Shall they never cease? Will England never turn to God and do penance for its pride? When shall its great chastisements have an end — its vast and sudden prosperity, and its deep and spreading spiritual famine? How long shall generation after generation take up the tradition of disobedience? Shall we never outgrow the miseries of the past? I have a better hope, and seem to see afar off the first lights of a happier day stealing up the sky, when England shall be once more united to the kingdom of Jesus, as brethren of one Father, and disciples of one Lord. We shall once more give' to each other the kiss of peace before the altar in presence of the Incarnate Word.

There is much more that should be said, but this must suffice. St. Thomas vindicated the spiritual liberties of all nations, and all nations therefore owe to him a reparation. It is a duty of all Catholics, at all times, to honour the Martyr of their liberties; but above all in the days in which we live; for the contest which never ceases has been renewed with a greater intensity around the sanctuary of the freedom of the Church. The conflict of the last fifteen years has been maintained for the highest and most vital form of the immunities for which St. Thomas suffered. He stood for the temporal and spiritual freedom of the Church in England: but the temporal dominion of the Holy See is the source of those liber-ties throughout the world. The storm which swept over England has turned upon its axis, and now sweeps over Italy. And nobly have the brethren of St. Thomas followed in his steps. Princes of the Church, Archbishops, Bishops, and simple priests, the cross-bearers and acolytes in this great procession, have gone forth into exile and to prison for the liberties of the kingdom of God. There is also in the example of St. Thomas this especial lesson for the days in which we live. He stood against all earthly powers for those points in which the spiritual office of the Church comes in contact with the world, and is often confounded with it. He testified that even in these things the liberty of the Church is ultimately at stake; that they are a providential order for the free exercise of the spiritual office and mission of the Church; the frontiers which protect the centre and citadel, not only of spiritual jurisdiction, but even of the faith.

It is therefore a seasonable and excellent purpose to rebuild in Home the Church of St. Thomas the Martyr. We cannot gather up his dust from the soil of England, nor restore his tomb in the glories of Becket's crown at Canterbury; but we may give back to him his sanctuary in the Holy City. Of old, pilgrims wore deep paths in the lanes of southern England to visit Becket's shrine; now they will find him where he came for shelter, by the side of the Vicar of Christ. The ruin of the great revolution, which burst upon the opening of this century, destroyed his church. We owe to him a reparation. As the noble and Catholic people of France are about to restore at Tours, in reparation for the sacrileges of the past, the church of their St. Martin, so ought we to make a like reparation to our St. Thomas, the Martyr of our liberties. And we English, who are his sons, and are of one faith, will not be backward. We owe it to him for the outrages and sacrileges of the so-called Eeformation, and for all the dishonour done to him, and to the Church he loved even to the death. We owe it also to our brethren of the faith in every land, especially in Italy. If there be a people who have sown wheresoever they go, and wheresoever their speech is known, the anti-Catholic spirit of hostility to the Holy See, its sovereignty, and its freedom, it is we English. We are debtors to the nations whom we have so long troubled with the inspirations of Henry II. and of Henry VIII., to raise our witness to the cause and to the glory of St. Thomas. The Catholics of other nations will not refuse their aid. St. Thomas is dear to Spain, to France, to Germany, to the Catholics of all lands to whom the Church of God is dear. There will be found everywhere, especially at this moment, both among the pastors and the flock, those who discern that the cause of St. Thomas is the cause of the Holy See, and the cause of this hour. They will unite with us in honouring in Rome the Martyr of the ecclesiastical immunities, whom the Holy See has chosen as its patron in guarding the liberties of the Church.

There is a great fitness too in erecting the Church of St. Thomas by the side of the venerable College of the English in Eome; for within its walls were nurtured the aspirations and the fortitude of five-and-forty youthful martyrs, who, in the great persecution of England, gave their lives for the testimony of Jesus. A simple inscription in the upper corridor records at this day their passion and their crown, and in the Church of St. Thomas they too will have their commemoration — perhaps will be one day upon its altars; and St. Thomas will have here in Kome a more glorious crown than even in Canterbury — a circle of his sons martyred and crowned like himself, for the same liberties and for the same Church he loved so well.

It is good in these days, when on every side the world rings with voices clamouring for the rights of man, for the rights of freedom, for liberty in every form — of speech, of action, of revolution, to raise a witness to the rights of God. It is among the rights of God that He should be known in His own world, believed in, obeyed, and worshipped; that His Church should possess inviolate the freedom and the sovereignty which He has bestowed upon it.

The rights of man and the rights of God cannot be opposed, except by the usurpations of man. God is the fountain of both; God has harmonised them in the spiritual and temporal sovereignty with which He has invested His Church; for His Church is His kingdom among men, the way and the foretaste of the kingdom of eternal justice. St. Thomas died for the rights of God. The witness passes to his crown; but the cause can never pass away. Principles are eternal; and the liberties of the Church, though always violated, are always imperishable. ' Ubi Spiritus Domini, ibi libertas.'11 The voice of the Holy Ghost through the Church redeems the world from the bondage and abuse of human wills. This conflict began from Pentecost.12 Then Peter, filled with the Holy Ghost, said to them, ' Ye princes of the people and ancients, hear. If it be just in the sight of God to hear you rather than God, judge ye.' As one said the other day, and he a successor of the Prince of the Apostles, whose name is already in the annals of this glorious conflict for the rights of God, and for the liberties of His Church, ' Simon may die; but Peter lives for ever.'

11 2 Cor. iii. 17.

12 Tune repletus Spiritu Sancto Petrus dixit ad eos: Principes populi et seniores, audite. Acts iv. 8.