prelacy of the Established Church of England most respect,.. the memory of Becket, who preserved the possessions of his see; or the memory of those prelates so eloquently praised by you in a further part of your work, who in the reigns of Edward VI. and Elizabeth so liberally complimented away large portions of them to their Sovereign?"..I can only wonder at the question, and suppose that he who accuses those prelates of complimenting away the possessions of their sees to the crown, must be very little acquainted with the records of those times. Their vindication is to be found in their history, as it appears in the faithful compilations of good old John Strype, one of those humble and happy-minded men who, by diligently labouring in the fields of literature, find while they live an enjoyment from which time takes away nothing of its relish, and secure for themselves an honourable and lasting remembrance in the gratitude of posterity.

Some candid Protestants," you say, “have done justice to Becket's memory." Some candid Romanists will include me, Sir, in such an acknowledgement. Having always endeavoured in my historical writings to render honour where honour is due, and always allowed full weight to those motives by which men are deceived, or seek to deceive themselves, when they are

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acting ill, I had in this place almost expected from Mr. Butler, an admission that no Protestant could represent Becket, on the whole, more favourably. Could the most zealous advocate for the papal power have spoken in higher terms of his magnanimity, or expressed a stronger condemnation of the King's conduct on those occasions in which Henry acted with injustice and cruelty? When I compare my statement with yours,..when I look at the way in which you have summed up the second part of the contest, keeping out of sight whatever was violent, whatever was offensive on Becket's part,.. in fact all the circumstances which led to his fate, and may truly be said to have provoked it,.. I do not wonder you should have abstained from all detail as foreign to your subject; and can only regret that with so much courtesy there should be so little candour,.. that with so much ingenuity there should be so little ingenuousness.

One remark more will suffice for winding up this division of our argument. In no part of his conduct is Becket less excusable than for accepting the Primacy under the circumstances in which it was offered to him. The manner of his promotion was irregular; the motive for

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it is known to have been a persuasion on the King's part that he would co-operate with him in those plans of necessary reform which had been concerted certainly with his knowledge, and in all likelihood with his counsel. For proof of this I refer you to Turner; by whom also you will find it stated, that when he told the King the effect of this promotion must be to make him lose his favour, or sacrifice his own duty as a servant of God, he spake with a smile; so that, whether intentionally or not, the manner conveyed a meaning which invalidated the words. I need not I need not say to you, Sir, that our friend is an historian who may be trusted in his references. The indefatigable diligence which has enabled him to throw so much light on Anglo-Saxon and English history is accompanied in him with perfect candour, with unimpeachable fidelity, and with a true spirit of Christian charity, as enlightened as it is enlarged. It cannot, I think, be pretended that Becket was urged by a sense of duty to this dissimulation: if it be, Heaven save us from a religion which teaches such morality! But if it became his duty afterwards, as a Prelate of the Romish Church, to oppose the King in those very measures for the promotion of which he had with his own full knowledge been pre

ferred; if it became his duty to excommunicate the King's ministers and servants for obeying him in the discharge of their offices; to defy and insult the King himself; to strengthen, if not actually to raise up foreign enemies against him, and to threaten him with excommunication; after which, the next measure would have been a sentence of deposition, unless the King yielded the points in dispute,... if this, I say, was the duty of Becket, as a Romish Prelate,..which the Romanists at this day,.. the English Romanists, the liberal English Romanists,.. affirm it to have been,.. then is the religion, which renders such conduct a duty, incompatible with the honour and safety of Sovereigns, with the peace and security of States. Even you, Sir, who for your apparent liberality have obtained the applause of unwary Protestants, and drawn on yourself the reprehension of the more consistent members of your own Church, even you, Sir, assert that Becket's conduct "was admired and applauded by the whole world," and that he " perished for a faithful adherence to ecclesiastical duty.' If such be the duty of a Romish Prelate, then is the system which makes it so as irrecon

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cileable with national policy as it is with Christian principles, .. as incompatible with loyalty as it is with religion,..as inconsistent with the constitution of these kingdoms as it is with the gospel,..as intolerable as it has every where shown itself to be intolerant.

One of your own* writers, not long since, has told us that the professors of that religion are unchanged. These are his words: "If any one says, or pretends to insinuate, that modern Roman Catholics, who have been the late objects of the bounty of Parliament, differ in one iota from their ancestors, he either deceives himself, or wishes to deceive others."..I believe him.

Mr. Francis Plowden, in his Case Stated. I take the quotation from a letter of Sir Harcourt Lees in the newspapers.