A great deal has been written of late years on Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury in the reign of Henry II.,—some historians writing him up, and others writing him down; some making him a martyr to the Church, and others representing him as an ambitious prelate who encroached on royal authority,—more of a rebel than a patriot. His history has become interesting, in view of this very discrepancy of opinion,—like that of Oliver Cromwell, one of those historical puzzles which always have attraction to critics. And there is abundant material for either side we choose to take. An advocate can make a case in reference to Becket's career with more plausibility than about any other great character in English history,—with the exception of Queen Elizabeth, Cromwell, and Archbishop Laud.
The cause of Becket was the cause of the Middle Ages. He was not the advocate of fundamental principles, as were Burke and Bacon. He fought either for himself, or for principles whose importance has in a measure passed away. He was a high-churchman, who sought to make the spiritual power independent of the temporal. He appears in an interesting light only so far as the principles he sought to establish were necessary for the elevation of society in his ignorant and iron age. Moreover, it was his struggles which give to his life its chief charm, and invest it with dramatic interest. It was his energy, his audacity, his ability in overcoming obstacles, which made him memorable,—one of the heroes of history, like Ambrose and Hildebrand; an ecclesiastical warrior who fought bravely, and died without seeing the fruits of his bravery.
There seems to be some discrepancy among historians as to Becket's birth and origin, some making him out a pure Norman, and others a Saxon, and others again half Saracen. But that is, after all, a small matter, although the critics make a great thing of it. They always are inclined to wrangle over unimportant points. Michelet thinks he was a Saxon, and that his mother was a Saracen lady of rank, who had become enamored of the Saxon when taken prisoner while on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, and who returned with him to England, embraced his religion, and was publicly baptized in Saint Paul's Cathedral, her beauty and rank having won attention; but Mr. Froude and Milman regard this as a late legend.
It would seem, however, that he was born in London about the year 1118 or 1119, and that his father, Gilbert Becket, was probably a respectable merchant and sheriff, or portreeve, of London, and was a Norman. His parents died young, leaving him not well provided for; but being beautiful and bright he was sent to school in an abbey, and afterwards to Oxford. From Oxford he went into a house of business in London for three years, and contrived to attract the notice of Theobald, Archbishop of Canterbury, who saw his talents, sent him to Paris, and thence to Bologna to study the canon law, which was necessary to a young man who would rise in the world. He was afterwards employed by Theobald in confidential negotiations. The question of the day in England was whether Stephen's son (Eustace) or Matilda's son (Henry of Anjou) was the true heir to the crown, it being settled that Stephen should continue to rule during his lifetime, and that Henry should peaceably follow him; which happened in a little more than a year. Becket had espoused the side of Henry.
The reign of Henry II., during which Becket's memorable career took place, was an important one. He united, through his mother Matilda, the blood of the old Saxon kings with that of the Norman dukes. He was the first truly English sovereign who had sat on the throne since the Conquest. In his reign (1154-1189) the blending of the Norman and Saxon races was effected. Villages and towns rose around the castles of great Norman nobles and the cathedrals and abbeys of Norman ecclesiastics. Ultimately these towns obtained freedom. London became a great city with more than a hundred churches. The castles, built during the disastrous civil wars of Stephen's usurped reign, were demolished. Peace and order were restored by a legitimate central power.
Between the young monarch of twenty-two and Thomas, as a favorite of Theobald and as Archdeacon of Canterbury, an intimacy sprang up. Henry II. was the most powerful sovereign of Western Europe, since he was not only King of England, but had inherited in France Anjou and Touraine from his father, and Normandy and Maine from his mother. By his marriage with Eleanor of Aquitaine, he gained seven other provinces as her dower. The dominions of Louis were not half so great as his, even in France. And Henry was not only a powerful sovereign by his great territorial possessions, but also for his tact and ability. He saw the genius of Becket and made him his chancellor, loading him with honors and perquisites and Church benefices.
The power of Becket as chancellor was very great, since he was prime minister, and the civil administration of the kingdom was chiefly intrusted to him, embracing nearly all the functions now performed by the various members of the Cabinet. As chancellor he rendered great services. He effected a decided improvement in the state of the country; it was freed from robbers and bandits, and brought under dominion of the law. He depressed the power of the feudal nobles; he appointed the most deserving people to office; he repaired the royal palaces, increased the royal revenues, and promoted agricultural industry. He seems to have pursued a peace policy. But he was headstrong and grasping. His style of life when chancellor was for that age magnificent: Wolsey, in after times, scarcely excelled him. His dress was as rich as barbaric taste could make it,—for the more barbarous the age, the more gorgeous is the attire of great dignitaries. "The hospitalities of the chancellor were unbounded. He kept seven hundred horsemen completely armed. The harnesses of his horses were embossed with gold and silver. The most powerful nobles sent their sons to serve in his household as pages; and nobles and knights waited in his antechamber. There never passed a day when he did not make rich presents." His expenditure was enormous. He rivalled the King in magnificence. His sideboard was loaded with vessels of gold and silver. He was doubtless ostentatious, but his hospitality was free, and his person was as accessible as a primitive bishop. He is accused of being light and frivolous; but this I doubt. He had too many cares and duties for frivolity. He doubtless unbent. All men loaded down with labors must unbend somewhere. It was nothing against him that he told good stories at the royal table, or at his own, surrounded by earls and barons. These relaxations preserved in him elasticity of mind, without which the greatest genius soon becomes a hack, a plodding piece of mechanism, a stupid lump of learned dulness. But he was stained by no vices or excesses. He was a man of indefatigable activity, and all his labors were in the service of the Crown, to which, as chancellor, he was devoted, body and soul.
Is it strange that such a man should have been offered the See of Canterbury on the death of Theobald? He had been devoted to his royal master and friend; he enjoyed rich livings, and was Archdeacon of Canterbury; he had shown no opposition to the royal will. Moreover Henry wanted an able man for that exalted post, in order to carry out his schemes of making himself independent of priestly influence and papal interference.
So Becket was made archbishop and primate of the English Church at the age of forty-four, the clergy of the province acquiescing,— perhaps with secret complaints, for he was not even priest; merely deacon, and the minister of an unscrupulous king. He was ordained priest only just before receiving the primacy, and for that purpose.
Nothing in England could exceed the dignity of the See of Canterbury. Even the archbishopric of York was subordinate. Becket as metropolitan of the English Church was second in rank only to the King himself. He could depose any ecclesiastic in the realm. He had the exclusive privilege of crowning the king. His decisions were final, except an appeal to Rome. No one dared disobey his mandates, for the law of clerical obedience was one of the fundamental ideas of the age. Through his clergy, over whom his power was absolute, he controlled the people. His law courts had cognizance of questions which the royal courts could not interfere with. No ecclesiastical dignitary in Europe was his superior, except the Pope.
The Archbishop of Canterbury had been a great personage under the Saxon kings. Dunstan ruled England as the prime minister of Edward the Martyr, but his influence would have been nearly as great had he been merely primate of the Church. Nor was the power of the archbishop reduced by the Norman kings. William the Conqueror might have made the spiritual authority subordinate to the temporal, if he had followed his inclinations. But he dared not quarrel with the Pope,—the great Hildebrand, by whose favor he was unmolested in the conquest of the Saxons. He was on very intimate terms of friendship with Lanfranc, whom he made Archbishop of Canterbury,—an able, ambitious Italian, who was devoted to the See of Rome and his spiritual monarch. The influence of Hildebrand and Lanfranc combined was too great to be resisted. Nor did he attempt resistance; he acquiesced in the necessity of making a king of Canterbury. His mind was so deeply absorbed with his conquest and other state matters that he did not seem to comprehend the difficulties which might arise under his successors, in yielding so much power to the primate. Moreover Lanfranc, in the quiet enjoyment of his ecclesiastical privileges, gave his powerful assistance in imposing the Norman yoke. He filled the great sees with Norman prelates. He does not seem to have had much sympathy with the Saxons, or their bishops, who were not so refined or intellectual as the bishops of France. The Normans were a superior race to the Saxons in executive ability and military enthusiasm. The chivalric element of English society, among the higher classes, came from the Normans, not from the Saxons. In piety, in passive virtues, in sustained industry, in patient toil, in love of personal freedom, the Saxons doubtless furnished a finer material for the basis of an agricultural, industrial, and commercial nation. The sturdy yeomen of England were Saxons: the noble and great administrators were Normans. In pride, in ambition, and in executive ability the Normans bore a closer resemblance to the old heroic Romans than did the Saxons.
The next archbishop after Lanfranc was Anselm, appointed by William Rufus. Anselm was a great scholar, the profoundest of the early Schoolmen; a man of meditative habits, who it was presumed would not interfere with royal encroachments. William Rufus never dreamed that the austere and learned monk, who had spent most of his days in the abbey of Bec in devout meditations and scholastic inquiries, would interfere with his rapacity. But, as we have already seen, Anselm was conscientious, and became the champion of the Papal authority in the West. He occupied two distinct spheres,—he was absorbed in philosophical speculations, yet took an interest in all mundane questions. His resolve to oppose the king's usurpations in the spiritual realm caused the bitter quarrel already described, which ended in a compromise.
When Henry I. came to the throne, he appointed Theobald, a feeble but good man, to the See of Canterbury,—less ambitious than Lanfranc, more inoffensive than Anselm; a Norman disinclined to quarrel with his sovereign. He died during the reign of Henry II., and this great monarch, as we have seen, appointed Becket to the vacant See, thinking that in the double capacity of chancellor and archbishop he would be a very powerful ally. But he was amazingly deceived in the character of his Chancellor. Becket had not sought the office,—the office had sought him. It would seem that he accepted it unwillingly. He knew that new responsibilities and duties would be imposed upon him, which, if he discharged conscientiously like Anselm, would in all probability alienate his friend the King, and provoke a desperate contest. And when the courtly and luxurious Chancellor held out, in Normandy, the skirts of his gilded and embroidered garments to show how unfit he was for an archbishop, Henry ought to have perceived that a future estrangement was a probability.
Better for Henry had Becket remained in the civil service. But Henry, with all his penetration, had not fathomed the mind of his favorite. Becket was not one to dissemble, but a great change may have been wrought in his character. Probably the new responsibilities imposed upon him as Primate of the English Church pressed upon his conscience. He knew that supreme allegiance was due to the Pope as head of the Church, and that if compelled to choose between the Pope and the King, he must obey the Pope. He was ambitious, doubtless; but his subsequent career shows that he preferred the liberties of his Church to the temporal interests of the sovereign. He was not a theologian, like Lanfranc and Anselm. Of all the great characters who preceded him, he most resembles Ambrose. Ambrose the governor, and a layman, became Archbishop of Milan. Becket the minister of a king, and only deacon, became Archbishop of Canterbury. The character of both these great men changed on their elevation to high ecclesiastical position. They both became high-churchmen, and defended the prerogatives of the clergy. But Ambrose was superior to Becket in his zeal to defend the doctrines of the Church. It does not appear that Becket took much interest in doctrines. In his age there was no dissent. Everybody, outwardly at least, was orthodox. In England, certainly, there were no heretics. Had Becket remained chancellor, in all probability he would not have quarrelled with Henry. As archbishop he knew what was expected of him; and he knew also the infamy in store for him should he betray his cause. I do not believe he was a hypocrite. Every subsequent act of his life shows his sincerity and his devotion to his Church against his own interests.
Becket was no sooner ordained priest and consecrated as archbishop than he changed his habits. He became as austere as Lanfranc. He laid aside his former ostentation. He clothed himself in sackcloth; he mortified his body with fasts and laceration; he associated only with the pious and the learned; he frequented the cloisters and places of meditation; he received into his palace the needy and the miserable; he washed the feet of thirteen beggars every day; he conformed to the standard of piety in his age; he called forth the admiration of his attendants by his devotion to clerical duties. "He was," says James Stephen, "a second Moses entering the tabernacle at the accepted time for the contemplation of his God, and going out from it in order to perform some work of piety to his neighbor. He was like one of God's angels on the ladder, whose top reached the heavens, now descending to lighten the wants of men, now ascending to behold the divine majesty and the splendor of the Heavenly One. His prime councillor was reason, which ruled his passions as a mistress guides her servants. Under her guidance he was conducted to virtue, which, wrapped up in itself, and embracing everything within itself, never looks forward for anything additional."
This is the testimony of his biographer, and has not been explained away or denied, although it is probably true that Becket did not purge the corruptions of the Church, or punish the disorders and vices of the clergy, as Hildebrand did. But I only speak of his private character. I admit that he was no reformer. He was simply the high-churchman aiming to secure the ascendency of the spiritual power. Becket is not immortal for his reforms, or his theological attainments, but for his intrepidity, his courage, his devotion to his cause,—a hero, and not a man of progress; a man who fought a fight. It should be the aim of an historian to show for what he was distinguished; to describe his warfare, not to abuse him because he was not a philosopher and reformer. He lived in the twelfth century.
One of the first things which opened the eyes of the King was the resignation of the Chancellor. The King doubtless made him primate of the English hierarchy in order that he might combine both offices. But they were incompatible, unless Becket was willing to be the unscrupulous tool of the King in everything. Of course Henry could not long remain the friend of the man who he thought had duped him. Before a year had passed, his friendship was turned to secret but bitter enmity. Nor was it long before an event occurred,—a small matter,—which brought the King and the Prelate into open collision.
The matter was this: A young nobleman, who held a clerical office, committed a murder. As an ecclesiastic, he was brought before the court of the Bishop of Lincoln, and was sentenced to pay a small fine. But public justice was not satisfied, and the sheriff summoned the canon, who refused to plead before him. The matter was referred to the King, who insisted that the murderer should be tried in the civil court,—that a sacred profession should not screen a man who had committed a crime against society. While the King had, as we think, justice on his side, yet in this matter he interfered with the jurisdiction of the spiritual courts, which had been in force since Constantine. Theodosius and Justinian had confirmed the privilege of the Church, on the ground that the irregularities of a body of men devoted to the offices of religion should be veiled from the common eye; so that ecclesiastics were sometimes protected when they should be punished. But if the ecclesiastical courts had abuses, they were generally presided over by good and wise men,—more learned than the officers of the civil courts, and very popular in the Middle Ages; and justice in them was generally administered. So much were they valued in a dark age, when the clergy were the most learned men of their times, that much business came gradually to be transacted in them which previously had been settled in the civil courts,—as tithes, testaments, breaches of contract, perjuries, and questions pertaining to marriage. But Henry did not like these courts, and was determined to weaken their jurisdiction, and transfer their power to his own courts, in order to strengthen the royal authority. Enlightened jurists and historians in our times here sympathize with Henry. High-Church ecclesiastics defend the jurisdiction of the spiritual courts, since they upheld the power of the Church, so useful in the Middle Ages. The King began the attack where the spiritual courts were weakest,—protection afforded to clergymen accused of crime. So he assembled a council of bishops and barons to meet him at Westminster. The bishops at first were inclined to yield to the King, but Becket gained them over, and would make no concession. He stood up for the privileges of his order. In this he was contending for justice and he defended his Church, at all hazards,—not her doctrines, but her prerogatives. He would present a barrier against royal encroachments, even if they were for the welfare of the realm. He would defend the independence of the clergy, and their power,— perhaps as an offset to royal power. In his rigid defence of the privileges of the clergy we see the churchman, not the statesman; we see the antagonist, not the ally, of the King. Henry was of course enraged. Who can wonder? He was bearded by his former favorite,—by one of his subjects.
If Becket was narrow, he no doubt was conscientious. He may have been ambitious of wielding unlimited spiritual authority. But it should be noted that, had he not quarrelled with the King, he could have been both archbishop and chancellor, and in that double capacity wielded more power; and had he been disposed to serve his royal master, had he been more gentle, the King might not have pushed out his policy of crippling the spiritual courts,—might have waived, delayed, or made concessions. But now these two great potentates were in open opposition, and a deadly warfare was at hand. It is this fight which gives to Becket all his historical importance. It is not for me to settle the merits of the case, if I could, only to describe the battle. The lawyers would probably take one side, and Catholic priests would take the other, and perhaps all high-churchmen. Even men like Mr. Froude and Mr. Freeman, both very learned and able, are totally at issue, not merely as to the merits of the case, but even as to the facts. Mr. Froude seems to hate Becket and all other churchmen as much as Mr. Freeman loves them. I think one reason why Mr. Froude exalts so highly Henry VIII. is because he put his foot on the clergy and took away their revenues. But with the war of partisans I have nothing to do, except the war between Henry II. and Thomas Becket.
This war waxed hot when a second council of bishops and barons was assembled at Clarendon, near Winchester, to give their assent to certain resolutions which the King's judges had prepared in reference to the questions at issue, and other things tending to increase the royal authority. They are called in history "The Constitutions of Clarendon." The gist and substance of them were, that during the vacancy of any bishopric or abbey of royal foundation, the estates were to be in the custody of the Crown; that all disputes between laymen and clergymen should be tried in the civil courts; that clergymen accused of crime should, if the judges decided, be tried in the King's court, and, if found guilty, be handed over to the secular arm for punishment; that no officer or tenant of the King should be excommunicated without the King's consent; that no peasant's son should be ordained without permission of his feudal lord; that great ecclesiastical personages should not leave the kingdom without the King's consent.
"Anybody must see that these articles were nothing more nor less than the surrender of the most important and vital privileges of the Church into the hands of the King: not merely her properties, but her liberties; even a surrender of the only weapon with which she defended herself in extreme cases,—that of excommunication." It was the virtual confiscation of the Church in favor of an aggressive and unscrupulous monarch. Could we expect Becket to sign such an agreement, to part with his powers, to betray the Church of which he was the first dignitary in England? When have men parted with their privileges, except upon compulsion? He never would have given up his prerogatives; he never meant for a moment to do so. He was not the man for such a base submission. Yet he was so worried and threatened by the King, who had taken away from him the government of the Prince, his son, and the custody of certain castles; he was so importuned by the bishops themselves, for fear that the peace of the country would be endangered,—that in a weak moment he promised to sign the articles, reserving this phrase: "Saving the honor of his order." With this reservation, he thought he could sign the agreement, for he could include under such a phrase whatever he pleased.
But when really called to fulfil his promise and sign with his own hand those constitutions, he wavered. He burst out in passionate self-reproaches for having made a promise so fatal to his position. "Never, never!" he said; "I will never do it so long as breath is in my body." In his repentance he mortified himself with new self- expiations. He suspended himself from the service of the altar. He was overwhelmed with grief, shame, rage, and penitence. He resolved he would not yield up the privileges of his order, come what might,—not even if the Pope gave him authority to sign.
The dejected and humbled metropolitan advanced to the royal throne with downcast eye but unfaltering voice; accused himself of weakness and folly, and firmly refused to sign the articles. "Miserable wretch that I am," cried he, with bitter tears coursing down his cheeks, "I see the English Church enslaved, in punishment for my sins. But it is all right. I was taken from the court, not the cloister, to fill this station; from the palace of Caesar, not the school of the Saviour. I was a feeder of birds, but suddenly made a feeder of men; a patron of stage-players, a follower of hounds, and I became a shepherd over so many souls. Surely I am rightly abandoned by God."
He then took his departure for Canterbury, but was soon summoned to a grand council at Northampton, to answer serious charges. He was called to account for the sums he had spent as chancellor, and for various alleged injustices. He was found guilty by a court controlled by the King, and sentenced to pay a heavy fine, which he paid. The next day new charges were preferred, and he was condemned to a still heavier fine, which he was unable to pay; but he found sureties. On the next day still heavier charges were made, and new fines inflicted, which would have embarrassed the temporalities of his See. He now perceived that the King was bent on his ruin; that the more he yielded the more he would be expected to yield. He therefore resolved to yield no further, but to stand on his rights.
But before he made his final resistance he armed himself with his crozier, and sought counsel from the bishops assembled in another chamber of the royal castle. The bishops were divided: some for him, some against him. Gilbert Foliot of London put him in mind of the benefits he had received from Henry, and the humble condition from which he was raised, and advised him to resign for sake of peace. Henry of Winchester, a relative of the King, bade him resign. Roger of Worcester was non-committal. "If I advise to resist the King, I shall be put out of the synagogue" said he. "I counsel nothing." The Bishop of Chichester declared that Becket was primate no longer, as he had gone against the laws of the realm. In the midst of this conference the Earl of Leicester entered, and announced the sentence of the peers. Then gathering himself up to his full height, the Primate, with austere dignity, addressed the Earl and the Bishops: "My brethren, our enemies are pressing hard upon us, and the whole world is against us; but I now enjoin you, in virtue of your obedience, and in peril of your orders, not to be present in any cause which may be made against my person; and I appeal to that refuge of the distressed, the Holy See. And I command you as your Primate, and in the name of the Pope, to put forth the censures of the Church in behalf of your Archbishop, should the secular arm lay violent hands upon me; for, be assured, though this frail body may yield to persecution,—since all flesh is weak,—yet shall my spirit never yield."
Then pushing his way, he swept through the chamber, reached the quadrangle of the palace, mounted his horse, reached his lodgings, gave a banquet to some beggars, stole away in disguise and fled, reaching the coast in safety, and succeeding in crossing over to Flanders. He was now out of the King's power, who doubtless would have imprisoned him and perhaps killed him, for he hated him with the intensest hatred. Becket had deceived him, having trifled with him by taking an oath to sign the Constitutions of Clarendon, and then broken his oath and defied his authority, appealing to the Pope, and perhaps involving the King in a quarrel with the supreme spiritual power of Christendom. Finally he had deserted his post and fled the kingdom. He had defeated the King in his most darling schemes.
But although Becket was an exile, a fugitive, and a wanderer, he was still Archbishop of Canterbury. He was the head of the English Church, and all the clergy of the kingdom owed him spiritual obedience. He still had the power of excommunicating the King, and the sole right of crowning his successor. If the Pope should take his side, and the King of France, and other temporal powers, Becket would be no unequal match for the King. It was a grand crisis which Henry comprehended, and he therefore sent some of his most powerful barons and prelates to the Continent to advance his cause and secure the papal interposition.
Becket did not remain long in Flanders, since the Count was cold and did not take his side. He escaped, and sought shelter and aid from the King of France.
Louis VII. was a feeble monarch, but he hated Henry II. and admired Becket. He took him under his protection, and wrote a letter to the Pope in his behalf.
That Pope was Alexander III.,—himself an exile, living in Sens, and placed in a situation of great difficulty, struggling as he was with an anti-pope, and the great Frederic Barbarossa; Emperor of Germany. Moreover he was a personal friend of Henry, to whom he had been indebted for his elevation to the papal throne. His course, therefore, was non-committal and dilatory and vacillating, although he doubtless was on the side of the prelate who exalted ecclesiastical authority. But he was obliged from policy to be prudent and conciliatory. He patiently heard both sides, but decided nothing. All he consented to do was to send cardinal legates to England, but intrusted to none but himself the prerogatives of final judgment.
After Henry's ambassadors had left, Becket appeared with a splendid train of three hundred horsemen, the Archbishop of Rheims, the brothers of the King of France, and a long array of bishops. The Pope dared not receive him with the warmth he felt, but was courteous, more so than his cardinals; and Becket unfolded and discussed the Constitutions of Clarendon, which of course found no favor with the Pope. He rebuked Becket for his weakness in promising to sign a paper which curtailed so fundamentally the privileges of the Church. Some historians affirm he did not extend to him the protection he deserved, although he confirmed him in his office. He sent him to the hospitable care of the Abbot of Pontigny. "Go now," he said, "and learn what privation is; and in the company of Christ's humblest servants subdue the flesh to the spirit."
In this Cistercian abbey it would seem that Becket lived in great austerity, tearing his flesh with his nails, and inflicting on himself severe flagellations; so that his health suffered, and his dreams haunted him. He was protected, but he could not escape annoyances and persecutions. Henry, in his wrath, sequestrated the estates of the archbishopric; the incumbents of his benefices were expelled; all his relatives and dependents were banished,—some four hundred people; men, women, and children. The bishops sent him ironical letters, and hoped his fasts would benefit his soul.
The quarrel now was of great interest to all Europe. It was nothing less than a battle between the spiritual and temporal powers, like that, a century before, between Hildebrand and the Emperor of Germany. Although the Pope was obliged from motives of policy,—for fear of being deposed,—to seem neutral and attempt to conciliate, still the war really was carried on in his behalf. "The great, the terrible, the magnificent in the fate of Becket," says Michelet, "arises from his being charged, weak and unassisted, with the interests of the Church Universal,—a post which belonged to the Pope himself." He was still Archbishop; but his revenues were cut off, and had it not been for the bounty of Louis the King of France, who admired him and respected his cause, he might have fared as a simple monk. The Pope allowed him to excommunicate the persons who occupied his estates, but not the King himself. He feared a revolt of the English Church from papal authority, since Henry was supreme in England, and had won over to his cause the English bishops. The whole question became complicated and interesting. It was the common topic of discourse in all the castles and convents of Europe. The Pope, timid and calculating, began to fear he had supported Becket too far, and pressed upon him a reconciliation with Henry, much to the disgust of Becket, who seemed to comprehend the issue better than did the Pope; for the Pope had, in his desire to patch up the quarrel, permitted the son of Henry to be crowned by the Archbishop of York, which was not only an infringement of the privileges of the Primate, but was a blow against the spiritual power. So long as the Archbishop of Canterbury had the exclusive privilege of crowning a king, the King was dependent in a measure on the Primate, and, through him, on the Pope. At this suicidal act on the part of Alexander, Becket lost all patience, and wrote to him a letter of blended indignation and reproach. "Why," said he, "lay in my path a stumbling-block? How can you blind yourself to the wrong which Christ suffers in me and yourself? And yet you call on me, like a hireling, to be silent. I might flourish in power and riches and pleasures, and be feared and honored of all; but since the Lord hath called me, weak and unworthy as I am, to the oversight of the English Church, I prefer proscription, exile, poverty, misery, and death, rather than traffic with the liberties of the Church."
What language to a Pope! What a reproof from a subordinate! How grandly the character of Becket looms up here! I say nothing of his cause. It may have been a right or a wrong one. Who shall settle whether spiritual or temporal power should have the ascendency in the Middle Ages? I speak only of his heroism, his fidelity to his cause, his undoubted sincerity. Men do not become exiles and martyrs voluntarily, unless they are backed by a great cause. Becket may have been haughty, irascible, ambitious. Very likely. But what then? The more personal faults he had, the greater does his devotion to the interests of the Church appear, fighting as it were alone and unassisted. Undaunted, against the advice of his friends, unsupported by the Pope, he now hurls his anathemas from his retreat in France. He excommunicates the Bishop of Salisbury, and John of Oxford, and the Arch deacon of Ilchester, and the Lord Chief-Justice de Luci, and everybody who adhered to the Constitutions of Clarendon. The bishops of England remonstrate with him, and remind him of his plebeian origin and his obligations to the King. To whom he replies: "I am not indeed sprung from noble ancestors, but I would rather be the man to whom nobility of mind gives the advantages of birth than to be the degenerate issue of an illustrious family. David was taken from the sheep-fold to be a ruler of God's people, and Peter was taken from fishing to be the head of the Church. I was born under a humble roof, yet, nevertheless, God has intrusted me with the liberties of the Church, which I will guard with my latest breath."
Henry now threatens to confiscate the property of all the Cistercian convents in England; and the Abbot of Pontigny, at the command of his general, is forced to drive Becket away from his sanctuary. Becket retires to Sens, sad at heart and grieved that the excommunications which he had inflicted should have been removed by the Pope. Then Louis, the King of France, made war on Henry, and took Becket under his protection. The Pope rebuked Louis for the war; but Louis retorted by telling Alexander that it was a shame for him not to give up his time-serving policy. In so doing, Louis spoke out the heart of Christendom. The Pope, at last aroused, excommunicated the Archbishop of York for crowning the son of Henry, and threatened Henry himself with an interdict, and recalled his legates. Becket also fulminated his excommunications. There was hardly a prelate or royal chaplain in England who was not under ecclesiastical censure. The bishops began to waver. Henry had reason to fear he might lose the support of his English subjects, and Norman likewise. He could do nothing with the whole Church against him.
The King was therefore obliged to compromise. Several times before, he had sought reconciliation with his dreadful enemy; but Becket always, in his promises, fell back on the phrase, "Saving the honor of his order," or "Saving the honor of God." But now, amid the fire of excommunications, Henry was compelled to make his peace with the man he detested. He himself did not much care for the priestly thunderbolts, but his clergy and his subjects did. The penalty of eternal fire was a dreadful fear to those who believed, as everybody then did, in the hell of which the clergy were supposed to hold the keys. This fear sustained the empire of the popes; it was the basis of sacerdotal rule in the Middle Ages. Hence Becket was so powerful, even in exile. His greatness was in his character; his power was in his spiritual weapons.
In the hollow reconciliation at last effected between the King and the Prelate, Henry promised to confirm Becket in his powers and dignities, and molest him no more. But he haughtily refused the customary kiss of peace. Becket saw the omen; so did the King of France. The peace was inconclusive. It was a truce, not a treaty. Both parties distrusted each other.
But Henry was weary with the struggle, and Becket was tired of exile,—never pleasant, even if voluntary. Moreover, the Prelate had gained the moral victory, even as Hildebrand did when the Emperor of Germany stooped as a suppliant in the fortress of Canossa. The King of England had virtually yielded to the Archbishop of Canterbury. Perhaps Becket felt that his mission was accomplished; that he had done the work for which he was raised up. Wearied, sickened with the world, disgusted with the Pope, despising his bishops, perhaps he was willing to die. He had a presentiment that he should die as a martyr. So had the French king and his prelates. But Becket longed to return to his church and celebrate the festivities of Christmas. So he made up his mind to return to England, "although I know, of a truth," he said, "I shall meet my passion there." Before embarking he made a friendly and parting visit to the King of France, and then rode to the coast with an escort of one hundred horsemen. As Dover was guarded by the King's retainers, who might harm him, he landed at Sandwich, his own town. The next day he set out for Canterbury, after an absence of seven years. The whole population lined the road, strewed it with flowers, and rent the air with songs. Their beloved Archbishop had returned. On reaching Canterbury he went directly to his cathedral and seated himself on his throne, and the monks came and kissed him, with tears in their eyes. One Herbert said, "Christ has conquered; Christ is now King!"
From Canterbury Becket made a sort of triumphal progress through the kingdom, with the pretence of paying a visit to the young king at Woodstock,—exciting rather than allaying the causes of discord, scattering his excommunications, still haughty, restless, implacable; so that the Court became alarmed, and ordered him to return to his diocese. He obeyed, as he wished to celebrate Christmas at home; and ascending his long-neglected pulpit preached, according to Michelet, from this singular text: "I am come to die in the midst of you."
Henry at this time was on the Continent, and was greatly annoyed at the reports of Becket's conduct which reached him. Then there arrived three bishops whom the Primate had excommunicated, with renewed complaints and grievances, assuring him there would be no peace so long as Becket lived. Henry was almost wild with rage and perplexity. What could he do? He dared not execute the Archbishop, as Henry VIII. would have done. In his age the Prelate was almost as powerful as the King. Violence to his person was the last thing to do, for this would have involved the King in war with the adherents of the Pope, and would have entailed an excommunication. Still, the supremest desire of Henry's soul was to get Becket out of the way. So, yielding to an impulse of passion, he said to his attendants, "Is there no one to relieve me from the insults of this low-born and turbulent priest?"
Among these attendants were four courtiers or knights, of high birth and large estates, who, hearing these reproachful words, left the court at once, crossed the channel, and repaired to the castle of Sir Ranulf de Broc, the great enemy of Becket, who had molested him in innumerable ways. Some friendly person contrived to acquaint Becket with his danger, to whom he paid no heed, knowing it very well himself. He knew he was to die; and resolved to die bravely.
The four armed knights, meanwhile, on the 29th of December, rode with an escort to Canterbury, dined at the Augustinian abbey, and entered the court-yard of the Archbishop's palace as Becket had finished his mid-day meal and had retired to an inner room with his chaplain and a few intimate friends. They then entered the hall and sought the Archbishop, who received them in silence. Sir Reginald Fitzurst then broke the silence with these words: "We bring you the commands of the King beyond the sea, that you repair without delay to the young King's presence and swear allegiance. And further, he commands you to absolve the bishops you have excommunicated." On Becket's refusal, the knight continued: "Since you will not obey, the royal command is that you and your clergy forthwith depart from the realm, never more to return." Becket angrily declared he would never again leave England. The knights then sprang to their feet and departed, enjoining the attendants to prevent the escape of Becket, who exclaimed: "Do you think I shall fly, then? Neither for the King nor any living man will I fly. You cannot be more ready to kill me than I am to die."
He sought, however, the shelter of his cathedral, as the vesper bell summoned him to prayers,—followed by the armed knights, with a company of men-at-arms, driving before them a crowd of monks. The Archbishop was standing on the steps of the choir, beyond the central pillar, which reached to the roof of the cathedral, in the dim light shed by the candles of the altars, so that only the outline of his noble figure could be seen, when the knights closed around him, and Fitzurst seized him,—perhaps meaning to drag him away as a prisoner to the King, or outside the church before despatching him. Becket cried, "Touch me not, thou abominable wretch!" at the same time hurling Tracy, another of the knights, to the ground, who, rising, wounded him in the head with his sword. The Archbishop then bent his neck to the assassins, exclaiming, "I am prepared to die for Christ and His Church."
Such was the murder of Becket,—a martyr, as he has been generally regarded, for the liberties of the Church; but, according to some, justly punished for presumptuous opposition to his sovereign.
The assassination was a shock to Christendom. The most intrepid churchman of his age was slain at his post for doing, as he believed, his duty. No one felt the shock more than the King himself, who knew he would be held responsible for the murder. He dreaded the consequences, and shut himself up for three days in his chamber, refusing food, issuing orders for the arrest of the murderers, and sending ambassadors to the Pope to exculpate himself. Fearing an excommunication and an interdict, he swore on the Gospel, in one of the Norman cathedrals, that he had not commanded nor desired the death of the Archbishop; and stipulated to maintain at his own cost two hundred knights in the Holy Land, to abrogate the Constitutions of Clarendon, to reinvest the See of Canterbury with all he had wrested away, and even to undertake a crusade against the Saracens of Spain if the Pope desired. Amid the calamities which saddened his latter days, he felt that all were the judgments of God for his persecution of the martyr, and did penance at his tomb.
So Becket slew more by his death than he did by his life. His cause was gained by his blood: it arrested the encroachments of the Norman kings for more than three hundred years. He gained the gratitude of the Church and a martyr's crown. He was canonized as a saint. His shrine was enriched with princely offerings beyond any other object of popular veneration in the Middle Ages. Till the time of the Reformation a pilgrimage to that shrine was a common form of penance for people of all conditions, the nobility as well as the common people. Even miracles were reputed to be wrought at that shrine, while a drop of Becket's blood would purchase a domain!
Whatever may be said about the cause of Becket, to which there are two sides, there is no doubt about his popularity. Even the Reformation, and the changes made in the English Constitution, have not obliterated the veneration in which he was held for five hundred years. You cannot destroy respect for a man who is willing to be a martyr, whether his cause is right or wrong. If enlightened judgments declare that he was "a martyr of sacerdotal power, not of Christianity; of a caste, and not of mankind;" that he struggled for the authority and privileges of the clergy rather than for the good of his country,—still it will be conceded that he fought bravely and died with dignity. All people love heroism. They are inclined to worship heroes; and especially when an unarmed priest dares to resist an unscrupulous and rapacious king, as Henry is well known to have been, and succeeds in tearing from his hands the spoils he has seized, there must be admiration. You cannot extinguish the tribute of the soul for heroism, any more than that of the mind for genius. The historian who seeks to pull down a hero from the pedestal on which he has been seated for ages plays a losing game. No brilliancy in sophistical pleadings can make men long prefer what is NEW to that which is TRUE. Becket is enshrined in the hearts of his countrymen, even as Cromwell is among the descendants of the Puritans; and substantially for the same reason,—because they both fought bravely for their respective causes,—the cause of the people in their respective ages. Both recognized God Almighty, and both contended against the despotism of kings seeking to be absolute, and in behalf of the people who, were ground down by military power. In the twelfth century the people looked up to the clergy as their deliverers and friends; in the seventeenth century to parliaments and lawyers. Becket was the champion of the clergy, even as Cromwell was the champion—at least at first—of the Parliament. Carlyle eulogizes Cromwell as much as Froude abuses Becket; but Becket, if more haughty and defiant than Cromwell in his private character, yet was truer to his principles. He was a great hero, faithful to a great cause, as he regarded it, however averse this age may justly be to priestly domination. He must be judged by the standard which good and enlightened people adopted seven hundred years ago,—not in semi-barbarous England alone, but throughout the continent of Europe. This is not the standard which reason accepts to-day, I grant; but it is the standard by which Becket must be judged,—even as the standard which justified the encroachments of Leo the Great, or the rigorous rule of Tiberius and Marcus Aurelius, is not that which en-thrones Gustavus Adolphus and William of Orange in the heart of the civilized world.
Eadmer's Life of Anselm; Historia Novarum; Sir J. Stephen's Life ofBecket, of William of Malmsbury, and of Henry of Huntington;Correspondence of Thomas Becket, with that of Foliot, Bishop ofLondon, and John of Salisbury; Chronicle of Peter of Peterborough;Chronicle of Ralph Niper, and that of Jocelyn of Brakeland;Dugdale's Monasticon; Freeman's Norman Conquest; Michelet's Historyof France; Green, Hume, Knight, Stubbs, among the Englishhistorians; Encyclopaedia Britannica; Hook's Lives of theArchbishops of Canterbury; Lord Littleton on Henry II.; Stanley'sMemorials of Canterbury; Milman's Latin christianity; article byFroude; Morris's Life of Thomas a Becket; J. Craigie Robertson'sLife of Thomas Becket.
About A. D. 800-1300.
There is no great character with whom Feudalism is especially identified. It was an institution of the Middle Ages, which grew out of the miseries and robberies that succeeded the fall of the Roman Empire.
Before I present the mutual relation between a lord and his vassal, I would call your attention to political anarchies ending in political degradation; to an unformed state of society; to semi- barbarism, with its characteristic vices of plunder, rapine, oppression, and injustice; to wild and violent passions, unchecked by law; to the absence of central power; to the reign of hard and martial nobles; to the miseries of the people, ground down, ignorant, and brutal; to rude agricultural life; to petty wars; to general ignorance, which kept society in darkness and gloom for a thousand years,—all growing out of the eclipse of the old civilization, so that the European nations began a new existence, and toiled in sorrow and fear, with few ameliorations: an iron age, yet an age which was not unfavorable for the development of new virtues and heroic qualities, under the influence of which society emerged from barbarism, with a new foundation for national greatness, and a new material for Christianity and art and literature and science to work upon.
Such was the state of society during the existence of feudal institutions,—a period of about five hundred years,—dating from the dismemberment of Charlemagne's empire to the fifteenth century. The era of its greatest power was from the Norman conquest of England to the reign of Edward III. But there was a long and gloomy period before Feudalism ripened into an institution,—from the dissolution of the Roman Empire to the eighth and ninth centuries. I would assign this period as the darkest and the dreariest in the history of Europe since the Roman conquests, for this reason, that civilization perished without any one to chronicle the changes, or to take notice of the extinction.
From Charlemagne there had been, with the exception of brief intervals, the birth of new ideas and interests, the growth of a new civilization. Before his day there was a progressive decline. Art, literature, science, alike faded away. There were no grand monuments erected, the voice of the poet was unheard in the universal wretchedness, the monks completed the destruction which the barbarians began. Why were libraries burned or destroyed? Why was classic literature utterly neglected? Why did no great scholars arise even in the Church? The new races looked in vain for benefactors. Even the souvenirs of the old Empire were lost. Nearly all the records of ancient greatness perished. The old cities were levelled to the ground. Nothing was built but monasteries, and these were as gloomy as feudal castles at a later date. The churches were heavy and mournful. Good men hid themselves, trying to escape from the miserable world, and sang monotonous chants of death and the grave. Agriculture was at the lowest state, and hunting, piracy, and robbery were resorted to as a means of precarious existence. There was no commerce. The roads were invested with vagabonds and robbers. It was the era of universal pillage and destruction; nothing held sacred. Universal desolation filled the souls of men with despair. What state of society could be worse than that of England under the early Saxon kings? There were no dominant races and no central power. The countries of Europe relapsed into a sullen barbarism. I see no bright spot anywhere, not even in Italy, which was at this time the most overrun and the most mercilessly plundered of all the provinces of the fallen Empire. The old capital of the world was nearly depopulated. Nothing was spared of ancient art on which the barbarians could lay their hands, and nothing was valued.
This was the period of what writers call ALLODIAL tenure, in distinction from feudal. The allodialist owned indeed his lands, but they were subject to incessant depredations from wandering tribes of barbarians and from robbers. There was no encouragement to till the soil. There was no incentive to industry of any kind. During a reign of universal lawlessness, what man would work except for a scanty and precarious support? His cattle might be driven away, his crops seized, his house plundered. It is hard to realize that our remote ancestors were mere barbarians, who by the force of numbers overran the world. They seem to have had but one class of virtues,—contempt of death, and the willing sacrifice of their lives in battle. The allodialist, however, was not a barbaric warrior or chieftain, but the despoiled owner of lands that his ancestors had once cultivated in peace and prosperity. He was the degenerate descendant of Celtic and Roman citizens, the victim of barbaric spoliations. His lands may have passed into the hands of the Gothic conquerors; but the Gothic or Burgundian or Frankish possessor of innumerable acres, once tilled by peaceful citizens, remained an allodial proprietor. Even he had no protection and no safety; for any new excursion of less fortunate barbarians would desolate his possessions and decimate his laborers. The small proprietor was especially subject to pillage and murder.
In the universal despair from this reign of anarchy and lawlessness, when there was no security to property and no redress of evils, the allodialist parted with his lands to some powerful chieftain, and obtained promise of protection. He even resigned the privilege of freedom to save his wretched life. He became a serf,—a semi-bondman, chained to the soil, but protected from outrage. Nothing but inconceivable miseries, which have not been painted by historians, can account for the almost simultaneous change in the ownership of land in all European countries. We can conceive of nothing but blank despair among the people who attempted to cultivate land. And there must have been the grossest ignorance and the lowest degradation when men were willing to submit to the curtailment of personal freedom and the loss of their lands, in order to find protectors.
Thus Feudalism arose in the ninth and tenth centuries from the absolute wreck of property and hopes. It was virtually the surrender of land for the promise of protection. It was the great necessity of that anarchical age. Like all institutions, it grew out of the needs of the times. Yet its universal acceptance seems to prove that the change was beneficial. Feudalism, especially in its early ages, is not to be judged by the institutions of our times, any more than is the enormous growth of spiritual power which took place when this social and political revolution was going on. Wars and devastations and untold calamities and brutal forces were the natural sequence of barbaric invasions, and of the progressive fall of the old civilization, continued from generation to generation for a period of two or three hundred years, with scarcely any interruption. You get no relief from such a dispensation of Divine Providence, unless you can solve the question why the Roman Empire was permitted to be swept away. If it must be destroyed, from the prevalence of the same vices which have uniformly undermined all empires,—utter and unspeakable rottenness and depravity,—in spite of Christianity, whether nominal or real; if eternal justice must bear sway on this earth, bringing its fearful retributions for the abuse of privileges and general wickedness,—then we accept the natural effects of that violence which consummated the ruin. The natural consequences of two hundred years of pillage and warfare and destruction of ancient institutions were, and could have been nothing other than, miseries, misrule, sufferings, poverty, insecurity, and despair. A universal conflagration must destroy everything that past ages had valued. As a relief from what was felt to be intolerable, and by men who were brutal, ignorant, superstitious, and degraded, all from the effect of the necessary evils which war creates, a sort of semi-slavery was felt to be preferable, as the price of dependence and protection.
Dependence and protection are the elemental principles of Feudalism. These were the hard necessities which the age demanded. And for three hundred years, it cannot be doubted, the relation between master and serf was beneficial. It resulted in a more peaceful state of society,—not free from great evils, but still a healthful change from the disorders of the preceding epoch. The peasant could cultivate his land comparatively free from molestation. He was still poor. Sometimes he was exposed to heavy exactions. He was bound to give a portion of the profits of his land to his lordly proprietor; and he was bound to render services in war. But, as he was not bound to serve over forty days, he was not led on distant expeditions; he was not carried far from home. He was not exposed to the ambition of military leaders. His warlike services seem to be confined to the protection of his master's castle and family, or to the assault of some neighboring castle. He was simply made to participate in baronial quarrels; and as these quarrels were frequent, his life was not altogether peaceful.
But war on a large scale was impossible in the feudal age. The military glory of the Roman conquerors was unknown, and also that of modern European monarchs. The peasant was bound to serve under the banner of a military chieftain only for a short time: then he returned to his farm. His great military weapon was the bow,—the weapon of semi-barbarians. The spear, the sword, the battle-axe were the weapons of the baronial family,—the weapons of knights, who fought on horseback, cased in defensive armor. The peasant fought on foot; and as the tactics of ancient warfare were inapplicable, and those of modern warfare unknown, the strength of armies was in cavalry and not in the infantry, as in modern times. But armies were not large from the ninth to the twelfth century,— not until the Crusades arose. Nor were they subject to a rigid discipline. They were simply an armed rabble. They were more like militia than regular forces; they fostered military virtues, without the demoralization of standing armies. In the feudal age there were no standing armies. Even at so late a period as the time of Queen Elizabeth that sovereign had to depend on the militia for the defence of the realm against the Spaniards. Standing armies are the invention of great military monarchs or a great military State. The bow and arrow were used equally to shoot men and shoot deer; but they rarely penetrated the armor of knights, or their force was broken by the heavy shield: they took effect only on the undefended bodies of the peasantry. Hence there was a great disproportion of the slain in battle between peasants and their mounted masters. War, even when confined to a small sphere, has its terrors. The sufferers were the common people, whose lives were not held of much account. History largely confines itself to battles. Hence we are apt to lose sight of the uneventful life of the people in quiet times.
But the barons were not always fighting. In the intervals of war the peasant enjoyed the rude pleasures of his home. He grew up with strong attachments, having no desire to migrate or travel. Gradually the sentiment of loyalty was born,—loyalty to his master and to his country. His life was rough, but earnest. He had great simplicity of character. He became honest, industrious, and frugal. He was contented with but few pleasures,—rural fetes and village holidays. He had no luxuries and no craving for them. Measured by our modern scale of pleasures he led a very inglorious, unambitious, and rude life.
Contentment is one of the mysteries of existence. We should naturally think that excitement and pleasure and knowledge would make people happy, since they stimulate the intellectual powers; but on the contrary they seem to produce unrest and cravings which are never satisfied. And we should naturally think that a life of isolation, especially with no mental resources,—a hard rural existence, with but few comforts and no luxuries,—would make people discontented. Yet it does not seem to be so in fact, as illustrated by the apparent contentment of people doomed to hard labor in the most retired and dreary retreats. We wonder at their placitude, as we travel in remote and obscure sections of the country. A poor farmer, whose house is scarcely better than a hovel, surrounded with chickens and pigs, and with only a small garden,—unadorned and lonely and repulsive,—has no cravings which make the life of the favored rich sometimes unendurable. The poorer he is, and therefore the more miserable as we should think, the more contented he seems to be; while a fashionable woman or ennuied man, both accustomed to the luxuries and follies of city life, with all its refinements and gratification of intellectual and social pleasures, will sometimes pine in a suburban home, with all the gilded glories of rich furniture, books, beautiful gardens, greenhouses, luxurious living, horses, carriages, and everything that wealth can furnish.
So that civilization would seem often a bitter mockery, showing that intellectual life only stimulates the cravings of the soul, but does not satisfy them. And when people are poor but cultivated, the unhappiness seems to be still greater; demonstrating that cultivated intellect alone opens to the mind the existence of evils which are intensified by the difficulty of their removal, and on which the mind dwells with feelings kindred to despair. I have sometimes doubted whether an obscure farmer's daughter is any happier with her piano, and her piles of cheaply illustrated literature and translations of French novels, and her smatterings of science learned in normal schools, since she has learned too often to despise her father and mother and brother, and her uneducated rural beau, and all her surroundings, with poverty and unrest and aspiration for society eating out her soul. The happiness produced merely by intellectual pleasures and social frivolities is very small at the best, compared with that produced by the virtues of the heart and the affections kindled by deeds of devotion, or the duties which take the mind from itself. Intellectual pleasures give only a brief satisfaction, unless directed to a practical end, like the earnest imparting of knowledge in educational pursuits, or the pursuit of art for itself alone,—to create, and not to devour, as the epicure eats his dinner. Where is the happiness of devouring books with no attempt to profit by them, except in the temporary pleasure of satisfying an appetite? So even the highest means of happiness may become a savor of death unto death when perverted or unimproved. Never should we stimulate the intellect merely to feed upon itself. Unless intellectual culture is directed to what is useful, especially to the necessities or improvement of others, it is a delusion and a snare. Better far to be ignorant, but industrious and useful in any calling however humble, than to cram the mind with knowledge that leads to no good practical result. The buxom maiden of rural life, in former days absorbed in the duties of home, with no knowledge except that gained in a district school in the winter, with all her genial humanities in the society of equals no more aspiring than herself, is to me a far more interesting person than the pale-faced, languid, discontented, envious girl who has just returned from a school beyond her father's means, even if she can play upon an instrument, and has worn herself thin in exhausting studies under the stimulus of ambitious competition, or the harangues of a pedant who thinks what he calls "education" to be the end of life,—an education which reveals her own insignificance, or leads her to strive for an unattainable position.
I am forced to make these remarks to show that the Mediaeval peasant was not necessarily miserable because he was ignorant, or isolated, or poor. In so doing I may excite the wrath of some who think a little knowledge is not a dangerous thing, and may appear to be throwing cold water on one of the noblest endeavors of modern times. But I do not sneer at education. I only seek to show that it will not make people happy, unless it is directed into useful channels; and that even ignorance may be bliss when it is folly to be wise. A benevolent Providence tempers all conditions to the necessities of the times. The peasantry of Europe became earnest and stalwart warriors and farmers, even under the grinding despotism of feudal masters. With their beer and brown bread, and a fowl in the pot on a Sunday, they grew up to be hardy, bold, strong, healthy, and industrious. They furnished a material on which Christianity and a future civilization could work. They became patriotic, religious, and kind-hearted. They learned to bear their evils in patience. They were more cheerful than the laboring classes of our day, with their partial education,— although we may console ourselves with the reflection that these are passing through the fermenting processes of a transition from a lower to a higher grade of living. Look at the picture of them which art has handed down: their faces are ruddy, genial, sympathetic, although coarse and vulgar and boorish. And they learned to accept the inequalities of life without repining insolence. They were humble, and felt that there were actually some people in the world superior to themselves. I do not paint their condition as desirable or interesting by our standard, but as endurable. They were doubtless very ignorant; but would knowledge have made them any happier? Knowledge is for those who can climb by it to positions of honor and usefulness, not for those who cannot rise above the condition in which they were born,—not for those who will be snubbed and humiliated and put down by arrogant wealth and birth. Better be unconscious of suffering, than conscious of wrongs which cannot be redressed.
Let no one here misunderstand and pervert me. I am not exalting the ignorance and brutality of the feudal ages. I am not decrying the superior advantages of our modern times. I only state that ignorance and brutality were the necessary sequences of the wars and disorders of a preceding epoch, but that this very ignorance and brutality were accompanied by virtues which partially ameliorated the evils of the day; that in the despair of slavery were the hopes of future happiness; that religion took a deep hold of the human mind, even though blended with puerile and degrading superstitions; that Christianity, taking hold of the hearts of a suffering people, taught lessons which enabled them to bear their hardships with resignation; that cheerfulness was not extinguished; and that so many virtues were generated by the combined influence of suffering and Christianity, that even with ignorance human nature shone with greater lustre than among those by whom knowledge is perverted. It was not until the evil and injustice of Feudalism were exposed by political writers, and were meditated upon by the people who had arisen by education and knowledge, that they became unendurable; and then the people shook off the yoke. But how impossible would have been a French Revolution in the thirteenth century! What readers would a Rousseau have found among the people in the time of Louis VII.? If knowledge breaks fetters when the people are strong enough to shake them off, ignorance enables them to bear those fetters when emancipation is impossible.
The great empire of Charlemagne was divided at his death (in A. D. 814) among his three sons,—one of whom had France, another Italy, and the third Germany. In forty-five years afterwards we find seven kingdoms, instead of three,—France, Navarre, Provence, Burgundy, Lorraine, Germany, and Italy. In a few years more there were twenty-nine hereditary fiefs. And as early as the tenth century France itself was split up into fifty-five independent sovereignties; and these small sovereignties were again divided into dukedoms and baronies. All these dukes and barons, however, acknowledged the King of France as their liege lord; yet he was not richer or more powerful than some of the dukes who swore fealty to him. The Duke of Burgundy at one time had larger territories and more power than the King of France himself. So that the central authority of kings was merely nominal; their power extended scarcely beyond the lands they individually controlled. And all the countries of Europe were equally ruled by petty kings. The kings of England seem to have centralized around their thrones more power than other European monarchs until the time of the Crusades, when they were checked, not so much by nobles as by Act of Parliament.
Now all Europe was virtually divided among these petty sovereigns, called dukes, earls, counts, and barons. Each one was virtually independent. He coined money, administered justice, and preserved order. He ruled by hereditary right, and his estate descended to his oldest son. His revenues were derived by the extorted contributions of those who cultivated his lands, and by certain perquisites, among which were the privilege of wardship, and the profits of an estate during the minority of its possessor, and reliefs, or fines paid on the alienation of a vassal's feud; and the lord could bestow a female ward in marriage on whomever he pleased, and on her refusal take possession of her estate.
These lordly proprietors of great estates,—or nobles,—so powerful and independent, lived in castles. These strongholds were necessary in such turbulent times. They were large or small, according to the wealth or rank of the nobles who occupied them, but of no architectural beauty. They were fortresses, generally built on hills, or cragged rocks, or in inaccessible marshes, or on islands in rivers,—anywhere where defence was easiest. The nobles did not think of beautiful situations, or fruitful meadows, so much as of the safety and independence of the feudal family. They therefore lived in great isolation, travelling but little, and only at short distances (it was the higher clergy only who travelled). Though born to rank and power, they were yet rude, rough, unpolished. They were warriors. They fought on horseback, covered with defensive armor. They were greedy and quarrelsome, and hence were engaged in perpetual strife,—in the assault on castles and devastation of lands. These castles were generally gloomy, heavy, and uncomfortable, yet were very numerous in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. They were occupied by the feudal family, perhaps the chaplain, strangers of rank, bards, minstrels, and servants, who lived on the best the country afforded, but without the luxuries of our times. They lived better than the monks, as they had no vows to restrain them. But in their dreary castles the rooms were necessarily small, dark, and damp, except the banqueting hall. They were poorly lighted, there being no glass in the narrow windows, nor chimneys, nor carpets, nor mirrors, nor luxurious furniture, nor crockery, nor glassware, nor stoves, nor the refinements of cookery. The few roads of the country were travelled only by horsemen, or people on foot. There were no carriages, only a few heavy lumbering wagons. Tea and coffee were unknown, as also tropical fruits and some of our best vegetables. But game of all kinds was plenty and cheap; so also were wine and beer, and beef and mutton, and pork and poultry. The feudal family was illiterate, and read but few books. The chief pleasures were those of the chase,—hunting and hawking,—and intemperate feasts. What we call "society" was impossible, although the barons may have exchanged visits with each other. They rarely visited cities, which at that time were small and uninteresting. The lordly proprietor of ten thousand acres may have been jolly, frank, and convivial, but he was still rough, and had little to say on matters of great interests. Circumscribed he was of necessity, ignorant and prejudiced. Conscious of power, however, he was proud and insolent to inferiors. He was merely a physical man,—ruddy, healthy, strong indeed, but without refinement, or knowledge, or social graces. His castle was a fort and not a palace; and here he lived with boisterous or sullen companions, as rough and ignorant as himself. His wife and daughters were more interesting, but without those attainments which grace and adorn society. They made tapestries and embroideries, and rode horseback, and danced well, and were virtuous; but were primitive, uneducated, and supercilious. Their beauty was of the ruddy sort,—physical, but genial. They were very fond of ornaments and gay dresses; and so were their lords on festive occasions, for semi-barbarism delights in what is showy and glittering,—purple, and feathers, and trinkets.
Feudalism was intensely aristocratic. A line was drawn between the noble and ignoble classes almost as broad as that which separates liberty from slavery. It was next to impossible for a peasant, or artisan, or even a merchant to pass that line. The exclusiveness of the noble class was intolerable. It held in scorn any profession but arms; neither riches nor learning was of any account. It gloried in the pride of birth, and nourished a haughty scorn of plebeian prosperity. It was not until cities and arts and commerce arose that the arrogance of the baron was rebuked, or his iron power broken. Haughty though ignorant, he had no pity or compassion for the poor and miserable. His peasantry were doomed to perpetual insults. Their corn-fields were trodden down by the baronial hunters; they were compelled even to grind their corn in the landlord's mill, and bake their bread in his oven. They had no redress of injuries, and were scorned as well as insulted. What knight would arm himself for them; what gentle lady wept at their sorrows? The feeling of personal consequence was entirely confined to the feudal family. The poorest knight took precedence over the richest merchant. Pride of birth was carried to romantic extravagance, so that marriages seldom took place between different classes. A beautiful peasant girl could never rise above her drudgeries; and she never dreamed of rising, for the members of the baronial family were looked up to as superior beings. A caste grew up as rigid and exclusive as that of India. The noble and ignoble classes were not connected by any ties; there was nothing in common between them. Even the glory of successful warfare shed no radiance on a peasant's hut. He fought for his master, and not for himself, and scarcely for his country. He belonged to his master as completely as if he could be bought and sold. Christianity teaches the idea of a universal brotherhood; Feudalism suppressed or extinguished it. Peasants had no rights, only duties,—and duties to hard and unsympathetic masters. Can we wonder that a relation so unequal should have been detested by the people when they began to think? Can we wonder it should have created French Revolutions? When we remember how the people toiled for a mail- clad warrior, how they fought for his interests, how they died for his renown, how they were curtailed in their few pleasures, how they were not permitted even to shoot a pheasant or hare in their own grounds, we are amazed that such signal injustice should ever have been endured. It is impossible that this injustice should not have been felt; and no man ever became reconciled to injustice, unless reduced to the condition of a brute. Religious tyranny may be borne, for the priest invokes a supreme authority which all feel to be universally binding. But all tyranny over the body—the utter extinction of liberty—is hateful even to the most degraded Hottentot.
Why, then, was such an unjust and unequal relation permitted to exist so long? What good did it accomplish? What were its extenuating features? Why was it commended by historians as a good institution for the times?
It created a hardy agricultural class, inured them to the dangers and the toils of war, bound them by local attachments, and fostered a patriotic spirit. It developed the virtues of obedience, and submission to evils. It created a love of home and household duties. It was favorable to female virtue. It created the stout yeomanry who could be relied upon in danger. It made law and order possible. It defended the people from robbers. It laid a foundation for warlike prowess. It was favorable to growth of population, for war did not sweep off the people so much as those dire plagues and pestilences which were common in the Middle Ages. It was preferable to the disorders and conflagrations and depredations of preceding times. The poor man was oppressed, but he was safe so long as his lord could protect him. It was a hard discipline, but a discipline which was healthy; it preserved the seed if it did not bear the fruits of civilization. The peasantry became honest, earnest, sincere. They were made susceptible of religious impressions. They became attached to all the institutions of the Church; the parish church was their retreat, their consolation, and their joy. The priest held sway over the soul and the knight over the body, but the flame of piety burned steadily and warmly.