Beccles

“ For a real angler or sportsman such a house as that in which George Borrow spent the latter years of his long life must have been a perfect paradise. The world is utterly away from you, and, what is better still, in such a spot the world has no chance of finding you out. Approaching by road, you see no sign of the house till you are in it, so completely is it hidden in the nook of trees in which it stands. Only to the water is it open. It would be really beautiful to live there in the summer, and have a gondola to row into Beccles or Lowestoft or Bungay when you wanted to be gay. ”

“ Here is a Day for entering on seventy-four! But I do think, notwithstanding, that I am not much the better for it. The Cold I had before Christmas, returns, or lurks about me: and I cannot resolve on my usual out-of-door liberty. Enough of that. I suppose that I shall have some Company at Easter; my poor London Clerk, if he can find no more amusing place to go to for his short Holyday; probably Aldis Wright, who always comes into these parts at these Seasons—his ‘Nazione’ being Beccles. ”

“ Do you know Mitchy?" Mrs. Brook suddenly asked.
"Oh yes, he knows Mitchy"—Vanderbank had approached again.
"Then make him tell him"—she put it before the young man as a charming turn for them all. "Mitchy can be refined when he tries."
"Oh dear—when Mitchy 'tries'!" Vanderbank laughed. "I think I should rather, for the job, offer him to Mr. Longdon as abandoned to his native wild impulse."
"I like Mr. Mitchett," the old man said, endeavoring to look his hostess straight in the eye, and speaking as if somewhat to defy her to convict him, even from the point of view of Beccles, of a mistake. ”

“ Murray. Snippets only on Google Books, but I have looked at hard copy. Note on p. 25: Arthur Hughes was educated at Haileybury, matriculated at Oriel, but did not graduate (breakdown) . He died in Beccles, Suffolk in 1921. ”

“ Close to the church is the Hall, now the property of George Borrow, Esq., whose pleasant and retired residence is a little to the right of it, overlooking the Oulton Broad.
p. 74On the road from Oulton church to Lowestoft is the house of E. Leathes, Esq., at Normanstone, which has a fine view of the Railway and Lake Lothing, with the parish of Kirtley in the distance.
The road to Beccles—though in some parts of it pleasing—is less attractive than others in the neighbourhood, in consequence of the marshes on one side of it ”

“ Thus Becket at once kicked down from him the ladder by which he had risen, and now, no longer obsequious towards his sovereign, he determined to maintain to the utmost the privileges of the Church. Never was there a change of life more sudden, or one that excited so much indignation, on the one hand, or so much admiration on the other. The new archbishop became the idol of the poor, and especially of his own countrymen, while the king and his favourites regarded him with the deepest anger and aversion. ”

“ But Becket ever moves against a king. The Church is all—the crime to be a king. We trust your Royal Grace, lord of more land Than any crown in Europe, will not yield To lay your neck beneath your citizens' heel. HENRY. Not to a Gregory of my throning! No. FOLIOT. My royal liege, in aiming at your love, It may be sometimes I have overshot My duties to our Holy Mother Church, Tho' all the world allows I fall no inch Behind this Becket, rather go beyond In scourgings, macerations, mortifyings, Fasts, disciplines that clear the spiritual eye, And break the soul from earth. ”

“ Not so; it is some one even greater than the king—it is the archbishop, Thomas Becket. You wonder that an archbishop should be more powerful than a king, but in these early days the Church is the greatest power on earth. Even kings must submit to its decrees.
Now the trumpets blow, and a long procession winds its way towards the cathedral. As the archbishop comes in sight loud shouts of welcome rend the air. Look at him as he sits his charger, prouder than the boldest knight in the land. There was a time when he could joust and use sword and lance with the most skilful warrior in the kingdom. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ This was good sense in the Archbishop, who perhaps had been reading Epicurus, before he sat down to his repast. However this may be, it is certain that the philosopher in question says something very like what Becket said to the friar. “Is man,” he asks, “made to disdain the gifts of nature? Is he placed on earth only to gather bitter fruits? For whom then are the flowers that the gods strew at the feet of mortals?... ”

“ Becket turned, on seeing the monks trying to bolt and bar the church doors. “It is not right,” said he; “to make a fortress of the house of prayer. It can protect its own, even if its doors are open. We shall conquer our enemies by suffering, not by fighting.”
The vespers ceased; the clergy threw themselves on the altars for protection; the Archbishop stood alone with one canon, with Fitzstephen and Edward Grim, a priest who had come to visit him. In rushed the band of armed men, crying out, “Where is the traitor, Thomas Becket?” ”

“ But now that they would serve him in his need, he pretended that he had always laid them up in his heart, and intended to abide by them.
"Young man," he said, "they who would woo my child Alcestis must woo and win her as the gods have ordered. When she lay in her mother's arms, there came a prophet and stood over her and spake, saying, 'Child of evil fortune! whosoever thou weddest, woe to thy wedded life, sobeit thy lord come not to bear thee away in a chariot drawn by a lion and a boar.' Thus spake the prophet of the gods, and his words shall surely come to pass. ”

“ BECKET and HERBERT wait upon them. 1ST BEGGAR. Swine, sheep, ox—here's a French supper. When thieves fall out, honest men—— 2ND BEGGAR. Is the Archbishop a thief who gives thee thy supper? 1ST BEGGAR. Well, then, how does it go? When honest men fall out, thieves—no, it can't be that. 2ND BEGGAR. Who stole the widow's one sitting hen o' Sunday, when she was at mass? 1ST BEGGAR. Come, come! thou hadst thy share on her. Sitting hen! Our Lord Becket's our great sitting-hen cock, and we shouldn't ha' been sitting here if the barons and bishops hadn't been a-sitting on the Archbishop. ”

“ Look at the Bishops of Jerusalem, Antioch, Rome, Constantinople, &c., striving for the mastery; till finally the Bishop of Rome succeeded, trampling under foot all others, and then rearing a mighty fabric, and taking his seat in the temple of God, showing himself that he was God. But we must remember that this was not done in one year, or one century. It was like the leaven in the measure of meal—a gradual work. The deviation was so small at the first, as not to be noticed. The professed Church were imperceptibly assimilated into the same spirit; like priest, like people. ”

“ But his conscience recovered its strength: he returned to his loyalty to the Papacy; he declared his belief that, in matters spiritual, the Pope was his proper sovereign, that the Bishop of Rochester was a martyr, as Thomas à Becket had been a martyr. Becket he held up as the pattern of all churchmen’s imitation, courting for himself Becket’s fortunes. [358] Like others, he attempted a distinction in the nature of allegiance. “In matters secular his duty was to his prince.” ”

“ I,” replied Becket, “the archbishop, but no traitor.” He read his doom in the eyes of his pursuers. “Tyrant king,” muttered he, “though I die I will be thy undoing.” He wrote hastily upon a tablet, “Woodstock,” and giving it to his only attendant, whispered, “Deliver this to Queen Eleanor. Tarry not till thou find her.” Then turning calmly to the knights,
“Reginald,” said he, “I have granted thee many favors, what is thy object now? If thou seekest my life, I command thee, in the name of God, not to touch one of my people.” ”

“ Thomas à Becket said, at length, ‘What do you want?’
‘We want,’ said Reginald Fitzurse, ‘the excommunication taken from the Bishops, and you to answer for your offences to the King.’ Thomas à Becket defiantly replied, that the power of the clergy was above the power of the King. That it was not for such men as they were, to threaten him. That if he were threatened by all the swords in England, he would never yield.
‘Then we will do more than threaten!’ said the knights. And they went out with the twelve men, and put on their armour, and drew their shining swords, and came back. ”

“ Becket martyr of the clergy.
Becket was indeed the martyr of the clergy, not of the Church; of sacerdotal power, not of Christianity; of a caste, not of mankind.223 [241] From beginning to end it was a strife for the authority, the immunities, the possessions of the clergy.224 The liberty of the Church was the exemption of the clergy from law; the vindication of their separate, exclusive, distinctive existence from the rest of mankind. It was a sacrifice to the deified self; not the individual self, but self as the centre and representative of a great corporation. ”

“ In the Chartulary of Furness Abbey, some rude Latin verses, written by John Stell a monk, refer to a plant called Bekan, which at some remote period grew in the valley in great abundance, whence the name of Bekansghyll was anciently derived. ”

“ Being successfully opposed at Rome, as well as persecuted in England, the archbishop was compelled to take refuge in France. From his place of retirement he wrote, and Becket afterwards echoed the words, "Rome prefers gold and silver to justice; what counsel or redress can a man obtain there who has nothing to give?" The primates who succeeded Anselm were more easily moulded to the will of their sovereign ”

“ The other conspirators immediately followed him, armed to the teeth, and brandishing their swords.
It was already twilight, which, within the walls of the dimly-lighted church, had deepened into blackest obscurity. Becket's attendants entreated him to fly to the winding staircase which led to the roof of the building, or to seek refuge in the vaults underground. He rejected both of these expedients, and stood still to meet his assailants. "Where is the traitor?" cried a voice. There was no answer. "Where is the archbishop?" "Here I am," Becket replied; "but here is no traitor. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Blest above all men he who hallows his life in such mystic rites, and, purified with holiest waters, goes dancing with the worshippers of Bacchus, and of thee, mighty Mother Cybele, shaking his thyrsus, and all his locks crowned with ivy. Bacchus's birth is sung, and how from the flashing lightning Jove snatched him and preserved in his thigh, until at the fated hour he gave him to light, horned and crowned with serpents. Wherefore should Thebes, sacred scene of the miracle, be one blossom of revellers, clad in motley and waving the thyrsus, the whole land maddening with the dance. ”

“ He wrote a life of the martyr in Latin, which is known only through frequent references to it in the Icelandic ‘Thomas Saga.’ Many important details of the life and character of Becket are ascribed to the authority of ‘Prior Robert of Cretel.’ Such are the accounts of Becket's relations with Archbishop Theobald and of the saintliness of his early life. ”

“ The desire to see, in the quarrel between Becket and Henry, a struggle between the old Anglo-Saxon population and their Norman conquerors has probably been carried much too far by the eminent living French historian Augustin Thierry: the controversy was in the main and essentially, there can be no doubt, a trial of strength between the church and the state, between the temporal and the spiritual powers, between the crown and the pope, between the laity and the clergy; nor do we believe that the accident of Becket being of Anglo-Saxon lineage went for anything in the case. ”