Original subtitles

Here, let us kneel, close by the cathedral.

Here, let us pray for our good Archbishop.

May his journey be easy,

his road be smooth,

weather and wind be fair.

May his horse not fail.

God, who created us, Jesus, who saved us,

Spirit, who cleanseth us.

God be with you between the woods.

Jesus be with you at the turning of the hill.

Spirit be with you in crossing the stream.

Blessed Mary,

Saint Michael,

Saint Elphege,

and all the saints pray.

May the prayers of the poor,

of your poor people, your poor folk of Kent avail,

and of us, the women of Canterbury.

Now, may the King be enlightened,

your enemies thwarted,

the truth prevail,

all powers of evil driven away.

At this morning, my fire would not kindle.

This morning, my cauldron would not boil.

Last night, I was ridden by witches,

and the cat jumped onto the bed.

Our house dog howled all the night

at the owl that cried in the elm tree.

My wedding ring slipped from my finger.

And my milk jug fell on the hearth.

O Lord Archbishop, do not carry the cross,

or the cross will carry you.

I have balding of bane and bale.

Return, return to us.

For without you, we have no succour or stake.

My Lord, The King.

I am guilty of no treason.

Never would I be lacking in reverence for the King's grace.

Or for the King's law, in his domain.

The suit of John the Marshal pertained to my court.

It was tried in my court,

and it was dismissed.

The evidence was plain.

The judgement, that imposed by Canon Law.

Beyond that court,

there could be no appeal for such a case, in this land.

Therefore, when summoned to your court,

I could not comply.

That were to fail, in my duty as Archbishop

and betray the church in all Christendom.

Yet, I did not fail in respect for the King's majesty.

I sent three of my knights to give account of my actions,

to testify that this suit could not be allowed,

and to explain my absence.

More, I could not do.

Your defence is not accepted.

You pretend to ignore the Constitutions of Clarendon.

To these, every bishop, all of them here present, consented.

And you too, My Lord Archbishop.

The Constitutions admit that a plaintiff has the right of appeal

from the archdeacon to the bishop,

from the bishop to the Archbishop,

and from the Archbishop to the King.

I, therefore, hold you guilty of treason.

And I shall hold guilty of treason, all those, if there be any,

who support you in this conduct.

My Lord's Bishops,

I demand that you now pronounce the judgement of my council.

What shall we say?

To my mind, the question is perfectly simple.

We signed the Constitutions of Clarendon.

We are honest men, the oath was binding.

For us to break it now would be excessively imprudent.

The Archbishop exceeds his authority.

I refuse to be bullied. I say, we should pronounce for the King.

But the saving clause,

Thomas consented saving only the law of the church.

And the King did not accept this reservation?

So, Thomas refused to sign.

For my part, I am convinced

that the true interests of the church demand

that we should give judgement for the King.

It was the King who forced Becket upon us as Archbishop,

against our wishes and the interests of the church.

He must now regret this interference.

By condemning Thomas,

we shall be expressing in the clearest possible manner,

our objection to the intrusion of the state into church affairs.

I agree.

And then we can have My Lord of London as Archbishop.

A choice, My Lords, which I know we should all have preferred.

My Lord, you are too kind.

Yes, My Lord. We know you as the wisest man among us.

And a moderate man, an extremely moderate man.

I think I see a way.

But I am fearful of hasty measures.

It is most inconvenient, but Thomas is still Archbishop,

and has power of excommunication over us.

I know, I know.

And that is why I shall propose the solution,

which will make it possible for us to satisfy the King.

I agree.

This is better than a tournament.

And the onlookers, My Lord, see the best of the game.

Look at those bishops.

Like frightened birds, when one of my falcons is ranging.

They don't know where to turn.

These are birds too fat to fly.

This is an end of bishops' law, I think.

Tomorrow, there will be only King's law.

And tomorrow, My Lord, look to your own rights.

Aye, aye.

One thing at a time.

Let king eat bishop.

He will find his loyal barons tougher meat.

I do not like it, I tell you.

The King may grow too powerful for us.

My Lord of Canterbury.

We, the bishops of this realm,

hold that you have failed of the respect due to the King's grace.

By reason of your oath of homage,

you were bound, saving only urgent business or infirmity,

to answer the King's summons in person.

This, you failed to do.

We exhort you, therefore, to admit your contumacy,

and throw yourself upon the King's mercy.

Hear, hear.

My Lord, King.

There is no subtlety in this charge.

And I will use no subtlety in my defence.

I am not guilty.

Were I to give any other answer, then should I three times break faith.

The oath I took at Clarendon, was ever saving my order.

That, all men know.

Should I now be faithless to my vows as priest and bishop?

These same Constitutions of Clarendon were then annulled by the Pope.

Should I now be faithless to my obedience to the Vicar of Christ?

And as touching the third bond,

I know well what evils would come upon this country of England,

were I to suffer unprotesting,

the subjection of the spiritual power to the temple.

Should I now be faithless to my people?

My Lords,

as concerning the temporal power,

though it be also of God,

as signified in the consecration of the King to his abbeys

when he is anointed and crowned by the church,

I bid you think

that this same temporal power has to do with today and tomorrow.

Those who wield it,

as you, My Lords, wield this power under the King,

are much tempted to bend it to their own advantage.

You think of estates and honours for yourselves and for your sons.

Yet it is, but a little while

and your estates are scattered,

and your honour is lost,

and your monuments broken,

and your names forgotten.

Tomorrow, where is Veer, where is Boone, where is...

You would do well to remember the church of God.

Which was, and is, and ever shall be to the end of the world,

according to the promises of Christ.

But for you, My Lords, Bishops,

my heart is very sorrowful.

You have deserted me to whom you are bound,

by your order, by your estate, and by your dignity.

Those disciples, that were afterwards saints,

by the grace of the Holy Spirit,

left our Lord and fled through bodily fear.

Take heed that you do not desert me,

through the greater sin of worldly greed and ambition.

And that no saving grace redeem your ill.

There is one here, would willingly be Archbishop in my stead.

Consider, My Lords,

that what violates the law of God, cannot be lawful.

Consider that the King's reverence cannot be magnified

by abating the reverence of the church.

You have yet time.

And the time is this very moment, and no more

to abjure your apostasy,

and renew your obedience to the law of Christ's church,

to Christ's Vicar, and to me.

And for myself, though I stand alone in England,

though every depravation and enforcement ensued to me,

yet, will I in no way relinquish the right.

Hear him no further, but pronounce.

I have not got you here to whisper and whine,

to plead with an Archbishop,

but to give judgement upon a manifest and shameless traitor.

Will you make yourselves accomplices of this man?

I have consulted you according to the form of law.

What more do you require?

Pronounce judgement,

or by the mass, I will strip you

every one of you, out of palace and church.

Aye, out of chasuble and cassock too.

My Lord, we are taken between the hammer and the anvil.

Have mercy upon us.

Fool!

You betray yourself among irreverent, laughing men.

You ask me to commit the greater sin.

To confirm and justify you in your cowardice.

The law of man that breaks the law of God.

is no law, but lawless violence.

Betray me if you will, but do not ask me to betray.

My Lord, The King.

I have taken counsel with my brethren, here gathered.

And they have asked me to put forward a proposal,

which should satisfy both Your Majesty's reasonable demand

and their own, not unreasonable, scruples.

The Archbishop, as our metropolitan,

forbids us to proceed further with this case.

Here, it must be admitted, he is acting

according to the strict letter of ecclesiastical law.

However we may interpret his motives,

he has the power of excommunication over us.

And, I think Your Majesty will acknowledge

that it would be a very grave scandal

and the excuse for misconduct among the common people,

for the whole of your bench of bishops to be excommunicated.

There is nothing that we more earnestly desire

than to demonstrate our loyalty to Your Majesty's person,

and Your Majesty's laws.

We therefore respectfully propose to appeal to the Pope

to release us from our canonical obedience to the Archbishop.

We shall then be in a position to pronounce judgement upon him.

I hope that the suggestion will commend itself to Your Majesty.

Cowards and traitors.

I will have judgement, and I will have it now.

You've heard these windbags and precise committee men.

You, My Lords, are men of action.

Who can prove your loyalty without palaver.

Pronounce the judgement.

My Lord Archbishop.

- We declare you guilty... - What is this?

Did I not say, truly,

that the law of man that violates the law of God

is no law, but lawlessness.

You respect not even these same Constitutions of Clarendon

that the King invokes.

Is it not there referred,

that, offences by the clergy against the King

shall be punished by the church?

You are but laypersons.

You cannot err no judgement upon your Father in God.

I will not hear you.

My brethren,

and you good people of Canterbury.

These knights have brought bad news.

Bad news is what I give you.

The King's court has given judgement.

If that is a judgement, which is only the voice

of the wicked, and the frightened.

And if that is a court,

which has no authority to pronounce such a judgement.

The Archbishop is gone.

He refused to hear the sentence, left the court.

He has taken ship for France.

For what can he do but appeal to the Holy Father,

to the judgement seat of Rome.

He is not a man who has fled for his own safety.

Safety he could have bought, at the price of betrayal.

But he is your Archbishop,

who must carry on the fight where the fight can be waged,

no other place than Rome.

To Rome, he will appeal for the church in England,

for the law of God in England.

He will return to you with the Holy Father's blessing,

and the papal anathema.

For us, is but to wait.

To wait.

To pray.

To suffer, perhaps for a long time.

I have nothing to promise you until his return,

but waiting and suffering.

I have nothing to ask of you but prayer, and endurance.

The men at arms will soon be here to enforce the King's command.

To confirm the seizure by John the Marshal

to the great harm of some of you.

To take forfeit from us.

Imposing heavy penalty.

We must not withstand them.

You must not withstand them.

The Archbishop would not wish of you rebellious behaviour against your King,

to the danger of your bodies.

Or hatred and anger, to the danger of your souls.

We must comply, but not consent.

Pray to Saint Elphege.

Let us bow the knee.

Let us pray.

Here, let us stand, close by the cathedral.

Here, let us wait.

Are we drawn by danger?

Is it the knowledge of safety

that draws our feet towards the cathedral?

What danger can befall us, the poor,

the poor women of Canterbury?

What tribulation with which we are not already familiar?

There is no danger for us.

And there is no safety in the cathedral.

Some presage of an act, which our eyes are compelled to witness,

has forced our feet towards the cathedral.

We are forced to bear witness.

Since golden October declined into sombre November,

and the apples were gathered and stored,

and the land became brown, sharp points of death

in a waste of water and mud, the new year awaits.

Breathes, waits, whispers in darkness.

While the labourer kicks off a muddy boot

and stretches his hand to the fire,

the new year awaits.

Destiny waits for the coming.

Who has stretched out his hand to the fire,

and remember the saints at All Hallows,

remember the martyrs and saints who wait?

And who shall stretch out his hand to the fire,

and deny his master?

Who shall be warmed by the fire, and deny his master?

Seven years of the summer is over.

Seven years since the Archbishop left us.

He who was always kind to his people.

But it would not be well, if he should return.

King rules or barons rule.

We have suffered various oppression.

But mostly, we are left to our own devices.

And we are content if we are left alone.

We try to keep our households in order.

The merchant, shy and cautious, fries to compile a little fortune.

And the labourer bends to his piece of earth.

Earth colour,

his own colour.

Preferring to pass unobserved.

Now I fear disturbance of the quiet seasons.

Winter shall come bringing death from the sea.

Ruinous spring shall beat at our doors.

Root and shoot shall eat our eyes and our ears.

Disastrous summer burn up the beds of our streams.

And the poor shall wait for another decaying October.

Why should the summer bring consolation for autumn fires and winter fogs?

What shall we do in the heat of summer,

but wait in barren orchards for another October?

Some malady is coming upon us.

We wait, we wait.

And the saints and martyrs wait

for those who shall be martyrs and saints.

Destiny waits in the hand of God, shaping the still unshapen.

I have seen these things in a shaft of sunlight.

Destiny waits in the hand of God, not in the hands of statesmen,

who do some well, some ill, planning and guessing.

Having their aims, which turn in their hands in the pattern of time.

Come, happy December, who shall observe you,

who shall preserve you?

Shall the Son of Man be born again in the litter of scorn?

For us, the poor, there is no action,

but only to wait, and to witness.

Seven years and the summer is over.

Seven years since the Archbishop left us.

What does the Archbishop do, and our Sovereign Lord, the Pope,

with a stubborn King, and the French King,

in ceaseless intrigue, combinations,

in confidence, meetings accepted, meetings refused,

meetings un-ended or endless,

at one place or another, in France?

I see nothing quite conclusive in the art of temporal government,

but violence, duplicity and frequent malversation.

King rules or barons rule,

the strong man strongly and the weak man by caprice.

They have but one law, to seize the power and keep it.

And the steadfast can manipulate the greed and lust of others.

The feeble is devoured by his own.

Shall these things not end

until the poor at the gate have forgotten their friend,

their Father in God, have forgotten that they had a friend?

Servants of God, and watchers of the Temple,

I am here to inform you without circumlocution,

the Archbishop is in England and is close outside the city.

I was sent before in haste to give you notice of his coming,

as much as was possible, that you may prepare to meet him.

What, is the exile ended?

Is our Lord Archbishop reunited with the King?

What reconciliation of two proud men?

What peace can be found to grow between the hammer and the anvil?

Tell us, are the old disputes at an end,

is the wall of pride cast down, that divided them?

Is it peace, or war?

Does he come in full assurance, or only secure in the power of Rome,

the spiritual rule,

the assurance of right, and the love of the people?

You are right to express a certain incredulity.

He comes in pride and sorrow, affirming all his claims,

assured beyond doubt of the devotion of the people,

who received him with scenes of frenzied enthusiasm,

lining the roads and throwing down their capes,

strewing the way with leaves and late flowers of the season.

The streets of the city will be packed to suffocation,

and I think that his horse will be deprived of its tail,

a single hair, of which, becomes a precious relic.

He is at one with the Pope and with the King of France,

who indeed would have liked to detain him in his kingdom.

But as for our King, that is another matter.

But again, is it war or peace?

Peace, but not the kiss of peace.

A patched up affair, if you ask my opinion.

And if you ask me,

I think the Lord Archbishop is not the man to cherish any illusions,

nor yet to diminish the least of his pretensions.

If you ask my opinion, I think that this peace

is nothing like an end, or like a beginning.

It is common knowledge

that when the Archbishop parted from the King,

he said to the King, "My Lord," he said,

"I leave you as a man whom in this life I shall not meet again."

I have this, I assure you, on the highest authority.

There are several opinions as to what he meant,

but no one considers it a happy prognostic.

I fear for the Archbishop.

I fear for the church.

I know that the pride bred of sudden prosperity

was but confirmed by bitter adversity.

I saw him as chancellor, flattered by the King,

liked or feared by courtiers in their overbearing fashion,

despised and despising, always isolated,

never one among them, always insecure.

His pride always feeding upon his own virtues,

pride drawing sustenance from impartiality,

pride drawing sustenance from generosity,

loathing power given by temporal devolution,

wishing subjection to God alone.

Had the King been greater, or had he been weaker,

things had perhaps been different for Thomas.

Yet our Lord has returned.

Our Lord has come back to his own again.

We have had enough of waiting, from December to dismal December.

The Archbishop shall be at our head, dispelling dismay and doubt.

He will tell us what we are to do. He will give us our orders, instruct us.

Our Lord is at one with the Pope, and also the King of France.

We can lean on a rock, we can feel a firm foothold

against the perpetual wash of tides of balance of forces,

of barons and landholders.

The rock of God is beneath our feet.

Let us meet the Archbishop with cordial thanksgiving,

our Lord, our Archbishop, returns.

And when the Archbishop returns, our doubts are dispelled.

Let us, therefore, rejoice,

I say rejoice, and show a glad face for his welcome.

I am the Archbishop's man.

Let us give the Archbishop welcome!

For good or ill, let the wheel turn.

The wheel has been still these seven years, and no good.

For ill or good, let the wheel turn.

For who knows the end of good or evil?

Until the grinders cease,

and the door shall be shut in the street,

and all the daughters of music shall be brought low.

Here is no continuing city.

Here is no abiding stay.

Ill the wind, ill the time.

Uncertain the profit, certain the danger.

Oh late, late, late, late is the time,

late, too late, and rotten the year.

Evil the wind, and bitter the sea,

and grey the sky.

Grey, grey, grey.

O Thomas, return Archbishop.

Return, return to France.

Return quickly, quietly.

Leave us to perish in quiet.

You come with applause, you come with rejoicing,

but you come bringing death into Canterbury.

A doom on the house,

a doom on yourself,

a doom on the world.

We do not wish anything to happen.

Seven years we have lived quietly.

Succeeded in avoiding notice.

Living and partly living.

There have been oppression and luxury,

there have been poverty and licence,

there has been minor injustice.

Yet, we have gone on living, living and partly living.

Sometimes, the corn has failed us.

Sometimes, the harvest is good.

One year is a year of rain.

Another, a year of dryness.

One year, the apples are abundant.

Another year, the plums are lacking.

Yet we have gone on living.

Living and partly living.

We have kept the feasts,

heard the masses,

we have brewed beer and cider,

gathered wood against the winter,

talked at the corner of the fire,

talked at the corners of streets,

talked not always in whispers,

living and partly living.

We have seen births, deaths and marriages,

we have had various scandals,

we have been afflicted with taxes,

we have had laughter and gossip,

several girls have disappeared unaccountably,

and some not able to.

We have all had our private terrors,

our particular shadows,

our secret fears.

But now, a great fear is upon us.

A fear not of one but of many,

a fear like birth and death.

When we see birth and death alone in a boiler pot,

we are afraid of a fear which we cannot know,

which we cannot face,

which none understands.

And our hearts are torn from us,

our brains unskinned like the layers of an onion,

our selves are lost,

lost in a final fear which none understands.

O Thomas Archbishop.

O Thomas, our Lord, leave us.

And leave us be in our humble and tarnished frame of existence.

Leave us.

Do not ask us to stand to the doom on the house,

the doom on the Archbishop, the doom on the world.

Archbishop, secure, and assured of your fate,

unaffrayed among the shades, do you realise what you ask?

Do you realise what it means to the small folk

drawn into the pattern of fate?

The small folk who live among small things.

The strain on the brain of the small folk,

who stand to the doom of the house,

the doom of their Lord, the doom of the world.

O Thomas Archbishop, leave us, leave us.

Leave sullen Dover and set sail for France.

Thomas, our Archbishop, still our Archbishop, even in France.

Thomas Archbishop, set the white sail

between the grey sky and the bitter sea.

Leave us. Leave us for France.

What a way to talk at such a juncture!

You are foolish, immodest and babbling women.

Do you not know that the good Archbishop is likely to arrive at any moment?

The crowds in the streets will be cheering and cheering,

and you go on croaking like frogs in the tree tops.

But frogs at least can be cooked and eaten.

Whatever you are afraid of in your craven apprehension,

let me ask you at the least to put on pleasant faces,

and give a hearty welcome to our good Archbishop.

Peace.

And let them be in their exaltation.

They speak better than they know, and beyond your understanding.

They know and do not know what it is to act or suffer.

They know and do not know that action is suffering

and suffering is action.

Neither does the agent suffer, nor the patient act.

But both are fixed in an eternal action, an eternal patience,

to which all must consent that it may be willed.

And which all must suffer that they may will it,

that the pattern may subsist.

For the pattern is the action and the suffering,

that the wheel may turn and still be forever still.

O My Lord.

Forgive me, I did not see you coming,

engrossed in the chatter of these foolish women.

Forgive us, My Lord, you would have had a better welcome

if we had been sooner prepared for the event.

But your Lordship knows that seven years of waiting,

seven years of prayer, seven years of emptiness,

have better prepared our hearts for your coming,

than seven days could make ready Canterbury.

However, I will have fires laid in all your rooms

to take the chill off our English December.

Your Lordship now being used to a better climate.

Your Lordship will find your rooms in order as you left them.

And will try to leave them in order, as I find them.

I am more than grateful for all your kind attentions.

These are small matters.

Little rest in Canterbury with eager enemies restless about us.

Rebellious bishops, York, London, Salisbury,

would have intercepted our letters, filled the coast with spies,

and sent to meet me some who hold me in bitterest hate.

By God's grace, aware of their prevision,

I sent my letters on another day.

Had fair crossing, found at Sandwich.

Broc, Warenne, and the Sheriff of Kent.

Those who had sworn to have my head from me.

Only John, the Dean of Salisbury,

fearing for the King's name, warning against treason,

made them hold their hands.

So for the time, we are unmolested.

But do they follow after?

For a little time the hungry hawk will only soar and hover.

Circling lower, waiting excuse, pretence, opportunity.

End will be simple, sudden, God given.

Meanwhile, the substance of our first act will be shadows,

and the strife with shadows.

Heavier the interval than the consummation.

All things prepare the event.

Watch.

You see, My Lord, I do not wait upon ceremony.

Here I have come, forgetting all acrimony,

hoping that your present gravity will find excuse for my humble levity.

Remembering all the good time past.

Your Lordship won't despise an old friend out of favour?

Old Tom, Gay Tom, Becket of London.

Your Lordship won't forget that evening on the river

when the King and you and I were all friends together?

Friendship should be more than biting time can sever.

What, My Lord?

Now that you recover favour with the King,

shall we say that summer's over or that the good time cannot last?

Fluting in the meadows, viols in the hall,

laughter and apple-blossom floating on the water,

singing at nightfall, whispering in chambers,

fires devouring the winter season,

eating up the darkness, with wit and wine, and wisdom.

Now that the King and you are in amity,

clergy and laity may return to gaiety.

Mirth and sportfulness need not walk warily.

You talk of seasons that are past.

I remember, not worth forgetting.

And of the new season. Spring has come in winter.

Snow in the branches shall float as sweet as blossoms.

Ice along the ditches, mirror the sunlight.

Love in the orchard, send the sap shooting.

Mirth matches melancholy.

We do not know very much of the future.

Except that from generation to generation,

the same things happen again and again.

Men learn little from others' experience.

But in the life of one man, never the same time returns.

Sever the cord, shed the scale.

Only the fool fixed in his folly

may think he can turn the wheel on which he turns.

My Lord, a nod is as good as a wink.

A man will often love what he spurns.

For the good times past, that are come again,

I am your man.

Not in this train.

Look to your behaviour.

You were safer think of penitence and follow your master.

Not at this gait!

If you go so fast, others may go faster.

Your Lordship is too proud.

The safest beast is not the one that roars most loud.

This was not the way of the King, our master.

You were not used to be so hard upon sinners

when they were your friends.

Be easy, man.

The easy man lives to eat the best dinners.

Take a friend's advice. Leave well alone.

Or your goose may be cooked and eaten to the bone.

You come 20 years too late.

Then I leave you to your fate.

I leave you to the pleasures of your higher vices,

which will have to be paid for at higher prices.

Farewell, My Lord, I do not wait upon ceremony.

I leave as I came forgetting all acrimony.

Hoping that your present gravity will find excuse for my humble levity.

If you will remember me, My Lord, at your prayers

I'll remember you at the kissing-time below the stairs.

Leave well alone.

The springtime fancy.

So one thought goes whistling down the wind.

The impossible is still temptation.

The impossible, the undesirable.

Voices under sleep, waking a dead world.

So that the mind may not be whole in the present.

Your Lordship has forgotten me, perhaps.

I will remind you.

We met at Clarendon, at Northampton.

And last at Montmirail, in Maine.

Now that I have recalled them,

let us but set these not too pleasant memories

in balance against other, earlier and weightier ones,

those of the chancellorship.

See how the late ones rise!

You, master of policy, whom all acknowledged,

should guide the state again.

Your meaning?

The chancellorship that you resigned when you were made Archbishop,

that was a mistake on your part, still may be regained.

Think, My Lord, power obtained grows to glory.

Life lasting, a permanent possession.

A temple tomb, monument of marble.

Rule over men reckon no madness.

To the man of God, what gladness?

Sadness only to those giving love to God alone.

Shall he who held the solid substance wander waking with deceitful shadows?

Power is present.

Holiness hereafter.

Who then?

The Chancellor.

King and Chancellor.

King commands, Chancellor richly rules.

This is a sentence not taught in the schools.

To set down the great, protect the poor.

Beneath the throne of God can man do more?

Disarm the ruffian, strengthen the laws,

rule for the good of the better cause,

dispensing justice, make all even

is thrive on earth and perhaps in heaven.

What means?

Real power is purchased at price of a certain submission.

Your spiritual power is earthly perdition.

Power is present, for him who will wield.

Who shall have it?

He who will come.

What shall be the month?

The last from the first.

What shall we give for it?

Pretence of priestly power.

Why should we give it?

- For the power and the glory. - No!

Yes.

Or bravery will be broken,

cabined in Canterbury, realmless ruler,

self-bound servant of a powerless Pope,

the old stag, circled with hounds.

- No. - Yes.

Men must manoeuvre.

Monarchs also, waging war abroad, need fast friends at home.

Private policy is public profit.

Dignity still shall be dressed with decorum.

You forget the bishops, whom I have laid under excommunication.

Hungry hatred will not strive against intelligent self-interest.

You forget the barons,

who will not forget constant curbing of petty privilege.

Against the barons is King's cause,

churl's cause, Chancellor's cause.

No!

Shall I, who keep the keys of heaven and hell,

supreme alone in England,

who bind and loose, with the power from the Pope,

descend to desire a punier power?

Delegate to deal the doom of damnation,

to condemn Kings, not serve among their servants,

is my open office.

No.

Go.

Then I leave you to your fate.

Your sin soars sunward, covering Kings' falcons.

Temporal power to build a good world,

to keep order, as the world knows order.

Those who put their faith in wordly order,

not controlled by the order of God,

in confident ignorance, but arrest disorder.

Make it fast, breed fatal disease.

Degrade what they exult.

Power with the King.

I was the King, his arm, his better reason.

But what was once exaltation, would now be only mean descent.

I am an unexpected visitor.

I expected you.

But not in this guise or for my present purpose.

No purpose brings surprise.

Well, My Lord, I'm no trifler, and no politician.

To idle or intrigue at court, I have no skill.

I'm no courtier.

I know a horse, a dog, a wench.

I know how to hold my estates in order.

A country-keeping Lord, who minds his own business.

It is we country Lords who know the country.

And we who know what the country needs.

It is our country. We care for the country.

We are the backbone of the nation.

We, not the plotting parasites about the King.

Excuse my bluntness,

I am a rough, straightforward Englishman.

Proceed straight forward.

Purpose is plain.

Endurance of friendship does not depend upon ourselves,

but upon circumstance.

But circumstance is Not undetermined.

Unreal friendship may turn to real.

But real friendship once ended, cannot be mended.

Sooner shall enmity turn to alliance.

The enmity that never knew friendship can sooner know accord.

For a countryman,

you wrap your meaning in as a dark generality as any courtier.

This is the simple fact.

You have no hope of reconciliation with Henry the King.

You look only to blind assertion in isolation.

That is a mistake.

O Henry.

O My King.

Other friends may be found in the present situation.

King in England is not all-powerful.

King is in France, squabbling in Anjou.

Round him, waiting hungry sons.

We are for England.

We are in England.

You and I, My Lord, are Normans.

England is a land for Norman sovereignty.

Let the Angevin destroy himself fighting in Anjou.

He does not understand us, the English barons.

We are the people.

To what does this lead?

To a happy coalition of intelligent interests.

But what have you, if you do speak for barons?

For a powerful party, which has turned its eyes in your direction.

To gain from you, your lordship asks.

For us, church favour would be an advantage.

Blessing of Pope,

powerful protection in the fight for liberty.

You, My Lord, in being with us, would fight a good stroke at once

for England and for Rome.

Ending the tyrannous jurisdiction of King's court over bishop's court,

of King's court over baron's court.

Which I helped to found.

Which you helped to found.

But time past is time forgotten.

We expect the rise of a new constellation.

And if the Archbishop cannot trust the King,

how can he trust those who work for King's undoing?

Kings will allow no power but their own.

Church and people have good cause against the throne.

If the Archbishop cannot trust the throne,

he has good cause to trust none but God alone.

It is not better to be thrown to a thousand hungry appetites,

than to one.

At a future time this may be shown.

I ruled once as chancellor.

And men like you were glad to wait at my door.

Not only in the court,

but in the field and in the tilt-yard,

I made many yield.

Shall I who ruled like an eagle over doves,

now take the shape of a wolf among wolves?

Pursue your treacheries as you have done before.

No one shall say that I betrayed a king.

Then, My Lord, I shall not wait at your door.

And I well hope, before another spring,

the King will show his regard for your loyalty.

To make, then break, this thought has come before,

the desperate exercise of fading power.

Samson in Gaza did no more.

But if I break, I break myself alone.

Well done, Thomas, your will is hard to bend.

And with me beside you, you shall not lack a friend.

Who are you?

I expected three visitors, not four.

Do not be surprised to receive one more.

Had I been expected, I had been here before.

I always precede expectation.

Who are you?

As you do not know me, I do not need a name.

And, as you know me, that is why I come.

You know me, but have never seen my face.

To meet before was never time or place.

Say what you've come to say.

It shall be said at last.

Hooks have been baited with morsels of the past.

Wantonness is weakness.

As for the King, his hardened hatred shall have no end.

You know truly,

the King will never trust twice the man who has been his friend.

Borrow use cautiously,

employ your services as long as you have to lend.

You would wait for trap to snap,

having served your turn, broken and crushed.

As for barons, envy of lesser men

is still more stubborn than King's anger.

Kings have public policy, barons private profit,

Jealousy raging possession of the fiend.

Barons are employable against each other.

Greater enemies must Kings destroy.

What is your counsel?

Fare forward to the end.

All other ways are closed to you, except the way already chosen.

But what is pleasure, kingly rule, or rule of men beneath a king,

with craft in comers, stealthy stratagem,

to general grasp of spiritual power?

Man oppressed by sin since Adam fell.

You hold the keys of heaven and hell.

Power to bind and loose.

Bind, Thomas, bind king and bishop under your heel.

King, emperor, bishop, baron, king, uncertain mastery of melting armies,

war, plague, and revolution,

new conspiracies, broken pacts.

To be master or servant within an hour, that is the course of temporal power.

The Old King shall know it, when at last breath,

no sons, no empire, he bites broken teeth.

You hold the skein.

Wind, Thomas,

wind the thread of eternal life and death.

You hold this power.

Hold it.

Supreme, in this land?

Supreme, but for one.

That I do not understand.

It is not for me to tell you how this may be so.

I am only here, Thomas, to tell you what you know.

How long shall this be?

Save what you know already,

ask nothing of me.

But think, Thomas, think of glory after death.

When King is dead, there's another king,

and one more king is another reign.

King is forgotten, when another shall come.

Saint and martyr rule from the tomb.

Think, Thomas, think of enemies dismayed,

creeping in penance, frightened of a shade.

Think of pilgrims, standing in line before the glittering jewelled shrine,

from generation to generation, bending the knee in supplication.

Think of the miracles, by God's grace,

and think of your enemies, in another place.

I have thought of these things.

That is why I tell you.

Your thoughts have more power than kings to compel you.

You have also thought, sometimes at your prayers,

sometimes hesitating at the angles of stairs.

And between sleep and waking, early in the morning,

when the bird cries, have thought of further scorning,

that nothing lasts, but the wheel turns,

the nest is rifled, and the bird mourns,

that the shrine shall be pillaged and the gold spent,

the jewels gone for light ladies' ornament,

the sanctuary broken, and its stores swept

into the laps of parasites and whores.

When miracles cease, and the faithful desert you,

and men shall only do their best to forget you.

And later is worse, when men will not hate you

enough to defame or to execrate you,

but pondering the qualities that you lacked

will only try to find the historical fact.

When men shall declare that there was no mystery

about this man, who played a certain part in history.

But, what is there to do?

What is left to be done?

Is there no enduring crown to be won?

Yes, Thomas, yes, you have thought of that too.

What can compare with glory of saints

dwelling forever in presence of God?

What earthly glory, of king or emperor,

what earthly pride, that is not poverty,

compared with richness of heavenly grandeur?

Seek the way of martyrdom,

make yourself the lowest on earth to be high in heaven,

and see far off below you, where the gulf is fixed,

your persecutors, in timeless torment,

parched passion, beyond expiation.

No!

Who are you, tempting with my own desires?

Others have come, temporal tempters,

with pleasure and power at palpable price.

What do you offer? What do you ask?

I offer what you desire.

I ask what you have to give.

Is it too much for such a vision of eternal grandeur?

Others offered real goods.

Worthless, but real.

You only offer dreams to damnation.

You have often dreamt them.

Is there no way, in my soul's sickness,

does not lead to damnation in pride?

I well know that these temptations

mean present vanity and future torment.

Can sinful pride be driven out only by more sinful?

Can I neither act nor suffer without perdition?

You know and do not know what it is to act or suffer.

You know and do not know that action is suffering,

and suffering action.

Neither does the agent suffer, nor the patient act.

But both are fixed in an eternal action, an eternal patience,

to which all must consent that it may be willed,

and which all must suffer that they may will it,

that the pattern may subsist, that the wheel may turn

and still be forever still.

There is no rest in the house.

There is no rest in the street.

I hear restless movement of feet.

And the air is heavy and thick.

Thick and heavy, the sky.

And the earth presses up beneath my feet.

What is the sickly smell, the vapour?

The dark green light from a cloud on a withered tree?

The earth is heaving to parturition of issue of hell.

What is the sticky dew that forms on the back of my hand?

Man's life is a cheat and a disappointment.

All things are unreal, unreal or disappointing.

The Catherine Wheel.

The pantomime cat.

The prizes given at the children's party.

The prize awarded for the English essay.

The scholar's degree, the statesman's decoration.

All things become less real, man passes from unreality to unreality.

This man is obstinate, blind, intent on self-destruction,

passing from deception to deception,

from grandeur to grandeur to final illusion,

lost in the wonder of his own greatness.

The enemy of society.

Enemy of himself.

O Thomas, My Lord, do not fight the intractable tide,

do not sail the irresistible wind.

In the storm, should we not wait for the sea to subside?

In the night, abide the coming of day,

when the traveller may find his way,

the sailor lay course by the sun?

Is it the owl that calls, or a signal between the trees?

Is the window bar made fast, is the door under lock and bolt?

Is it rain that taps at the window, is it wind that pokes at the door?

Does the torch flame in the hall, the candle in the room?

Does the watchman walk by the wall?

Does the mastiff prowl by the gate?

Death has a hundred hands and walks by a thousand ways.

He may come in the sight of all, he may pass unseen, unheard.

Come whispering through the ear, or a sudden shock on the skull.

A man may walk with a lamp at night, and yet be drowned in a ditch.

A man may climb the stair in the day, and slip on a broken step.

A man may sit at meat, and feel the cold in his groin.

We have not been happy, My Lord, we have not been too happy.

We are not ignorant women,

we know what we must expect and not expect.

We know of oppression and torture,

we know of extortion and violence,

destitution, disease,

the old without fire in winter,

the child without milk in summer.

Our labour taken away from us,

our sins made heavier upon us.

We have seen the young man mutilated,

the torn girl, trembling by the millstream.

And meanwhile, we've gone on living,

living and partly living,

picking together the pieces,

gathering faggots at nightfall, building a partial shelter,

for sleeping, and eating, and drinking, and laughter.

God gave us always some reason, some hope.

But now a new terror has soiled us, which none can avert, none can avoid,

flowing under our feet and over the sky.

Under doors and down chimneys,

flowing in at the ear and the mouth and the eye.

God is leaving us, God is leaving us,

more pang, more pain than birth or death.

Sweet and cloying through the dark air, falls the stifling scent of despair.

The forms take shape in the dark air.

Puss-purr of leopard, footfall of padding bear,

palm-pat of nodding ape,

square hyena waiting for laughter, laughter, laughter.

The lords of hell are here.

They curl around you, lie at your feet,

swing and wing through the dark air.

O Thomas Archbishop, save us, save us.

Save yourself that we may be saved.

Destroy yourself and we are destroyed.

Now is my way clear.

Now is the meaning plain.

Temptation shall not come in this kind again.

The last temptation is the greatest treason.

To do the right deed for the wrong reason.

The natural vigour in the venial sin is the way in which our lives begin.

Thirty years ago, I searched all the ways

that lead to pleasure, advancement and praise.

Delight in sense, in learning and in thought,

music and philosophy, curiosity,

the purple bullfinch in the lilac tree,

the tilt-yard skill,

the strategy of chess,

love in the garden, singing to the instrument,

were all things equally desirable.

Ambition comes when early force is spent

and when we find no longer all things possible.

Ambition comes behind and unobservable.

Sin grows with doing good.

When I imposed the King's law in England

and waged war with him against Toulouse,

I beat the barons at their own game.

I could then despise the men who thought me most contemptible,

the raw nobility, whose manners matched their fingernails.

While I ate out of the King's dish,

to become servant of God was never my wish.

Servant of God has chance of greater sin and sorrow,

than the man who serves a king.

For those who serve the greater cause

may make the cause serve them, still doing right.

And striving with political men may make that cause political,

not by what they do, but by what they are.

I know that what remains to show you of my history

will seem to most of you, at best, futility.

Senseless self-slaughter of a lunatic,

arrogant passion of a fanatic.

I know that history at all times

draws the strangest consequence from remotest cause.

But for every evil, every sacrilege,

crime, wrong, oppression,

and the axe's edge,

indifference, exploitation,

you, and you, and you, must all be punished.

So must you.

I shall no longer act or suffer to the sword's end.

Now my good angel, whom God appoints to be my guardian.

Hover over the swords' points.

"Glory to God in the highest,

"and on earth, peace to men of good will."

The 14th verse, of the second chapter of the Gospel according to Saint Luke.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son,

and of the Holy Ghost.

Amen.

Dear children of God,

my sermon this Christmas morning will be a very short one.

I wish only that you should meditate in your hearts

the deep meaning and mystery of our masses of Christmas Day.

For whenever mass is said,

we re-enact the passion and the death of our Lord.

And on this Christmas Day, we do this in celebration of his birth.

So that at the same moment

we rejoice in his coming for the salvation of men,

and offer again to God his body and blood

in sacrifice, oblation and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world.

It was in this same night that has just passed

that a multitude of the heavenly host

appeared before the shepherds at Bethlehem, saying,

"Glory to God in the highest,

"and on earth, peace to men of good will."

At this same time of all the year

that we celebrate at once the birth of our Lord,

and his passion and death upon the cross.

Beloved, as the world sees, this is to behave in a strange fashion.

For who in the world will both mourn and rejoice at once,

and for the same reason?

For either joy will be overborne by mourning,

or mourning will be cast out by joy.

So it is only in these, our Christian mysteries,

that we can rejoice and mourn at once, for the same reason.

Now think for a moment about the meaning of this word "peace."

Does it seem strange to you

that the angels should have announced peace

when ceaselessly the world has been stricken with war and the fear of war?

Does it seem to you that the angelic voices were mistaken,

and that the promise was a disappointment and a cheat?

Reflect now how our Lord Himself spoke of peace.

He said to his disciples,

"My peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you."

Did he mean peace as we think of it?

The kingdom of England at peace with its neighbours,

the barons at peace with the King,

the householder counting over his peaceful gains,

the swept hearth, his best wine for a friend at the table,

his wife singing to the children?

Those men, his disciples knew no such things.

They went forth to journey afar, to suffer by land and sea,

to know torture, imprisonment, disappointment,

to suffer death by martyrdom.

What then did he mean?

If you ask that, remember then that he said also,

"Not as the world gives, give I unto you."

So then, he gave to his disciples peace,

but not peace as the world gives.

Consider also one thing, of which you have probably never thought.

Not only do we at the feast of Christmas celebrate at once

our Lord's birth and his death,

but on the next day, we celebrate the martyrdom

of his first martyr, the blessed Stephen.

Is it an accident, do you think, that the day of the first martyr

follows immediately the day of the birth of Christ?

By no means.

Just as we rejoice and mourn at once,

in the birth and in the passion of our Lord,

so also, in a smaller figure,

we both rejoice and mourn in the death of martyrs.

We mourn for the sins of the world that has martyred them.

We rejoice that another soul is numbered among the saints in heaven,

for the glory of God and for the salvation of men.

Beloved, we do not think of a martyr simply as a good Christian

who has been killed because he is a Christian.

For that would be solely to mourn.

We do not think of him simply as a good Christian

who has been elevated to the company of the saints.

For that would be simply to rejoice.

And neither our mourning nor our rejoicing is as the world's is.

A Christian martyrdom is never an accident.

Saints are not made by accident.

Still less is a Christian martyrdom

the effect of a man's will to become a saint,

as a man by willing and contriving may become a ruler of men.

Ambition fortifies the will of man to become a ruler over other men.

It operates with deception, cajolery, and violence.

It is the action of impurity upon impurity.

Not so in heaven.

A martyr, a saint,

is always made by the design of God

for his love of men, to warn them and to lead them,

to bring them back to his ways.

A martyrdom is never the design of man.

For the true martyr,

is he who has become the instrument of God,

who has lost his will in the will of God,

not lost it, but found it.

For he has found freedom in submission to God.

The martyr no longer desires anything for himself,

not even the glory of martyrdom.

So thus as on earth, the church mourns and rejoices at once,

in a fashion that the world cannot understand.

So in heaven the saints are most high,

having made themselves most low,

and are seen not as we see them,

but in the light of the Godhead from which they draw their being.

I have spoken to you today, dear children of God,

of the martyrs of the past,

asking you to remember especially

our martyr of Canterbury, the blessed Archbishop Elphege.

Because it is fitting, on Christ's birthday,

to remember what is that peace, which he brought.

And because, dear children,

I do not think I shall ever preach to you again.

And because it is possible

that in a short time you may have yet another martyr,

and that one perhaps not the last.

I would have you keep in your hearts these words that I say,

and think of them at another time.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son,

and of the Holy Ghost.

Amen.

Does the bird sing in the south?

Only the seabird cries, driven inland by the storm.

What sign of the spring of the year?

Only the death of the old.

Not a stir, not a shoot, not a breath.

Do the days begin to lengthen?

Longer and darker the day, shorter and colder the night.

Still and stifling the air, but a wind is stored up in the east.

The starved crow sits in the field, attentive,

and in the wood, the owl rehearses the hollow note of death.

What signs of a bitter spring?

The wind stored up in the east.

What? At the time of the birth of our Lord?

At Christmastide?

Is there not peace upon earth, goodwill among men?

The peace of this world is always uncertain,

unless men keep the peace of God.

And war among men defiles this world, but death in the Lord renews it.

And the world must be cleaned in the winter,

or we shall have only a sour spring,

a parched summer, an empty harvest.

Between Christmas and Easter, what work shall be done?

The ploughman shall go out in March

and turn the same earth he has turned before.

The bird shall sing the same song.

When the leaf is out on the tree,

when the elder and may burst over the stream,

and the air is clear and high,

and voices trill at windows,

and children tumble in front of the door.

What work shall have been done,

what wrong shall the bird's song cover,

the green tree cover?

What wrong shall the fresh earth cover?

We wait, and the time is short.

But waiting is long.

Since Christmas, a day.

And the day of Saint Stephen, first martyr.

Princes moreover did sit, and did witness falsely against me.

A day that was always most dear to the Archbishop Thomas.

And he kneeled down and cried with a loud voice,

"Lord, lay not this sin to their charge."

Princes moreover did sit.

Since Saint Stephen, a day.

And the day of Saint John the Apostle.

In the midst of the congregation, he opened his mouth.

That which was from the beginning,

which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes,

and our hands have handled of the word of life,

that which we have seen and heard, declare we unto you.

In the midst of the congregation.

Since St John the Apostle, a day.

And the day of the Holy Innocents.

Out of the mouth of very babes, O God.

As the voice of many waters, of thunder, of harps,

they sung as it were a new song.

The blood of thy saints have they shed like water,

and there was no man to bury them.

Avenge, O Lord, the blood of thy saints.

In Rama, a voice heard, weeping.

Out of the mouth of very babes, O God.

Since the Holy Innocents, a day,

the fourth day from Christmas.

Rejoice we all, keeping holy day.

As for the people, so also for himself,

he offereth for sins, he lays down his life for the sheep.

Rejoice we all, keeping holy day.

Today?

Today? What is today? For the day is half gone.

Today? What is today?

But another day, the dusk of the year.

Today?

What is today?

Another night, and another dawn.

What day is the day that we know that we hope for or fear for?

Every day is the day we should fear from or hope from.

One moment weighs like another.

Only in retrospection, selection, we say, that was the day.

The critical moment that is always now, and here.

Even now, in sordid particulars, the eternal design may appear.

Servants of the King.

And known to us. You are welcome.

Have you ridden far?

Not far today, but matters urgent have brought us from France.

We rode hard, took ship yesterday, landed last night,

having business with the Archbishop.

- Urgent business. - From the King.

By the King's order.

Our men are outside.

You know the Archbishop's hospitality.

We are about to go to dinner.

The good Archbishop would be vexed

if we did not offer you entertainment before your business.

Please dine with us.

Your men shall be looked after, also.

Dinner before business.

Do you like roast pork?

Business before dinner.

We will roast your pork first, and dine upon it after.

We must see the Archbishop.

Go tell the Archbishop we have no need of his hospitality.

We will find our own dinner.

Go tell His Lordship.

How much longer will you keep us waiting?

However certain our expectation,

the moment foreseen may be unexpected when it arrives.

It comes when we are engrossed with matters of other urgency.

On my table, you will find the papers in order and the documents signed.

You are welcome, whatever your business may be.

You say, from the King.

Most surely from the King, we must speak with you alone.

Leave us then alone.

Now, what is the matter?

This is the matter.

You are the Archbishop...

In revolt against the King.

In rebellion to the King and the law of the land.

You are the Archbishop who was made by the King.

Whom he set in your place to carry out his command.

You are his servant, his tool and his jack.

You wore his favours on your back.

You had your honours all from his hand.

From him you had the power, the seal, and the ring.

This is the man who was the tradesman's son.

The backstairs brat who was born in Cheapside.

This is the creature that crawled upon the King.

Swollen with blood and swollen with pride.

Creeping out of the London dirt, crawling up like a louse on your shirt.

The man who cheated, swindled, lied.

Broke his oath and betrayed his King.

This is not true.

Both before and after I received the ring

I have been a loyal vassal to the King.

Saving my order,

I am at his command, as his most faithful vassal in the land.

Saving your order?

Let your order save you, as I do not think it is like to do.

Saving your ambition is what you mean.

Saving your pride, envy and spleen.

Saving your insolence and greed.

Won't you ask us to pray to God for you in your need?

Yes, we'll pray for you.

Yes, we'll pray for you.

Yes, we'll pray that God may help you.

But gentlemen, your business which you said so urgent,

is it only scolding and blaspheming?

It was only our indignation as loyal subjects.

Loyal? To whom?

To the King.

- The King. - The King.

God bless him.

Then let your new coat of loyalty be worn carefully.

So it get not soiled or torn.

Have you something to say?

By the King's command...

Shall we say it now?

Without delay, before the old fox is off and away.

What you have to say by the King's command,

if it be the King's command, should be said in public.

If you make charges, then in public I will refute them.

No, here and now!

Now and here!

Of your earlier misdeeds, I shall make no mention.

They are too well known.

But after dissension had ended, in France,

and you were endued with your former privilege,

how did you show your gratitude?

You had fled from England, not exiled or threatened, mind you,

but in the hope of stirring up trouble in the French dominions.

You sowed strife abroad,

you reviled the King to the King of France,

to the Pope, raising up against him false opinions.

Yet the King, out of his charity,

and urged by your friends, offered clemency.

Made a pact of peace and all dispute ended

sent you back to your See as you demanded.

And burying the memory of your transgressions,

restored your honours and your possessions.

All was granted for which you sued.

Yet how, I repeat, did you show your gratitude?

Suspending those who had crowned the young prince,

denying the legality of his coronation.

Binding with the chains of anathema.

Using every means in your power to evince the King's faithful servants,

everyone who transacts his business in his absence,

the business of the nation.

These are the facts.

Say, therefore, if you will be content to answer in the King's presence.

Therefore were we sent.

Never was it my wish to uncrown the King's son,

or to diminish his honour and power.

Why should he wish to deprive my people of me,

and keep me from my own?

And bid me sit in Canterbury, alone?

I would wish him three crowns, rather than one.

And as for the bishops,

it is not my yoke that is laid upon them,

or mine to revoke.

Let them go to the Pope. It was he who condemned them.

Through you they were suspended.

By you be this amended.

Absolve them.

Absolve them.

I do not deny that this was done through me.

But it is not I, who can loose whom the Pope has bound.

Let them go to him,

upon whom redounds their contempt towards me,

their contempt towards the Church, shown.

Be that as it may, here is the King's command.

That you and your servants depart from this land.

If that is the King's command, I will be bold to say,

seven years were my people without my presence.

Seven years of misery and pain.

Seven years a mendicant on foreign charity, I lingered abroad.

Seven years is no brevity.

I shall not get those seven years back again.

Never again, you must make no doubt,

shall the sea run between the shepherd and his fold.

The King's justice, the King's majesty, you insult with gross indignity.

Insolent madman, whom nothing deters

from attaining his servants and ministers.

It is not I who insult the King.

And there is higher than I or the King.

It is not I, Becket from Cheapside.

It is not against me, Becket, that you strive.

It is not Becket who pronounces doom,

but the law of Christ's church, the judgement of Rome.

Priest, you have spoken in peril of your life.

Priest, you have spoken in danger of the knife.

Priest, you have spoken treachery and treason.

Priest, traitor, confirmed in malfeasance.

I submit my cause to the judgement of Rome.

But if you kill me,

I shall rise from my tomb to submit my cause before God's throne.

Priest, monk and servant, take, hold, detain.

Restrain this man, in the King's name.

- Or answer with your bodies. - Enough of words!

We come for King's justice, we come with swords.

I have smelt them, the death-bringers.

Senses are quickened by subtile forebodings.

I have heard fluting in the night time, fluting and owls,

have seen at noon scaly wings slanting over,

huge and ridiculous.

I have tasted the savour of putrid flesh in the spoon.

I have felt the heaving of earth at nightfall, restless, absurd.

I have heard laughter in the noises of beasts that make strange noises.

Jackal, jackass, jackdaw,

the scurrying noise of the mouse and jerboa,

the laugh of the loon, the lunatic bird.

I have seen grey necks twisting,

rat tails twining, in the thick light of dawn.

I have eaten smooth creatures still living,

with a strong salt taste of living things under sea.

I have tasted the living lobster,

the crab, the oyster, the whelk and the prawn,

and they live and spawn in my bowels.

And my bowels dissolve in the light of dawn.

I have smelt death in the rose,

death in the hollyhock, sweet pea, hyacinth, primrose and cowslip.

I have seen trunk and horn, tusk and hoof, in odd places.

I have lain on the floor of the sea,

and breathed with the breathing of the sea-anemone,

swallowed with ingurgitation of the sponge.

I have lain in the soil and criticised the worm.

In the air flirted with the passage of a kite,

I have plunged with the kite and cowered with the wren.

I have felt the horn of the beetle,

the scale of the viper,

the mobile, hard, insensitive skin of the elephant,

the evasive flank of the fish.

I have smelt corruption in the dish,

incense in the latrine, the sewer in the incense,

the smell of sweet soap in the wood path,

a hellish sweet scent in the wood path,

while the ground heaved.

I have seen rings of light coiling downwards,

descending to the horror of the ape.

Have I not known, not known what was coming to be?

It was here, in the kitchen, in the passage,

in the mews, in the barn, in the byre, in the market place.

In our veins, our bowels, our skulls as well.

As well as in the plottings of potentates.

As well as in the consultations of powers.

What is woven on the loom of fate,

what is woven in the councils of princes,

is woven also in our veins, our brains,

is woven like a pattern of living worms in the guts of the women of Canterbury.

I have smelt them, the death-bringers.

Now is too late for action, too soon for contrition.

Nothing is possible, but the shamed swoon

of those consenting to the last humiliation.

I have consented, Lord Archbishop, have consented.

Am torn away, subdued, violated.

United to the spiritual flesh of nature, mastered by the animal powers of spirit,

dominated by the lust of self-demolition.

By the final utter, uttermost death of spirit,

by the final ecstasy of waste and shame.

O Lord Archbishop.

O Thomas Archbishop, forgive us.

Forgive us.

Pray for us that we may pray for you, out of our shame.

Peace and be at peace with your thoughts and visions.

These things had to come to you and you to accept them.

This is your share of the eternal burden,

the perpetual glory.

This is one moment,

but know that another shall pierce you with a sudden painful joy

when the figure of God's purpose is made complete.

You shall forget these things, toiling in the household.

You shall remember them, droning by the fire,

when age and forgetfulness sweeten memory,

only like a dream that is often been told,

and often been changed in the telling.

They will seem unreal.

Human kind cannot bear very much reality.

Peace be with you.

My Lord, you must not stop here!

To the minster, through the cloister.

No time to waste, they're coming back armed.

To the altar, to the altar.

All my life they have been coming, these feet.

All my life I have waited.

Death will come only when I am worthy. And if I am worthy, there is no danger.

I have therefore, only to make perfect my will.

My Lord, they are coming, they will break through presently.

You'll be killed, come to the altar.

Make haste, My Lord!

Don't stop here talking, it is not right.

What shall become of us, My Lord, if you are killed?

- What shall become of us? - Peace, be quiet.

Remember where you are and what is happening.

No life here is sought for, but mine.

And I am not in danger.

- Only near to death. - My Lord, to vespers!

You must not be absent from vespers.

You must not be absent from the divine office.

- To vespers, into the cathedral. - Seize him!

- Force him! Drag him! - To vespers!

Keep your hands off.

Numb the hand and dry the eyelid.

Still the horror,

but more horror than when tearing in the belly.

Still the horror,

but more horror than when twisting in the fingers,

than when splitting in the skull.

More than footfall in the passage, more than shadow in the doorway,

more than fury in the hall.

The agents of hell disappear,

the human, they shrink and dissolve into dust on the wind.

Forgotten. Unmemorable.

Only is here the white flat face of death.

God's silent servant.

And behind the face of death, the judgement.

And behind the judgement, the void.

More horrid than active shapes of hell.

Emptiness.

Absence.

Separation from God.

The horror of the effortless journey to the empty land, which is no land.

Only emptiness, absence, the void.

Where those who were men

can no longer turn the mind to distraction,

delusion, escape into dream, pretence.

Where the soul is no longer deceived for there are no objects, no tones,

no colours, no forms to distract, to divert the soul from seeing itself,

foully united forever, nothing with nothing,

not what we call death,

but what beyond death is not death.

We fear.

We fear.

Who shall then plead for me?

Who intercede for me, in my most need?

Dead upon the tree, my saviour.

Let not be in vain, thy labour.

Help me, Lord, in my last fear.

Dust I am, to dust am bending.

From the final doom impending.

Help me, Lord, for death is near.

Bar the door, bar the door.

The door is barred.

We are safe, we are safe.

They dare not break in. They cannot break in.

They have not the force.

We are safe. We are safe.

Unbar the doors.

Throw open the doors.

I will not have the house of prayer, the church of Christ, the sanctuary,

turned into a fortress.

The Church shall protect her own, in her own way.

Not as oak and stone. Stone and oak decay, give no stay.

But the church shall endure.

The church shall be open, even to our enemies.

Open the door!

My Lord, these are not men.

These come not as men come, but like maddened beasts.

They come not like men, who respect the sanctuary,

who kneel to the body of Christ, but like beasts!

You would bar the door against the lion, the leopard, the wolf, the bear.

Why not more against beasts with the souls of damned men,

against men who would damn themselves to beasts.

My Lord! My Lord!

You think me reckless, desperate and mad.

You argue by results, as this world does,

to settle if an act be good or bad.

You defer to the fact.

For every life and every act,

consequence of good and evil can be shown.

And as in time results of many deeds are blended,

so good and evil in the end become confounded.

It is not in time that my death shall be known.

It is out of time that my decision is taken.

If you call that decision, to which my whole being gives entire consent.

I give my life to the Law of God, above the Law of Man.

Those who do not the same, how should they know what I do?

How should you know what I do?

Yet how much more should you know, than these madmen beating on the door.

Unbar the door.

Unbar the door.

We are not here to triumph by fighting, by stratagem, or by resistance.

Not to fight with beasts as men.

We have fought the beast and have conquered.

We have only now to conquer by suffering.

This is the easier victory.

Now is the triumph of the Cross.

Now, open the door.

I command it. Open the door.

- This way, My Lord, quick! - Up the stairs. To the roof.

- To the crypt, quick, quick. - Come. Force him.

Go to vespers, remember me at your prayers.

They shall find the shepherd here, the flock shall be spared.

I have had a tremor of bliss, a wink of heaven, a whisper.

And I would no longer be denied.

All things proceed to a joyful consummation.

Where is Becket, the traitor to the King?

Where is Becket, the meddling priest?

Come down, Daniel, to the lions' den.

Come down, Daniel, for a mark of the beast.

Are you washed in the blood of the lamb?

Are you marked with the mark of the beast?

Come down, Daniel, to the lions' den.

Come down, Daniel, and join in the feast.

Where is Becket, the Cheapside brat?

Where is Becket, the faithless priest?

Come down, Daniel, to the lions' den.

Come down, Daniel, and join in the feast.

It is the just man

who like a bold lion, should be without fear.

I am here.

No traitor to the King.

I am a priest, a Christian, saved by the blood of Christ,

ready to suffer with my blood.

This is the sign of the church always.

The sign of blood.

Blood for blood.

His blood given to buy my life.

My blood given to pay for his death.

My death for his death.

Absolve all those you have excommunicated.

Resign the powers you have arrogated.

Restore to the King, the money you appropriated.

Renew the obedience you have violated.

For My Lord, I am now ready to die.

That his Church may have peace and liberty.

Do with me as you will, to your hurt and shame.

But none of my people in God's name, whether layman or clerk shall you touch!

This I forbid.

Traitor!

Traitor!

Traitor!

You Reginald, three times traitor, you!

Traitor to me, as my temporal vassal.

Traitor to me, as your spiritual lord.

Traitor to God, in desecrating his Church.

No faith do I owe to a renegade.

And what I owe shall now be paid.

Now to Almighty God, to the blessed Mary ever Virgin,

to the blessed John the Baptist, the holy apostles, Peter and Paul,

to the blessed martyr, Denys, and to all the saints,

I commend my cause and that of the church.

Clear the air. Clean the sky.

Wash the wind.

Take stone from stone and wash them.

The land is foul, the water is foul,

our beasts and ourselves defiled with blood.

A rain of blood has blinded my eyes.

Where is England? Where is Kent? Where is Canterbury?

Oh, far, far, far, far in the past.

And I wander in a land of barren boughs. If I break them, they bleed.

I wander in the land of dry stones. If I touch them, they bleed.

How? How can I ever return to the soft, quiet seasons?

Night stay with us.

Stop sun.

Hold season.

Let the day not come.

Let the spring not come.

Can I look again at the day and its common things,

and see them all smeared with blood, through a curtain of falling blood?

We did not wish anything to happen. We understood the private catastrophe.

The personal loss, the general misery,

living and partly living.

The terror by night that ends in daily action.

The terror by day that ends in sleep.

But the talk in the marketplace, the hand on the broom,

the night-time heaping of the ashes, the fuel laid on the fire at daybreak,

these acts marked a limit to our suffering.

Every horror had its definition.

Every sorrow had a kind of end.

In life, there is not time to grieve long.

But this, this is out of life!

This is out of time, an instant eternity of evil and wrong.

We are soiled by a filth that we cannot clean,

united to supernatural vermin.

It is not we alone, it is not the house,

it is not the city that is defiled, but the world that is wholly foul.

Clear the air, clean the sky, wash the wind,

take the stone from the stone,

take the skin from the arm, take the muscle from the bone,

and wash them.

Wash the stone. Wash the bone.

Wash the brain. Wash the soul.

Wash them.

Wash them.

I appeal to your sense of justice.

I think as well, you must hear both sides of the case.

In what we have done, whatever you may think of it,

we have been perfectly disinterested.

We're not getting anything out of this.

We know perfectly well how things will turn out.

King Henry, God bless him,

will have to say, for reasons of state,

that he never meant this to happen.

And at the best, we shall have to spend the rest of our lives abroad.

Hear, hear!

You are sensible people,

and not to be taken in by emotional clap-trap.

Consider soberly, what were the Archbishop's aims,

and what are King Henry's aims.

Our King wanted to curb the local government.

Because there was utter chaos!

Three kinds of justice. Three kinds of cause.

That of the King, that of the bishops, that of the barons.

While the late Archbishop was Chancellor,

he supported the King's designs.

The King intended that he should unite the offices

of Chancellor and Archbishop.

Had Becket followed the King's wishes, we should've had an almost ideal state.

A union of spiritual and temporal administration,

under the central government.

But what happened?

Becket became more priestly than the priests.

He affirmed, there was a higher order

than that, which our King, and he as the King's servant

had for so many years striven to establish.

And that, God knows why, the two orders were incompatible.

No one regrets the necessity for violence more than we do.

Unhappily, there are times, when violence is the only way,

in which social justice can be secured.

At another time,

you would condemn an Archbishop by vote of Parliament.

And execute him formally, as a traitor.

At a later time still,

even such measures as these, would become unnecessary.

If you have now arrived at a just subordination

of the pretensions of the Church to the welfare of the state,

remember, that it is we, who took the first step.

You accept our principles. You benefit by our precedent.

You enjoy the fruits of our action.

Yet we have been dead for nearly 800 years,

and you still call us murderers.

In a moment,

you will see the Archbishop laid before the altar,

and acclaimed as a martyr!

Then ask yourselves,

who is more representative of the thing you are?

The man you call a martyr, or the men you call his murderers?

We praise thee, O God,

for thy glory displayed in all the creatures of the earth,

in the snow, in the rain, in the wind, in the storm.

In all of thy creatures, both the hunters and the hunted.

For all things exist,

only as seen by thee, only as known by thee.

All things exist only in thy light.

And thy glory is declared, even in that which denies thee.

The darkness declares the glory of light.

Those who deny thee, could not deny if thou didst not exist.

And their denial is never complete, for it were so, they would not exist.

They affirm thee in living. All things affirm thee in living.

The bird in the air, both the hawk and the finch,

the beast on the earth, both the wolf and the lamb,

the worm in the soil, and the worm in the belly.

Therefore, man, whom thou has made to be conscious of thee,

must consciously praise thee, in thought, and in word and in deed.

Even with the hand to the broom, the back bent in laying the fire,

the knee bent in cleaning the hearth,

we, the scrubbers and sweepers of Canterbury,

the back bent under toil, the knee bent under sin,

the hands to the face under fear, the head bent under grief.

Even in us the voices of seasons,

the snuffle of winter, the song of spring,

the drone of summer, the voices of beasts and of birds.

Praise thee.

We thank thee for thy mercies of blood,

for thy redemption by blood.

For the blood of thy martyrs and saints shall enrich the earth,

shall create the holy places.

For wherever a saint has dwelt,

wherever a martyr has given his blood for the blood of Christ,

there is holy ground.

And the sanctity shall not depart from it

though armies trample over it,

though sightseers come with guidebooks looking over it.

From where the western seas gnaw at the coast of Iona,

to the death in the desert,

the prayer in forgotten places by the broken imperial column.

From such ground, springs that which forever renews the earth.

Though it is forever denied.

Therefore, O God, we thank thee,

who hast given such blessing, to Canterbury.

Forgive us, O Lord,

we acknowledge ourselves as types of the common man,

of the men and women who shut the door and sit by the fire,

who fear the blessing of God, the loneliness of the night of God,

the surrender required, the deprivation inflicted,

who fear the injustice of men, less than the justice of God,

who fear the hand at the window,

the fire in the thatch, the fist in the tavern,

the push into the canal,

less than we fear the love of God.

We acknowledge our trespass, our weakness, our fault.

We acknowledge that the sin of the world is upon our heads,

that the blood of the martyrs, and the agony of the saints,

is upon our heads.

Lord, have mercy upon us.

Christ, have mercy upon us.

Lord, have mercy upon us.

Blessed, Thomas, pray for us.