Note (return) — Chapter I

That this service excited much disgust among the early reformers, we learn from various writers85. On the merits of the struggle between Becket and his king; on the question of Becket's moral and religious worth, (a question long and often discussed among the exercises of the masters of Paris in the full assembly of the Sorbonne86,) or on the motives which influenced Henry the Eighth, I intend not to say one word: those points belong not to our present inquiry. It may not, however, be thought irrelevant here to quote a passage from the ordinance of this latter monarch for erasing Becket's service out of the books, and his name from the calendar of the saints.