My reasons why I give the preference to Fitz-Stephens are, 1.

If the friendship of Fitz-Stephens might render him partial to Becket even after the death of that prelate, the declared enmity of the bishop must, during his lifetime, have rendered him more partial on the other side.2.The bishop was moved by interest, as well as enmity, to calumniate Becket.

He had himself to defend against the sentence of excommunication, dreadful to all, especially to a prelate; and no more effectual means than to throw all the blame on his adversary.3.He has actually been guilty of palpable calumnies in that letter.

Among these, I reckon the following.

He affirms that when Becket subscribed the Constitutions of Clarendon, he said plainly to all the bishops of England, "It is my master's pleasure, that I should forswear myself, and at present I submit to it, and do resolve to incur a perjury, and repent afterwards as I may." However barbarous the times, and however negligent zealous churchmen were then of morality, these are not words which a primate of great sense and of much seeming sanctity would employ in an assembly of his suffragans: he might act upon these principles, but never surely would publicly avow them.