Third Lesson.

The king therefore hearing of his immoveable constancy, having directed commendatory letters by some abbots of the Cistertian order to the General Chapter, caused him to be driven from Pontinea.  But the blessed Thomas fearing that, by occasion of his right, injury would befal the saints, retired of his own accord.  Yet before he set out from thence he was comforted by a divine revelation:  a declaration being made to him from heaven, that he should return to his Church with glory, and by the palm of martyrdom depart to the Lord.  When he was disturbed and sent from his retreat at Pontinea, Louis, the most Christian king of the French, received him with the greatest honour, and supported him most courteously till peace was restored.  But even he too was often, though in vain, urged not to show any grace of kindness towards a traitor to the king of England.  The hand of fury proceeded further, and a cruelty dreadful for pious ears to hear.  For whereas the Catholic Church prays even for heretics, and schismatics, and faithless Jews, it was forbidden that any one should assist him by the supplications of prayer.  Exiled, then, for six continuous years, afflicted with varied and unnumbered injuries, and like a living stone squared by various cuttings and pressures for the building of the heavenly edifice, the more he was thrust at that he might fall, the more firm and immoveable was he enabled to stand. {207} For neither could gold so carefully tried be burned away, nor a house, founded on a firm rock, be torn down.  Neither does he suffer the wolves to rage against the lambs, nor the vineyard to pass into a garden of herbs.

  The best of men, holy, and renowned is banished,
  Lest the dignity of the Church should yield to the unworthy. 
  The estates of the exiled man are the spoil of the malignant,
  But when placed in the fire, the fire burns him not.

Fourth Lesson.

At length by the exertions, as well of the aforesaid pontiff as of the king of the French, many days were appointed for re-establishing peace:  and because the servant of God would not accept of peace, unless with safety to the honour of God, and the character of the Church, they departed in discord from each other.  At length the supreme Pontiff, pitying the desolation of the Anglican Church, with difficulty at the last extorted by threatening measures, that peace should be restored to the Church.  The realms indeed rejoiced, that the King had been reconciled to the Archbishop, whilst some believed that the affair was carried on in good faith, and others formed different conjectures.  Consequently in the seventh year of his exile the noble pastor returned into England, that he might either rescue the sheep of Christ from the jaws of the wolves, or sacrifice himself for the flock intrusted to his care.  He is received by the clergy and the people with incalculable joy; all shedding tears, and saying, Blessed is he who cometh