"Let us be off," he cried triumphantly, "this traitor will never rise again." [Sidenote: The Church and Literature] The brutal murder was received with a thrill of horror throughout Christendom; miracles were wrought at the martyr's tomb; he was canonized, and became the most popular of English saints.

The stately "martyrdom" which rose over his relics at Canterbury seemed to embody the triumph which his blood had won.

But the contest had in fact revealed a new current of educated opinion which was to be more fatal to the Church than the reforms of the king.

Throughout it Henry had been aided by a silent revolution which now began to part the purely literary class from the purely clerical.

During the earlier ages of our history we have seen literature springing up in ecclesiastical schools, and protecting itself against the ignorance and violence of the time under ecclesiastical privileges.