But Henry’s mind was made up. Residing largely in France, he would have Thomas, Archbishop of Canterbury and Chancellor, to rule England as his vice-regent. Six years had Thomas been the king’s friend and chancellor, but the king did not know at all the real character of his man, or rather it was inconceivable to the royal mind that Thomas, whom the king had raised from a mere nobody, from Archdeacon of Canterbury, an important ecclesiastic at best, to the chief man in the realm, should ever dare set himself at variance with the king’s will. Henry, with his untiring energy, was earnest enough for good government in Church and State under an absolute monarchy, and he counted on greater co-operation with Thomas in carrying out his plans, were the latter archbishop. Hitherto, more than once the chancellor had succeeded in moderating the king’s outbursts of wrath against some hapless offender, but he had never shown himself a partisan of the clergy at the expense of the commonwealth,[11] and his lack of pride in his order had even incurred rebuke, so little of the ecclesiastic did this statesman appear. Thomas understood the king better than the king understood his chancellor. But his protests were in vain. He was as surely marked for the archbishopric as Anselm had been. Bishops of the province approved and the monks of Canterbury duly voted for the king’s chancellor in common consent, Gilbert Foliot, the Bishop of Hereford, and afterwards of London, and the archbishop’s enemy to the end, alone opposing the election. “Then the archbishop-elect was by the king’s authority declared free of all debts to the crown and given free to the Church of England, and in that freedom he was received by the Church with the customary hymns and words of praise.” (Herbert of Bosham.) On June 2nd, 1162, the Saturday after Whit Sunday, Thomas was ordained priest and on the following day consecrated bishop. (The new archbishop instituted the festival of Trinity Sunday to commemorate his consecration, and some 200 years later the festival was made of general observance in the Catholic Church.) The king realised the mistake he had made within a year of the consecration. The brilliant chancellor was no sooner archbishop than he turned from all the gaieties of the world, and while no less a statesman, adopted the life of his monks--though never himself a monk--at Canterbury. Henceforth Archbishop Thomas was the unflinching champion of the poor and them that had no helper, the resolute defender of the liberties of the Church against all who would make religion subject to the autocracy of the king of England. Thomas was forty-four years old, in the full strength of his manhood, when he was made archbishop, and for eight years he did battle with the crown, only laying down his charge at the call of martyrdom.