were too dissatisfied with the prospect, for him to with Madam Elizabeth. She has told Pole, that there is now no one in her council in whom she has perfect confidence but himself.' p. 205. Pole continued to be her prime minister. pp. 256, 275, 282, 288, 311. Caricature prints were also circulated, of a withered and wrinkled queen, with Spaniards at her breasts; to intimate that they had reduced her to skin and bone, with legends representing the rings, jewels and money she had privately given to Philip. She was greatly incensed at this, and ascribed it to some of her own council, who only could have known of the secret presents. Carte 3, p. 331. 87 Philip's preference for others had first disquieted her, Noailles, 172; but his continuance in Flanders without returning to her as he had promised, increased her vexation, p. 172. His protracted absence put her into a great 'fureur.' p. 188. On 30th December 1555, the prothonotary Noailles wrote to a lady, that the prince perceived such a tres mauvaise pensée to be nourishing against him, that he had within the last four months dexterously drawn out of their hands and got away, piece by piece, all which remained there of his, as well men as goods; so only his confessor was left with his wife, tho she had tried all she could to detain some of his train. She had spared neither tears nor piteous remonstrances, nor all the sad plaints which could issue from the heart of a woman tormented with extreme passion.' p. 266. 88 se Michele's report, in 1557, to the doge of Venice, particularized this circumstance: It is believed that but for this interference of the king, the queen would, without remorse, chastise her in the severest manner. He also remarks of Mary, The evil disposition of the people towards her; and she is a prey to the hatred she bears my lady Elizabeth.' Ellis Lett. second ser. v. 2. p. 237. Foxe gives us a repeated assurance, which I consider to be the full belief of the time, that Gardiner was always laboring for her destruction, and that it was his death which preserved her. p. 1622; 1900. Philip paid her such respect, that once meeting her, he made her such obeisance that his knee touched the ground. p. 1901. The Spaniards favored her, and entreated their king to deliver her from her imprisonment; which he soon afterwards did. p. 1899. Elizabeth herself afterwards acknowleged that she had owed her life to his interference. The certainty that her death would have placed Mary of Scotland, then married to the heir apparent of France, his great political enemy, on the throne of England, may have been Philip's chief inducement to this unusual act of liberal humanity. CHAP. XVI. II. BOOK during all this reign, than this 'Sorella,' this princely sister, to whom the expressive intimation of the Vatican had so early and so emphatically directed “ the attention of the queen, whom it governed, flattered, and misled. 90 The departure of Philip left Mary without any friend in whom she could fully confide, except cardinal Pole, the instigator and partaker of her sanguinary cruelties; and the pope's blow of unexplained but implacable vengeance at him, made him as miserable as the sovereign, whose better mind he had so greatly assisted to miscounsel and deprave. Mary pined into premature decay; which the loss of Calais hastened She said that if she died, the dissection of her heart would show that Calais was the cause. We may refer its withering effect in part to her unquestionable patriotism; but it is probable that the more fatal poison was the certainty it gave her that even her bosom friends were deserting her. The governor of Calais was always one of the most trusted and faithful servants of the English crown and that lord Wentworth should give up such a fortress, which had defied all the power and efforts of France for two centuries, after a siege of a few days, was such a revelation of the secret defection of those on whom she most relied, that her spirits could never recover the mortifying discovery. She had forfeited the affections of her kingdom, and 9 See before, Chap. XIII. note 27. 90 One of her last attendants told Foxe, that on their remarking to Mary that they feared she took thought for king Philip departing from her, the queen answered, Not that only; but when I am dead, and opened, you shall find Calais lying in my heart.' Foxe, 1901. XVI. plunged into the worst of crimes, the destruction of CHAP. some of the best of her fellow-creatures for unoffendingly retaining their religious and natural right of private conscience, in order to please and aggrandise a popedom, that was now both insulting her, and degrading the counsellor by whose exertions and contrivance the unpopular revolution had been violently effected. As personal misery was thus pursuing both the queen and the cardinal, the illnesses of each increased; and when Pole drew near to that new scene of existence, in which he would have to account for his conduct before a tribunal, at which no political machinations of religion are of any estimation or avail, some unexplained but important feelings or mutations arose in his mind; for on his death bed, and when his expressions imply that he thought he was so, he sent his chaplain to Elizabeth, with some secret communication, which he desired her to believe, and which would make all persons, and her more especially, satisfied of him." What 91 All that we know of this circumstance, is from Pole's letter in the British Museum, MS. Vesp. F. 3; from which Collier printed it; it is dated three days only before the queen's death. It may please your grace to understand, that albeit the long continuance and vehemence of my sickness be such as justly might move, casting away all cares of this world, to think only of that to come; yet, not being convenient for me to determine of life or death, which is only in the hand of God, I thought it my duty before I should depart, so nigh as I could, to leave all persons satisfied of me, and especially your grace, being of that honor and dignity that the providence of God hath called you unto. For which purpose I send to you at this present my faithful chaplain the dean of Worcester; to whom, may it please your grace to give credit, in that he shall say unto you in my behalf. I doubt not but that your grace shall remain satisfied thereby; whom God Almighty long prosper to his honor, your comfort, and the wealth of the realm. Lambeth, 14 Nov. 1558. Collier's Records, p. 83. This letter obviously alludes to some important communication. BOOK II. was thus imparted, has not been disclosed. Soon afterwards, death claimed his victims, and intercepted all further repentance. The queen died 17 November 1558, and the cardinal on the following day. Two events, which gave England a freedom, and a felicity in mind and conscience, of which she has never since been deprived. CHAP. XVII. ACCESSION OF ELIZABETH-HER PREVIOUS POPULARITY— HER DANGERS, AND CAUTIOUS MEASURES-PEACE WITH THE successive deaths of Gardiner, Mary, and Pole, terminated for ever the sanguinary dominion of Rome over the English nation; the tyranny of the papal hierarchy, and the practice of burning alive those, who chose to separate the Christianity of the Scriptures from that medley of tradition, council determinations, papal decretals, and scholastic logic, which had become the favored system of the Vatican. Dark and dreary were the prospects of the conscientious and of the intellectual, until these three individuals disappeared; because, by attaching all the power of the English crown to the popish cause; and by exerting all its commanding means of inflicting legal misery, they put every one in the nation, who was not a papist, under the hopeless necessity of suffering all the wretchedness which they chose to impose, or of revolting against the government, which had become the stern and persevering tyrant. But no one who is not in an hospital of insanity, would rise into individual rebellion; and combinations of numbers to the same end, are almost always experienced to be unavailing agitation, destructive to its plotters. No movement but that of national resentment, so universal as to be irresistible, can XVII. |