beth did not allow itself to be daunted by these CHAP. persecuting and unjust humiliations.19 She was living every hour surrounded with the greatest peril. As the intentions of Mary to bring back popery became visible, the greatest discontents began to arise,20 with an idea in some, naturally arising from Henry's statutes against his daughters, that the young queen of the Scots was the rightful heiress of the crown.21 But the danger to Elizabeth arose from the larger portion of the dissatisfied forming conspiracies to dispossess her sister, and to place her as a Protestant princess on the throne.2 The chief nobility, and almost all the soldiers, are represented to have had these feelings. There is no evidence against her that these plans were communicated to Elizabeth, or that they received her sanction; but it was impossible for her to exist 22 19 Her sister is so little 'etonnée' by this, that she has daily had all the young gentlewomen of the court, who have gone to visit her, and whom she takes pains to entertain, thinking 's'en prevaloir' in a few days, and hoping to have soon leave to go to her house. But I doubt if this liberty will be granted, unless with persons who will keep their eye always upon her, and perhaps a strong guard for this purpose.' Noailles, 274. 20 The French ambassador's dispatch to his king, of 22d September, has this strong passage: I assure you, sire! I cannot enough declare to you the great number of men, malcontens,' who are in this kingdom.' ib. p. 161. 21 Noailles informs his sovereign, that a member of parliament had said to him of the queen, He could not love her, being assured that this crown did not belong to her, but certainly to the queen of Scots your daughter, for whom he promised to do many things, as well in this kingdom as in Ireland.' ib. 161. He adds the information, that Cranmer has been put in the Tower, for a declaration against the mass.' And that a captain had been imprisoned, for beating a priest for saying mass. ib. 22 On 9 November, Noailles reports that they intended to marry Elizabeth to Courtney, and to seize her and carry her away, 'l'enlever et emmener' to Devonshire and Cornwall; and that he was assured that the duke of Suffolk, the earls of Pembroke and Cumberland, and lord Clinton, and many other great men, were of this party, and ' presque generalement tous les vaillans homme de guerre du pays.' ib. 246. XIV. BOOK II. without both the suspicion and the imputation. Her enemies would be certain to assume her connivance, and the plotters would diffuse the idea, to increase their own consequence and party. She was vigilantly watched. Spies were in her own household, and obtained so much of her confidence, as to be consulted by her; 23 and they soon reported to one of the ministers, that a refugee French preacher privately visited her." This being communicated to the Spanish ambassador, he advised that she should be immediately imprisoned in the Tower.25 Mary would not venture on this, but issued an order, that every French refugee should leave the kingdom in twenty-four days; and sent Paget and Arundel to sound her, and to exhort her not to follow any evil counsel. She acquiesced fully in their sentiments; and the experienced and watching statesmen could detect nothing further against her." To charge her with the conspiracies which 27 26 23 Deux des principeaux domestiques de cette jeune princesse, qu'elle avoit coutume de consulter dans toutes les affaires.' Greffet, from Renard. Disp. p. 110. 24 They added to lord Paget, that they did not know why she saw him, nor for what end, but that they apprized him of it, that in case their mistress should depart from her duty, the fault might not be imputed to them.' ib. 111. 25 He said the information given by her domestics was un titre suffisant' for this arrest. ib. 112. 26 Ib. 113. By this order, Ribadineira exultingly declares that 30,000 heretics were forced to quit the kingdom, who had taken refuge in it. Ib. 114. On 14 Dec. Noailles (Hist. p. 216) informed his king, that the Spanish envoy had charged him, four days before, with going three or four times of a night to Elizabeth's chamber, to concert with her some marriage that would suit French politics; that the two cabinet ministers had gone to Elizabeth about it, with serious admonitions; but that she easily freed herself from the misrepresentation. Young as she was, she had the good sense to desire them, as they left her, never to believe any notions that should be expressed to her disadvantage, without first hearing herself.' Noailles, 309. others chose, from their own alarm or resentment, to form against the government for its revolutionizing schemes, is an injustice which no one ought, without the most clear and direct evidence, to attempt. No innocence can occasionally escape suspicion or accusation; but our common welfare calls upon every one to distinguish surmise and scandal, from proof and guilt. Her situation was made more uneasy to her, by foreign powers intriguing about her marriage.29 28 But now the rash folly of others conferred on the queen and the papal hierarchy the power they coveted for the abasement of the Reformation, and those legal advantages of using it with intimidating effect, against their opponents of all descriptions, of which they had hitherto been destitute. If the usurpation of lady Gray had not been attempted, Mary would have quietly succeeded to the crown of a nation, which in its greatest part, as even the pope perceived and stated, hated him to death;' she would have therefore acceded, like Charles II. and James II., with a parliament and people jealous, vigilant, and dangerous to provoke by any Romish machinations. But Jane's abortive elevation rousing 28 It was quite natural that in this situation she should desire, as the French envoy said, 'de se mettre hors de tutelle;' (p. 310.) for he says, she could not go into the country without the Spanish part of the cabinet being put into much suspicion and jealousy, that she was only there to excite something to their disadvantage.' p. 309. 29 Thus as the Spanish minister charged the French one with forming plans of matrimony for her, the constable of France, on 30th December 1553, wrote in alarm to Noailles, that the queen of Hungary was coming to England to arrange a marriage between Elizabeth and the prince of Piedmont, who was poor and destitute; that he must learn if it was true, and whether the princess would be persuaded; and if she were inclined to it, he must try to rompre cette pratique,' and divert Elizabeth from it.' Noailles, v. 3. p. 2. СНАР. XIV. II. BOOK the country's affectionate remembrance of their popular Henry, they carried Mary to the throne as his unjustly deprived daughter, with an enthusiasm which, if her succession had been quiet and unopposed, they would have neither felt nor displayed. This benefit gave her power to place papal ministers immediately in her cabinet; to abase her most formidable opponents, and to hold the sword of terror over those, who, from their unreasonable precipitancy to secure a Protestant reign, had compromised themselves by favoring the pretensions which had been overthrown. Yet as the effect of this error subsided, the majority of the country was so manifestly protestant, that Mary could not venture to obey the papal instigations, nor attempt any further revolution. The safe and efficacious policy of all who wished well to the Reformation, was to have remained tranquil, firm and loyal; and then, whatever might have been attempted by the injudicious friends of Rome, would have soon become ineffective and powerless, from their calm, persevering and constitutional opposition. Nothing is a more stubborn obstacle to encroaching power, than the defeating inertia of popular dislike. It does in time. all that it can desire to effect, by its resisting inactivity; it is an invisible opponent, that cannot be either encountered or mastered; it defies power, and gathers strength from its oppressions; but it loses all its advantages as soon as it embodies itself into a visible and calculable assailant, unless it be so superior as to be overpowering. Armed force can be always met by armed force; and in such a conflict the government has advantages of name, XIV. discipline, union, legality, compactness, celerity, CHAP. and immediate obedience. Nothing can therefore be more acceptable to existing authorities, which seek to establish despotic objects, than to see a perilous disaffection converting itself into palpable rebellion. Such an explosion is troublesome, and for a time dangerous, but rarely invincible by equal spirit and activity; and the power which it attacks becomes doubled and resistless by its failure. The abortive insurrection of sir Thomas Wyatt was the real overthrow of the Reformation in England, as the attempt and its abortion produced to Mary an instantaneous power of deterring or overwhelming all future opposition to her secret project. He had been to her a friend so ardent as to have courageously proclaimed her queen at Maidstone, before he knew that any others had taken that decided step; but as he was an earnest Protestant, the proposal and progress of the Spanish match united him with those who were apprehensive of its religious consequences. The House of Commons, participating in these feelings, had voted an address to her, to select her husband from her own nobility. An illness delayed a while its presentation;30 and when the speaker, on her re-establishment, read it to her, she pronounced herself the answer, which, if it pleased the peers," did not satisfy the House of Commons.32 She 30 Noailles' lett. 4 Nov. v. 2, p. 233, 234; 241. On 14th November he reported to his court, that she had been ill for three weeks. But on the 24th he mentioned that she had sent for the deputies of the commons, and given her answer. p. 269. Greffet, p. 125. 32 Noailles, 270. The French and Spanish ambassadors do not quite |