After about twenty years, the Presbyterian system, pure and simple, was established, under the auspices of Andrew Melville. Subsequently, the attempts of James VI. to establish the royal supremacy, and to introduce not only the Anglican polity, but the Anglican ritual, also, began that contest between the Throne and the Kirk, which signalized the next reign, and brought Charles I. to the scaffold.1

The Queen of England professed, and probably with sincerity, her high indignation at the treatment of Mary by her subjects. It was a flagrant disregard of Elizabeth's great political maxim "that the head should not be subject to the foot." But in Murray she had a perspicacious and firm man to deal with. It was evident to the counsellors of Elizabeth and to Elizabeth herself, that if she interposed to put down the Protestant lords, who had imprisoned Mary and compelled her abdication, they would make common cause with France, and her own throne would be shaken. This conclusion, however, was not reached at once. Mary escaped from Lochleven on the 2d of May, 1568, and an army quickly rallied to her standard. It was then the wish of Elizabeth and her Cabinet to restore her to her throne, without any intervention of the French, and under such circumstances as would effectually secure the safety of England and the be found in Calderwood, History of the Kirk of Scotland (Wodrow Society), iii. 170 seq. See also Principal Lee, History of the Church of Scotland, i. 306, ii. seq.

1

1 The last days of Knox were not free from peril and conflict. When the Queen's party obtained the ascendency (in 1571) in Edinburgh, he retired to St. Andrews. James Melville, afterwards a minister, then a student in the college, has left a very interesting description of him, a decrepit old man, with marten fur about his neck, with a staff in hand, and helped along the street by his faithful servant, Richard Bannatyne, "and by the said Richard and another servant lifted up to the pulpit, where he behovit to lean at his first entry, but ere he had done with his sermon, he was so active and vigorous, that he was likely to ding the pulpit in blads and fly out of it." (McCrie, p. 330.) Bannatyne wrote interesting Memorials of Knox. Knox died on the 24th of November, 1572. Morton said, over his grave, "that he neither feared nor flattered any flesh." (Burton, v. 327.)

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ascendency of Elizabeth in her counsels. But Mary's army was defeated at Langside, when she was attempting to march to Dumbarton Castle, and she escaped by a precipitate flight into England, where she threw herself on the protection of Elizabeth. The ardent and persevering solicitations of Mary for an interview with the English Queen were put off until she should be cleared of the crime that was imputed to her. Murray and his associates were called upon to justify their proceedings, and brought forward the "casket documents," to substantiate their charges.

Elizabeth might dislike the religious system of the victorious party in Scotland and abhor their political maxims; but they were, in the existing situation of Europe, her allies, and to put Mary back upon her throne would have been an act of suicide. It must be remembered that she never renounced her claim to the crown of England. At this juncture, it was fortunate that the slow and cautious Philip declined the offensive alliance that was offered him by France. In 1569, the victory over the Huguenots in France was followed by a Catholic rebellion in the North of England. The demand was that Mary's title to the succession should be acknowledged. The excommunication of Elizabeth by Pius V. succeeded. Thenceforward, all who sympathized with the spirit of the Catholic reaction in Europe, and acknowledged the Pope's authority, were under the strongest temptation to treat Elizabeth as a usurper who ought to be actually dethroned. The rebellion, under the lead of Norfolk, was undertaken with the express and warm approbation of the Pope, and Philip was only deterred by prudential motives from sending his forces in aid of it; he preferred to wait until the insurgents should have seized on the person of the Queen. The current of events was gradually leading to an open conflict with Spain, which both the Queen and Philip were reluctant to begin. For her own security

she secretly provided assistance to the revolted subjects of Philip in the Netherlands, which pleased France, as her aid to the Scottish rebels had gratified Philip. The consequence was that favorable terms were granted to the Netherlands in the Pacification of Ghent, in 1576. It was material to her interests that the Huguenots should not be subdued, and she covertly gave them help while she was in friendly relations with the French government that was seeking to crush them. At length the desperate condition of the Protestants in the Netherlands imposed on her the necessity, in 1585, of openly sending her troops, under the command of Leicester, for their deliverance. Shortly after, Drake appeared before St. Domingo and took possession of that island.

Mary Stuart was the centre of the hopes of the enemies of Protestant England and of Elizabeth. Their plots looked to the elevation of Mary to the throne which Elizabeth filled. Political ambition and religious fanaticism were linked together in this great scheme. Mary's life was regarded by the wisest of the English statesmen as a standing menace. When her complicity with the conspiracy of Babington, which involved a Spanish invasion and the dethronement and death of Elizabeth was proved, the execution of Mary followed (1587).

Apart from the interference of Elizabeth in the Netherlands, England and Spain had long been engaged in a desultory warfare on the ocean, where the treasure ships of Philip were captured by Drake and his compeers, and the Spanish colonies harassed by their attacks. The cruelty of the Inquisition to English sailors in Spain quickened the relish of the great English mariners for this kind of retaliation. The sailing of the invincible Armada for the conquest of England was at once the culmination of this prolonged, indefinite conflict, and the supreme effort of the Catholic reaction to annihilate the Protestant strength. The valor of the English seamen,

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with the winds for their allies, dispersed and destroyed the mighty fleet, and "the northern ocean even to the frozen Thule was scattered with the proud shipwrecks of the Spanish Armada." A death-blow was given to the hopes of the enemies of Protestant England (1588).

A sketch of the Reformation in Great Britain would be incomplete without some notice of the attempts to plant Protestantism in Ireland. Ireland, one of the last of the countries to bow to the supremacy of the Holy See, has been equaled by none in its devotion to the Roman Church, although the independence of the country was wrested from it under the warrant of a bull of Adrian IV., which gave it to Henry II. Protestantism was associated with the hated domination of foreigners, and was propagated according to methods recognized in that age as lawful to the conqueror.2 Invaders who were engaged in an almost perpetual conflict with a subject race, the course of which was marked by horrible massacres, could hardly hope to convert their enemies to their own religious faith. Henry VIII., having made himself the head of the English Church, proceeded to establish his ecclesiastical supremacy in the neighboring island. This was ordained by the Irish Parliament in 1537, but was resisted by a great part of the clergy, with the Archbishop of Armagh at their head. George Browne, a willing agent of the King, who had been Provincial of the Augustine friars in England, was made Archbishop of Dublin. The Protestant hierarchy was constituted, but the people remained Catholic. The mistaken policy of seeking to Anglicize the country was pursued, and the services of religion were conducted in a tongue which they did not understand. The Prayer Book, which was introduced in 1551, was not rendered into Irish, but was to

1 Milton, Of Reformation in England, b. ii.

2 Hallam, Const. Hist., ch. xviii.

be rendered into Latin, for the sake of ecclesiastics and others who were not acquainted with English! On the accession of Mary, the new fabric which had been raised by Henry VIII. and his son, fell to pieces without resistance. As the Catholic Reaction became organized in Europe, and began to wage its contest with Queen Elizabeth, the Irish who had to some extent attended the English service, generally deserted it. Protestantism had no footing outside of the Pale, or where English soldiers were not present to protect it or force it upon the people. The Episcopal Church in Ireland wore a somewhat Puritanic cast, and in its formularies set forth prominently the Calvinistic theology. The New Testament was not translated into Irish until 1602; and the Prayer Book, though translated earlier, was not sanctioned by public authority, and was little used.1 Among various wise suggestions in Lord Bacon's tract, written in 1601, entitled "Considerations touching the Queen's service in Ireland," is a recommendation to take care "of the versions of Bibles and catechisms, and other books of instruction, into the Irish language." 2 With equal sagacity and good feeling, he counsels the establishment of colonies or plantations, the sending out of fervent, popular preachers and of pious and learned bishops, and the fostering of education. He recommends mildness and toleration rather than the use of the temporal sword. But the policy which the great philosopher and statesman marked out, was very imperfectly followed.

1 Hardwick, History of the Reformation, p. 270.

2 This tract is in vol. v. of Montagu's edition of Bacon's writings.