Read The History of England - Vols. 1 to 6 Online
Authors: David Hume
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advantage, that she could, by marrying him, unite both their claims; and as he was by birth an Englishman, and could not, by his power or alliances, give any ground or suspicion to Elizabeth, it was hoped, that the proposal of this marriage would not be unacceptable to that jealous princess.
Elizabeth was well informed of these intentions;
w
and was secretly not displeased, with the projected marriage between Darnley and the queen of Scots.
x
She would rather have wished, that Mary had continued for ever in a single life: But finding little probability of rendering this scheme effectual, she was satisfied with a choice, which freed her at once from the dread of a foreign alliance, and from the necessity of parting with Leicester, her favourite. In order to pave the way to Darnley’s marriage, she secretly desired Mary to invite Lenox into Scotland, to reverse his attainder, and to restore him to his honours and fortune.
y
And when her request was complied with, she took care, in order to preserve the friendship of the Hamiltons and her other
partizans in Scotland, to blame openly this conduct of Mary.z
Hearing that the negotiation for Darnley’s marriage advanced 28th July.
apace, she gave that nobleman permission, on his first
application, to follow his father into Scotland: But no sooner did she learn, that the queen of Scots was taken with his figure and person, and that all measures were fixed for espousing him, than she exclaimed against the marriage; sent Throgmorton to order Darnley immediately, upon his allegiance, to return to England; threw the countess of Lenox and her second son into the Tower, where they suffered a rigorous confinement; seized all Lenox’s English estate; and, though it was impossible for her to assign one single reason for her displeasure,
a
she menaced, and protested, and complained, as if she had suffered the most grievous injury in the world.
The politics of Elizabeth, though judicious, were usually full of duplicity and artifice; but never more so than in her transactions with the queen of Scots, where there entered so many little passions and narrow jealousies, that she durst not avow to the world the reasons of her conduct, scarcely to her ministers, and scarcely even to herself. But besides a womanish rivalship and envy against the marriage of this princess, she had some motives of interest for feigning a displeasure on the present occasion. It served her as a pretence for refusing to acknowledge Mary’s title to the succession of England; a point to which, for good reasons, she was determined never to consent. And it was useful to her for a purpose, still more unfriendly and dangerous, for encouraging the discontents and rebellion of the Scottish nobility and
Nothing can be more unhappy for a people than to be governed by a sovereign, attached to a religion different from the established; and it is scarcely possible that mutual confidence can ever, in such a situation, have place between the prince and his subjects.
Mary’s conduct had been hitherto, in every respect,
1565.
unexceptionable, and even laudable; yet had she not made such progress in acquiring popularity, as might have been expected from her gracious deportment and agreeable accomplishments. Suspicions every moment prevailed on account of her attachment to the catholic faith, and especially to her uncles, the open and avowed promoters of the scheme for exterminating the professors of the reformed PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
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religion throughout all Europe. She still refused to ratify the acts of parliament which had established the reformation; she made attempts for restoring to the catholic bishops some part of their civil jurisdiction;
c
and she wrote a letter to the council of Trent, in which, besides professing her attachment to the catholic faith, she took notice of her title to succeed to the crown of England, and expressed her hopes of being able, in some period, to bring back all her dominions to the bosom of the
church.d
The zealots among the protestants were not wanting, in their turn, to exercise their insolence against her, which tended still more to alienate her from their faith. A law was enacted, making it capital, on the very first offence, to say mass any where, except in the queen’s chapel;
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and it was with difficulty that even this small indulgence was granted her: The general assembly importuned her anew to change her religion; to renounce the blasphemous idolatry of the mass, with the tyranny of the Roman Antichrist; and to embrace the true religion of Christ Jesus.
f
As she answered with temper, that she was not yet convinced of the falsity of her religion or the impiety of the mass; and that her apostacy would lose her the friendship of her allies on the continent; they replied, by assuring her, that their religion was undoubtedly the same which had been revealed by Jesus Christ, which had been preached by the apostles, and which had been embraced by the faithful in the primitive ages; that neither the religion of Turks, Jews, nor Papists was built on so solid a foundation as theirs; that they alone, of all the various species of religionists, spread over the face of the earth, were so happy as to be possessed of the truth; that those who hear, or rather who gaze on the mass, allow sacrilege, pronounce blasphemy, and commit most abominable idolatry; and that the friendship of the King of Kings was preferable to all
The marriage of the queen of Scots had kindled afresh the zeal of The queen of Scots the reformers, because the family of Lenox was believed to marries the earl of
adhere to the catholic faith; and though Darnley, who now bore Darnley.
the name of King Henry, went often to the established church, he could not, by this exterior compliance, gain the confidence and regard of the ecclesiastics. They rather laid hold of the opportunity to insult him to his face; and Knox scrupled not to tell him from the pulpit, that God, for punishment of the offences and ingratitude of the people, was wont to commit the rule over them to boys and women.
h
The populace of Edinburgh, instigated by such doctrines, began to meet
and to associate themselves against the government.i
But what threatened more immediate danger to Mary’s authority, were the discontents which prevailed among some of the principal nobility.
The duke of Chatelrault was displeased with the restoration, and still more with the aggrandizement of the family of Lenox, his hereditary enemies; and entertained fears lest his own eventual succession to the crown of Scotland should be excluded by his rival, who had formerly advanced some pretensions to it. The earl of Murray found his credit at court much diminished by the interest of Lenox, and his son; and began to apprehend the revocation of some considerable grants, which he had obtained from Mary’s bounty. The earls of Argyle, Rothes, and Glencairne, the lords Boyde and Ochiltry, Kirkaldy of Grange, Pittarow, were instigated by like motives; and as these were the persons who had most zealously promoted the reformation, they were disgusted to find, that the queen’s favour was entirely ingrossed by a new cabal, the PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
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earls of Bothwel, Athole, Sutherland, and Huntley; men who were esteemed either lukewarm in religious controversy, or inclined to the catholic party. The same ground of discontent, which, in other courts, is the source of intrigue, faction, and opposition, commonly produced in Scotland, either projects of assassination, or of rebellion; and besides mutual accusations of the former kind, which it is difficult to clear up,
NOTE
[G]
the malcontent lords, as soon as they saw the queen’s marriage entirely resolved on, entered into a confederacy for taking arms against their sovereign. They met at Stirling; pretended an anxious concern for the security of religion; framed engagements for mutual defence; and made applications to Elizabeth for assistance and protection.
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That princess, after publishing the expressions of her displeasure against the marriage, had secretly ordered her ambassadors Randolf and Throgmorton, to give in her name some promises of support to the malcontents; and had even sent them a supply of ten thousand pounds, to enable them to begin an insurrection.
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Mary was no sooner informed of the meeting at Stirling, and the movements of the lords, than she summoned them to appear at court, in order to answer for their conduct; and having levied some forces to execute the laws, she obliged the rebels to leave the low countries, and take shelter in Argyleshire. That she might more effectually cut off their resources, she proceeded with the king to Glasgow, and forced them from their retreat. They appeared at Paisley in the neighbourhood with about a thousand horse; and passing the queen’s army, proceeded to Hamilton, thence to Edinburgh, which they entered without resistance. They expected great reinforcements in this place, from the efforts of Knox and the seditious preachers; and they beat their drums, desiring all men to enlist, and receive wages for the defence of God’s glory.
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But the nation was in no disposition for rebellion: Mary was esteemed and beloved: Her marriage was not generally disagreeable to the people: And the interested views of the malcontent lords were so well known, that their pretence of zeal for religion had little influence even on the ignorant populace.
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The king and queen advanced to Edinburgh at the head of their army: The rebels were obliged to retire into the south; and being pursued by a force which now amounted to eighteen thousand men,
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they found themselves under a necessity of abandoning their country, and of taking shelter in England.
Elizabeth, when she found the event so much to disappoint her expectations, thought proper to disavow all connexions with the Scottish malcontents, and to declare every where, that she had never given them any encouragement, nor any promise of countenance or assistance. She even carried farther her dissimulation and hypocrisy.
Murray had come to London, with the abbot of Kilwinning, agent for Chatelrault; and she seduced them, by secret assurances of protection, to declare, before the ambassadors of France and Spain, that she had nowise contributed to their insurrection. No sooner had she extorted this confession from them, than she chased them from her presence, called them unworthy traitors, declared that their detestable rebellion was of bad example to all princes, and assured them, that, as she had hitherto given them no encouragement, so should they never thenceforth receive from her any
assistance or protection.q
Throgmorton alone, whose honour was equal to his abilities, could not be prevailed on to conceal the part, which he had acted in the enterprise of the Scottish rebels; and being well apprised of the usual character and conduct of PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)
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Elizabeth, he had had the precaution to obtain an order of council to authorize the
engagements, which he had been obliged to take with them.r
The banished lords, finding themselves so harshly treated by Elizabeth, had recourse to the clemency of their own sovereign; and after some solicitation and some professions of sincere repentence, the duke of Chatelrault obtained his pardon, on condition that he should retire into France. Mary was more implacable against the ungrateful earl of Murray and the other confederates, on whom she threw the chief blame of the enterprize; but as she was continually plied with applications from their friends, and as some of her most judicious partizans in England thought, that nothing would more promote her interests in that kingdom, than the gentle treatment of men so celebrated for their zeal against the catholic religion; she agreed to give way to her natural temper, which inclined not to severity, and she seemed determined to restore
them to favour.s
In this interval, Rambouillet arrived as ambassador from France, and brought her advice from her uncle, the cardinal of Lorraine, to whose opinion she always paid an extreme deference, by no means to pardon these protestant leaders,
who had been engaged in a rebellion against her.t
The two religions, in France, as well as in other parts of Europe, were rather irritated than tired with their acts of mutual violence; and the peace granted to the hugonots, as had been foreseen by Coligni, was intended only to lull them asleep, and prepare the way for their final and absolute destruction. The queen-regent made a pretence of travelling through the kingdom, in order to visit the provinces, and correct all the abuses arising from the late civil war; and after having held some conferences on the frontiers with the duke of Lorraine and the duke of Savoy, she came to Bayonne, where she was met by her daughter, the queen of Spain, and the duke of Alva.
Nothing appeared in the congress of these two splendid courts, but gaiety, festivity, love, and joy; but amidst these smiling appearances were secretly fabricated schemes the most bloody, and the most destructive to the repose of mankind, that had ever been thought of in any age or nation. No less than a total and universal extermination of the protestants by fire and sword was concerted by Philip and Catherine of Medicis; and Alva, agreeably to his fierce and sanguinary disposition, advised the queen-regent to commence the execution of this project, by the immediate massacre
of all the leaders of the hugonots.u
But that princess, though equally hardened against every humane sentiment, would not forego this opportunity of displaying her wit and refined politics; and she purposed, rather by treachery and dissimulation, which she called address, to lead the protestants into the snare, and never to draw the sword, till they were totally disabled from resistance.