“Nine times outlawed had been
By England’s king and Scotland’s queen.”
They were sometimes Protestants, sometimes Catholics; sometimes half
Protestants half Catholics.
The English had not, for ages, been bigoted Papists. In the fourteenth
century, the first and perhaps the greatest of the reformers, John
Wickliffe, had stirred the public mind to its inmost depths. During the
same century, a scandalous schism in the Catholic Church had diminished,
in many parts of Europe, the reverence in which the Roman pontiffs were
held. It is clear that, a hundred years before the time of Luther, a
great party in this kingdom was eager for a change at least as extensive
as that which was subsequently {27}effected by Henry the Eighth.
The House of Commons, in the reign of Henry the Fourth, proposed a
confiscation of ecclesiastical property, more sweeping and violent even
than that which took place under the administration of Thomas Cromwell;
and, though defeated in this attempt, they succeeded in depriving the
clerical order of some of its most oppressive privileges. The splendid
conquests of Henry the Fifth turned the attention of the nation from
domestic reform. The Council of Constance removed some of the grossest
of those scandals which had deprived the Church of the public respect.
The authority of that venerable synod propped up the sinking authority
of the Popedom. A considerable reaction took place. It cannot, however,
be doubted, that there was still some concealed Lollardism in England;
or that many who did not absolutely dissent from any doctrine held by
the Church of Rome were jealous of the wealth and power enjoyed by her
ministers. At the very beginning of the reign of Henry the Eighth, a
struggle took place between the clergy and the courts of law, in which
the courts of law remained victorious. One of the bishops, on that
occasion, declared that the common people entertained the strongest
prejudices against his order, and that a clergyman had no chance of fair
play before a lay tribunal. The London juries, he said, entertained such
a spite to the Church that, if Abel were a priest, they would find him
guilty of the murder of Cain. This was said a few months before the time
when Martin Luther began to preach at Wittenburg against indulgences.
As the Reformation did not find the English bigoted Papists, so neither
was it conducted in such a manner as to make them zealous Protestants.
It was not under {28}the direction of men like that fiery Saxon who
swore that he would go to Worms, though he had to face as many devils
as there were tiles on the houses, or like that brave Switzer who was
struck down while praying in front of the ranks of Zurich. No preacher
of religion had the same power here which Calvin had at Geneva and
Knox in Scotland. The government put itself early at the head of the
movement, and thus acquired power to regulate, and occasionally to
arrest, the movement.
To many persons it appears extraordinary that Henry the Eighth should
have been able to maintain himself so long in an intermediate position
between the Catholic and Protestant parties. Most extraordinary it would
indeed be, if we were to suppose that the nation consisted of none but
decided Catholics and decided Protestants. The fact is that the great
mass of the people was neither Catholic nor Protestant, but was, like
its sovereign, midway between the two sects. Henry, in that very part
of his conduct which has been represented as most capricious and
inconsistent, was probably following a policy far more pleasing to the
majority of his subjects than a policy like that of Edward, or a policy
like that of Mary, would have been. Down even to the very close of the
reign of Elizabeth, the people were in a state somewhat resembling that
in which, as Machiavelli says, the inhabitants of the Roman empire were,
during the transition from heathenism to Christianity; “sendo la maggior
parte di loro incerti a quale Dio dovessero ricorrere.” They were
generally, we think, favourable to the royal supremacy. They disliked
the policy of the Court of Rome. Their spirit rose against the
interference of a foreign priest with their national concerns. The bull
{29}which pronounced sentence of deposition against Elizabeth, the plots
which were formed against her life, the usurpation of her titles by
the Queen of Scotland, the hostility of Philip, excited their strongest
indignation. The cruelties of Bonner were remembered with disgust. Some
parts of the new system, the use of the English language, for example,
in public worship, and the communion in both kinds, were undoubtedly
popular. On the other hand, the early lessons of the nurse and the
priest were not forgotten. The ancient ceremonies were long remembered
with affectionate reverence. A large portion of the ancient theology
lingered to the last in the minds which had been imbued with it in
childhood.
The best proof that the religion of the people was of this mixed kind
is furnished by the Drama of that age. No man would bring unpopular
opinions prominently forward in a play intended for representation. And
we may safely conclude, that feelings and opinions which pervade the
whole Dramatic Literature of a generation, are feelings and opinions of
which the men of that generation generally partook.
The greatest and most popular dramatists of the Elizabethan age treat
religious subjects in a very remarkable manner. They speak respectfully
of the fundamental doctrines of Christianity. But they speak neither
like Catholics nor like Protestants, but like persons who are wavering
between the two systems, or who have made a system for themselves out of
parts selected from both. They seem to hold some of the Romish rites and
doctrines in high respect. They treat the vow of celibacy, for example,
so tempting, and, in later times, so common a subject for ribaldry, with
mysterious reverence. Almost every member of a religious order {30}whom
they introduce is a holy and venerable man. We remember in their plays
nothing resembling the coarse ridicule with which the Catholic religion
and its ministers were assailed, two generations later, by dramatists,
who wished to please the multitude. We remember no Friar Dominic, no
Father Foigard, among the characters drawn by those great poets. The
scene at the close of the Knight of Malta might have been written by a
fervent Catholic. Massinger show’s a great fondness for ecclesiastics of
the Romish Church, and has even gone so far as to bring a virtuous and
interesting Jesuit on the stage. Ford, in that fine play which it is
painful to read and scarcely decent to name, assigns a highly creditable
part to the Friar. The partiality of Shakspeare for Friars is well
known. In Hamlet, the Ghost complains that he died without extreme
unction, and, in defiance of the article which condemns the doctrine of
purgatory, declares that he is
“Confined to fast in fires,
Till the foul crimes, done in his days of nature,
Are burnt and purged away.”
These lines, we suspect, would have raised a tremendous storm in the
theatre at any time during the reign of Charles the Second. They were
clearly not written by a zealous Protestant, or for zealous Protestants.
Yet the author of King John and Henry the Eighth was surely no friend to
papal supremacy.
There is, we think, only one solution of the phenomena which we find in
the history and in the drama of that age. The religion of the English
was a mixed religion, like that of the Samaritan settlers, described in
the second book of Kings, who “feared the Lord, and served their
graven images;” like that of the Judaizing Christians who blended the
ceremonies and {31}doctrines of the synagogue with those of the church;
like that of the Mexican Indians, who, during many generations after
the subjugation of their race, continued to unite with the rites learned
from their conquerors the worship of the grotesque idols which had been
adored by Montezuma and Guatemozin.
These feelings were not confined to the populace. Elizabeth herself was
by no means exempt from them. A crucifix, with wax-lights burning round
it, stood in her private chapel. She always spoke with disgust and anger
of the marriage of priests. “I was in horror,” says Archbishop Parker,
“to hear such words to come from her mild nature and Christian learned
conscience, as she spake concerning God’s holy ordinance and institution
of matrimony.” Burleigh prevailed on her to connive at the marriages of
churchmen. But she would only connive; and the children sprung from such
marriages were illegitimate till the accession of James the First.
That which is, as we have said, the great stain on the character of
Burleigh is also the great stain on the character of Elizabeth. Being
herself an Adiaphorist, having no scruple about conforming to the Romish
Church when conformity was necessary to her own safety, retaining to the
last moment of her life a fondness for much of the doctrine and much
of the ceremonial of that church, she yet subjected that church to a
persecution even more odious than the persecution with which her sister
had harassed the Protestants. We say more odious. For Mary had at least
the plea of fanaticism. She did nothing for her religion which she was
not prepared to suffer for it. She had held it firmly under persecution.
She fully believed it to be essential to salvation. If she burned the
bodies of her {32}subjects, it was in order to rescue their souls.
Elizabeth had no such pretext. In opinion, she was little more than
half a Protestant. She had professed, when it suited her, to be wholly
a Catholic. There is an excuse, a wretched excuse, for the massacres of
Piedmont and the _Autos de fe_ of Spain. But what can be said in defence
of a ruler who is at once indifferent and intolerant?
If the great Queen, whose memory is still held in just veneration by
Englishmen, had possessed sufficient virtue and sufficient enlargement
of mind to adopt those principles which More, wiser in speculation than
in action, had avowed in the preceding generation, and by which
the excellent L’Hospital regulated his conduct in her own time, how
different would be the colour of the whole history of the last
two hundred and fifty years! She had the happiest opportunity ever
vouchsafed to any sovereign of establishing perfect freedom of
conscience throughout her dominions, without danger to her government,
without scandal to any large party among her subjects. The nation, as it
was clearly ready to profess either religion, would, beyond all doubt,
have been ready to tolerate both. Unhappily for her own glory and for
the public peace, she adopted a policy from the effects of which the
empire is still suffering. The yoke of the Established Church was
pressed down on the people till they would bear it no longer. Then
a reaction came. Another reaction followed. To the tyranny of the
establishment succeeded the tumultuous conflict of sects, infuriated
by manifold wrongs, and drunk with unwonted freedom. To the conflict of
sects succeeded again the cruel domination of one persecuting church.
At length oppression put off its most horrible form, and took a milder
{33}aspect. The penal laws which had been framed for the protection of
the established church were abolished. But exclusions and disabilities
still remained. These exclusions and disabilities, after having
generated the most fearful discontents, after having rendered all
government in one part of the kingdom impossible, after having brought
the state to the very brink of ruin, have, in our times, been removed,
but, though removed, have left behind them a rankling which may last
for many years. It is melancholy to think with what ease Elizabeth
might have united all conflicting sects under the shelter of the same
impartial laws and the same paternal throne, and thus have placed the
nation in the same situation, as far as the rights of conscience are
concerned, in which we at last stand, after all the heart-burnings,
the persecutions, the conspiracies, the seditions, the revolutions, the
judicial murders, the civil wars of ten generations.
This is the dark side of her character. Yet she surely was a great
woman. Of all the sovereigns who exercised a power which was seemingly
absolute, but which in fact depended for support on the love and
confidence of their subjects, she was by far the most illustrious.
It has often been alleged as an excuse for the misgovernment of her
successors that they only followed her example, that precedents might be
found in the transactions of her reign for persecuting the Puritans,
for levying money without the sanction of the House of Commons, for
confining men without bringing them to trial, for interfering with the
liberty of parliamentary debate. All this may be true. But it is no good
plea for her successors; and for this plain reason, that they were her
successors. She governed one generation, they governed another; and
between {34}the two generations there was almost as little in common as
between the people of two different countries. It was not by looking at
the particular measures which Elizabeth had adopted, but by looking at
the great general principles of her government, that those who followed
her were likely to learn the art of managing untractable subjects. If,
instead of searching the records of her reign for precedents which
might seem to vindicate the mutilation of Prynne and the imprisonment of
Eliot, the Stuarts had attempted to discover the fundamental rules which
guided her conduct in all her dealings with her people, they would have
perceived that their policy was then most unlike to hers, when to a
superficial observer it would have seemed most to resemble hers.
Firm, haughty, sometimes unjust and cruel in her proceedings towards
individuals or towards small parties, she avoided with care, or
retracted with speed, every measure which seemed likely to alienate the
great mass of the people. She gained more honour and more love by the
manner in which she repaired her errors than she would have gained by
never committing errors. If such a man as Charles the First had been in
her place when the whole nation was crying out against the monopolies,
he would have refused all redress. He would have dissolved the
Parliament, and imprisoned the most popular members. He would have
called another Parliament. He would have given some vague and delusive
promises of relief in return for subsidies. When entreated to fulfil
his promises, he would have again dissolved the Parliament, and again
imprisoned his leading opponents. The country would have become more
agitated than before. The next House of Commons would have been more
unmanageable than {35}that which preceded it. The tyrant would have
agreed to all that the nation demanded. He would have solemnly ratified
an act abolishing monopolies forever. He would have received a large
supply in return for this concession; and within half a year new
patents, more oppressive than those which had been cancelled, would have
been issued by scores. Such was the policy which brought the heir of a
long line of kings, in early youth the darling of his countrymen, to a
prison and a scaffold.
Elizabeth, before the House of Commons could address her, took out of
their mouths the words which they were about to utter in the name of the
nation. Her promises went beyond their desires. Her performance followed
close upon her promise. She did not treat the nation as an adverse
party, as a party which had an interest opposed to hers, as a party to
which she was to grant as few advantages as possible, and from which she
was to extort as much money as possible. Her benefits were given, not
sold; and, when once given, they were never withdrawn. She gave them too
with a frankness, an effusion of heart, a princely dignity, a motherly
tenderness, which enhanced their value. They were received by the sturdy
country gentlemen who had come up to Westminster full of resentment,
with tears of joy, and shouts of “God save the Queen.” Charles the
First gave up half the prerogatives of his crown to the Commons; and the
Commons sent him in return the Grand Remonstrance.
We had intended to say something concerning that illustrious group of
which Elizabeth is the central figure, that group which the last of
the bards saw in vision from the top of Snowdon, encircling the Virgin
Queen,
“Many a baron bold,