difficulty of subsisting them, fought with the duke of Anjou the battle
of Moncontour in Poictou, where he was wounded and defeated. The court
of France, notwithstanding their frequent experience of the obstinacy of
the Hugonots, and the vigor of Coligny, vainly flattered themselves
that the force of the rebels was at last finally annihilated; and they
neglected further preparations against a foe, who, they thought, could
never more become dangerous. They were surprised to hear, that this
leader had appeared, without dismay, in another quarter of the kingdom;
had encouraged the young princes, whom he governed to like constancy;
had assembled an army; had taken the field; and was even strong enough
to threaten Paris. The public finances, diminished by the continued
disorders of the kingdom, and wasted by so many fruitless military
enterprises, could no longer bear the charge of a new armament, and the
king, notwithstanding his extreme animosity against the Hugonots, was
obliged, in 1570, to conclude an accommodation with them, to grant them
a pardon for all past offences, and to renew the edicts for liberty of
conscience.
Though a pacification was seemingly concluded, the mind of Charles was
nowise reconciled to his rebellious subjects, and this accommodation,
like all the foregoing, was nothing but a snare, by which the perfidious
court had projected to destroy at once, without danger, all its
formidable enemies. As the two young princes, the admiral, and the other
leaders of the Hugonots, instructed by past experience, discovered
an extreme distrust of the king’s intentions, and kept themselves in
security at a distance, all possible artifices were employed to remove
their apprehensions, and to convince them of the sincerity of the
new counsels which seemed to be embraced. The terms of the peace were
religiously observed to them; the toleration was strictly maintained;
all attempts made by the zealous Catholics to infringe it were punished
with severity; offices, and favors, and honors were bestowed on the
principal nobility among the Protestants; and the king and council every
where declared that, tired of civil disorders, and convinced of the
impossibility of forcing men’s consciences, they were thenceforth
determined to allow every one the free exercise of his religion.
Among the other artifices employed to lull the Protestants into a
fatal security, Charles affected to enter into close connections with
Elizabeth; and as it seemed not the interest of France to forward the
union of the two kingdoms of Great Britain, that princess the more
easily flattered herself that the French monarch would prefer her
friendship to that of the queen of Scots. The better to deceive her,
proposals of marriage were made her with the duke of Anjou; a prince
whose youth, beauty, and reputation for valor might naturally be
supposed to recommend him to a woman who had appeared not altogether
insensible to these endowments. The queen immediately founded on this
offer the project of deceiving the court of France; and being intent
on that artifice, she laid herself the more open to be deceived.
Negotiations were entered into with regard to the marriage; terms of the
contract were proposed; difficulties started and removed; and the
two courts, equally insincere, though not equally culpable, seemed
to approach every day nearer to each other in their demands and
concessions. The great obstacle seemed to lie in adjusting the
difference of religion; because Elizabeth, who recommended toleration to
Charles, was determined not to grant it in her own dominions, not even
to her husband; and the duke of Anjou seemed unwilling to submit, for
the sake of interest, to the dishonor of an apostasy.[*]
* Camden, p. 433. Davila, lib. v. Digger’s Complete
Ambassador p. 84, 110, 111
The artificial politics of Elizabeth never triumphed so much in any
contrivances as in those which were conjoined with her coquetry; and
as her character in this particular was generally known, the court of
France thought that they might, without danger of forming any final
conclusion, venture the further in their concessions and offers to
her. The queen also had other motives for dissimulation. Besides
the advantage of discouraging Mary’s partisans by the prospect of an
alliance between France and England, her situation with Philip
demanded her utmost vigilance and attention; and the violent authority
established in the Low Countries made her desirous of fortifying herself
even with the bare appearance of a new confederacy.
The theological controversies which had long agitated Europe, had from
the beginning penetrated into the Low Countries; and as these provinces
maintained an extensive commerce, they had early received, from
every kingdom with which they corresponded, a tincture of religious
innovation. An opinion at that time prevailed, which had been zealously
propagated by priests, and implicitly received by sovereigns, that
heresy was closely connected with rebellion, and that every great or
violent alteration in the church involved a like revolution in the civil
government. The forward zeal of the reformers would seldom allow them
to wait the consent of the magistrate to their innovations: they became
less dutiful when opposed and punished; and though their pretended
spirit of reasoning and inquiry was in reality nothing but a new species
of implicit faith, the prince took the alarm, as if so institutions
could be secure from the temerity of their researches. The emperor
Charles, who proposed to augment his authority under pretence of
defending the Catholic faith, easily adopted these political principles;
and notwithstanding the limited prerogative which he possessed in the
Netherlands, he published the most arbitrary, severe, and tyrannical
edicts against the Protestants; and he took care that the execution of
them should be no less violent and sanguinary. He was neither cruel nor
bigoted in his natural disposition; yet an historian, celebrated for
moderation and caution, has computed, that in the several persecutions
promoted by that monarch, no less than a hundred thousand persons
perished by the hands of the executioner.[*] But these severe remedies;
far from answering the purposes intended, had rather served to augment
the numbers as well as zeal of the reformers; and the magistrates of the
several towns, seeing no end of those barbarous executions, felt their
humanity rebel against their principles, and declined any further
persecution of the new doctrines.
* Grotii Annal. lib. i. Father Paul, another great
authority, computes, in a passage above cited, that fifty
thousand persons were put to death in the Low Countries
alone.
When Philip succeeded to his father’s dominions, the Flemings were
justly alarmed with new apprehensions, lest their prince, observing the
lenity of the magistrates, should take the execution of the edicts
from such remiss hands, and should establish the inquisition in the Low
Countries, accompanied with all the iniquities and barbarities which
attended it in Spain. The severe and unrelenting character of the man,
his professed attachment to Spanish manners, the inflexible bigotry of
his principles; all these circumstances increased their terror; and when
he departed the Netherlands, with a known intention never to return, the
disgust of the inhabitants was extremely augmented, and their dread of
those tyrannical orders which their sovereign, surrounded with Spanish
ministers, would issue from his cabinet at Madrid. He left the duchess
of Parma governess of the Low Countries, and the plain good sense and
good temper of that princess, had she been intrusted with the sole
power, would have preserved the submission of those opulent provinces,
which were lost from that refinement of treacherous and barbarous
politics on which Philip so highly valued himself. The Flemings found,
that the name alone of regent remained with the duchess; that Cardinal
Granville entirely possessed the king’s confidence; that attempts were
every day made on their liberties; that a resolution was taken never
more to assemble the states; that new bishoprics were arbitrarily
erected, in order to enforce the execution of the persecuting edicts;
and that, on the whole, they must expect to be reduced to the condition
of a province under the Spanish monarchy. The discontents of the
nobility gave countenance to the complaints of the gentry, which
encouraged the mutiny of the populace; and all orders of men showed
a strong disposition to revolt. Associations were formed, tumultuary
petitions presented, names of distinction assumed, badges of party
displayed; and the current of the people, impelled by religious zeal,
and irritated by feeble resistance, rose to such a height, that in
several towns, particularly in Antwerp, they made an open invasion on
the established worship, pillaged the churches and monasteries, broke
the images, and committed the most unwarrantable disorders.
The wiser part of the nobility, particularly the prince of Orange, and
the counts Egmont and Horn, were alarmed at these excesses, to which
their own discontents had at first given countenance; and seconding the
wisdom of the governess, they suppressed the dangerous insurrections,
punished the ringleaders, and reduced all the provinces to a state
of order and submission. But Philip was not contented with the
reëstablishment of his ancient authority: he considered that provinces
so remote from the seat of government could not be ruled by a limited
prerogative; and that a prince who must entreat rather than command,
would necessarily, when he resided not among the people, feel every day
a diminution of his power and influence. He determined, therefore,
to lay hold of the late popular disorders as a pretence for entirely
abolishing the privileges of the Low Country provinces, and for ruling
them thenceforth with a military and arbitrary authority.
In the execution of this violent design, he employed a man who was a
proper instrument in the hands of such a tyrant. Ferdinand of Toledo,
duke of Alva, had been educated amidst arms; and having attained a
consummate knowledge in the military art, his habits led him to transfer
into all government the severe discipline of a camp, and to conceive
no measures between prince and subject but those of rigid command and
implicit obedience. This general, in 1568, conducted from Italy to
the Low Countries a powerful body of veteran Spaniards; and his avowed
animosity to the Flemings, with his known character, struck that whole
people with terror and consternation. It belongs not to our subject to
relate at length those violences which Alva’s natural barbarity,
steeled by reflection and aggravated by insolence, exercised on those
flourishing provinces. It suffices to say, that all their privileges,
the gift of so many princes, and the inheritance of so many ages,
were openly and expressly abolished by edict; arbitrary and sanguinary
tribunals erected; the counts Egmont and Horn, in spite of their great
merits and past services, brought to the scaffold; multitudes of
all ranks thrown into confinement, and thence delivered over to the
executioner; and notwithstanding the peaceable submission of all men,
nothing was heard of but confiscation, imprisonment, exile, torture, and
death.
Elizabeth was equally displeased to see the progress of that scheme laid
for the extermination of the Protestants, and to observe the erection of
so great a military power in a state situated in so near a neighborhood.
She gave protection to all the Flemish exiles who took shelter in her
dominions; and as many of these were the most industrious inhabitants of
the Netherlands, and had rendered that country celebrated for its
arts, she reaped the advantage of introducing into England some useful
manufactures, which were formerly unknown in that kingdom. Foreseeing
that the violent government of Alva could not long subsist without
exciting some commotion, she ventured to commit an insult upon him,
which she would have been cautious not to hazard against a more
established authority. Some Genoese merchants had engaged, by contract
with Philip, to transport into Flanders the sum of four hundred thousand
crowns; and the vessels on which this money was embarked, had been
attacked in the Channel by some privateers equipped by the French
Hugonots, and had taken shelter in Plymouth and Southampton. The
commanders of the ships pretended that the money belonged to the king of
Spain; but the queen, finding upon inquiry that it was the property of
Genoese merchants, took possession of it as a loan; and by that means
deprived the duke of Alva of this resource in the time of his greatest
necessity. Alva, in revenge, seized all the English merchants in the Low
Countries, threw them into prison, and confiscated their effects.
The queen retaliated by a like violence on the Flemish and Spanish
merchants; and gave all the English liberty to make reprisals on the
subjects of Philip.
These differences were afterwards accommodated by treaty, and mutual
reparations were made to the merchants; but nothing could repair the
loss which so well-timed a blow inflicted on the Spanish government in
the Low Countries. Alva, in want of money, and dreading the immediate
mutiny of his troops, to whom great arrears were due, imposed, by
his arbitrary will, the most ruinous taxes on the people. He not only
required the hundredth penny, and the twentieth of all immovable goods;
he also demanded the tenth of all movable goods on every sale; an absurd
tyranny, which would not only have destroyed all arts and commerce, but
even have restrained the common intercourse of life. The people refused
compliance; the duke had recourse to his usual expedient of the gibbet;
and thus matters came still nearer the last, extremities between the
Flemings and the Spaniards.[*]
All the enemies of Elizabeth, in order to revenge themselves for her
insults, had naturally recourse to one policy, the supporting of the
cause and pretensions of the queen of Scots; and Alva, whose measures
were ever violent, soon opened a secret intercourse with that princess.
There was one Rodolphi, a Florentine merchant, who had resided about
fifteen years in London, and who, while he conducted his commerce in
England, had managed all the correspondence of the court of Rome with
the Catholic nobility and gentry.[**]
* Bentivoglio, part. i. lib. v. Camden, p. 416.
** Lesley, p. 123. State Trials, vol. i. p. 87.
He had been thrown into prison at the time when the duke of Norfolk’s
intrigues with Mary had been discovered; but either no proof, was found
against him, or the part which he had acted was not very criminal; and
he soon after recovered his liberty. This man, zealous for the Catholic
faith, had formed a scheme, in concert with the Spanish ambassador,
for subverting the government, by a foreign invasion and a domestic
insurrection; and when he communicated his project by letter to Mary, he
found, that as she was now fully convinced of Elizabeth’s artifices,
and despaired of ever recovering her authority, or even her liberty, by
pacific measures, she willingly gave her concurrence. The great number
of discontented Catholics were the chief source of their hopes on the
side of England and they also observed that the kingdom was at that
time full of indigent gentry, chiefly younger brothers, who, having at
present, by the late decay of the church, and the yet languishing state
of commerce, no prospect of a livelihood suitable to their birth, were
ready to throw themselves into any desperate enterprise.[*] But in
order to inspire life and courage into all these malecontents, it was
requisite that some great nobleman should put himself at their head; and
no one appeared to Rodolphi, and to the bishop of Ross, who entered into
all these intrigues, so proper, both on account of his power and his
popularity, as the duke of Norfolk.
This nobleman, when released from confinement in the Tower, had given
his promise, that he would drop all intercourse with the queen of
Scots;[**] but finding that he had lost, and, as he feared, beyond
recovery, the confidence and favor of Elizabeth, and being still in some
degree restrained from his liberty, he was tempted, by impatience and
despair, to violate his word, and to open anew his correspondence with
the captive princess.[***] A promise of marriage was renewed between
them; the duke engaged to enter into all her interests; and as his
remorses gradually diminished in the course of these transactions,
he was pushed to give his consent to enterprises still more criminal.
Rodolphi’s plan was, that the duke of Alva should, on some other
pretence, assemble a great quantity of shipping in the Low Countries;
should transport a body of six thousand foot and four thousand horse
into England; should land them at Harwich, where the duke of Norfolk
was to join them with all his friends; should thence march directly
to London, and oblige the queen to submit to whatever terms the
conspirators should please to impose upon her.[****] Norfolk expressed
his assent to this plan; and three letters, in consequence of it, were
written in his name by Rodolphi; one to Alva, another to the pope, and
a third to the king of Spain; but the duke, apprehensive of the danger,
refused to sign them.[v]
* Lesley, p. 123.
** Haynes, p. 571.
*** State Trials, vol. i. p. 102.
**** Lesley, p. 155., State Trials, vol. i. p. 86, 87.
v Lesley, p. 159., 161. Camden, p. 432.
He only sent to the Spanish ambassador a servant and confidant, named
Barker, as well to notify his concurrence in the plan, as to vouch
for the authenticity of these letters; and Rodolphi, having obtained
a letter of credence from the ambassador, proceeded on his journey to
Brussels and to Rome. The duke of Alva and the pope embraced the scheme
with alacrity: Rodolphi informed Norfolk of their intentions;[*] and
every thing seemed to concur in forwarding the undertaking.
Norfolk, notwithstanding these criminal enterprises, had never entirely
forgotten his duty to his sovereign, his country, and his religion: and
though he had laid the plan both of an invasion and an insurrection,
he still flattered himself, that the innocence of his intentions would
justify the violence of his measures, and that, as he aimed at nothing
but the liberty of the queen of Scots, and the obtaining of Elizabeth’s
consent to his marriage, he could not justly reproach himself as a rebel
and a traitor.[**] It is certain, however, that, considering the queen’s
vigor and spirit, the scheme, if successful, must finally have ended in
dethroning her; and her authority was here exposed to the utmost danger.
The conspiracy hitherto had entirely escaped the vigilance of Elizabeth,
and that of Secretary Cecil, who now bore the title of Lord Burleigh. It
was from another attempt of Norfolk’s that they first obtained a hint,
which, being diligently traced, led at last to a full discovery. Mary
had intended to send a sum of money to Lord Herreis and her partisans
in Scotland; and Norfolk undertook to have it delivered to Bannister,
a servant of his, at that time in the north, who was to find some
expedient for conveying it to Lord Herreis.[***] He intrusted the money
to a servant who was not in the secret, and told him, that the bag
contained a sum of money in silver, which he was to deliver to Bannister
with a letter: but the servant, conjecturing from the weight and size
of the bag that it was full of gold, carried the letter to Burleigh;
who immediately ordered Bannister, Barker, and Hicford, the duke’s
secretary, to be put under arrest, and to undergo a severe examination.
Torture made them confess the whole truth; and as Hicford, though
ordered to burn all papers, had carefully kept them concealed under
the mats of the duke’s chamber, and under the tiles of the house, full
evidence now appeared against his master.[****]
* State Trials, vol. i. p. 93.
** Lesley, p. 158.
*** Lesley, p. 169. State Trials, vol. i. p. 87. Camden, p.
434. Digges, p. 134, 137, 140. Strype, vol. ii. p. 82.
**** Lesley, p. 173.
Norfolk himself, who was entirely ignorant of the discoveries made by
his servants, was brought before the council; and though exhorted to
atone for his guilt by a full confession, he persisted in denying every
crime with which he was charged. The queen always declared, that if
he had given her this proof of his sincere repentance, she would have
pardoned all his former offences;[*] but finding him obstinate, she
committed him to the Tower, and ordered him to be brought to his trial.
The bishop of Ross had, on some suspicion, been committed to custody
before the discovery of Norfolk’s guilt; and every expedient was
employed to make him reveal his share in the conspiracy. He at first
insisted on his privilege: but he was told, that as his mistress was no
longer a sovereign, he would not be regarded as an ambassador, and
that, even if that character were allowed, it did not warrant him in
conspiring against the sovereign at whose court he resided.[**] As
he still refused to answer interrogatories, he was informed of the
confession made by Norfolk’s servants; after which he no longer scrupled
to make a full discovery; and his evidence put the guilt of that
nobleman beyond all question.
{1572.} A jury of twenty-five peers unanimously passed sentence upon
him. The trial was quite regular, even according to the strict rules
observed at present in these matters; except that the witnesses gave not
their evidence in court, and were not confronted with the prisoner; a
laudable practice, which was not at that time observed in trials for
high treason.
The queen still hesitated concerning Norfolk’s execution; whether that
she was really moved by friendship and compassion towards a peer of that
rank and merit, or that, affecting the praise of clemency, she only put
on the appearance of these sentiments. Twice she signed a warrant for
his execution, and twice revoked the fatal sentence;[***] and though
her ministers and counsellors pushed her to rigor, she still appeared
irresolute and undetermined.
* Lesley, p. 175.
** Lesley, p. 189. Spotswood.
*** Carte, p. 527, from Fenelon’s Despatches. Digges, p.
166. Strype, vol. ii. p. 83.
After four months’ hesitation, a parliament was assembled; and the
commons addressed her in strong terms for the execution of the duke; a
sanction which, when added to the greatness and certainty of his guilt,
would, she thought, justify, in the eyes of all mankind, her severity
against that nobleman. Norfolk died with calmness and constancy; and
though he cleared himself of any disloyal intentions against the queen’s
authority, he acknowledged the justice of the sentence by which he
suffered.[*] That we may relate together affairs of a similar nature,
we shall mention, that the earl of Northumberland, being delivered up
to the queen by the regent of Scotland, was also, a few months after,
brought to the scaffold for his rebellion.
The queen of Scots was either the occasion or the cause of all these
disturbances; but as she was a sovereign princess and might reasonably,
from the harsh treatment which she had met with, think herself entitled
to use any expedient for her relief, Elizabeth durst not, as yet, form
any resolution of proceeding to extremities against her. She only sent
Lord Delawar, Sir Ralph Sadler, Sir Thomas Bromley, and Dr. Wilson, to
expostulate with her, and to demand satisfaction for all those parts
of her conduct, which, from the beginning of her life, had given
displeasure to Elizabeth: her assuming the arms of England, refusing to
ratify the treaty of Edinburgh, intending to marry Norfolk without the
queen’s consent, concurring in the northern rebellion,[**] practising
with Rodolphi to engage the king of Spain in an invasion of
England,[***] procuring the pope’s bull of excommunication, and allowing
her friends abroad to give her the title of queen of England. Mary
justified herself from the several articles of the charge, either
by denying the facts imputed to her, or by throwing the blame on
others.[****] But the queen was little satisfied with her apology;
and the parliament was so enraged against her, that the commons made a
direct application for her immediate trial and execution. They employed
some topics derived from practice, and reason, and the laws of nations;
but the chief stress was laid on passages and examples from the Old
Testament,[v] which, if considered as a general rule of conduct,
(an intention which it is unreasonable to suppose,) would lead to
consequences destructive of all principles of humanity and morality.
Matters were here carried further than Elizabeth intended; and that
princess, satisfied with showing Mary the disposition of the nation,
sent to the house her express commands not to deal any further at
present with the affair of the Scottish queen.[v*]
* Camden, p. 440. Strype, vol. ii. App. p. 23.
** Digges, p. 16, 107. Strype, vol. ii. p. 51, 52.
*** Digges, p. 194, 208, 209. Strype, vol. ii. p. 40, 51.
**** Camden, p. 442.
v D’Ewes, p. 207, 208, etc.
v* D’Ewes, p. 219, 241.
Nothing could be a stronger proof that the puritanical interest
prevailed in the house, than the intemperate use of authorities derived
from Scripture, especially from the Old Testament; and the queen was
so little a lover of that sect, that she was not likely to make any
concession merely in deference to their solicitation. She showed, this
session, her disapprobation of their schemes in another remarkable
instance. The commons had passed two bills for regulating ecclesiastical
ceremonies; but she sent them a like imperious message with her former
ones; and by the terror of her prerogative, she stopped all further
proceeding in those matters[*]
But though Elizabeth would not carry matters to such extremities against
Mary as were recommended by the parliament, she was alarmed at the great
interest and the restless spirit of that princess, as well as her close
connections with Spain; and she thought it necessary both to increase
the rigor and strictness of her confinement, and to follow maxims
different from those which she had hitherto pursued in her management
of Scotland.[**] That kingdom remained still in a state of anarchy. The
Castle of Edinburgh, commanded by Kirkaldy of Grange, had declared for
Mary; and the lords of that party, encouraged by his countenance, had
taken possession of the capital, and carried on a vigorous war against
the regent. By a sudden and unexpected inroad, they seized that nobleman
at Stirling; but finding that his friends, sallying from the castle,
were likely to rescue him, they instantly put him to death. The earl of
Marre was chosen regent in his room, and found the same difficulties in
the government of that divided country. He was therefore glad to accept
of the mediation offered by the French and English ambassadors; and to
conclude, on equal terms, a truce with the queen’s party.[***] He was a
man of free and generous spirit, and scorned to submit to any dependence
on England; and for this reason Elizabeth, who had then formed
intimate connections with France, yielded with less reluctance to
the solicitations of that court, still maintained the appearance of
neutrality between the parties, and allowed matters to remain on a
balance in Scotland.[****]
* D’Ewes, p. 213, 238.
** Digges, p. 152.
*** Spotswood, p. 263.
**** Digges, p. 156, 165, 169.
But affairs soon after took a new turn: Marre died of melancholy, with
which the distracted state of the country affected him: Morton was
chosen regent; and as this nobleman had secretly taken all his measures
with Elizabeth, who no longer relied on the friendship of the French
court, she resolved to exert herself more effectually for the support
of the party which she had always favored. She sent Sir Henry Killegrew
ambassador to Scotland, who found Mary’s partisans so discouraged by the
discovery and punishment of Norfolk’s conspiracy, that they were glad to
submit to the king’s authority, and accept of an indemnity for all past
offences.[*] The duke of Chatelrault and the earl of Huntley, with
the most considerable of Mary’s friends, laid down their arms on these
conditions. The garrison alone of the Castle of Edinburgh continued
refractory. Kirkaldy’s fortunes were desperate; and he flattered himself
with the hopes of receiving assistance from the kings of France and
Spain, who encouraged his obstinacy, in the view of being able, from
that quarter, to give disturbance to England. Elizabeth was alarmed with
the danger; she no more apprehended making an entire breach with the
queen of Scots, who, she found, would not any longer be amused by her
artifices; she had an implicit reliance on Morton; and she saw, that
by the submission of all the considerable nobility, the pacification of
Scotland would be an easy, as well as a most important undertaking. She
ordered, therefore, Sir William Drury, governor of Berwick, to march
with some troops and artillery to Edinburgh, and to besiege the
castle.[**]
* Spotswood, p. 268.
** Camden, p, 443.
The garrison surrendered at discretion: Kirkaldy was delivered into the
hands of his countrymen, by whom he was tried, condemned, and executed;
Secretary Lidington, who had taken part with him, died, soon after, a
voluntary death, as is supposed; and Scotland submitting entirely to
the regent, gave not, during a long time, any further inquietude to
Elizabeth.
The events which happened in France were not so agreeable to the queen’s
interests and inclinations. The fallacious pacifications, which had been
so often made with the Hugonots, gave them reason to suspect the present
intentions of the court; and after all the other leaders of that party
were deceived into a dangerous credulity, the sagacious admiral still
remained doubtful and uncertain. But his suspicions were at last
overcome, partly by the profound dissimulation of Charles, partly by his
own earnest desire to end the miseries of France, and return again
to the performance of his duty towards his prince and country. He
considered, besides, that as the former violent conduct of the court had
ever met with such fatal success, it was not unlikely that a prince, who
had newly come to years of discretion, and appeared not to be rivetted
in any dangerous animosities or prejudices, would be induced to govern
himself by more moderate maxims. And as Charles was young, was of a
passionate, hasty temper, and addicted to pleasure,[*] such deep
perfidy seemed either remote from his character, or difficult and
almost impossible to be so uniformly supported by him. Moved by these
considerations, the admiral, the queen of Navarre, and all the Hugonots,
began to repose themselves in full security, and gave credit to the
treacherous caresses and professions of the French court. Elizabeth
herself, notwithstanding her great experience and penetration,
entertained not the least distrust of Charles’s sincerity; and being
pleased to find her enemies of the house of Guise removed from all
authority, and to observe an animosity every day growing between the
French and Spanish monarchs, she concluded a defensive league with the
former,[**] and regarded this alliance as an invincible barrier to her
throne. Walsingham, her ambassador, sent her over, by every courier, the
most satisfactory accounts of the honor, and plain dealing, and fidelity
of that perfidious prince.
* Digges, p. 8, 39.
** Camden, p. 443.
The better to blind the jealous Hugonots, and draw their leaders into
the snare prepared for them, Charles offered his sister, Margaret,
in marriage to the prince of Navarre; and the admiral, with all the
considerable nobility of the party, had come to Paris, in order to
assist at the celebration of these nuptials, which, it was hoped, would
finally, if not compose the differences, at least appease the bloody
animosity of the two religions. The queen of Navarre was poisoned
by orders from the court; the admiral was dangerously wounded by an
assassin: yet Charles, redoubling his dissimulation, was still able
to retain the Hugonots in their security; till, on the evening of St.
Bartholomew, a few days after the marriage, the signal was given for a
general massacre of those religionists, and the king himself in person
led the way to these assassinations. The hatred long entertained by
the Parisians against the Protestants, made them second, without any
preparation, the fury of the court; and persons of every condition, age,
and sex, suspected of any propensity to that religion, were involved in
an undistinguished ruin. The admiral, his son-in-law Teligni, Soubize,
Rochefoucault, Pardaillon, Piles, Lavardin, men who, during the late
wars, had signalized themselves by the most heroic actions, were
miserably butchered without resistance; the streets of Paris flowed with
blood; and the people, more enraged than satiated with their cruelty,
as if repining that death had saved their victims from further insult,
exercised on their dead bodies all the rage of the most licentious
brutality. About five hundred gentlemen and men of rank perished in this
massacre; and near ten thousand of inferior condition.[*] Orders were
instantly despatched to all the provinces for a like general execution
of the Protestants; and in Rouen, Lyons, and many other cities, the
people emulated the fury of the capital. Even the murder of the king of
Navarre, and prince of Condé, had been proposed by the duke of Guise;
but Charles, softened by the amiable manners of the king of Navarre,
and hoping that these young princes might easily be converted to the
Catholic faith, determined to spare their lives, though he obliged them
to purchase their safety by a seeming change of their religion.
Charles, in order to cover this barbarous perfidy, pretended that
a conspiracy of the Hugonots to seize his person had been suddenly
detected; and that he had been necessitated, for his own defence, to
proceed to this severity against them. He sent orders to Fenelon, his
ambassador in England, to ask an audience, and to give Elizabeth this
account of the late transaction. That minister, a man of probity,
abhorred the treachery and cruelty of his court, and even scrupled not
to declare that he was now ashamed to bear the name of Frenchman;[**]
yet he was obliged to obey his orders, and make use of the apology which
had been prescribed to him. He met with that reception from all the
courtiers which he knew the conduct of his master had so well merited.
Nothing could be more awful and affecting than the solemnity of his
audience. A melancholy sorrow sat on every face: silence, as in the dead
of night, reigned through all the chambers of the royal apartment: the
courtiers and ladies, clad in deep mourning, were ranged on each side,
and allowed him to pass without affording him one salute or favorable
look, till he was admitted to the queen herself.[***]
* Davila, lib. v.
** Digges, p. 24[**?]
*** Carte, vol. iii. p. 522,
That princess received him with a more easy, if not a more gracious
countenance; and heard from Fenelon’s Despatches, his apology, without
discovering any visible symptoms of indignation. She then told him, that
though, on the first rumor of this dreadful intelligence, she had been
astonished that so many brave men and loyal subjects, who rested secure
on the faith of their sovereign, should have been suddenly butchered
in so barbarous a manner, she had hitherto suspended her judgment, till
further and more certain information should be brought her: that
the account which he had given, even if founded on no mistake or bad
information, though it might alleviate, would by no means remove the
blame of the king’s counsellors, or justify the strange irregularity of
their proceedings: that the same force which, without resistance, had
massacred so many defenceless men, could easily have secured their
persons, and have reserved them for a trial, and for punishment by a
legal sentence, which would have distinguished the innocent from the
guilty: that the admiral in particular, being dangerously wounded,
and environed by the guards of the king, on whose protection he seemed
entirely to rely, had no means of escape, and might surely, before his
death, have been convicted of the crimes imputed to him: that it was
more worthy of a sovereign to reserve in his own hands the sword of
justice, than to commit it to bloody murderers, who, being the declared
and mortal enemies of the persons accused, employed it without mercy and
without distinction: that if these sentiments were just, even supposing
the conspiracy of the Protestants to be real, how much more so if that
crime was a calumny of their enemies, invented for their destruction?
that if, upon inquiry, the innocence of these unhappy victims should
afterwards appear, it was the king’s duty to turn his vengeance on their
defamers, who had thus cruelly abused his confidence, had murdered so
many of his brave subjects, and had done what in them lay to cover him
with everlasting dishonor: and that for her part, she should form her
judgment of his intentions by his subsequent conduct; and in the mean
time should act as desired by the ambassador and rather pity than blame
his master for the extremities to which he had been carried.[*]
* Digges, p. 247, 248.
Elizabeth was fully sensible of the dangerous situation in which she
now stood. In the massacre of Paris, she saw the result of that general
conspiracy formed for the extermination of the Protestants; and she knew
that she herself, as the head and protectress of the new religion, was
exposed to the fury and resentment of the Catholics. The violence and
cruelty of the Spaniards in the Low Countries was another branch of the
same conspiracy; and as Charles and Philip, two princes nearly allied in
perfidy and barbarity, as well as in bigotry, had now laid aside their
pretended quarrel, and had avowed the most entire friendship,[*] she had
reason, as soon as they had appeased their domestic commotions, to dread
the effects of their united counsels. The duke of Guise also, and his
family, whom Charles, in order to deceive the admiral, had hitherto
kept at a distance, had now acquired an open and entire ascendant in the
court of France; and she was sensible that these princes, from personal
as well as political reasons, were her declared and implacable enemies.
The queen of Scots, their near relation and close confederate, was the
pretender to her throne; and though detained in custody, was actuated by
a restless spirit, and, besides her foreign allies, possessed numerous
and zealous partisans in the heart of the kingdom. For these reasons
Elizabeth thought it more prudent not to reject all commerce with the
French monarch, but still to listen to the professions of friendship
which he made her. She allowed even the negotiations to be renewed for
her marriage with the duke of Alençon, Charles’s third brother:[**]
those with the duke of Anjou had already been broken off. She sent
the earl of Worcester to assist in her name at the baptism of a young
princess, born to Charles; but before she agreed to give him this last
mark of condescension, she thought it becoming her dignity to renew her
expressions of blame, and even of detestation, against the cruelties
exercised on his Protestant subjects.[***] Meanwhile, she prepared
herself for that attack which seemed to threaten her from the combined
power and violence of the Romanists: she fortified Portsmouth, put her
fleet in order, exercised her militia, cultivated popularity with her
subjects, acted with vigor for the further reduction of Scotland under
obedience to the young king, and renewed her alliance with the German
princes, who were no less alarmed than herself at these treacherous and
sanguinary measures, so universally embraced by the Catholics.
* Digges, p. 268, 282.
** Digges, passim. Camden, p. 447.
*** Digges, p. 297, 298. Camden, p. 447.
But though Elizabeth cautiously avoided coming to extremities with
Charles, the greatest security that she possessed against his violence
was derived from the difficulties which the obstinate resistance of the
Hugonots still created to him.
{1573.} Such of that sect as lived near the frontiers, immediately,
on the first news of the massacres, fled into England, Germany, or
Switzerland; where they excited the compassion and indignation of
the Protestants, and prepared themselves, with increased forces and
redoubled zeal, to return into France, and avenge the treacherous
slaughter of their brethren. Those who lived in the middle of the
kingdom took shelter in the nearest garrisons occupied by the Hugonots;
and finding that they could repose no faith in capitulations, and expect
no clemency, were determined to defend themselves to the last extremity.
The sect which Charles had hoped at one blow to exterminate, had now an
army of eighteen thousand men on foot, and possessed, in different parts
of the kingdom, above a hundred cities, castles, or fortresses;[*] nor
could that prince deem himself secure from the invasion threatened
him by all the other Protestants in Europe. The nobility and gentry of
England were roused to such a pitch of resentment, that they offered
to levy an army of twenty-two thousand foot and four thousand horse, to
transport them into France, and to maintain them six months at their own
charge: but Elizabeth, who was cautious in her measures, and who feared
to inflame further the quarrel between the two religions by these
dangerous crusades, refused her consent, and moderated the zeal of her
subjects.[**] The German princes, less political, or more secure from
the resentment of France, forwarded the levies made by the Protestants;
and the young prince of Condé, having escaped from court, put himself at
the head of these troops, and prepared to invade the kingdom. The duke
of Alençon, the king of Navarre, the family of Montmorency, and many
considerable men even among the Catholics, displeased, either on a
private or public account, with the measures of the court, favored the
progress of the Hugonots; and every thing relapsed into confusion.
{1574.} The king, instead of repenting his violent counsels, which
had brought matters to such extremities, called aloud for new
violences;[***] nor could even the mortal distemper, under which he
labored, moderate the rage and animosity by which he was actuated. He
died without male issue, at the age of twenty-five years; a prince,
whose character, containing that unusual mixture of dissimulation and
ferocity, of quick resentment and unrelenting vengeance, executed the
greatest mischiefs, and threatened still worse, both to his native
country and to all Europe.
* Digges, p. 343.
** Digges, p. 335, 341.
*** Davila, lib.
Henry, duke of Anjou, who had some time before been elected king of
Poland, no sooner heard of his brother’s death, than he hastened to
take possession of the throne of France; and found the kingdom not only
involved in the greatest present disorders, but exposed to infirmities
for which it was extremely difficult to provide any suitable remedy.
{1575.} The people were divided into two theological factions, furious
from their zeal, and mutually enraged from the injuries which they had
committed or suffered; and as all faith had been violated and moderation
banished, it seemed impracticable to find any terms of composition
between them. Each party had devoted itself to leaders whose commands
had more authority than the will of the sovereign; and even the
Catholics, to whom the king was attached, were entirely conducted by the
counsels of Guise and his family. The religious connections had, on both
sides, superseded the civil; or rather, (for men will always be guided
by present interest,) two empires being secretly formed in the kingdom,
every individual was engaged by new views of interest to follow those
leaders to whom, during the course of past convulsions, he had been
indebted for his honors and preferment.
Henry, observing the low condition of the crown, had laid a scheme for
restoring his own authority, by acting as umpire between the parties, by
moderating their differences, and by reducing both to a dependence upon
himself. He possessed all the talents of dissimulation requisite for
the execution of this delicate plan; but being deficient in vigor,
application, and sound judgment, instead of acquiring a superiority over
both factions, he lost the confidence of both, and taught the partisans
of each to adhere still more closely to their particular leaders, whom
they found more cordial and sincere in the cause which they espoused.
{1576.} The Hugonots were strengthened by the accession of a German
army under the prince of Condé and Prince Casimir; but much more by the
credit and personal virtues of the king of Navarre, who, having fled
from court, had placed himself at the head of that formidable party.
Henry, in prosecution of his plan, entered into a composition with them;
and being desirous of preserving a balance between the sects, he granted
them peace on the most advantageous conditions. This was the fifth
general peace made with the Hugonots, but though it was no more sincere
on the part of the court than any of the former, it gave the highest
disgust to the Catholics; and afforded the duke of Guise the desired
pretence of declaiming against the measures, and maxims, and conduct of
the king.
That artful and bold leader took thence an occasion of reducing his
party into a more formed and regular body; and he laid the first
foundations of the famous “league,” which, without paying any regard to
the royal authority, aimed at the entire suppression of the Hugonots.
Such was the unhappy condition of France, from the past severities
and violent conduct of its princes, that toleration could no longer
be admitted; and a concession for liberty of conscience, which would
probably have appeased the reformers, excited the greatest resentment in
the Catholics.
{1577.} Henry, in order to divert the force of the league from himself,
and even to elude its efforts against the Hugonots, declared himself the
head of that seditious confederacy, and took the field as leader of the
Romanists. But his dilatory and feeble measures betrayed his reluctance
to the undertaking; and after some unsuccessful attempts, he concluded
a new peace, which, though less favorable than the former to the
Protestants, gave no contentment to the Catholics. Mutual diffidence
still prevailed between the parties; the king’s moderation was
suspicious to both; each faction continued to fortify itself against
that breach, which, they foresaw, must speedily ensue; theological
controversy daily whetted the animosity of the sects; and every private
injury became the ground of a public quarrel.
{1578.} The king, hoping by his artifice and subtlety to allure the
nation into a love of pleasure and repose, was himself caught in the
snare; and sinking into a dissolute indolence, wholly lost the esteem,
and, in a great measure, the affections, of his people. Instead of
advancing such men of character and abilities as were neuters between
these dangerous factions, he gave all his confidence to young, agreeable
favorites, who, unable to prop his falling authority, leaned entirely
upon it, and inflamed the general odium against his administration. The
public burdens, increased by his profuse liberality, and felt more heavy
on a disordered kingdom, became another ground of complaint: and the
uncontrolled animosity of parties, joined to the multiplicity of taxes,
rendered peace more calamitous than any open state of foreign or even
domestic hostility.
{1579.} The artifices of the king too refined to succeed, and too
frequent to be concealed; and the plain, direct, and avowed conduct of
the duke of Guise on one side, and that of the king of Navarre on the
other, drew by degrees the generality of the nation to devote themselves
without reserve to one or the other of those great leaders.
The civil commotions of France were of too general importance to be
overlooked by the other princes of Europe; and Elizabeth’s foresight and
vigilance, though somewhat restrained by her frugality, led her to take
secretly some part in them. Besides employing on all occasions her good
offices in favor of the Hugonots, she had expended no inconsiderable
sums in levying that army of Germans which the prince of Condé and
Prince Casimir conducted into France;[*] and notwithstanding her
negotiations with the court, and her professions of amity, she always
considered her own interests as connected with the prosperity of the
French Protestants, and the depression of the house of Guise. Philip,
on the other hand, had declared himself protector of the league; had
entered into the closest correspondence with Guise; and had employed
all his authority in supporting the credit of that factious leader. This
sympathy of religion, which of itself begat a connection of interests,
was one considerable inducement; but that monarch had also in view the
subduing of his rebellious subjects in the Netherlands; who, as they
received great encouragement from the French Protestants, would, he
hoped, finally despair of success, after the entire suppression of their
friends and confederates.
* Camden, p 452.
The same political views which engaged Elizabeth to support the Hugonots
would have led her to assist the distressed Protestants in the Low
Countries; but the mighty power of Philip, the tranquillity of all
his other dominions, and the great force which he maintained in these
mutinous provinces, kept her in awe, and obliged her, notwithstanding
all temptations and all provocations, to preserve some terms of amity
with that monarch. The Spanish ambassador represented to her, that many
of the Flemish exiles, who infested the seas, and preyed on his master’s
subjects, were received into the harbors of England, and were there
allowed to dispose of their prizes; and by these remonstrances the queen
found herself under a necessity of denying them all entrance into her
dominions.
But this measure proved in the issue extremely prejudicial to the
interests of Philip. These desperate exiles, finding no longer any
possibility of subsistence, were forced to attempt the most perilous
enterprises; and they made an assault on the Brille, a seaport town
in Holland, where they met with success, and after a short resistance
became masters of the place.[*]
* Camden, p. 443.
The duke of Alva was alarmed at the danger; and stopping those bloody
executions which he was making on the defenceless Flemings, he hastened
with his army to extinguish the flame, which, falling on materials so
well prepared for combustion, seemed to menace a general conflagration.
His fears soon appeared to be well grounded. The people in the
neighborhood of the Brille, enraged by that complication of cruelty,
oppression, insolence, usurpation, and persecution, under which they and
all their countrymen labored, flew to arms; and in a few days almost all
the whole province of Holland and that of Zealand had revolted from the
Spaniards, and had openly declared against the tyranny of Alva. This
event happened in the year 1572.
William, prince of Orange, descended from a sovereign family of great
lustre and antiquity in Germany, inheriting the possessions of
a sovereign family in France, had fixed his residence in the Low
Countries; and on account of his noble birth and immense riches, as
well as of his personal merit, was universally regarded as the greatest
subject that lived in those provinces. He had opposed, by all regular
and dutiful means, the progress of the Spanish usurpations; and
when Alva conducted his army into the Netherlands, and assumed the
government, this prince, well acquainted with the violent character of
the man, and the tyrannical spirit of the court of Madrid, wisely fled
from the danger which threatened him, and retired to his paternal estate
and dominions in Germany. He was cited to appear before Alva’s
tribunal, was condemned in absence, was declared a rebel, and his ample
possessions in the Low Countries were confiscated. In revenge, he had
levied an army of Protestants in the empire, and had made some attempts
to restore the Flemings to liberty; but was still repulsed with loss by
the vigilance and military conduct of Alva, and by the great bravery
as well as discipline of those veteran Spaniards who served under that
general.
The revolt of Holland and Zealand, provinces which the prince of Orange
had formerly commanded, and where he was much beloved, called him anew
from his retreat; and he added conduct, no less than spirit, to that
obstinate resistance which was here made to the Spanish dominion. By
uniting the revolted cities in a league, he laid the foundation of that
illustrious commonwealth, the offspring of industry and liberty, whose
arms and policy have long made so signal a figure in every transaction
of Europe. He inflamed the inhabitants by every motive which religious
zeal, resentment, or love of freedom could inspire. Though the present
greatness of the Spanish monarchy might deprive them of all courage, he
still flattered them with the concurrence of the other provinces,
and with assistance from neighboring states; and he exhorted them, in
defence of their religion, their liberties, their lives, to endure the
utmost extremities of war. From this spirit proceeded the desperate
defence of Harlem; a defence which nothing but the most consuming famine
could overcome, and which the Spaniards revenged by the execution of
more than two thousand of the inhabitants.[*] This extreme severity,
instead of striking terror into the Hollanders, animated them by
despair; and the vigorous resistance made at Alemaer, where Alva was
finally repulsed, showed them that their insolent enemies were not
invincible. The duke, finding at last the pernicious effects of
his violent counsels, solicited to be recalled; Medinaceli, who was
appointed his successor, refused to accept the government: Requesens,
commendator of Castile, was sent from Italy to replace Alva; and this
tyrant departed from the Netherlands in 1574; leaving his name in
execration to the inhabitants; and boasting in his turn, that, during
the course of five years, he had delivered above eighteen thousand of
these rebellious heretics into the hands of the executioner.[**]
* Bentivoglio, lib. vol.1.*
** Grotius, lib. ii.
Requesens, though a man of milder dispositions, could not appease the
violent hatred which the revolted Hollanders had conceived against the
Spanish government; and the war continued as obstinate as ever. In the
siege of Leyden, under taken by the Spaniards, the Dutch opened the
dikes and sluices, in order to drive them from the enterprise: and the
very peasants were active in ruining their fields by an inundation,
rather than fall again under the hated tyranny of Spain. But
notwithstanding this repulse, the governor still pursued the war; and
the contest seemed too unequal between so mighty a monarchy and two
small provinces, however fortified by nature, and however defended
by the desperate resolution of the inhabitants. The prince of Orange,
therefore, in 1575, was resolved to sue for foreign succor, and to make
applications to one or other of his great neighbors, Henry or Elizabeth.
The court of France was not exempt from the same spirit of tyranny and
persecution which prevailed among the Spaniards; and that kingdom, torn
by domestic dissensions, seemed not to enjoy, at present, either
leisure or ability to pay regard to foreign interests. But England, long
connected both by commerce and alliance with the Netherlands, and now
more concerned in the fate of the revolted provinces by sympathy in
religion, seemed naturally interested in their defence; and as Elizabeth
had justly entertained great jealousy of Philip, and governed her
kingdom in perfect tranquillity, hopes were entertained that her policy,
her ambition, or her generosity, would engage her to, support them under
their present calamities. They sent, therefore, a solemn embassy to
London, consisting of St. Aldegonde, Douza, Nivelle, Buys, and Melsen;
and after employing the most humble supplications to the queen, they
offered her the possession and sovereignty of their provinces, if she
would exert her power in their defence.
There were many strong motives which might impel Elizabeth to accept of
so liberal an offer. She was apprised of the injuries which Philip
had done her, by his intrigues with the malecontents in England and
Ireland:[*] she foresaw the danger which she must incur from a total
prevalence of the Catholics in the Low Countries: and the maritime
situation of those provinces, as well as their command over the great
rivers, was an inviting circumstance to a nation like the English, who
were beginning to cultivate commerce and naval power.
* Digges, p. 73.
But this princess, though magnanimous, had never entertained the
ambition of making conquests, or gaining new acquisitions; and the whole
purpose of her vigilant and active politics was to maintain, by the most
frugal and cautious expedients, the tranquillity of her own dominions.
An open war with the Spanish monarchy was the apparent consequence of
her accepting the dominion of these provinces; and after taking the
inhabitants under her protection, she could never afterwards in honor
abandon them, but, however desperate their defence might become, she
must embrace it, even further than her convenience or interests
would permit. For these reasons, she refused, in positive terms, the
sovereignty proffered her; but told the ambassadors, that, in return for
the good will which the prince of Orange and the states had shown
her, she would endeavor to mediate an agreement for them, on the most
reasonable terms that could be obtained.[*]
* Camden, p. 453, 454.
She sent accordingly Sir Henry Cobham to Philip; and represented to him
the danger which he would incur of losing entirely the Low Countries, if
France could obtain the least interval from her intestine disorders, and
find leisure to offer her protection to those mutinous and discontented
provinces. Philip seemed to take this remonstrance in good part; but no
accord ensued, and war in the Netherlands continued with the same rage
and violence as before.
It was an accident that delivered the Hollanders from their present
desperate situation. Requesens, the governor, dying suddenly, the
Spanish troops, discontented for want of pay, and licentious for want
of a proper authority to command them, broke into a furious mutiny, and
threw every thing into confusion. They sacked and pillaged the cities of
Maestricht and Antwerp, and executed great slaughter on the inhabitants:
they threatened the other cities with a like fate: and all the
provinces, excepting Luxembourg, united for mutual defence against their
violence, and called in the prince of Orange and the Hollanders as their
protectors. A treaty, commonly called the Pacification of Ghent, was
formed by common agreement; and the removal of foreign troops, with
the restoration of their ancient liberties, was the object which the
provinces mutually stipulated to pursue. Don John of Austria, natural
brother to Philip, being appointed governor, found, on his arrival at
Luxembourg, that the states had so fortified themselves, and that the
Spanish troops were so divided by their situation, that there was no
possibility of resistance; and he agreed to the terms required of him.
The Spaniards evacuated the country; and these provinces seemed at last
to breathe a little from their calamities.
But it was not easy to settle entire peace, while the thirst of revenge
and dominion governed the king of Spain, and while the Flemings were so
strongly agitated with resentment of past, and fear of future injuries.
The ambition of Don John, who coveted this great theatre for his
military talents engaged him rather to inflame than appease the quarrel;
and as he found the states determined to impose very strict limitations
on his authority, he broke all articles, seized Namur, and procured the
recall of the Spanish army from Italy. This prince, endowed with a lofty
genius, and elated by the prosperous successes of his youth, had opened
his mind to vast undertakings; and looking much beyond the conquest of
the revolted provinces, had projected to espouse the queen of Scots,
and to acquire in her right the dominion of the British kingdoms.[*]
Elizabeth was aware of his intentions; and seeing now, from the union of
all the provinces, a fair prospect of their making a long and vigorous
defence against Spain, she no longer scrupled to embrace the protection
of their liberties, which seemed so intimately connected with her own
safety. After sending them a sum of money, about twenty thousand pounds,
for the immediate pay of their troops, she concluded a treaty with them;
in which she stipulated to assist them with five thousand foot and
a thousand horse, at the charge of the Flemings; and to lend them a
hundred thousand pounds, on receiving the bonds of some of the most
considerable towns of the Netherlands, for her repayment within the
year. It was further agreed, that the commander of the English army
should be admitted into the council of the states; and nothing be
determined concerning war or peace, without previously informing the
queen or him of it; that they should enter into no league without
her consent; that if any discord arose among themselves, it should be
referred to her arbitration; and that, if any prince, on any pretext,
should attempt hostilities against her, they should send to her
assistance an army equal to that which she had employed in their
defence. This alliance was signed on the seventh of January, 1578.[**]
* Camden, p. 466. Grotius, lib. iii.
** Camden, p. 466.
One considerable inducement to the queen for entering into treaty with
the states, was to prevent their throwing themselves into the arms of
France; and she was desirous to make the king of Spain believe that it
was her sole motive. She represented to him, by her ambassador, Thomas
Wilkes, that hitherto she had religiously acted the part of a good
neighbor and ally; had refused the sovereignty of Holland and Zealand
when offered her, had advised the prince of Orange to submit to the
king; and had even accompanied her counsel with menaces, in case of his
refusal. She persevered, she said, in the same friendly intentions; and,
as a proof of it, would venture to interpose with her advice for the
composure of the present differences: let Don John, whom she could not
but regard as her mortal enemy, be recalled; let some other prince more
popular be substituted in his room; let the Spanish armies be withdrawn;
let the Flemings be restored to their ancient liberties and privileges;
and if, after these concessions, they were still obstinate not to return
to their duty, she promised to join her arms with those of the king of
Spain, and force them to compliance. Philip dissembled his resentment
against the queen, and still continued to supply Don John with money and
troops. That prince, though once repulsed at Rimenant by the valor of
the English, under Norris, and though opposed, as well by the army of
the states as by Prince Casimir, who had conducted to the Low Countries
a great body of Germans paid by the queen, gained a great advantage
over the Flemings at Gemblours; but was cut off in the midst of his
prosperity by poison, given him secretly, as was suspected, by orders
from Philip, who dreaded his ambition. The prince of Parma succeeded to
the command; who, uniting valor and clemency, negotiation and military
exploits, made great progress against the revolted Flemings, and
advanced the progress of the Spaniards by his arts as well as by his
arms.
During these years, while Europe was almost every where in great
commotion, England enjoyed a profound tranquillity; owing chiefly to
the prudence and vigor of the queen’s administration, and to the wise
precautions which she employed in all her measures. By supporting
the zealous Protestants in Scotland, she had twice given them the
superiority over their antagonists, had closely connected their
interests with her own, and had procured herself entire security from
that quarter whence the most dangerous invasions could be made upon her.
She saw in France her enemies, the Guises, though extremely powerful,
yet counterbalanced by the Hugo*nots, her zealous partisans, and even
hated by the king, who was jealous of their restless and exorbitant
ambition. The bigotry of Philip gave her just ground of anxiety; but the
same bigotry had happily excited the most obstinate opposition among his
own subjects, and had created him enemies whom his arms and policy were
not likely soon to subdue. The queen of Scots, her antagonist and rival,
and the pretender to her throne, was a prisoner in her hands; and, by
her impatience and high spirit, had been engaged in practices which
afforded the queen a pretence for rendering her confinement more
rigorous, and for cutting off her communication with her partisans in
England.
Religion was the capital point on which depended all the political
transactions of that age; and the queen’s conduct in this particular,
making allowance for the prevailing prejudices of the times, could
scarcely be accused of severity or imprudence. She established no
inquisition into men’s bosoms; she imposed no oath of supremacy, except
on those who received trust or emolument from the public; and though
the exercise of every religion but the established was prohibited by
statute, the violation of this law, by saying mass, and receiving the
sacrament, in private houses, was in many instances connived at;[*]
while, on the other hand, the Catholics, in the beginning of her reign,
showed little reluctance against going to church, or frequenting the
ordinary duties of public worship. The pope, sensible that this practice
would by degrees reconcile all his partisans to the reformed religion,
hastened the publication of the bull which excommunicated the queen, and
freed her subjects from their oaths of allegiance; and great pains were
taken by the emissaries of Rome, to render the breach between the two
religions as wide as possible, and to make the frequenting of Protestant
churches appear highly criminal in the Catholics.[**] These practices,
with the rebellion which ensued, increased the vigilance and severity of
the government; but the Romanists, if their condition were compared with
that of the nonconformists in other countries, and with their own
maxims where they domineered, could not justly complain of violence or
persecution.
* Camden, p. 459.
** Walsingham’s Letter in Burnet, vol. ii. p. 418. Cabala,
p. 406.
The queen appeared rather more anxious to keep a strict hand over
the Puritans; who, though their pretensions were not so immediately
dangerous to her authority, seemed to be actuated by a more unreasonable
obstinacy, and to retain claims, of which, both in civil and
ecclesiastical matters, it was as yet difficult to discern the full
scope and intention. Some secret attempts of that sect to establish a
separate congregation and discipline, had been carefully repressed in
the beginning of this reign;[*] and when any of the established clergy
discovered a tendency to their principles, by omitting the legal habits
or ceremonies, the queen had shown a determined resolution to punish
them by fines and deprivation;[**] though her orders to that purpose had
been frequently eluded, by the secret protection which these sectaries
received from some of her most considerable courtiers.
But what chiefly tended to gain Elizabeth the hearts of her subjects,
was her frugality, which, though carried sometimes to an extreme, led
her not to amass treasures, but only to prevent impositions upon her
people, who were at that time very little accustomed to bear the burdens
of government. By means of her rigid economy, she paid all the debts
which she found on the crown, with their full interest; though some
of these debts had been contracted even during the reign of her
father.[***] Some loans, which she had exacted at the commencement
of her reign, were repaid by her; a practice in that age somewhat
unusual;[****] and she established her credit on such a footing, that no
sovereign in Europe could more readily command any sum which the public
exigencies might at any time require.[v] During this peaceable and
uniform government, England furnishes few materials for history; and
except the small part which Elizabeth took in foreign transactions,
there scarcely passed any occurrence which requires a particular detail.
* Strype’s Life of Parker, p. 342. Strype’s Life of Grindal,
p. 315.
** Heylin, p. 165, 166.
*** D’Ewes, p. 245. Camden, p. 446.
**** D’Ewes, p. 245.
v D’Ewes, p. 246.
The most memorable event in this period was a session of parliament,
held on the eighth of February, 1576; where debates were started which
may appear somewhat curious and singular. Peter Wentworth, a Puritan,
who had signalized himself in former parliaments by his free and
undaunted spirit, opened this session with a premeditated harangue,
which drew on him the indignation of the house, and gave great offence
to the queen and the ministers. As it seems to contain a rude sketch
of those principles of liberty which happily gained afterwards the
ascendant in England, it may not be improper to give, in a few words,
the substance of it. He premised, that the very name of liberty is
sweet; but the thing itself is precious beyond the most inestimable
treasures and that it behoved them to be careful, lest, contenting
themselves with the sweetness of the name, they forego the substance,
and abandon what of all earthly possessions was of the highest value
to the kingdom. He then proceeded to observe, that freedom of speech in
that house,--a privilege so useful both to sovereign and subject,--had
been formerly infringed in many essential articles, and was at present
exposed to the most imminent danger: that it was usual, when any subject
of importance was handled, especially if it regarded religion, to
surmise, that these topics were disagreeable to the queen, and that the
further proceeding in them would draw down her indignation upon their
temerity: that Solomon had justly affirmed the king’s displeasure to be
a messenger of death; and it was no wonder if men, even though urged by
motives of conscience and duty, should be inclined to stop short when
they found themselves exposed to so severe a penalty: that by the
employing of this argument, the house was incapacitated from serving
their country, and even from serving the queen herself, whose ears,
besieged by pernicious flatterers, were thereby rendered inaccessible
to the most salutary truths: that it was a mockery to call an assembly
a parliament, yet deny it that privilege which was so essential to its
being, and without which it must degenerate into an abject school
of servility and dissimulation: that as the parliament was the great
guardian of the laws, they ought to have liberty to discharge their
trust, and to maintain that authority whence even kings themselves
derive their being: that a king was constituted such by law, and though
he was not dependent on man, yet was he subordinate to God and the law,
and was obliged to make their prescriptions, not his own will, the rule
of his conduct: that even his commission, as God’s vicegerent, enforced,
instead of loosening this obligation; since he was thereby invested with
authority to execute on earth the will of God, which is nothing but
law and justice: that though these surmises of displeasing the queen by
their proceedings, had impeached, in a very essential point, all freedom
of speech,--a privilege granted them by a special law,--yet was there
a more express and more dangerous invasion made on their liberties, by
frequent messages from the throne: that it had become a practice, when
the house was entering on any question, either ecclesiastical or civil,
to bring an order from the queen, inhibiting them absolutely from
treating of such matters, and debarring them from all further discussion
of these momentous articles: that the prelates, emboldened by her royal
protection, had assumed a decisive power in all questions of religion,
and required that every one should implicitly submit his faith to their
arbitrary determinations: that the love which he bore his sovereign
forbade him to be silent under such abuses, or to sacrifice, on this
important occasion, his duty to servile flattery and complaisance; and
that, as no earthly creature was exempt from fault, so neither was the
queen herself; but, in imposing this servitude on her faithful commons,
had committed a great and even dangerous fault against herself and the
whole commonwealth.[*]
It is easy to observe from this speech, that, in this dawn of liberty,
the parliamentary style was still crude and unformed; and that
the proper decorum of attacking ministers and counsellors, without
interesting the honor of the crown, or mentioning the person of the
sovereign, was not yet entirely established. The commons expressed great
displeasure at this unusual license; they sequestered Wentworth from
the house, and committed him prisoner to the serjeant at arms. They
even ordered him to be examined by a committee, consisting of all those
members who were also members of the privy council; and a report to be
next day made to the house. This committee met in the star chamber, and,
wearing the aspect of that arbitrary court, summoned Wentworth to appear
before them, and answer for his behavior. But though the commons had
discovered so little delicacy or precaution in thus confounding their
own authority with that of the star chamber, Wentworth better understood
the principles of liberty, and refused to give these counsellors any
account of his conduct in parliament, till he were satisfied that they
acted, not as members of the privy council, but as a committee of the
house.[**] He justified his liberty of speech by pleading the rigor and
hardship of the queen’s messages; and notwithstanding that the committee
showed him, by instances in other reigns, that the practice of sending
such messages was not unprecedented, he would not agree to express any
sorrow or repentance. The issue of the affair was, that after a month’s
confinement, the queen sent to the commons, informing them, that, from
her special grace and favor, she had restored him to his liberty and to
his place in the house.[***]
* D’Ewes, p. 236, 237, etc.
** D’Ewes, p. 244.
*** D’Ewes, p. 241.
By this seeming lenity, she indirectly retained the power which she had
assumed, of imprisoning the members and obliging them to answer before
her for their conduct in parliament. And Sir Walter Mildmay endeavored
to make the house sensible of her majesty’s goodness, in so gently
remitting the indignation which she might justly conceive at the
temerity of their member; but he informed them, that they had not the
liberty of speaking what and of whom they pleased; and that indiscreet
freedoms used in that house, had, both in the present and foregoing
ages, met with a proper chastisement. He warned them, therefore, not to
abuse further the queen’s clemency, lest she be constrained, contrary
to her inclination, to turn an unsuccessful lenity into a necessary
severity.[*]
The behavior of the two houses was, in every other respect, equally tame
and submissive. Instead of a bill, which was at first introduced,[**]
for the reformation of the church, they were contented to present a
petition to her majesty for that purpose; and when she told them, that
she would give orders to her bishops to amend all abuses, and, if they
were negligent, she would herself, by her supreme power and authority
over the church, give such redress as would entirely satisfy the nation,
the parliament willingly acquiesced in this sovereign and peremptory
decision.[***]
Though the commons showed so little spirit in opposing the authority
of the crown, they maintained, this session, their dignity against an
encroachment of the peers, and would not agree to a conference which,
they thought, was demanded of them in an irregular manner. They
acknowledged, however, with all humbleness, (such is their expression,)
the superiority of the lords: they only refused to give that house any
reason for their proceedings; and asserted, that where they altered a
bill sent them by the peers, it belonged to them to desire a conference,
not to the upper house to require it.[****]
* D’Ewes, p. 259.
** D’Ewes, p. 252.
*** D’Ewes, p. 257.
**** D’Ewes, p. 263.
The commons granted an aid of one subsidy and two fifteenths. Mildmay,
in order to satisfy the house concerning the reasonableness of this
grant, entered into a detail of the queen’s past expenses in supporting
the government, and of the increasing charges of the crown, from the
daily increase in the price of all commodities. He did not, however,
forge to admonish them, that they were to regard this detail as the pure
effect of the queen’s condescension, since she was not bound to give
them any account how she employed her treasure.[*]
* D’Ewes, p. 246.