_Scandal against Queen Elizabeth_ (Vol. iii., pp. 225. 285. 393.).--I do
not recollect that either of your correspondents on this subject has
brought forward the aspersion upon Queen Elizabeth's fair fame in
precisely the same form in which the Jesuit Sanders places it in the
following passage:--
"Hâc Ecclesiæ contra ipsam sententiâ, et Catholicorum novis
incrementis quotidianis, non mediocriter offensa Elizabetha,
convocatis ordinibus, leges valde iracundas et cruentas contra
veteris fidei cultores promulgat: quibus primum cavetur, _ne quis
Elizabetham hæreticam, schismaticam, infidelem, usurpatricemve,
sub poenâ capitis vocet_. Item. _Ne quis aliam quamcunque certam
personam nominet, cui regnum vel in vitâ, vel post mortem ipsius,
deberi dicatur, exceptâ Elizabethæ naturali prole._ Ea enim sunt
ipsa decreti verba. In eam enim homines vel adulationem vel
necessitatem ita perduxit hæresis, ut quod illud nobilissimum
regnum illegitimæ illius regis sui proli ægre unquam concessit,
nunc _naturali_, id est, _spuriæ_, soboli reginæ in cujus sexu
fornicationis peccatum est foedius, non denegarint: pariter et
reipublicæ, ex proximi successoris ignoratione, extremum
periculum, et Elizabethæ incontinentiam prodentes."--Nicolai
Sanderi _Hist. Schism. Angl._ lib. iii. § Novæ leges latæ in
Catholicos, ann. 1571, ed. 8vo. Col. Agr. 1628, p. 299.
To some of your readers this passage may seem to indicate that the use
of the equivocal word _naturali_ may have given colour, not to say
occasion, to the whole scandal against Queen Elizabeth. By many, I
apprehend, it will be acknowledged that _spuriæ_ is not the only, if an
allowable, interpretation.