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Many of these conspiracies were, with great appearance of reason, imputed to the intrigues of the queen of Scots; [**] and as her name was employed in all of them, the council thought that they could not use too many precautions against the danger of her claims, and the restless activity of her temper. She was removed from under the care of the earl of Shrewsbury, who, though vigilant and faithful in that trust, had also been indulgent to his prisoner, particularly with regard to air and exercise; and she was committed to the custody of Sir Amias Paulet and Sir Drue Drury; men of honor, but inflexible in their care and attention. An association was also set on foot by the earl of Leicester and other courtiers; and as Elizabeth was beloved by the whole nation, except the more zealous Catholics, men of all ranks willingly flocked to the subscription of it. The purport of this association was to defend the queen, to revenge her death, or any injury committed against her, and to exclude from the throne all claimants, what title soever they might possess, by whose suggestion or for whose behoof any violence should be offered to her majesty,[***] The queen of Scots was sensible that this association was levelled against her; and to remove all suspicion from herself, she also desired leave to subscribe it.

* Camden, p. 499.

** Strype, vol. lii. p. 246.

*** State Trials, vol i. p. 122, 123.

Elizabeth, that she might the more discourage malecontents, by showing them the concurrence of the nation in her favor, summoned a new parliament; and she met with that dutiful attachment which she expected. The association was confirmed by parliament; and a clause was added by which the queen was empowered to name commissioners for the trial of any pretender to the crown, who should attempt or imagine any invasion, insurrection, or assassination against her: upon condemnation pronounced by these commissioners, the guilty person was excluded from all claim to the succession, and was further punishable as her majesty should direct. And for greater security, a council of regency, in case of the queen’s violent death, was appointed to govern the kingdom, to settle the succession, and to take vengeance for that act of treason.[*]

A severe law was also enacted against Jesuits and Popish priests: it was ordained, that they should depart the kingdom within forty days; that those who should remain beyond that time, or should afterwards return, should be guilty of treason; that those who harbored or relieved them should be guilty of felony; that those who were educated in seminaries, if they returned not in six months after notice given, and submitted not themselves to the queen, before a bishop or two justices, should be guilty of treason; and that if any, so submitting themselves, should, within ten years, approach the court, or come within ten miles of it, their submission should be void.[**] By this law, the exercise of the Catholic religion, which had formerly been prohibited under lighter penalties, and which was in many instances connived at, was totally suppressed. In the subsequent part of the queen’s reign, the law was sometimes executed by the capital punishment of priests; and though the partisans of that princess asserted that they were punished for their treason, not their religion, the apology must only be understood in this sense, that the law was enacted on account of the treasonable views and attempts of the sect, not that every individual who suffered the penalty of the law was convicted of treason.[***] The Catholics, therefore, might now with justice complain of a violent persecution; which we may safety affirm, in spite of the rigid and bigoted maxims of that age, not to be the best method of converting them, or of reconciling them to the established government and religion.

* 27 Eliz. cap. 1.

* 27 Eliz. cap. 2.

* Some even of those who defend the queen’s measures, allow
that in ten years fifty priests were executed, and fifty-
five banished Camden, p. 649.

The parliament, besides arming the queen with these powers, granted her a supply of one subsidy and two fifteenths. The only circumstance in which their proceedings were disagreeable to her, was an application, made by the commons, for a further reformation in ecclesiastical matters. Yet even in this attempt, which affected her, as well as them, in a delicate point, they discovered how much they were overawed by her authority. The majority of the house were Puritans, or inclined to that sect;[*] but the severe reprimands which they had already, in former sessions, met with from the throne deterred them from introducing any bill concerning religion; a proceeding which would have been interpreted as an encroachment on the prerogative: they were content to proceed by way of humble petition, and that not addressed to her majesty, which would have given offence, but to the house of lords, or rather the bishops, who had a seat in that house, and from whom alone they were willing to receive all advances towards reformation;[**] a strange departure from what we now apprehend to be the dignity of the commons!

* Besides the petition after mentioned, another proof of the
prevalency of the Puritans among the commons was, their
passing a bill for the reverent observance of Sunday, which
they termed the Sabbath, and the depriving the people of
those amusements which they were accustomed to take on that
day. D’Ewes, p. 335. It was a strong symptom of a contrary
spirit in the upper house, that they proposed to add
Wednesday to the fast days, and to prohibit entirely the
eating of flesh on that day. D’Ewes, p. 373.

* D’Ewes, p. 357

The commons desired, in their humble petition, that no bishop should exercise his function of ordination but with the consent and concurrence of six presbyters: but this demand, as it really introduced a change of ecclesiastical government, was firmly rejected by the prelates. They desired, that no clergyman should be instituted into any benefice without previous notice being given to the parish, that they might examine whether there lay any objection to his life or doctrine; an attempt towards a popular model, which naturally met with the same fate. In another article of the petition, they prayed that the bishops should not insist upon every ceremony, or deprive incumbents for omitting part of the service; as if uniformity in public worship had not been established by law; or as if the prelates had been endowed with a dispensing power. They complained of abuses which prevailed in pronouncing the sentence of excommunication, and they entreated the reverend fathers to think of some law for the remedy of these abuses: implying that those matters were too high for the commons of themselves to attempt.

But the most material article which the commons touched upon in their petition, was the court of ecclesiastical commission, and the oath “ex officio,” as it was called, exacted by that court. This is a subject of such importance as to merit some explanation.

The first primate after the queen’s accession, was Parker; a man rigid in exacting conformity to the established worship, and in punishing, by fine or deprivation, all the Puritanical clergymen who attempted to innovate any thing in the habits, ceremonies, or liturgy of the church. He died in 1575; and was succeeded by Grindal, who, as he himself was inclined to the new sect, was with great difficulty brought to execute the laws against them, or to punish the nonconforming clergy. He declined obeying the queen’s orders for the suppression of “prophesyings,” or the assemblies of the zealots in private houses, which, she apprehended, had become so many academies of fanaticism; and for this offence she had, by an order of the star chamber, sequestered him from his archiepiscopal function, and confined him to his own house. Upon his death, which happened in 1583, she determined not to fall into the same error in her next choice; and she named Whitgift, a zealous Churchman, who had already signalized his pen in controversy, and who, having in vain attempted to convince the Puritans by argument, was now resolved to open their eyes by power, and by the execution of penal statutes. He informed the queen, that all the spiritual authority lodged in the prelates was insignificant without the sanction of the crown; and as there was no ecclesiastical commission at that time in force, he engaged her to issue a new one, more arbitrary than any of the former, and conveying more unlimited authority.[*]