for 'uniformity of apparel and ritual,' and submitted them to Cecil for approval. Elizabeth meanwhile had supplemented her first orders by a command that ‘matters in controversy in religion' should not be discussed in sermons; the clergy while wearing Catholic garments were not to criticise Catholic doctrines. The Archbishop told Cecil that while the adversaries' were so busy on the Continent writing against the English Liturgy, this last direction was thought 'too unreasonable;' and implored him not to strain the cord too tight;' while he requested an order in writing from the Queen, addressed to himself and the Bishop of London, as their authority for enforcing her first commands.1

Neither a letter from herself however, nor assistance in any form from the Government, would Elizabeth allow to be given. The bishops should deliver their tale of bricks, but they should have no straw to burn them. They were the appointed authorities, and by them she was determined at once that the work should be done and that the odium of it should be borne.

On

She did something indeed; but not what Parker desired. As if purposely to affront the Protestants, the Court had revived the ceremonies of the Carnival. Shrove Tuesday Leicester gave a tournament and afterwards a masque, where Juno and Diana held an argument on the respective merits of marriage and celibacy. Jupiter, as the umpire, gave sentence at last for matrimony; and the Queen, who had the Spanish ambassador

1 Parker to Cecil, March 3, 1565: Lansdowne MSS. 8.

as usual at her side, whispered to him that is meant for me.' A supper followed, but not till past midnight. As Lent had begun the ambassador declined to eat, and Elizabeth laughed at him. The next day

March 2. being Ash Wednesday, de Silva accompanied

her to St Paul's, where Nowell, the Dean, was to preach. A vast crowd had assembled-more, the Queen thought, to see her than to hear the sermon. The Dean began, and had not proceeded far when he came on the subject of images—which he handled roughly.'

'Leave that alone,' Elizabeth called from her seat. The preacher did not hear, and went on with his invectives. To your text! Mr Dean,' she shouted, raising her voice; To your text; leave that; we have heard enough of that! To your subject.'

The unfortunate Doctor Nowell coloured, stammered out a few incoherent words, and was unable to go on. Elizabeth went off in a rage with her ambassador. The congregation— the Protestant part of it-were in tears.1

Archbishop Parker, seeing the Dean 'utterly dismayed,' took him for pity home to Lambeth to dinner;' and wrote to Cecil a respectful but firm remonstrance. Without the letter for which he had applied he was powerless to move. The bishops, without the support of the Queen or council, would only be laughed at. Let Leicester, Bacon, Cecil himself, and the Queen send for the Protestant ministers if they

1 De Silva to Philip, March 12: MS. Simancas.
2 Parker to Cecil, March 8: Lansdowne MSS. 8.

pleased, and say to them what they pleased. They had begun the trouble, and it was for them to pacify it. 'I can do no good,' he said. 'If the ball shall be tossed unto us, and we have no authority by the Queen's hand, we will sit still; I will no more strive against the stream-fume or chide who will. The Lord be with you ! '1

Still labouring to do his best, the Archbishop called a meeting of the bishops and invited them either to recommend obedience among the clergy or to abstain from encouraging them in resistance. But the bishops were now as angry as the Queen. They refused in a body to 'discourage good Protestants;' and Parker told Elizabeth plainly that unless she supported him in carrying them out the injunctions must be modified. He had to deal with men who would offer themselves to lose all, yea, their bodies to prison, rather than condescend;' while the lawyers told him that he could not deprive incumbents of their livings with no more warrant but the Queen's mouth.'

The

While Parker addressed the Queen, the other bishops waited on Cecil with the same protest. Reforming clergy, they said, refused everywhere 'to wear the apparel of Satan;''Christ had no fellowship with Belial;' and 'for themselves they would not be made Papists in disguise.'

Cecil, who knew that all appeals to Elizabeth in her present humour would only exasperate her, replied that

1 Parker to Cecil, March 8: Lansdowne MSS.

VOL. VII.

17

'they talked more rhetoric than reason; the Queen must be obeyed or worse would follow.'1

Never were human beings in a more cruel position. Elizabeth sat still in malicious enjoyment of the torture which she was inflicting, while Parker and Grindal, after a fresh consultation with the lawyers, undertook at last to summon the London clergy and attempt to extort a promise from them to obey the Act of Uniformity; if the clergy refused, the Archbishop supposed that the Court was prepared for the consequences, and that he must proceed to sequestration and deprivation; but while he consented to submit to the Queen's commands he warned Cecil of the inevitable consequences : many churches would be left destitute of service; many ministers would forsake their livings and live at printing, teaching children, or otherwise as they could : 'what tumults would follow, what speeches and talks were like to rise in the realm and in the city, he left it to Cecil's wisdom to consider;' and driven as he was against his will to these unwise extremities, he again entreated that some member of the council might be joined in commission with him to authorize the Queen's commandments.'"

On this last point Elizabeth would yield nothing. The clergy were under the charge of the bishops; and the bishops should manage them with law or without. One or two of the most violent of the London preachers were called before the council and foul chidden: ' but

' De Silva to Philip, March 12.

2 Parker and Grindal to Cecil, March 20: Lansdowne MSS. 8.

lay interference with them was limited to remonstrance. The responsibility of punishing them was flung persistently on the Archbishop, who at length, after once more ineffectually imploring Cecil' to pacify the Queen,' opened a commission at Lambeth with the Bishop of London on the 26th of March.

A few hours' experience sufficed to justify the worst alarm. More than a hundred of the London clergy appeared. Sixty-one promised conformity; a few hesitated; thirty-seven distinctly refused and were suspended for three months from all manner of ministry.' They were the best preachers in the city; they showed reasonable quietness and modesty other than was looked for,' but submit they would not.1 As an immediate consequence, foreseen by every one but the Queen, the most frequented of the London churches either became the scenes of scandal and riot or were left without service. When the Archbishop sent his chaplains to officiate, the congregation forcibly expelled them. The doors of one church were locked, and six hundred citizens who came to communion' were left at the doors unable to find entrance; at another, an Anglican priest, of high church tendencies, who was sent to take the place of the deposed minister, produced a wafer at the sacrament; the parishioners, when he was reading the prayer of consecration, removed it from the table 'because it was not common bread.' At a third church the churchwardens refused to provide surplices. The

1 Parker to Cecil, March 26: Lansdowne MSS. 8.