writer, nor any other historian, has taken any notice of them. So absolute, indeed, was the authority of the crown, that the precious spark of liberty had been kindled, and was preserved, by the Puritans alone; and it was to this sect, whose principles appear so frivolous, and habits so ridiculous, that the English owe the whole freedom of their constitution. Actuated by that zeal which belongs to innovators, and by the courage which enthusiasm inspires, they hazarded the utmost indignation of their sovereign, and employing all their industry to be elected into parliament, a matter not difficult while a seat was rather regarded as a burden than an advantage * they first acquired a majority in that assembly, and then obtained an ascendent over the church and monarchy. The following were the principal laws enacted this session. It was declared treason, during the lifetime of the queen, to affirm that she was not the lawful sovereign, or that any other possessed a preferable title, or that she was a heretic, schismatic, or infidel, or that the laws and statutes cannot limit and determine the right of the crown and the successor thereof: to maintain, in writing or printing, that any person, except the "natural issue" of her body, is, or ought to be, the queen's heir or successor, subjected the person and all his abettors, for the first offence, to imprisonment during a year, and to the forfeiture of half their goods: the second offence subjected them to the penalty of a præmunire. This law was plainly levelled against the queen of Scots and her partisans; and implied an avowal, that Elizabeth never intended to declare her successor. It may be noted, that the usual phrase of "lawful issue," which the parliament thought indecent towards the queen, as if she could be supposed to have any other, was changed into that of “natural issue." But this alteration was the source of pleasantry during the time; and some suspected a deeper design, as if Leicester intended, in case of the queen's demise, to produce some bastard of his own, and affirm that he was her offspring. It was also enacted, that whosoever by bulls should publish absolutions or other rescripts of the pope, or should, by means of them, reconcile any man to the church of Rome, such It appeared this session, that a bribe of four pounds had been given to a mayor for a seat in parliament. D'Ewes, p. 181. It is probable that the member had no other view than the privilege of being free from arrests. Camden, p. 436. + 13 Eliz. c. 1. offenders, as well as those who were so reconciled, should be. guilty of treason. The penalty of a præmunire was imposed on every one who imported any Agnus Dei, crucifix, or such other implement of superstition, consecrated by the pope. The former laws against usury were enforced by a new stat ute. A supply of one subsidy and two fifteenths was granted by parliament. The queen, as she was determined to yield to them none of her power, was very cautious in asking them for any supply. She endeavored, either by a rigid frugality to make her ordinary revenues suffice for the necessities of the crown, or she employed her prerogative, and procured money by the granting of patents, monopolies, or by some such ruinous expedient. Though Elizabeth possessed such. uncontrolled authority over her parliaments, and such extensive influence over her people; though, during a course of thirteen years, she had maintained the public tranquillity, which was only interrupted by the hasty and ill-concerted insurrection in the north; she was still kept in great anxiety, and felt her throne perpetually totter under her. The violent commotions excited in France and the Low Countries, as well as in Scotland, seemed in one view to secure her against any disturbance; but they served, on more reflection, to instruct her in the danger of her situa tion, when she remarked that England, no less than these neighboring countries, contained the seeds of intestine discord; the differences of religious opinion, and the furious intolerance and animosity of the opposite sectaries. The league, formed at Bayonne in 1566, for the extermina tion of the Protestants, had not been concluded so secretly but intelligence of it had reached Condé, Coligny, and the other leaders of the Hugonots; and finding that the measures of the court agreed with their suspicions, they determined to prevent the cruel perfidy of their enemies, and to strike a blow before the Catholics were aware of the danger. The Hugonots, though dispersed over the whole kingdom, formed a kind of separate empire; and being closely united, as well by their religious zeal as by the dangers to which they were perpetu ally exposed, they obeyed with entire submission the orders of their leaders, and were ready on every signal to fly to arms. The king and queen mother were living in great security at Monceaux, in Brie, when they found themselves @ 13 Eliz. c. 2. + 13 Eliz. C. 8. surrounded by Protestant troops, which had secretly marched thither from all quarters; and had not a body of Swiss come speedily to their relief, and conducted them with great intre pidity to Paris, they must have fallen, without resistance, into the hands of the malecontents. A battle was afterwards fought in the plains of St. Denis; where, though the old constable, Montmorency, the general of the Catholics, was killed combating bravely at the head of his troops, the Hugonots were finally defeated. Condé, collecting his broken forces, and receiving a strong reënforcement from the German Prot estants, appeared again in the field; and laying siege to Char tres, a place of great importance, obliged the court to agree to a new accommodation. So great was the mutual animosity of those religionists, that even had the leaders on both sides been ever so sincere in their intentions for peace, and reposed ever so much confidence in each other, it would have been difficult to retain the people in tranquillity; much more where such extreme jealousy prevailed, and where the court employed every pacification as a snare for their enemies. A plan was laid for seizing the person of the prince and admiral; who narrowly escaped to Rochelle, and summoned their partisans to their assistance. The civil wars were renewed with greater fury than ever, and the parties became still more exasperated against each other. The young duke of Anjou, brother to the king, commanded the forces of the Catholics; and fought, in 1569, a great battle at Jarnac with the Hugonots, where the prince of Condé was killed, and his army defeated. This discomfiture, with the loss of so great a leader, reduced not the Hugonots to despair. The admiral still supported the cause; and having placed at the head of the Protestants the prince of Navarre, then sixteen years of age, and the young prince of Condé, he encouraged the party rather to perish bravely in the field, than ignominiously by the hands of the executioner. He collected such numbers, so determined to endure every extremity, that he was enabled to make head against the duke of Anjou; and being strengthened by a new reenforcement of Germans, he obliged that prince to retreat, and to divide his forces. Coligny then laid siege to Poictiers; and as the eyes of all France were fixed on this enterprise, the duke of Guise, *Davila, lib. iv. emulous of the renown which his father had acquired by the defence of Metz, threw himself into the place, and so animated the garrison by his valor and conduct, that the admiral was obliged to raise the siege. Such was the commencement of that unrivalled fame and grandeur afterwards attained by this duke of Guise. The attachment which all the Catholics had borne to his father, was immediately transferred to the son; and men pleased themselves in comparing all the great and shining qualities which seemed, in a manner, hereditary in that family. Equal in affability, in munificence, in address, in eloquence, and in every quality which engages the affections of men; equal also in valor, in conduct, in enterprise, in capacity; there seemed only this difference between them, that the son, educated in more turbulent times, and finding a greater dissolution of all law and order, exceeded the father in ambition and temerity, and was engaged in enterprises still more destructive to the authority of his sovereign, and to the repose of his native country. Elizabeth, who kept her attention fixed on the civil commotions of France, was nowise pleased with this new rise of her enemies, the Guises; and being anxious for the fate of the Protestants, whose interests were connected with her own,* she was engaged, notwithstanding her aversion from all rebellion, and from all opposition to the will of the sovereign, to give them secretly some assistance. Besides employing her authority with the German princes, she lent money to the queen of Navarre, and received some jewels as pledges for the loan. And she permitted Henry Champernon to levy, and transport over into France, a regiment of a hundred gentlemen volunteers; among whom Walter Raleigh, then a young man, began to distinguish himself, in that great school of military valor.t The admiral, constrained by the impa tience of his troops, and by the 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 • Haynes, p. 471. † Camden, p. 423. 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 H |