2. The Anjou Marriage Treaty and the Ridolfi Plot. 1570-1571.—For all that, Elizabeth's danger was great. In 1570 she had done her best to embroil parties in Scotland lest they should join against herself. The bulk of the nobility in that country had thrown themselves on the side of Mary, and were fighting against the new regent, Lennox, having taken alarm at the growth of the popular Church organisation of Knox and the Presbyterians, who sheltered themselves under the title of the little James VI. At home Elizabeth expected a fresh outbreak, and could not be certain that Alva would be unable to support it when it occurred. Cecil accordingly pleaded hard with her to marry the frivolous Duke of Anjou. He thought that unless she married and had children, her subjects would turn from her to Mary, who, having already a son, would give them an assured succession. If she was to marry, an alliance with the tolerant Government of France was better than any other. Elizabeth indeed consented to open negotiations for the marriage, though it was most unlikely that she would ever really make up her mind to it. The English Catholics, in consequence, flung themselves into the arms of the king of Spain, and in March 1571, Ridolfi, a Florentine banker residing in England, who carried on their correspondence with Alva, crossed to the Netherlands to inform him that the great majority of the lay peers had invited him to send 6,000 Spanish soldiers to dethrone Elizabeth and to put Mary in her place. Norfolk, who had been released from the Tower (see p. [441]), was then to become the husband of Mary, and it was hoped that there would spring from the marriage a long line of Catholic sovereigns ready to support the Papal Church.
3. Elizabeth and the Puritans.—Elizabeth's temporising policy had naturally strengthened the Calvinism of the Calvinistic clergy. In every generation there are some who ask not what is expedient but what is true, and the very fact that they aim at truth, in defiance of all earthly considerations, not merely assures them influence, but diffuses around them a life and vigour which would be entirely wanting if all men were content to support that which is politically or socially convenient. Such were the best of the English Puritans, so called because, though they did not insist upon the abolition of Episcopacy or the establishment of the Calvinistic discipline (see p. [431]), they contended for what they called purity of worship, which meant the rejection of such rites and vestments as reminded them of what they termed the idolatry of the Roman Church. Elizabeth and Parker had from time to time interfered, and some of the Puritan leaders had been deprived of their benefices for refusing to wear the cap and surplice.
4. Elizabeth and Parliament. 1566.—From 1566 to 1571 Elizabeth abstained from summoning a Parliament, having been far more economical than any one of the last three sovereigns. Early in her reign she had restored the currency, and after the session of 1566 had actually returned to her subjects a subsidy which had been voted to her and which had been already collected.[16] Her reason for avoiding Parliaments was political. Neither of the Houses was likely to favour her ecclesiastical policy. The House of Lords wanted her to go backwards—to declare Mary her successor and to restore the mass. The House of Commons wanted her to go forwards—to marry, and have children of her own, and to alter the Prayer Book in a Puritan direction. In 1566, if the House of Commons had really represented the average opinion of the nation, she would have been obliged to yield. That it did not was partly owing to the imposition in 1562 of the oath of supremacy upon its members, by which all who favoured the Pope's authority were excluded from its benches, but still more on account of the difficulty of packing a Parliament so as to suit the queen's moderate ideas. Those who admired the existing Church system were but few. The majority of the nation, even if those who refused to accept the Royal supremacy were left out of account, was undoubtedly sufficiently attached to the old state of things to be favourable at least to Mary's claim to be acknowledged as heir to the throne. To Elizabeth it was of the first importance that the influence of the Crown should be used to reduce the numbers of such men in the House of Commons. If, however, they were kept out, there was nothing to be done but to favour the election of Puritans, or at least of those who had a leaning towards Puritanism. The queen, therefore, having to make her choice between those who objected to her proceedings as too Protestant and those who objected to them as not Protestant enough, not unnaturally preferred the latter.
5. A Puritan Parliament. 1571.—In 1571 Elizabeth had to deal with a Puritan House of Commons. The House granted supplies, and wanted to impose new penalties on the Roman Catholics and to suppress ecclesiastical abuses. One of the members named Strickland, having proposed to ask leave to amend the Prayer Book, the Queen ordered him to absent himself from the House. The House was proceeding to remonstrate when Elizabeth, too prudent to allow a quarrel to spring up, gave him permission to return. She had her way, however, and the Prayer Book remained untouched. She was herself a better representative of the nation than the House of Commons, but as yet she represented it only as standing between two hostile parties; though she hoped that the time would come when she would have a strong middle party of her own.
6. The Duke of Norfolk's Plot and Execution. 1571-1572. For the present Elizabeth's chief enemies were the conspirators who were aiming at placing Mary on her throne. In April 1571 Ridolfi reached the Netherlands, and urged Alva to send a Spanish army to England. Alva was cautious, and thought the attempt dangerous unless Elizabeth had first been killed or captured. Philip was consulted, gave his approval to the murder, but afterwards drew back, though he ordered Alva to proceed with the invasion. In the meanwhile Cecil, who had just been made Lord Burghley, came upon traces of the plot. Norfolk was arrested, and before the end of the year everything was known. Though the proposal of a marriage between Elizabeth and the Duke of Anjou had lately broken down, she now, in her anxiety to find support in France against Spain, entered into a negotiation to marry Anjou's brother, the Duke of Alençon, a vicious lad twenty-one years younger than herself. Then she was free to act. She drove the Spanish ambassador out of England, and Norfolk was tried and convicted of treason. A fresh Parliament meeting in 1572 urged the queen to consent to the execution of Mary. Elizabeth refused, but she sent Norfolk to the block.