The advice was acted upon, improved upon. “The affairs of religion continue as usual,” says the Venetian agent (Dec. 17th, 1558), “but I hear that at Court when the Queen is present a priest officiates, who says certain prayers with the Litanies in English, after the fashion of King Edward.”[530] She went to Mass, but asked the Bishop officiating not to elevate the Host for adoration; and when he refused to comply, she and her ladies swept out of church immediately after the Gospel was read.[531] Parliament was opened in the usual manner with the performance of Mass, but the Queen did not appear until it was over; and then her procession was preceded by a choir which sang hymns in English. When the Abbot of Westminster met her in ecclesiastical procession with the usual candles sputtering in the hands of his clergy, the Queen shouted, “Away with these torches, we have light enough.”[532]
She was crowned on January 15th, 1559; but whether with all the customary ceremonies, it is impossible to say; it is most likely that she did not communicate.[533] The Bishops swore fealty in the usual way, but were chary of taking any official part in the coronation of one so plainly a heretic. Later in the day, Dr. Cox, who had been King Edward’s tutor, and was one of the returned refugees, preached before the Queen. As early as Dec. 14th (1558) the Spanish Ambassador could report that the Queen “is every day standing up against religion (Romanism) more openly,” and that “all the heretics who had escaped are beginning to flock back again from Germany.”[534]
When Convocation met it became manifest that the clergy would not help the Government in the proposed changes. They declared in favour of transubstantiation and of the sacrifice of the Mass, and against the royal supremacy. The Reformation, it was seen, must be carried through by the civil power exclusively; and it was somewhat difficult to forecast what Parliament would consent to do.
What was actually done is still matter of debate, but it seems probable that the Government presented at least three Bills. The first was withdrawn; the second was wrecked by the Queen withholding her Royal Assent; the third resulted in the Act of Supremacy and in the Act of Uniformity. It is most likely that the first and second Bills, which did not become law, included in one proposed Act of legislation the proposals of the Government about the Queen’s Supremacy and about Uniformity of Public Worship.[535] The first was introduced into the House of Commons on Feb. 9th (1559), was discussed there Feb. 13th to 16th, and then withdrawn. A “new” Bill “for the supremacy annexed to the Crown” was introduced in the Commons on Feb. 21st, passed the third reading on the 25th, and was sent to the Lords on the 27th.[536]
The majority in the House of Commons was Protestant;[537] but the Marian Bishops had great influence in the House of Lords, and it was there that the Government proposals met with strong opposition. Dr. Jewel describes the situation in a letter to Peter Martyr (March 20th):
“The bishops are a great hindrance to us; for being, as you know, among the nobility and leading men in the Upper House, and having none there on our side to expose their artifices and confute their falsehoods, they reign as sole monarchs in the midst of ignorant and weak men, and easily overreach our little party, either by their numbers or their reputation for learning. The Queen, meanwhile, though she openly favours our cause, yet is wonderfully afraid of allowing any innovations.”[538]
The Bill (Bill No. 2—the “new” Bill), which had passed the Commons on the 25th, was read for the first time in the Lords on the 28th, passed the second reading on March 13th, and was referred to a Committee consisting of the Duke of Norfolk, the Bishops of Exeter and Carlisle, and Lords Winchester, Westmoreland, Shrewsbury, Rutland, Sussex, Pembroke, Montagu, Clinton, Morley, Rich, Willoughby, and North. They evidently made such alterations on the Bill as to make that part of it at least which enforced a radical change in public worship useless for the purpose of the Government. The clearest account of what the Lords did is contained in a letter of a person who signs himself “Il Schifanoya,” which is preserved in the State Archives in Mantua.[539] He says:
“Parliament, which ought to have ended last Saturday, was prolonged till next Wednesday in Passion Week, and according to report they will return a week after Easter (March 26, 1559); which report I believe, because of the three principal articles the first alone passed, viz. to give the supremacy of the Anglican Church to the Queen ... notwithstanding the opposition of the bishops, and of the chief lords and barons of this kingdom; but the Earls of Arundel and Derby, who are very good Christians, absented themselves from indisposition, feigned, as some think, to avoid consulting about such ruin of this realm.
“The Earl of Pembroke, the Earl of Shrewsbury, Viscount Montague and Lord Hastings did not fail in their duty, like true soldiers of Christ, to resist the Commons, whom they compelled to modify a book passed by the Commons forbidding the Mass to be said or the Communion to be administered (ne se communicassero) except at the table in the manner of Edward VI.; nor were the Divine offices to be performed in church; priests likewise being allowed to marry, and the Christian religion and the Sacraments being absolutely abolished; adding thereto many extraordinary penalties against delinquents. By a majority of votes they have decided that the aforesaid things shall be expunged from the book, and that the Masses, Sacraments, and the rest of the Divine offices shall be performed as hitherto.... The members of the Lower House, seeing that the Lords passed this article of the Queen’s supremacy of the Church, but not as the Commons drew it up,—the Lords cancelling the aforesaid clauses and modifying some others,—grew angry, and would consent to nothing, but are in very great controversy.”[540]
The Lords, induced by the Marian Bishops, had wrecked the Government’s plan for an alteration of religion.
The Queen then intervened. She refused her assent to the Bill, on the dexterous pretext that she had doubts about the title which it proposed to confer upon her—Supreme Head of the Church.[541] She knew that Romanists and Calvinists both disliked it, and she adroitly managed to make both parties think that she had yielded to the arguments which each had brought forward. The Spanish Ambassador took all the credit to himself; and Sandys was convinced that Elizabeth had been persuaded by Mr. Lever, who “had put a scruple into the Queen’s head that she would not take the title of Supreme Head.”[542]