British Quarterly Review, American Edition, Vol. LIII / January and April, 1871

by Various

'The conclusion of all is, that there is nothing in the conditions to justify the inference that the captive was to be sent thither as to a place of sordidness and severity, as well as of seclusion and security.... There is no evidence that the Lady of Lochleven treated her prisoner harshly. Much vigilance was necessary, however, and that could not be accomplished without giving annoyance and even pain. The daughters of the house shared the prisoner's bed. To one who had enjoyed full command over the stately reserve of the court of France, and the impregnable barrier of isolation which it had put at her disposal, this may have been a heavy grievance; it can be paralleled only by the sufferings of people accustomed to civilized refinement, when their lot is cast among barbarians.'—(Vol. v. 98.)

The only personage, as is well known, who seems to have shown any real sympathy with the Queen of Scotland, in this forlorn condition, was the sovereign who, it might be supposed, was of all persons the least likely to do anything in behalf of her cause. On hearing of the imprisonment of Mary, Elizabeth not only refused to give open support to her 'rebellious lords,' but actually threatened to invade Scotland, should they not restore their mistress to the throne, on terms, however, dictated by England. To suppose that this conduct is to be ascribed to chivalrous generosity would be a mistake; nor do we think with Mr. Burton, that it was due wholly to Tudor dislike of disobedience to the Lord's anointed, though this certainly was one ruling motive. Elizabeth, undoubtedly, throughout her entire reign, especially in the case of the united provinces, was averse to countenancing revolted subjects, even when to do so was her evident interest; but in this instance she was, in fact, guided by other considerations in her conduct. She seems to have wished in this, following the traditional policy of English rulers, to have taken upon herself the settlement of Scotland; and she did not choose that that kingdom should be revolutionized without her sanction. She also had a particular aversion to Knox and the Reforming leaders; and very probably her sagacious advisers may have foreseen that the rule of Murray and his associates was far from secure. These motives probably influenced her policy in not siding with the Regent and his followers; and in one respect the event vindicated, in a great measure, her cautious prudence. Though the infant James was formally crowned, though the Reformed Church was established in Scotland, and Murray proved himself an able ruler, a strong reaction set in in favour of the imprisoned queen; and though unquestionably the great mass of the nation remained completely hostile, she was able to rally a party sufficient to cause a violent counter-revolution. The numerous adherents of the old Church, the whole body of the Catholic clergy, and a large minority of the Scottish nobility enlisted themselves on the side of Mary Stuart; they were joined by some of the politicians and patriots whose one idea was the giving a Scottish sovereign to England; and pity for misfortune, the recollection of rare beauty and great gifts, and that strange loyalty which so often has shown itself superior to the sense of right, of justice, and of the successful cause, contributed to swell the ranks of her followers. Mr. Burton describes the escape from Lochleven, and the stirring incidents of the struggle which ensued, with much research and even animation; but we can only refer our readers to them. The unimportant battle of Langside showed that, however imposing it was in name, the party of the queen was not supported in any degree by the Scottish nation; a defeat, though little more than a skirmish, was sufficient to overthrow her career, and to compel her forthwith to leave her kingdom. After her flight, in which she found few friends, Mary Stuart was obliged to take refuge in England, abandoning for ever a country in which she had played one of the most astonishing parts that have ever fallen to the lot of woman, and which, excepting a revolutionary faction, had repudiated her for crimes which had effaced the sentiment of former affection.

We agree generally with Mr. Burton in his estimate of Elizabeth's policy when her rival had placed herself in her power. That policy was not generous or high-minded; it was even temporising, doubtful, and tentative; but it was essentially crafty and prudent. To have listened to the petition of the Scottish queen, and to have sent her over to France or Spain, would have been to arm the enemies of England with a weapon of the most perilous kind, and, at the same time, to make all Protestant Scotland permanently hostile. On the other hand, Elizabeth refused to hand her guest over to the Scottish lords, in part certainly from compassionate feelings, in part from her known antipathy to rebellion against a lawful sovereign, and in part from a well-founded doubt whether the government of Murray was really stable, and whether, if the surrender were made, a violent reaction would not follow. A middle course was artfully struck out, which had the advantage of seeming just, of ruining the fair fame of Mary Stuart, and depriving her of all moral influence, and which, moreover, gave her the right of intervening in Scottish affairs, and making England the arbiter of them. Under the form of a charge against her revolted subjects, Mary Stuart was really put on her trial before the most distinguished personages in England; and the result of the inquiry was that she was disgraced in public opinion, that her detention was in part justified, and that, though made somewhat dependent on England, Murray and the Regency were confirmed in power. This is what Elizabeth and Cecil had aimed at, and whatever may be thought of the dignity of their conduct, it fell in with the interests of England; and it was, on the whole, inspired by wisdom. Mr. Burton describes at much length the conferences at York and Hampton Court, but we have no space to dwell on his narrative. The only real question was as to the guilt of Mary, and of this, like ourselves, he has no doubt. The evidence contained in the casket letters is confirmed by numerous subordinate proofs; the authenticity of the letters themselves was hardly questioned in that generation, and not a single member of the Commission—though several were devoted to Mary—not even, apparently, her own advocates, attempted to challenge this decisive fact. As the Scottish queen has found defenders of the boldest kind, even in our day, we quote a part of Mr. Burton's comments:—

'There are two theories on which the guilty conclusion to which the casket documents point has been resisted with great perseverance and gallantry; the one is, that, as we now see them, they have been tampered with; the other, that they are forgeries from the beginning. All questions raised on the prior theory, are at once settled by the fact that those to whom the letters were first shown, drew conclusions from them as damnatory as any they can now suggest.... The theory of an entire forgery seems not to have occurred to any of those friends or foes of the queen who saw the documents.... And it is impossible not to connect the stream of contemporary impugnment with a notable peculiarity in these documents. They are as affluent in petty details about matters personally known to persons who could have contradicted them if false, that the forger could only have scattered around him, in superfluous profusion, allusions that must have been traps for his own detection. Wherever any of these petty matters come to the surface elsewhere, it is in a shape to confirm the accuracy of the mention made of them in these letters.... Though this controversy has produced dazzling achievements of ingenuity and sagacity, I would be inclined not so much to press technical points of evidence, as to look to the general tone and character of the whole story. In this view nothing appears to me more natural than the casket letters. They fit entirely into their places in the dark history of events.'—(Vol. iv. p. 436, et seq.)

Events showed that Elizabeth and Cecil were right in calculating that the power of Murray did not rest on a secure foundation. The Regent was one of the best governors who ever appeared in Scottish history; he was honourable, upright, firm, yet humane; and during his too brief rule he maintained order in a manner unknown in that generation. The religious movement, too, of which he was the unselfish and sincere champion, was followed by the great mass of the nation; and though most of the Reforming lords were simply greedy for the spoils of Popery, Knox and his adherents went with them, and, as a people, Scotland was sincerely Protestant. These combined elements of power, however, did not render the Government safe, and it was exposed to a series of formidable attacks which kept the country for some years in anarchy. The united parties which Langside had quelled again formed a perilous coalition; and the old Church, many of the great feudal lords, and the statesmen who wished above all things to place a Stuart on the Tudor throne, once more rallied in behalf of Queen Mary. The leading spirit of this ill-assorted league was that singular character, Maitland of Lethington, one of the ablest men of that stirring age, yet, with his keen intellect and clear brain, an enthusiast possessed by a vain idea. Long one of the chief opponents of the queen, he had yielded to the alluring prospect—held out to him skilfully by his wife, one of the captive's principal attendants—of making Mary Stuart the sovereign of Great Britain, and he now schemed and plotted in her cause in conjunction with his worst former enemies. At the same time, Elizabeth maintained a dubious attitude towards the Regency: wishing to stand well with the Catholic Powers, with whom for the moment she was at peace, and always disliking undutiful subjects, she more than once declared she would release the queen; and though we do not believe she was sincere in this, the effect was to weaken the Scottish Government, and to add strength to its many adversaries. Besides, Elizabeth contrived to stir the sense of Scottish patriotism to the quick by an imperious demand for the extradition of one of the leaders of the Northern rebellion; and the cry went forth that the pusillanimous Regency was the dishonoured instrument of Tudor oppression, and that Scotland under her lawful sovereign should again vindicate her independence with the assistance of her old ally, France. The result was a furious civil war, of which, after the murder of the Regent, the issue was for a time doubtful; and, as Mr. Burton correctly observes, Scotland was more thoroughly and widely divided than she had been at any former period. An event, however, which in that age revolutionized the politics of Europe, was, in Scotland also, to change the situation. The atrocious massacre of St. Bartholomew stirred to its depths a people essentially Protestant, confounded the adherents of Mary Stuart, made the French alliance a source of dread, and threw the nation on the side of the Regency, now in the hands of the vigorous Morton. At the same time, it showed Elizabeth that the interest of England compelled her to support 'the lords,' Knox, and the Reformation; that in Mary she had an implacable enemy; and that her only chance was to strike in boldly with Morton and the national Protestant party. The union of these forces was decisive; Morton and his adherents, backed generally by the spirit of an indignant people, overcame quickly Mary Stuart's faction; an English army invaded Scotland, and the siege and fall of the Castle of Edinburgh put an end to the French alliance, destroyed for ever the chances of the Scottish queen, and, with the death of Lethington and Grange, extinguished the prospects of her cause.

Mr. Burton thus describes this conjunction, one of the turning-points in the history of Scotland:—

'For the future three great disturbing forces, prolific in action, are seen no more. In the first place, the game of conquest has been entirely played out by England. We may say, perhaps, that it came to an end with the Reformation; but there was still room for it, and it might start up any day. Now its place was occupied. On both sides of the border, men looked to another solution of the problem, how the two nations should be made into one. Secondly, it followed that there was no longer danger from abroad, since French protection was no longer needed. The ancient league, if not dead, was paralyzed, and all its long romance of heroism and kindly sympathy was at an end.... Thirdly, Queen Mary has no longer a place in the history of her country. She was in one sense busier than ever ... but in Scotland, however many may have been the hearts secretly devoted to her, her name passed out of the arena of political action and discussion.'—(Vol. v. 384.)

After these events the history of Scotland passes through a period of intrigues and factions, in the midst of which James I. grew up. He abandoned his ill-fated mother, and the Catholic Powers endeavoured to make his youth the instrument of their designs. The ascendancy of D'Aubigny and Arran marks the short-lived triumph of this policy. These attempts, however, were in the long run fruitless; the great body of the people adhered to Protestantism and the English alliance; the Kirk and the Reforming nobles worked together against the common enemy; and James, as he grew to man's estate, had sagacity enough to see the strongest side, and to direct accordingly his public conduct. Mr. Burton omits to dwell upon the base selfishness of the young king, in throwing over the unhappy princess, to whom he owed the love of a son. But morally he was always a coward; and the prospect of the inheritance of England, and the dread of alienating Elizabeth, was more than enough to determine his purpose. The extremely unsettled state of Scotland, after the death of the Regent Morton, and the rudeness and barbarism of its government, appear in the frequency and sudden violence of the changes which took place in its rulers; and it seems to have been assumed, that whatever faction had possession of the person of the king, was rightly invested with supreme authority. In these circumstances, as may be supposed, the progress of Scotland was only slow; the face of the country seemed scarred with the marks of desolation and war; the nation was rent by intestine troubles; and travellers from England drew marked contrasts between the aspect of the Southern land at peace under the Tudor sceptre, and that of its lawless Northern neighbour. Nevertheless, the course of events tended inevitably to the approaching union of the two crowns under a common sovereign—invasion from England had wholly ceased—and though the aged Elizabeth would not acknowledge the title of James to her glorious throne, every politician in both countries was aware that the time was not distant, when the policy inaugurated by Edward I., and pursued by every great English monarch, of joining together the whole of the island, would be consummated without civil war or bloodshed. Meanwhile the tragic and striking figure which had played such an awful and mournful part in the historical drama of the two kingdoms had passed away for ever from the stage, and the terrible career of Mary Stuart had been cut short by the Fotheringay headsman. Mr. Burton properly does not dilate on the incidents of her melancholy life during the later years of her long imprisonment, for they hardly belong to his subject, but his estimate of them is generally correct. Mary Stuart, after the final overthrow of her party in Scotland, transferred her energies to intriguing with the Continental powers; and it can admit of no question that she continued to maintain her claims to the crown of England, that she plotted directly against the life of Elizabeth, and that she kept England in a state of apprehension, intolerable to the Parliament and nation. She was a conspirator of the worst kind, and deserved the death she bravely encountered; and the crooked policy, the vacillation, and the duplicity of her rival towards her prisoner, should not render us blind to the real issue.

While, in circumstances such as these, Scotland was working out her political destiny, her ecclesiastical and religious reformation was being developed and matured. In no country, perhaps, in Europe had the Church of Rome been so grossly corrupt as in the northern part of our island; it had been the appanage of a vicious court, and the instrument of coarse spiritual tyranny; and in none, accordingly, was the reaction against it more rapid, popular, and thoroughly decisive. Although Beaton and the men of his faction had endeavoured to associate the defence of Popery with the spirit of stern opposition to the Southron, their policy had, in the long run, failed; and before Mary Stuart ascended the throne, Scotland, as a nation, had become Protestant. The grand and striking figure of Knox was the chief exponent of this movement; but it is idle to imagine that even Knox could have changed the spiritual life of Scotland, if the people had not been generally with him. As usually has happened, the baser elements of selfishness mingled with this revolution; and the support given by most of the Scottish nobles to the overthrow of Romanism was chiefly prompted by a greedy appetite for the spoils of the fallen Church. Nevertheless, the Reformation took firm root; the old ecclesiastical system of the country and its ancient faith were violently changed; and the accession of Murray to the Regency marks the period of this great transformation. Mr. Burton's account of the new Church which rose on the ruins of its predecessor, and of its peculiar ritual and doctrine, is one of the most interesting parts of his book, and abounds in learning and sound criticism. The Scottish Kirk was founded upon the model of the Huguenot Church of France; with a large admixture of lay elements, it had the same definite and strong organization, and the same tendency to create what was a powerful priesthood all but in name; and its teaching exemplified the austerity and strictness of the theology of Calvin. From the first, accordingly, it was calculated to encourage pretensions among the ministry, and to become an imperium in imperio, not without risk of collision with the State; and its whole system, in its excess, led to fanaticism and contempt of civil authority. We transcribe a few passages from Mr. Burton's description of the Second Book of Discipline of the Scottish Kirk, a specimen of its general principles:—

'It sets forth that, "as the ministers and others of the ecclesiastical estate are subject to the magistrate civil, so ought the person of the magistrate be subject to the Kirk spiritually, and in ecclesiastical government." Further:—"The civil power should command the spiritual to exercise and do their office according to the word of God; the spiritual rulers should require the Christian magistrate to minister justice and punish vice, and to maintain the liberty and quietness of the Kirk within their bounds." Nothing could be on its face a fairer distribution. The civil power was entitled to command the spiritual to do its duty; but then the magistrate was not to have authority to "execute the censures of the Church, nor yet prescribe any rule how it should be done." This is entirely in the hands of the Church; but in enforcing it the State is the Church's servant, for it is the magistrate's duty to "assist and maintain the discipline of the Kirk, and punish them civilly that will not obey the discipline of the same." Thus the State could give no effective orders to the Church, but the Church could order the State to give material effect to its rules and punishments. It was the State's duty, at the same time, to preserve for the Church its whole patrimony; and we have seen that this meant all the vast wealth which had been gathered up by the old Church. Among the prerogatives of the clergy, it was further declared that "they have power to abrogate and abolish all statutes and ordinances concerning ecclesiastical matters that are found noisome and unprofitable, and agree not with the time, or, are abused by the people."'—(Vol. v. 470.)