John Knox

by William M. Taylor

Knox continued at Geneva until the month of January, 1559, when, in response to a request sent to him by those who had signed the "Godly Band," which was backed by letters of a more recent date, informing him of the state of things in Scotland, he left his wife and family behind him and set out for his native land. Mary, the English queen, had now gone to her account, and her sister Elizabeth had succeeded to the throne, so that the Protestant refugees on the continent could safely return to their own country, and it was, therefore, no longer necessary for him to retain his position as pastor. Before the breaking up of the congregation, however, its members met to give thanks to God, and agreed to send one of their number with letters to their brethren in Frankfort and other places, congratulating them on the happy change which had come about at home, and requesting them to forget all past unpleasantness, while they co-operated as brethren to procure such a settlement of religion in England as would be well-pleasing to all the friends of the Reformation. Having received favourable replies to these letters, they went in a body to the council of the city, and William Whittingham, in their name, expressed to the seigneurie the gratitude which they felt for the good reception given to them during their exile, presenting them at the same time as a lasting memorial of their names the "Livre des Anglois," which is still preserved among the archives of Geneva, and from which we have quoted an interesting entry. They then left the city in which they had found so safe an asylum, and Knox sent letters with them to some of his former acquaintances in England, desiring that they would obtain permission for him to travel through England on his way to Scotland. Naturally enough he wished to see some of those among whom he had formerly laboured; but there is reason to believe that his principal motive in asking this favour, at this time, was that he might disclose to Cecil the existence of a plan which had been formed by the Princes of Lorraine, with which somehow he had become acquainted, and which had for its objects the setting up of the claim of Mary Stuart to the throne of England, the dethronement of Elizabeth under pretence that she was a bastard and a heretic, the union of England and Scotland under one crown, and the suppression of the Reformation in both by bringing the whole island under the virtual control of France. But the indignation of Elizabeth at his "First Blast" was such that his request was indignantly refused, and it was with difficulty that those who presented his letters escaped imprisonment. He did not learn this result of his application until his arrival in Dieppe; and even then, impressed with the importance of the information which he had to communicate, he himself wrote to Cecil, seeking to remove all difficulties, and desiring a personal interview. But this overture met with no better success; and so, determined to wait no longer for that which seemed to be hopeless, he sailed from Dieppe on the 22nd of April, and arrived at Leith on the 2nd of May, 1559. From this time up till his decease, with the exception of a brief visit which he made to England, Scotland was the sole scene of his labours; and during these thirteen years the incidents of his public life became part and parcel of the history of his country.

[[1]] "Works," vol. vi. p. lxvi.

[[2]] "Knox's Works," by Laing, vol. iv. p. 359.

[[3]] Carlyle's Works, vol. xii. p. 137.

CHAPTER IX.

RETURN TO SCOTLAND, 1559.

The landing of Knox in Scotland was almost dramatic in its timeliness; and though we cannot here undertake to rewrite the annals of the period, we must as briefly as possible outline the situation. The Queen Regent, who had so far succeeded in her temporizing policy as even at one time to have secured the commendation of Knox, had now openly declared herself as the enemy of the Reformation; and, at that very moment, four of its preachers were under summons, at her instance, to stand trial before the justiciary court at Stirling on the 10th of May, for "administering without the consent of the ordinaries the sacrament of the altar in a manner different from that of the Catholic Church, during three several days of the late feast of Easter, in the burghs and boundaries of Dundee, Montrose, and various other places in the sheriffdoms of Forfar and Kincardine, and for convening the subjects in these places, preaching to them, seducing them to their erroneous doctrines, and exciting seditions and tumults." How things had come to this crisis it is not hard to tell. At the consultation at which the "Godly Band" was adopted, the Reformers agreed besides on these two things, viz. first, that prayers and the lessons of the Old and New Testaments should be read in English, according to the Book of Common Prayer, in every parish on Sundays and festival days by the curates, or, if they refused, by such persons within the bounds as were best qualified; and second, that the Reformed preachers should teach in private houses only, until the government should allow them to do so in public. In accordance with the latter of these resolutions, the Protestant noblemen took preachers as private chaplains into their homes, kept them under their protection, and encouraged them in informal and domestic meetings to expound the word of God. This soon came to the knowledge of the bishops, and the primate, presuming on his influence with some of Argyle's friends, wrote to that earl, expostulating with him for having John Douglas under his care. Such interference provoked a very smart and stinging retort; and the archbishop, falling back on the old tactics of persecution, thought he would strike terror into the hearts of the Protestants by another execution. He found a victim in Walter Mill, a venerable old man, who, though condemned years before as a heretic by Cardinal Beaton, had escaped the stake at that time, but was now discovered and consigned to the flames, in the midst of which he expired, with these pathetic and prophetic words upon his lips, "As for me, I am four-score and two years old, and cannot live long by the course of nature, but a hundred better shall arise out of the ashes of my bones. I trust in God I shall be the last to suffer death in Scotland in this cause." This horrible deed—done on the 28th August, 1558—thrilled the people into earnestness in a moment, and determined them to make open profession of their adherence to the Reformed worship, so that their ministers were emboldened to preach and administer the sacraments in public, even without the permission of the government, for which until then they had waited.

Meanwhile, in the month of July, a formal petition had been presented to the Regent by the Protestant barons, requesting her to restrain the violence of the clergy, and asking liberty of worship according to a restricted plan, to which they were willing to conform until their grievances should be examined and redressed. To this she replied after her usual plausible fashion, in such a way as to make them believe that she was friendly to their proposals. But the hollowness of her words is apparent from the fact that in the very same month she was in consultation with the archbishop of St. Andrews, as to the course which should be adopted for checking the Reformation; yet, as she needed the help of the Protestants at the meeting of the Parliament in November for the carrying of certain measures on which her heart was set, nothing was done openly by her against them until after that date. In December, however, she gave the primate such assurances of her support, that he summoned the Reformed preachers to appear before him at St. Andrews on the and of February following, to answer the charges of usurping the sacred office and of disseminating heresy. This proceeding on his part stirred up the Protestant nobles, so that they informed the Regent that if the trial went on they would be present to see justice done, and she, fearing the consequences, prevailed upon the archbishop to prorogue the trial. At the same time she summoned a convention of the nobility to meet at Edinburgh on the 7th of March, and induced the archbishop to call a provincial council of the clergy to meet in the city on the first of the same month.