74 FAMOUS SCOTS 



sent to the Tower, not for any loyalty to the country or 

 to the constitution, but through a selfish maintenance 

 of their own interests as a class, did the Anglican body 

 bethink themselves of resistance, and of texts that re- 

 minded them of the hammer of Jael and the dagger of 

 Ehud no less than of the balm of the anointed of the 

 Lord. History has repeated itself. The landed and 

 clerical classes associated their triumph with the 

 triumph of Episcopacy, and their humiliation with the 

 triumph of the Independents. The exaltation of the 

 prerogative, therefore, again made its appearance at the 

 Restoration, to be shaken by the high-handed measures 

 of James, and pass to extinction at the Revolution. The 

 same thing has practically been seen in Spain. Spain, 

 remarks Borrow, is not naturally a fanatical country. 

 It was by humouring her pride only that she was 

 induced to launch the Armada and waste her treasures 

 in the wars of the Low Countries. But to the Spaniard, 

 Catholicism was the mark of his own ascendency; it 

 was the typification of his elevation over the Moor. 

 The Most Catholic King was therefore flattered to exalt 

 the claims of the Holy See no less than the English 

 clergy had exalted the prerogative of the king. Far 

 different the condition of affairs in Scotland. When 

 Knox landed at Leith, in May 1559, he found the whole 

 people ripe for a change, so that by August of next 

 year' the Scottish Parliament could pass a resolution to 

 abolish the Papacy with the entire consent of the nation, 

 and in December 1560 the First General Assembly met. 



