. Nothing
can stay the issue of his eloquent adulation. Again and again, "the
remembrance of Elizabeth's virtues" carries him away; and he has to hark
back again to find the scent of his argument. He is repressing his
vehement adoration throughout, until when the end comes, and he feels
his business at an end, he can indulge himself to his heart's content in
indiscriminate laudation of his royal mistress. It is humorous to think
that this illustrious lady, whom he here praises, among many other
excellences, for the simplicity of her attire and the "marvellous
meekness of her stomach," threatened him, years after, in no very meek
terms, for a sermon against female vanity in dress, which she held as a
reflection on herself.[74]

Whatever was wanting here in respect for women generally, there was no
want of respect for the Queen; and one cannot very greatly wonder if
these devoted servants looked askance, not upon Knox only, but on his
little flock, as they came back to England tainted with disloyal
doctrine. For them, as for him, the occidental star rose somewhat red
and angry. As for poor Knox, his position was the saddest of all. For
the juncture seemed to him of the highest importance; it was the nick of
time, the flood-water of opportunity. Not only was there an opening for
him in Scotland, a smouldering brand of civil liberty and religious
enthusiasm which it should be for him to kindle into flame with his
powerful breath; but he had his eye seemingly on an object of even
higher worth. For now, when religious sympathy ran so high that it could
be set against national aversion, he wished to begin the fusion together
of England and Scotland, and to begin it at the sore place. If once the
open wound were closed at the Border, the work would be half done.
Ministers placed at Berwick and such places might seek their converts
equally on either side of the march; old enemies would sit together to
hear the gospel of peace, and forget the inherited jealousies of many
generations in the enthusiasm of a common faith; or--let us say
better--a common heresy. For people are not most conscious of
brotherhood when they continue languidly together in one creed, but
when, with some doubt, with some danger perhaps, and certainly not
without some reluctance, they violently break with the tradition of the
past, and go forth from the sanctuary of their fathers to worship under
the bare heaven. A new creed, like a new country, is an unhome