Lethington, returned to Edinburgh (October 25), spoke his mind to Cecil.  “The Queen behaves herself . . . as reasonably as we can require:  if anything be amiss the fault is rather in ourselves.  You know the vehemency of Mr. Knox’s spirit which cannot be bridled, and yet doth utter sometimes such sentences as cannot easily be digested by a weak stomach.  I would wish he should deal with her more gently, being a young princess unpersuaded. . . .  Surely in her comporting with him she declares a wisdom far exceeding her age.” {201a} Vituperation is not argument, and gentleness is not unchristian.  St. Paul did not revile the gods of Felix and Festus.

But, prior to these utterances of October, the brethren had been baiting Mary.  On her public entry (which Knox misdates by a month) her idolatry was rebuked by a pageant of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram.  Huntly managed to stop a burning in effigy of a priest at the Mass.  They never could cease from insulting the Queen in the tenderest point.  The magistrates next coupled “mess-mongers” with notorious drunkards and adulterers, “and such filthy persons,” in a proclamation, so the Provost and Bailies were “warded” (Knox says) in the Tolbooth.  Knox blamed Lethington and Lord James, in a letter to Cecil; {201b} in his “History” he says, “God be merciful to some of our own.” {201c}

The Queen herself, as a Papist, was clearly insulted in the proclamation.  Moray and Lethington, the latter touched by her “readiness to hear,” and her gentleness in the face of Protestant brutalities; the former, perhaps, lured by the hope of obtaining, as the price of his alliance, the earldom of Moray, were by the end of October still attempting to secure amity between her and Elizabeth, and to hope for the best, rather than drive the Queen wild by eternal taunts and menaces.  The preachers denounced her rites at Hallowmass (All Saints), and a servant of her brother, Lord Robert, beat a priest; but men actually doubted whether subjects might interfere between the Queen and her religion.  There was a discussion on this point between the preachers and the nobles, and the Church in Geneva (Calvin) was to be consulted.  Knox offered to write, but Lethington said that he would write, as much stood on the “information”; that is, on the manner of stating the question.  Lethington did not know, and Knox does not tell us in his “History” that he had himself, a week earlier, put the matter before Calvin in his own way.  Even Lord James, he says to Calvin, though the Abdiel of godliness, “is afraid to overthrow that idol by violence”—­idolum illud missalicum. {202}

Knox’s letter to Calvin represents the Queen as alleging that he has already answered the question, declaring that Knox’s party has no right to interfere with the Royal mass.  This rumour Knox disbelieves.  He adds that Arran would have written, but was absent.