“In trouble impatient, tending to desperation,” Knox had said of himself.  He was still unhappy.  “Foolish Scotland” had “disobeyed God by sparing the Queen’s life,” and now the proposed Norfolk marriage of Mary and her intended restoration were needlessly dreaded.  A month later, Lethington, thrown back on Mary by his own peril for his share in Darnley’s murder, writes to the Queen that some ministers are reconcilable, “but Nox I think be inflexible.” {259a}

A year before Knox wrote his melancholy letter, just cited, he had some curious dealings with the English Puritans.  In 1566 many of them had been ejected from their livings, and, like the Scottish Catholics, they “assembled in woods and private houses to worship God.” {259b} The edifying controversies between these precisians and Grindal, the Bishop of London, are recorded by Strype.  The bishop was no zealot for surplices and the other momentous trifles which agitate the human conscience, but Elizabeth insisted on them; and “Her Majesty’s Government must be carried on.”  The precisians had deserted the English Liturgy for the Genevan Book of Common Order; both sides were appealing to Beza, in Geneva, and were wrangling about the interpretation of that Pontiff’s words. {259c}

Calvin had died in 1564, but the Genevan Church and Beza were still umpires, whose decision was eagerly sought, quibbled over, and disputed.  The French Puritans, in fact, extremely detested the Anglican Book of Common Prayer.  Thus, in 1562, De la Vigne, a preacher at St. Lo, consulted Calvin about the excesses of certain Flemish brethren, who adhered to “a certain bobulary (bobulaire) of prayers, compiled, or brewed, in the days of Edward VI.”  The Calvinists of St. Lo decided that these Flemings must not approach their holy table, and called our communion service “a disguised Mass.”  The Synod (Calvinistic) of Poictiers decided that our Liturgy contains “impieties,” and that Satan was the real author of the work!  There are saints’ days, “with epistles, lessons, or gospels, as under the papacy.”  They have heard that the Prayer Book has been condemned by Geneva. {260a}

The English sufferers from our Satanic Prayer Book appealed to Geneva, and were answered by Beza (October 24, 1567).  He observed, “Who are we to give any judgment of these things, which, as it seems to us, can be healed only by prayers and patience.”  Geneva has not heard both sides, and does not pretend to judge.  The English brethren complain that ministers are appointed “without any lawful consent of the Presbytery,” the English Church not being Presbyterian, and not intending to be.  Beza hopes that it will become Presbyterian.  He most dreads that any should “execute their ministry contrary to the will of her Majesty and the Bishops,” which is exactly what the seceders did.  Beza then speaks out about the question of costume, which ought not to be forced on the ministers.  But he does not think that the vestments justify schism.  In other points the brethren should, in the long run, “give way to manifest violence,” and “live as private men.”  “Other defilements” (kneeling, &c.) Beza hopes that the Queen and Bishops will remove.  Men must “patiently bear with one another, and heartily obey the Queen’s Majesty and all their Bishops.” {260b}