On the behaviour of the godly heaven did not smile—­for the moment.  Scaling-ladders had been constructed in St. Giles’s church, “so that preaching was neglected.”  “The preachers spared not openly to say that they feared the success of that enterprise should not be prosperous,” for this reason, “God could not suffer such contempt of His word . . . long to be unpunished.”  The Duke lost heart; the waged soldiers mutinied for lack of pay; Morton deserted the cause; Bothwell wounded Ormiston as he carried money from Croft, and seized the cash {160a}—­behaving treacherously, if it be true that he was under promise not to act against the brethren.  The French garrison of Leith made successful sorties; and despite the valour of Arran and Lord James and the counsel of Lethington, the godly fled from Edinburgh on November 5, under taunts and stones cast by the people of the town.

The fugitives never stopped till they reached Stirling, when Knox preached to them.  He lectured at great length on discomfitures of the godly in the Old Testament, and about the Benjamites, and the Levite and his wife.  Coming to practical politics, he reminded his audience that after the accession of the Hamiltons to their party, “there was nothing heard but This lord will bring these many hundred spears . . . if this Earl be ours, no man in such a district will trouble us.”  The Duke ought to be ashamed of himself.  Before Knox came to Scotland we know he had warned the brethren against alliance with the Hamiltons.  The Duke had been on the Regent’s side, “yet without his assistance they could not have compelled us to appoint with the Queen upon such unequal conditions” in the treaty of July.  So the terms were in favour of the Regent, after all is said and done! {160b}

God had let the brethren fall, Knox said, into their present condition because they put their trust in man—­in the Duke—­a noble whose repentance was very dubious.

Then Knox rose to the height of the occasion.  “Yea, whatsoever becomes of us and our mortal carcases, I doubt not but that this Cause (in despite of Satan) shall prevail in the realm of Scotland.  For as it is the eternal truth of the eternal God, so shall it once prevail . . .”  Here we have the actual genius of Knox, his tenacity, his courage in an uphill game, his faith which might move mountains.  He adjured all to amendment of life, prayer, and charity.  “The minds of men began to be wonderfully erected.”  In Arran and Lord James too, manifestly not jealous rivals, Randolph found “more honour, stoutness, and courage than in all the rest” (November 3).

Already, before the flight, Lethington was preparing to visit England.  The conduct of diplomacy with England was thus in capable hands, and Lethington was a persona grata to the English Queen.  Meanwhile the victorious Regent behaved with her wonted moderation.  “She pursueth no man that hath showed himself against her at this time.”  She pardoned all burgesses of Edinburgh, and was ready to receive the Congregation to her grace, if they would put away the traitor Lethington, Balnaves, and some others. {161a} Knox, however, says that she gave the houses of the most honest men to the French.  The Regent was now very ill; graviter aegrotat, say Francis and Mary (Dec. 4, 1559). {161b}