Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 11.djvu/64

48 REIGN OF ELIZABETH. L CH. 63. spiritual capacity had put out his thunders in vain. The Pope as a temporal prince, at the instigation of Sanders and Allen, had fallen back therefore on the arm of flesh. He was making actual war upon her in Ireland. His agents had revolutionized Scotland, and the most short- sighted eyes could not but see that Eng- land's turn was to follow. The forbearance which had been extended to the old priests was not unnaturally suspended when from the seminaries- at Rheims and at Rome, which had become notorious as nests of conspiracy , and from the Order of Jesus, which recognized no ob- ligation but the will of its General and of the Pope, a flight of spiritual immigrants appeared suddenly on the English shore. They were subjects who had left their country without leave, and had sworn allegiance to a power which was then at war with their sovereign. Prima facie they were fair objects of suspicion: the con- fession of Tyrrell proves that no wrong was done them when they were credited with a more dangerous charac- ter. They presented themselves as innocent lambs, apostles of a spiritual creed ; and there was something lamb-like in the disposition of more than one of them. But to suppose them ignorant of intentions which were avowed in the pulpits, and formed the common talk at the tables of the seminaries to which they belonged, does over-great injustice to their equally undoubted ability. Even the lamb when infected by theological fanaticism, secretes a virus in his teeth, and his bite is deadly as a rattlesnake's. A more particular account must be given of the