The reign of Elizabeth III

The reign of Elizabeth

1586 - 1603

Measures against Catholics

	The renewed plotting of Mary Queen of Scots' Catholic supporters increased fear of the Catholic threat, especially when combined with the threat of Spanish invasion.
	Between 1581 and 1588, at least sixty-four priests and twenty lay Catholics were executed for treason.

The view that English Catholics were a fifth column for the Spanish invaders was confirmed by Cardinal William Allen's Admonition. Printed in the Netherlands for distribution after a Spanish invasion, it exhorted the people of England to cease supporting Elizabeth - "an incestuous bastard, begotten and born in sin of an infamous courtesan" - and submit to the Spanish army.

	The defeat of the Spanish Armada and the execution of Mary Queen of Scots (leaving her son James -a Protestant - as best claimant to the English crown) led to lessened fears and a decrease in the harassment of English Catholics.
	Nonetheless, the 1593 Act against popish recusants increased the penalties on priests and on Catholics practicing their religion.

Medal struck to commemorate England's victory over the Spanish Armada.
The legend reads Ditior in toto non alter circulus orbe - In the whole circle of the globe there is no stronger [throne].

Disputes broke out within the ranks of English Catholics. English secular priests resented the excessive influence of the Jesuit priests and asked to be directed by their own Bishop. A bitter pamphlet war arose between the two parties, of which the English government was happy to take advantage. Richard Bancroft, Bishop of London, helped the secular priests, facilitating the publication of their books.

English Catholics began to hope that matters might improve for them after Elizabeth's death. In 1594, Robert Parsons published A Conference about the next succession arguing that the English people should place Elizabeth, the Spanish Infanta (Philip II's daughter) on the throne in preference to James. This impracticable scheme merely served to alienate James.

Presbyterians

Attempts in the 1570s by dedicated Protestants to introduce a Presbyterian system of government into the English Church had failed, and from 1583 John Whitgift, Archbishop of Canterbury launched a vigorous counter-attack.

Whitgift insisted that all ministers of the Church of England must acknowledge the Royal Supremacy, agree to use the Prayer Book in worship and accept the Thirty-Nine Articles. He used the Court of High Commission to fine and imprison ministers who would not conform to these demands. Its proceedings employed the oath ex officio, by which dissenting ministers were forced to incriminate themselves.

Archbishop John Whitgift
(1530? - 1604)

The puritan organizer, John Field, died in 1588, as the movement's two most important patrons - Robert Dudley Earl of Leicester (1588) and Sir Francis Walsingham (1589).

The Martin Marprelate pamphlets - crude but funny attacks on the bishops - were printed from 1588. These provided scurrilous entertainment to the faithful, but probably alienated moderates - especially gentlemen fearful of the social disruption these writings might provoke.

In London in 1591, William Hacket - a fanatic puritan with delusions that he was the Messiah - mounted an abortive uprising. To further undermine the Presbyterian movement, the Bishop of London, Richard Bancroft highlighted Hacket's connections with more moderate and same puritans.

All these factors undermined radical puritanism, especially as the gradual decline of the Catholic threat also diminished the need for Protestant unity.

The writings of Richard Hooker in favor of the Church of England's existing form of government and worship provided well-argued and positive reasons for supporting the status quo.

By the 1590s, an entire generation of ministers had been trained in the English Church. Unlike the Protestants of the Marian exile, they did not automatically look to the European Continent for their paradigm of a well-reformed church; their loyalties were centered on their home.

Separatists

	A very small number of English puritans abandoned the Church of England as altogether corrupt. They withdrew from their parish churches and worshipped together in separate congregations.
	Robert Browne and Robert Harrison formed a congregation at Norwich in 1580. Henry Barrow and John Greenwood formed a congregation in London a little later.
	Fearful of the same sort of violence and social disorder that had accompanied religious schism and Anabaptism in Europe, Elizabeth's government reacted savagely. Barrow and Greenwood were executed in 1593, and most of their congregation fled to Amsterdam.
	The legislation against recusancy (refusal to attend church services) that had long penalized Roman Catholics was extended by Parliament in 1593 to Protestants. Punishments as severe as execution could follow repeated disobedience.

A vagrant being whipped through the streets

Decline and death

The declining years of Elizabeth saw considerable economic problems. Bad weather produced a series of bad harvests, especially in the years 1595-98. Grain became extremely expensive, forcing down real wages.

	Increased levels of poverty and vagrancy provoked the 1598 Act for suppressing of rogues, vagabonds and sturdy beggars: this law stressed control and punishment, rather than relief and support.
	The rebellion of Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex (February 1601) was easily suppressed, but it was the rebels' belief in Elizabeth's unpopularity that made them risk the uprising.
	There was also considerable political discontent provoked by Elizabeth's use of monopolies to attempt to raise money to pay for war in Ireland and with Spain. Elizabeth quelled the protests in the Parliament of 1601 by vague promises of reform.
	Elizabeth fell ill in February 1603 and died on 24 March. She was almost seventy years old - a ripe old age by sixteenth century standards. Despite the problems of her later years, her reign was must be counted amongst the most impressive of English monarchs.