he assistance
of His saints in earth, of whose readie support we doubt not),
enter and take possession of _our said patrimony_, and eject you
utterly forth of the same.

_Let him therefore that before has stolen, steal no more; but
rather let him work with his hands that he may be helpful to the
poor._

FROM THE WHOLE CITIES, TOWNS, AND VILLAGES OF SCOTLAND, THE
FIRST DAY OF JANUARY, 1558 {1559}.[74]

As it turned out, this summons was in some cases literally fulfilled,
and a revolutionary ejectment carried out by Whitsunday 1559. But now
from another side came another warning to put the house of the Church in
order. The Catholic barons presented a petition for its reform, and the
Regent called a Provincial Council on 1st March. It dealt, however,
almost exclusively with the lives and duties of the clergy, and leaving
untouched the central grievance--the legal authority of the Church and
of the Pope over all subjects--had no effect whatever on the public.
Immediately after, all 'unauthorised' preaching was forbidden. The
Protestants, astonished, waited on the Regent and reminded her of her
promises. She replied, in words which were often recalled during the
reigns of her Stewart descendants, that 'it became not subjects to
burden their Princes with promises, farther than it pleaseth them to
keep the same,' and the preachers were ordered to appear before her at
Stirling. But now Knox, who had kept up constant communication from
Geneva with his friends, suddenly appears on the scene. On 2d May he
writes from Edinburgh to Mrs Locke:

'I am come, I praise my God, even in the brunt of the battle:
for my fellow-preachers have a day appointed to answer before
the Queen Regent, the 10th of this instant, where I intend, if
God impede not, also to be present: by life, by death, or else
by both, to glorify His godly name, who thus mercifully hath
heard my long cries.'[75]

The day after this letter was written, Knox was 'blown loud to the
horn,' _i.e._, declared an excommunicated outlaw: but he had meantime
left for Dundee, where he was received with acclamation, and from thence
departed to Perth, now the centre of Protestantism. There, day by day,
he preached to excited multitudes in the Parish Church; and it was
after a sermon there, 'vehement against idolatry,' that a foolish
priest, attempting to perform mass in the same building, was set upon by
the mob of Perth,