er the growth of the new opinions had been slow, and there
had been till now little public show of resistance to the religion of
the State.

[Sidenote: Knox.]

With the accession of Mary however all was changed. Under Henry and
Edward the Catholicism of Scotland had profited by the national
opposition to a Protestant England; but now that Catholicism was again
triumphant in England Protestantism became far less odious to the Scotch
statesmen. A still greater change was wrought by the marriage with
Philip. Such a match, securing as it did to England the aid of Spain in
any future aggression upon Scotland, became a danger to the northern
realm which not only drew her closer to France but forced her to give
shelter and support to the sectaries who promised to prove a check upon
Mary. Many of the exiles therefore who left England for the sake of
religion found a refuge in Scotland. Amongst these was John Knox. Knox
had been one of the followers of Wishart; he had acted as pastor to the
Protestants who after Beaton's murder held the Castle of St. Andrews,
and had been captured with them by a French force in the summer of 1547.
The Frenchmen sent the heretics to the galleys; and it was as a galley
slave in one of their vessels that Knox next saw his native shores. As
the vessel lay tossing in the bay of St. Andrews, a comrade bade him
look to the land, and asked him if he knew it. "I know it well" was the
answer; "for I see the steeple of that place where God first in public
opened my mouth to His glory; and I am fully persuaded, how weak that
ever I now appear, I shall not depart this life till my tongue glorify
His holy name in the same place!" It was long however before he could
return. Released at the opening of 1549, Knox found shelter in England,
where he became one of the most stirring among the preachers of the day,
and was offered a bishoprick by Northumberland. Mary's accession drove
him again to France. But the new policy of the Regent now opened
Scotland to the English refugees, and it was as one of these that Knox
returned in 1555 to his own country. Although he soon withdrew to take
charge of the English congregation at Frankfort and Geneva his energy
had already given a decisive impulse to the new movement. In a gathering
at the house of Lord Erskine he persuaded the assembly to "refuse all
society with idolatry, and bind themselves to the uttermost of their
power to maintain the true preaching of the Evangile