rge towns, and as long as Spain
controlled the Netherlands, open war was nearly impossible, for it
would have been extremely unpopular with the merchants of both London
and the Low Countries. In times of crisis, however, [Sidenote: 1569]
an embargo was laid on all trade with Philip's dominions.

Elizabeth's position was made extremely delicate by {333} the fact that
the heiress to her throne was the Scotch Queen Mary Stuart, who, since
1568, had been a refugee in England and had been kept in a sort of
honorable captivity. On account of her religion she became the center
of the hopes and of the actual machinations of all English malcontents.
In these plots she participated as far as she dared.

[Sidenote: The Catholic Powers]

Elizabeth's crown would have been jeoparded had the Catholic powers, or
any one of them, acted promptly. That they did not do so is proof,
partly of their mutual jealousies, party of the excellence of Cecil's
statesmanship. Convinced though he was that civil peace could only be
secured by religious unity, for five years he played a hesitating game
in order to hold off the Catholics until his power should be strong
enough to crush them. By a system of espionage, by permitting only
nobles and sailors to leave the kingdom without special licence, by
welcoming Dutch Protestant refugees, he clandestinely fostered the
strength of his party. His scheme was so far successful that the pope
hesitated more than eleven years before issuing the bull of
deprivation. For this Elizabeth had also to thank the Catholic
Hapsburgs; in the first place Philip who then hoped to marry her, and
in the second place the Emperor Ferdinand who said that if Elizabeth
were excommunicated the German Catholics would suffer for it and that
there were many German Protestant princes who deserved the ban as much
as she did.

Matters were clarified by the calling of the Council of Trent. Asked
to send an embassy to this council Elizabeth refused for three reasons:
(1) because she had not been consulted about calling the council; (2)
because she did not consider it free, pious and Christian; (3) because
the pope sought to stir up sedition in her realms. The council replied
to this snub by excommunicating her, but it is a significant sign of
the {334} times that neither they nor the pope as yet dared to use
spiritual weapons to depose her, as the pope endeavored to do a few
years later.

[Sidenote: Anti-Catholic laws]

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