ded
by every Tudor sovereign as lying exclusively within the competence of
the Crown. But Parliament had again and again asserted its right to
consider the succession. It persisted in spite of censure and rebuff in
presenting schemes of ecclesiastical reform. And three years before
Elizabeth's death it dealt boldly with matters of trade. Complaints made
in 1571 of the licences and monopolies by which internal and external
commerce was fettered were repressed by a royal reprimand as matters
neither pertaining to the Commons nor within the compass of their
understanding. When the subject was again stirred nearly twenty years
afterwards, Sir Edward Hoby was sharply rebuked by "a great personage"
for his complaint of the illegal exactions made by the Exchequer. But
the bill which he promoted was sent up to the Lords in spite of this,
and at the close of Elizabeth's reign the storm of popular indignation
which had been roused by the growing grievance nerved the Commons, in
1601, to a decisive struggle. It was in vain that the ministers opposed
a bill for the Abolition of Monopolies, and after four days of vehement
debate the tact of Elizabeth taught her to give way. She acted with her
usual ability, declared her previous ignorance of the existence of the
evil, thanked the House for its interference, and quashed at a single
blow every monopoly that she had granted.

[Sidenote: Growth of Puritanism.]

Dexterous as was Elizabeth's retreat, the defeat was none the less a
real one. Political freedom was proving itself again the master in the
long struggle with the Crown. Nor in her yet fiercer struggle against
religious freedom could Elizabeth look forward to any greater success.
The sharp suppression of the Martin Marprelate pamphlets was far from
damping the courage of the Presbyterians. Cartwright, who had been
appointed by Lord Leicester to the mastership of an hospital at Warwick,
was bold enough to organize his system of Church discipline among the
clergy of that county and of Northamptonshire. His example was widely
followed; and the general gatherings of the whole ministerial body of
the clergy and the smaller assemblies for each diocese or shire, which
in the Presbyterian scheme bore the name of Synods and Classes, began to
be held in many parts of England for the purposes of debate and
consultation. The new organization was quickly suppressed, but
Cartwright was saved from the banishment which Whitgift demanded by a
p