sake of decency, to join the question of the queen's marriage with that
of a settlement of the crown; and the commons were proceeding with great
earnestness in the debate, and had even appointed a committee to confer
with the lords, when express orders were brought them from Elizabeth not
to proceed further in the matter. Cecil told them, that she pledged to
the house the word of a queen for her sincerity in her intentions to
marry; that the appointment of a successor would be attended with great
danger to her person; that she herself had had experience, during the
reign of her sister, how much court was usually paid to the next heir,
and what dangerous sacrifices men were commonly disposed to make of
their present duty to their future prospects; and that she was therefore
determined to delay, till a more proper opportunity, the decision of
that important question.[*] The house was not satisfied with these
reasons, and still less with the command prohibiting them all debate
on the subject. Paul Wentworth, a spirited member, went so far as to
question whether such a prohibition were not an infringement of the
liberties and privileges of the house.[**] Some even ventured to violate
that profound respect which had hitherto been preserved to the queen;
and they affirmed, that she was bound in duty, not only to provide
for the happiness of her subjects during her own life, but also to
pay regard to their future security, by fixing a successor; that by an
opposite conduct she showed herself the step-mother, not the natural
parent of her people, and would seem desirous that England should no
longer subsist than she should enjoy the glory and satisfaction
of governing it; that none but timorous princes, or tyrants, or
faint-hearted women, ever stood in fear of their successors; and that
the affections of the people were a firm and impregnable rampart to
every sovereign, who, laying aside all artifice or by-ends, had courage
and magnanimity to put his sole trust in that honorable and sure
defence.[***] The queen, hearing of these debates, sent for the speaker;
and after reiterating her former prohibition, she bade him inform the
house, that if any member remained still unsatisfied, he might appear
before the privy council, and there give his reasons.[****]

* D'Ewes, p. 127, 128.

** D'Ewes, p. 128.

*** Camden, p. 400.

**** D'Ewes, p. 128.

As the members showed a disposition, notwithstanding these