had sanctified, and the
ancient faith of their fathers, as reformed by Henry VIII. The rights
of conscience had found no more consideration from the Protestant
doctrinalists than from the most bigoted of the persecuting prelates;
and the facility with which the professors of the gospel had yielded
to moral temptations, had for the time inspired moderate men with much
distrust for them and for their opinions.

Could Mary have been contented to pursue her victory no further, she
would have preserved the hearts of her subjects; and the reaction,
left to complete its own tendencies, would in {p.051} a few years,
perhaps, have accomplished in some measure her larger desires. But few
sovereigns have understood less the effects of time and forbearance.
She was deceived by the rapidity of her first success; she flattered
herself that, difficult though it might be, she could build up again
the ruined hierarchy, could compel the holders of church property to
open their hands, and could reunite the country to Rome. Before she
had been three weeks on the throne, she had received, as will be
presently mentioned, a secret messenger from the Vatican; and she had
opened a correspondence with the pope, entreating him, as an act of
justice to herself and to those who had remained true to their
Catholic allegiance, to remove the interdict.[110]

[Footnote 110: Renard to Charles V., September 9:
_Rolls House MSS._]

Other actors in the great drama which was approaching were already
commencing their parts.

Reginald Pole having attempted in vain to recover a footing in England
on the accession of Edward, having seen his passionate expectations
from the Council of Trent melt into vapour, and Germany confirmed in
heresy by the Peace of Passau, was engaged, in the summer of 1553, at
a convent on the Lago di Garda, in re-editing his book against Henry
VIII., with an intended dedication to Edward, of whose illness he was
ignorant. The first edition, on the failure of his attempt to raise a
Catholic crusade against his country, had been withdrawn from
circulation; the world had not received it favourably, and there was a
mystery about the publication which it is difficult to unravel. In the
interval between the first despatch of the book into England as a
private letter in the summer of 1536, and the appearance of it in
print at Rome in the winter of 1538-9, it was re-written, as I have
already stated, e