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342 and troops, though she declined an offer they made of acknowledging her as their sovereign.

The pope (who had succeeded Sextus), with the powerful house of Guise, and Philip, were continually the source of danger to Elizabeth. Encouragement, and offers of protection from the two latter, and an idea which was then common even with the pious, that any heretic who was so declaredly under the displeasure of the former, should be considered as a wretch whom it was meritorious to extirpate, induced several to plan the assassination of the queen. The vigilance of her ministers discovered and defeated their plots: but the nation began to be anxious for the safety of their beloved sovereign, whose patriotic economy had secured them from burthensome taxations, whose safety was so intimately connected with their religious security, and whose concern for them had tempted her to break off a marriage with the prince of Anjou, to which she had manifested an inclination. These fears were encouraged in the people, and facilitated the death of the queen of Scots, on whose account the plots were laid, which endangered her enemy. It seems that Elizabeth, when Mary was first imprisoned by her subjects, meant to serve and protect her, which appeared by many spirited and earnest remonstrances through her ambassador. When Mary made her escape, and fled into England, she was still in the same way of thinking, and happy had it been for her fame had she persisted in acting from that principle; but her ministers saw danger in her favouring the head of the catholic party, one who had claimed a superior right to the throne of England, and who was the next heir. Elizabeth was startled and convinced, her temporary generosity vanished, and former jealousies resumed their dominion over her mind. She confined her as a prisoner, under the pretence that till she was cleared of