Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 11.djvu/97

 1581.] THE JESUIT INVASION. 81 the service of the Established Church should pay 20^. a month for their exemption. 1 It was a serious step. The last clause especially was equivalent to the confiscation of the estates of the Ca- tholics ; and although the Commons did not hesitate to pass a measure which was felt to be necessary, yet they felt also that if the nation was to be coerced into con- formity the Established Church must be made worthy of its position. In the last session they had complained of the revival by the bishops of the worst practices of the unreformed system. The Queen had promised improve- ment, but her injunctions had been evaded or despised. ' "Were there any honesty in those prelates in whom honesty should most be found/ said one, ' we should not be in our present trouble.' Notwithstanding her order to abstain from such subjects the Commons by committee renewed their petition. The Queen thought it prudent to yield, and six of the bishops were appointed to confer with the Commons to devise means of redress. The discussion which followed appears to have been ex- tremely acrimonious. The bishops were told that they were unfit to be trusted with the charge of the Church. ' They had filled the pulpits with unlearned and unfit ministers whom they had admitted into orders, and the number of Papists and Anabaptists had increased by their remissness/ ' The bishops,' in reply, 'spake most or only for jurisdiction, in so much as one great . ' Statutes of the Realm, 23 Elizabeth, cap. I. VOL. xi. 6