Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 9.djvu/238

 224 REIGN OF ELIZABETH. [CH. 54. bloody judgments i ' there had been no civil wars in England like those which were desolating the neigh- bouring kingdoms; no needless foreign wars, no im- poverishing of the subject by ' taxes, assizes, gabels, or other exactions : ' she had incurred expenses in the defence of the country against intended invasions ; yet she had been more careful of her subjects' treasure than even Parliament itself had required her to be; the ordinary revenues of the Crown had sufficed for the ordinary government, and she invited the people gener- ally to contrast ' the security, tranquillity, and wealth which they enjoyed, with the continual and universal outrages, bloodshed, murders, burnings, spoilings, de- population of towns and villages, and infinite manner of exactions, in France and the Low Countries/ So much as to the general management of the coun- try. There remained to be considered religion, on which her rule ' specially from abroad had been most frequently and maliciously impugned.' It was true, Elizabeth admitted, that 'the external ecclesiastical policy of England diifered in some respects from that which was established in other countries, and occasions had been sought to trouble weak consciences on this ground. Simply however she declared that she had neither claimed nor exerted any other authority in the Church than had attached from immemorial time to the English Crown, although that authority had been recognized with greater or less distinctness at different times. The Crown challenged no superiority to define, decide, or determine any article or point of the Christian faith or