than those which had confronted St. Paul at Ephesus. To make matters
worse it was reported that public sympathy was on the side of the
recusants, and that hopes were being expressed by many that the
present advisers of her Majesty might soon be displaced, even though
it were necessary to have recourse to France or Spain.[11]

Nor was it merely from the side of the Catholics that the bishops and
the government anticipated serious danger. The men, who, like Hooper,
objected to the Edwardine settlement as not being sufficiently
extreme, had approached more closely to Calvinism in doctrine and in
ritual during their enforced sojourn at Frankfurt and Geneva. They
were enthusiastic in their praise of Elizabeth for her attacks upon
Rome, but they found fault with her religious programme as flavouring
too much of idolatry and papistry. They objected to crosses, candles,
vestments, copes, blessings, and much of the old ritual that had been
retained in the Book of Common prayer, and insisted that, until
religion had been brought back to a state of scriptural purity, the
English people should not rest satisfied. Whatever sympathy some of
the English political advisers may have had with the Puritans in
theory they had no intention of yielding to their demands, as such a
policy would have stirred up all the latent Catholicity in the
country. The official church "as by law established" was to be a
church for the nation, standing midway between Rome and Puritanism, a
kind of compromise between both extremes. Elizabeth was determined to
put down Puritanism, irreverence, and unlicensed preaching with a
heavy hand. As a foretaste of what the champions of innovation might
expect, much to the disgust of the archbishop, she struck a blow at
the married clergy by ordering the removal of women and children from
the enclosures of colleges and cathedrals (1561).