Nothing of the sort really contented him, of course, but at present he asked for no more.
Yet, a few days later, he writes, the Regent handed his letter to the Archbishop of Glasgow, saying, "Please you, my Lord, to read a pasquil," an offence which Knox never forgave and bitterly avenged in his "History." It is possible that the Regent merely glanced at his letter.

She would find herself alluded to in a biblical parallel with "the Egyptian midwives," with Nebuchadnezzar, and Rahab the harlot.

Her acquaintance with these amiable idolaters may have been slight, but the comparison was odious, and far from tactful.

Knox also reviled the creed in which she had been bred as "a poisoned cup," and threatened her, if she did not act on his counsel, with "torment and pain everlasting." Those who drink of the cup of her Church "drink therewith damnation and death." As for her clergy, "proud prelates do Kings maintain to murder the souls for which the blood of Christ Jesus was shed." These statements were dogmatic, and the reverse of conciliatory.

One should not, in attempting to convert any person, begin by reviling his religion.