Had Knox been in vigour he might have summoned the brethren in arms to resist; but he was weak of body, and Morton was an ill man to deal with.  Knox did draw up articles intended to minimise the mischief of these bastard and simoniacal bishoprics and abused patronages (August 1572). {268b} On May 26, 1572, he describes himself as “lying in St. Andrews, half dead.” {268c} He was able, however, to preach at a witch, who was probably none the better for his distinguished attentions.

On August 17, during a truce between the hostile parties, Knox left St. Andrews for Edinburgh, “not without dolour and displeasure of the few godly that were in the town, but to the great joy and pleasure of the rest;” for, “half dead” as he was, Knox had preached a political sermon every Sunday, and he was in the pulpit at St. Giles’s on the last Sunday of August. {269a} As his colleague, Craig, had disgusted the brethren by his moderation and pacific temper, a minister named Lawson was appointed as Knox’s coadjutor.

Late in August came the news of the St. Bartholomew massacre (August 24).  Knox rose to the occasion, and, preaching in the presence of du Croc, the French ambassador, bade him tell his King that he was a murderer, and that God’s vengeance should never depart from him or his house. {269b} The prophecy was amply fulfilled.  Du Croc remonstrated, “but the Lords answered they could not stop the mouths of ministers to speak against themselves.”

There was a convention of Protestants in Edinburgh on October 20, but lords did not attend, and few lairds were present.  The preachers and other brethren in the Assembly proposed that all Catholics in the realm should be compelled to recant publicly, to lose their whole property and be banished if they were recalcitrant, and, if they remained in the country, that all subjects should be permitted, lawfully, to put them to death. ("To invade them, and every one of them, to the death.”) {269c} This was the ideal, embodied in law, of the brethren in 1560.  Happily they were not permitted to disgrace Scotland by a Bartholomew massacre of her own.

Mr. Hume Brown thinks that these detestable proposals “if not actually penned by Knox, must have been directly inspired by him.”  He does not, however, mention the demand for massacre, except as “pains and penalties for those who preached the old religion.” {269d} “Without exception of persons, great or small,” all were to be obliged to recant, or to be ruined and exiled, or to be massacred.  Dr. M’Crie does not hint at the existence of these articles, “to be given to the Regent and Council.”  They included a very proper demand for the reformation of vice at home.  Certainly Knox did not pen or dictate the Articles, for none of his favourite adjectives occurs in the document.