It might be asked how it came to pass that the queen did not put a stop to these cruel executions. The answer is easy--she was herself in danger. The enemies of the Reformation, perceiving her influence over the king, bethought themselves that the execution of Anne Askew and of her companions did not advance their cause; that to make it triumphant the death of the queen was necessary; and that if Catherine were ruined, the Reformation would fall with her. Shortly after the king's return from France, these men approached him and cautiously insinuated that the queen had made large use of her liberty during his absence; that she diligently read and studied the Holy Scriptures; that she chose to have about her only women who shared her opinions; that she had engaged certain would-be wise and pious persons to assist her in attaining a thorough knowledge of the sacred writings; that she held private conferences with them on spiritual subjects all the year round, and that 'in Lent every day in the afternoon, for the space of an hour, one of her said chaplains, in her privy chamber,' expounded the Word of God to the queen, to the ladies of her court and of her bed-chamber and others who were disposed to hear these expositions;[448] that the minister frequently attacked what he called the abuses of the existing church; that the queen read heretical books proscribed by royal ordinances; further, that she, the queen of England, employed her leisure hours in translating religious works, and in composing books of devotion; and that she had turned some of the psalms into verse, and had made a collection entitled _Prayers or Meditations_. The king had always ignored these meetings, determined not to see, what was nevertheless clear, that the queen was an evangelical Christian like Anne Askew, who had lately been burnt. [Sidenote: ZEAL OF THE QUEEN.] Catherine was encouraged by this consideration on the part of the king. She professed her faith in the Gospel unreservedly, and boldly took up the cause of the evangelicals. Her one desire was to make known the truth to the king, and to bring him to the feet of Jesus Christ to find forgiveness for the errors of his life. Without regard to consequences she allowed her overflowing zeal to have free and unrestricted course. She longed to transform not the king alone, but England also. She often exhorted the king 'that as he had, to the glory of God and his eternal fame, begun a good and a godly work in banishing that monstrous idol of Rome, so he would thoroughly perfect and finish the same, cleansing and purging his church of England clean from the dregs thereof, wherein as yet remained great superstition.'[449]