Desmond, Shane O'Neill, and Hugh O'Neill seem to have cared very little for religion themselves. The first was a tool of Rome; the two latter rather made the Church subservient to their own ambition. But in these cases, and in a hundred others of less importance, the religious feeling of the people was always steadily opposed to the English Crown. Elizabeth was by nature no persecutor, yet she persecuted. Her advisers always maintained, and her apologists may still maintain, that in hanging a Campion or torturing an O'Hurley she did not meddle with freedom of conscience, but only punished those who were plotting against her crown. The Catholics, on the other hand, could plead that they had done nothing worthy of death or of bonds, nor against lawful authority, and that they suffered for conscience' sake. And the Continental nations, who were mainly Catholic, sided on the whole with the refugees. Ireland, it is true, was only a pawn in their game, and Philip II. was probably wrong in not making her much more. At Cork or Galway the Armada might have met with scarcely any resistance, and a successful descent would have taxed Elizabeth's resources to the utmost. The poverty of the Crown is the key to many problems of the Elizabethan age. The Queen had to keep Scotland quiet, to hold Spain at bay, and to maintain tolerable relations with France. She saw what ought to be done in Ireland, but very often could not afford to do it. The tendency to temporise was perhaps constitutional, but it was certainly much increased by want of money. Her vacillating policy did much harm, but it was caused less by changes of opinion than by circumstances. When the pressure at other points slackened she could attend to her troublesome kingdom; when it increased she was often forced to postpone her Irish plans. Ireland has always suffered, and still suffers sorely, from want of firmness. In modern times party exigencies work mischief analogous to that formerly caused by the sovereign's necessities.