The visit of Knox to Scotland, at this juncture, was of immense service to the cause of the Reformation. The clergy, unable or unwilling to discern the signs of the times, had sunk into supineness, under the belief that what they called heresy had been well-nigh banished from the land. Arran, now Duke of Chatellerault, had given place as Regent to Mary, the mother of Mary Queen of Scots, whose policy it was just then to temporize with the Protestant nobles, and to disguise for a season her deep-rooted and undying hatred of their cause. In the good providence of God, also, a number of the leading adherents of the new faith, like Erskine of Dun, Maitland of Lethington, and others, had come to Edinburgh to confer with and enjoy the ministrations of John Willock, who had been sent over by the Duchess of East Friesland, ostensibly on a commercial mission to the Scottish court, but really to see "what good work God would do by him to his native land;" and the private meetings which he held with the Protestants in Edinburgh for prayer and the exposition of the word, may have suggested to Knox that he should follow a similar plan. That at least was the course which he determined to pursue. He was received into the houses of certain burgesses whose names he has enshrined in his history, and though the number of meetings and the necessity of holding them in secret kept him busy night and day, he was greatly {98} encouraged by the results. Writing to Mrs. Bowes, he says that "the fervent thirst of his brethren, night and day, sobbing and groaning for the bread of life, was such, that if he had not seen it with his own eyes he could not have believed it;" and again that "the fervency here did far exceed all others that he had seen;" and "did so ravish him, that he could not but accuse and condemn his slothful coldness."