This declaration, which, if true, was of the utmost importance, was made on this occasion only, and in the absence of the accused. The Commissioners found Mary guilty, not of certain matters with which Lord Burleigh had charged her, but for having "compassed and imagined since the 1st of June aforesaid divers matters tending to the hurt, death, and destruction of the Queen of England." One man alone had the courage to assert his belief in Mary's innocence. Lord Zouch declared that he was not satisfied that "she had compassed, practised, or imagined the death of the Queen of England." The Commissioners added a clause to the effect that the King of Scots should not be held responsible for his mother's crimes. "The said sentence," added they, "did derogate nothing from James, King of Scots, in title or honour, but that he was the same in place, degree, and right as if the same sentence had never been pronounced." A few days later both Houses of Parliament presented an address to Elizabeth, praying for execution of the sentence against the Queen of Scots.[47] "We cannot find," said they, "that there is any possible means of providing for your Majesty's safety but by the just and speedy execution of the said Queen; the neglecting whereof may procure the heavy displeasure and punishment of Almighty God, as by sundry severe examples of His great justice in that behalf left us in the sacred Scriptures does appear," etc. [Footnote 47: "Parlt. has pressed E. to proceed to the execution, adding thereto that the forbearing thereof was, and would be daily, a certain and undoubted danger not only to her own life but to themselves, their posterity and the public state of this realm, as well for the cause of the Gospel and the true religion of Christ, as for the peace of the whole realm. Greenwich, 1 Feb., 29 Eliz."--Yelverton MSS., f. 534.] To this appeal Elizabeth made a very clever reply, beginning thus:-- "Though my life hath been dangerously shot at, yet I protest there is nothing hath more grieved me than that one not differing from me in sex, of like rank, and degree, of the same stock, and most nearly allied to me in blood, hath fallen into so great a crime." She goes on to say that if her cousin would even now truly repent, and if her own life alone, and not the good of England, were at stake, she would most willingly pardon Mary. She concludes by saying that in a matter of so great importance a speedy decision cannot be looked for, as it is her custom to deliberate long, even in matters which are unimportant as compared with this. At the end of twelve days Elizabeth sent a message to both Houses of Parliament, begging them to reconsider the matter, and "to devise some better remedy, whereby both the Queen of Scots' life might be spared and her own security provided for."[48] [Footnote 48: Hosack, pp. 430-433.]