On the other hand, James's ideas, even when they had the element of greatness in them, never lifted him into greatness. He looked upon large principles in a small way, usually regarding them through the medium of his own interests. The doctrine that the national government ought to be supreme, took in his mind the shape of a belief that his personal government ought to be supreme. When in Scotland he sought an understanding with the Pope, his own succession to the English Crown occupied the foreground, and the advantage of having the English Catholics on his side made him eager to strike a bargain. On the other hand, he refused to strike that bargain unless his own independent position were fully recognised. When, in 1599, he despatched Edward Drummond to Italy, he instructed him to do everything in his power to procure the elevation of a Scottish Bishop of Vaison to the Cardinalate, in order that he might advocate his interests at Rome. Yet he refused to write directly to the Pope himself, merely because he objected to address him as 'Holy Father.'[218] It was hardly the precise objection that would have been taken by a man of greater practical ability. Nor was it only on niceties of this sort that James's desire to come to some sort of understanding with the Pope was likely to be wrecked. His correspondence with Cecil during the last years of Elizabeth, shows how little he had grasped the special difficulties of the situation, whilst on the other hand it throws light on the shades of difference between himself and his future minister. In a letter written to Cecil in the spring of 1602, James objects to the immediate conclusion of a peace with Spain on three grounds, the last being that the 'Jesuits, seminary priests, and that rabble, wherewith England is already too much infected, would then resort there in such swarms as the caterpillars or flies did in Egypt, no man any more abhorring them, since the Spanish practices was the greatest crime that ever they were attainted of, which now by this peace will utterly be forgotten.'