Wives of the Prime Ministers, 1844-1906Lee, Elizabeth
History
Wives of the Prime Ministers, 1844-1906
Lee, Elizabeth
Great Britain -- Biography; Statesmen's spouses -- Great Britain -- Biography; Women -- Biography
She wrote to him nearly every day while she was at Brighton, and the
following extracts from her letters are of interest:
“BRIGHTON,
_17th January 1851_.
“I got down very safely yesterday, but I never was in a more
shaky train, however. The Ashleys and I were together, and
we got down in an hour and ten minutes, but I think for the
future I shall always avoid express trains. There is something
so awful in the notion of not stopping anywhere, so that if
unfortunately there should occur anything wrong about your
carriage you would have to go on fifty miles without any help
or the least power of getting your distress known. It is like
the horror of a bad dream to imagine the possibility of such a
casualty.”
Some persons will sympathise with her feelings in an express train.
In the following letter she refers to the Bull issued by the Pope in
September 1850, creating Roman Catholic Bishops in England. It roused
great excitement and hostility in the country.
“_31st January 1851._
“I hope you read the _Times_ leading article yesterday on the
dangers of Popery, so very true, and all so well described. It
is _impossible_ for the well-being of any Protestant country to
allow the system which the Pope is trying to introduce here. To
have such a band of conspirators leagued together to overthrow
Protestantism in England, and leaving no means untried to
compass their ends and to work on the weak-minded by the most
unscrupulous agents.... The Pope starting a new Pope in Ireland
after all the rout made about bishops here shows that he is
not inclined to go back an inch, but rather to force on and
increase his aggressions.”
The Ecclesiastical Titles Act declaring the Papal Bull null and void
was passed in July 1851. As a legislative measure it was, however, a
dead letter, and was repealed in 1871.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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