The Proposition. To promote a Woman to bear rule, superiority, dominion or empire above any realm, nation or city is
- Repugnant to nature.
- Contumely to GOD.
- The subversion of good order, of all equity and justice.
- Men illuminated only by the light of nature have seen and determined that it is a thing most repugnant to nature, that Women rule and govern over men.
Surprisingly enough, Elizabeth I was offended. Who’d have thunk it? Oh, no, I didn’t mean you, said Knox:
To the verteuus and godlie ELIZABEHT by the grace of GOD quen of England etc JOHN KNOX desireht the perpetuall Encrease of the Holie Spiritt. etc.
As your graces displeasur against me most Iniustlie conceaned, hath be[en] and is to my wretched hart a burthen grevous and almost intollerabill, so is the testimonye of a clean conscience to me a stay and vphold that in desperation I sink not, how vehement that ever the temptations appear, for in GODDis presence my conscience beareht me reacord that maliciouslie nor of purpose I inoffended your grace, nor your realme….
I can not Deny the Writeing of a booke against the vsurped aucthoritie and Iniust regiment of wemen, neyther yet am I mynded to retract or to call any principall point or proposition of the sam[e], till treuth and veritie do farther appear, but why that eyther your grace, eyther yit ony such as vnfeanedlie favourthe libertie of England should be offended at the aucthor of such a work I can perceaue no iust occasion. For first my booke tuchheht not your graces’ person in especiall, neyther yit is it preiudiciall till any libertie of the realme yf the tyme and my Writing be indifferently considered. How could I be enemy to your graces person?
The Queen still wasn’t impresssed. So Knox wrote again explaining that it was all Mary Queen of Scots’ doing:
May it please your maiestie that it is heir certainlie spoken that the Queen of Scotland travaleht earnestlie to have a treatise intituled the first blast of the trompett confuted by the answere of the learned in Diuerse realmes, And farther that she lauboureht to inflambe the hartes of princes against the writar.
What’s a plain honest man to do with such unreasonable harpies?
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/9660/9660-h/9660-h.htm
Gert Loveday's Fun with Books 
I read up on him. An interesting and obnoxious man; apparently considered the founder of Presbyterianism (or maybe just in Scotland?). The article I read said that Elizabeth never liked him because (at least in part) of his opinions of women rulers, but since he spent his time in Scotland, she didn’t have to engage with him.
Hah! “An ob-Knox-ious man”, I see what you did there! 🙂
Thanks, Calmgrove! Now I see what I did also. . . .
Sounds like he forgot the first rule of the whole hole-digging manual: stop digging when you find you’ve dug yourself into the hole. 🕳
I presume he justified his argument of women being second-class humans by noting that God was male. And as God wrote the Bible, which declared Him a He, then He was right and you would be wrong to doubt God was perfect. QED.
He acted like a blockhead but surprisingly enough he didn’t end up on the block. Now just imagine what would have happened if he’d been a Catholic!
He did do amazingly well for being so “in-your-face.” He had a lot of help from philosophers and theologians throughout the ages in determining the “proper” view of women. And he has plenty of people who agree with him today. Even in Australia and Canada, 10% to 15% of respondents to a survey believed that women are inferior to men in the ability to work, earn money, and learn (equal shares of men and women believe this, not just men). That’s still better than the US, where 15% to 20% believe that (and Russia and India, where 45% to 50% believe it). https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/world/2017/12/map-which-countries-believe-women-are-inferior-to-men.html.
Here is Aus there’s a long-running problem in the LNP, the right-wing party, about the puny number of women MPs. Labor on the left has had quotas for a long time and an almost equal representation now of women, but the LNP is opposed to quotas because they say people have to be elected on “merit”. Even on that side of politics people are starting to wonder about the “merit” of some of the dodos in very safe seats.
Yes, a lot of “merit” does turn out to be in the eye of the beholder and not in any sort of objective measurement.
Now that’s a classic “Whoops” moment. Now blaming that on Marry Queen of Scots (also a woman wanting to rule over men) a “Super Whoops” moment.
Leslie 😀 😀
He doesn’t quite seem to get it, does he?