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when contemplating the state of the country,* carries with it remarkable force, when we consider how fully his prognostication of the mischief, which would ensue from the accession of a Papist to the Crown, were realized on the occurrence of that event which he laboured to prevent. Popery," (he exclaimed,)" and slavery, like two sisters, go hand in hand, and sometimes one goes first, sometimes the other, but wheresoever the one enters, the other is always following close at hand!" A philosopher of later date, (who, like that extraordinary man, regarded religion only as a politician,) assigns, as the result of his observation, a reason for not recalling the Stuarts to the throne, similar to that urged for their exclusion from it. "The disadvantages of recalling the abdicated family, consist chiefly in their religion, which affords no toleration, or peace, or security, to any other communion."†

To profess himself a Protestant, however, is not all that the Settlement of 1688 requires from the sovereign. He must publicly declare his conviction, that the worship of the Church of Rome is "superstitious and idolatrous;"‡

Debate on the State of the Nation, March 25, 1678.

+ Hume's "Essay on the Protestant Succession." Essays, vol. 1. part 2.

Bill of Rights. 1 William and Mary. Stat. 2. cap. 2. sec. 10.

and that, be it observed, not before his privy council, but either when he first appears in parliament, as a branch of the legislature, or at the same time, and on the solemn occasion on which he is to pledge himself in the face of the people at large, to "maintain the Protestant reformed religion established by law." The views of the Legislature are again strongly expressed in the "Act of Settlement."* By that Act, (after confirming the law for excluding Papists from the throne,) it is enacted, that every King and Queen, who shall succeed to the Crown by virtue thereof, "shall have the Coronation Oath administered to him, her, or them, at their respective coronations, according to the Act for establishing the Coronation Oath, and shall make, subscribe, and repeat the Declaration (against Popery) in the Bill of Rights mentioned or referred to, in the manner and form thereby prescribed." In thus coupling the Coronation Oath, with the Declaration against Popery, is it possible to doubt that they were intended to refer to the same objects, and were designed to have, in one important particular, the same operation, namely, to render the Crown a barrier against the encroachments of Popery?†

The nature of the alterations made at this

* 12 and 13 William III. cap. 2.

+ Vide Note A.

period, in the oaths to be taken as qualifications for office, (particularly the oath of supremacy,) demonstrates that, as regarded Roman Catholics, the Legislature merely corroborated a principle, coeval with the establishment of the reformed religion. By the Statute of the twentyeighth of Henry VIII. cap. 10, "An Act to extinguish the authority of the Bishop of Rome," an oath was prescribed to be taken by all officers and ministers, spiritual and lay, by which the taker renounced the Pope, and all his authority and jurisdiction; and it was made high treason to refuse this oath, when it was required to be taken.* This statute having been repealed on the accession of Mary, another oath of supremacy was prescribed by the First of Elizabeth, cap. 1. It comprised,—1. A declaration, that the Queen was the only supreme governor of the realm, as well in all spiritual, or ecclesiastical, as temporal things.— 2. That no foreign prince, person, prelate, state, or potentate, had, or ought to have, any jurisdiction, power, or authority, ecclesiastical or spiritual, within this realm. And, lastly, an utter renunciation of all such foreign jurisdiction or authority. The refusal to take the oath, by any person preferred to any ecclesiastical or lay office, created in such person simply, a disability to retain or exercise any office, or

* Reeves's History of the English Law, vol. iv. page 276.

other promotion, which he, at the time of such refusal, had either solely, or jointly, or in common with any other person or persons. * When we reflect upon the sanguinary transactions of the last reign, (in palliation of which, no political delinquences on the part of the sufferers can be assigned,†) the moderation here displayed, in the re-establishment of our Protestant church, must, in every unprejudiced mind, excite admiration. No penalties were imposed, but on such as should, by writing, teaching, or preaching, express words, deed, or act, set forth and defend the authority of the Pope, in opposition to that of the sovereign. It was not till the Fifth of Elizabeth,§ when the inveterate hostility of the Roman Catholics (at that time, as the Act expresses, grown to marvellous outrage, and licentious boldness") rendered severer measures necessary, that all persons were rendered liable to have the oath administered to them. It is evident, that the primary intention of Elizabeth, in her measures for re-establishing the reformed church, was to restrain from power, and not to pursue with penalties, such as were inimical to it, till their enmity should endanger

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* 1 Elizabeth, cap. 1. sec. 20 and 21.

+ Vide Book of the Roman Catholic Church. Letter 14. Sections 28, 29, and 30.

§ 5 Elizabeth, cap. I. vide Preamble.

its existence. "Her Majesty" (says Lord Bacon, in his able justification of the measures of Elizabeth towards the Roman Catholics) "not liking to make windows into men's hearts and secret thoughts, except the abundance of them did overflow into overt and express acts and affirmations, tempered her law so as it restraineth only manifest disobedience in impugning and impeaching" the royal supremacy

"as for the oath, it was altered by Her Majesty into a more grateful form,—the harshness of the name and appellation of Supreme Head was removed, and the penalty of the refusal thereof, turned into a disablement to take any promotion, or to exercise any charge.'

That the intentions of the Legislature of the First of Elizabeth, were rendered, in some degree, nugatory, by the evasions and connivance which the weak and vacillating policy of her successor, and the turbulent occurrences in the following reign occasioned, we may judge from finding it a subject of frequent charge against the government, that the laws for restraining the influence of Papists were not enforced. General declarations (however obvious the intention of the framers of them may be) sometimes admit of equivocation. It was found, therefore, that

* Observations of a Libel, &c. Lord Bacon's Works, vol. iv. page 363; and see Sir Francis Walsingham's Letter in Burnet's History of the Reformation. Book iv. Conclusion.