Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 13.djvu/30

 REVOLUTION

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REVOLUTION

he underestimated two difficulties, the hatred of the dissenters for "poper>-" and their distrust of royal absolutism. His action in promoting Catholics to the Privy Council, the judicial bench, and the otiices of Lord "lieutenant. sherifT, and magistrate, wounded these susceptibilities, while he further oflfended the Anglicans by attempting to restore to Catholics some of their ancient foundations in the universities. Catholics obtained some footing both at Christ Church and I'niversitv College, Oxford, and in March 1688, James gave the presidency of Magdalen Col- lege to Honaventure (Jiffard, the Catholic Vicar Apostolic of the Midland District. This restoration of Magdalen as a Catholic college created the great- est alarm, not only among the holders of benefices throughout the country, but also among the owners of ancient abbey lands. The presence of the papal nuncio, Mgr d'Adda, at Court and the public position granted to the four Catholic bishops, who had re- cently been appointed as vicars ApostoUc, served to increase both the di.slike of the dissenters to support a king whose acts, while of doubtful legality, were also subversive of Protestant interests, and likewise the difficulty of the Anglicans in jjractising passive obedience in face of such provocation. Surrounded by the.se comphcations, James issued his second Declaration of Indulgence in April, 1G88, and ordered that it should be read in all the churches. This strained Anglican obedience to the breaking point. The Archbishop of Canterbury and six of his suf- fragans presented a petition questioning the dispens- ing power. The seven bishops were sent to the Tower prosecuted, tried, and acquitted. This trial proved to be the immediate occasion of the Revolution, for, as Halifax said, "it hath brought all Protestants to- gether and bound them up into a knot that cannot easily be untied". While the bishops were in the Tower, another epoch-marking event occurred — the birth of an heir to the crown (10 June, 1688). Hither- to the hopes of the king's opponents had been fixed on the succession of his Protestant daughter Mary, wife of William of Orange, the Protestant leader. The birth of Prince James now opened up the pro.s- pect of a Catholic; dynasty just at a moment when the ancient anti-Catholic bigotry had been aroused by events both in England and France. For besides the ill-a<i vised acts of James, the persecution of the Huguenots by I^uis XIV, consequent on the Revoca- tion of the Edict of Nantes in 1685, revived old re- ligious animosities. England was flooded with French Protestant refugcies bearing everywhere the tale of a Catholic king's cruelty.

Unfortunately for James his whole foreign policy ha<l been one of subsc^rvience to France, and at this moment of crisis the power of F'rance was a menace U) all Europ«!. Even Cathcilic Austria and Spain HUpp<jrted the threatened Protestant states, and the p<jp<' himself, outrag<;d by Louis XIV in a suc- c^rssion of wrongs, joincul the universal resistance; to France and was alli(!d with William of Orange and other Protestant sovereigns against Louis and his single supporter, James. William had long watched the situation in England, and during 1687 had re- c<'ived communications from the. op[)osifion in which it was agrwjd that, whenev(!r revolutionary action Bhf)uld bf'cf)me iwlvisable, it should be carried out under William's guiriance. As early as th(! autumn of 1687 the papal secretary of state was aware; of the pK»t to dfrllirone James and make Mary qu(!en, and a P'rench agent dispatched the news to Plngland through France. The Duke of Norfolk then in R/)me aWj learned it, and sent intelligence to the king before 18 Df!C.. 1687 rietter of d'Estrc'-es to Jjouvoifl, cited by Ranke, II, 424). liut James, though early informed, was reluctant to believe that his (v>n-in-law would hejul an insurrection against him. On the day the seven bishops were acquitted

seven English statesmen sent a letter to William in- viting him to rescue the religion and liberties of Eng- land. But William was threatened by a French army on the Belgian frontier, and could not take action. Louis XIV made a last etTort to save James, and warned the Dutch States General that he would re- gard any attack on England as a declaration of war against France. This was keenly resented by James, who regarded it as a .slight upon English indepen- dence, and he repudiated t lie charge that he hail made a secret treaty with France. Thereupon J.,ouis left him to his fate, removed the Fren(h troops from Flanders to begin a campaign against the empire, and thus William was free to move. When it was too late James realized his danger. By hasty con- cessions granted one after another he tried to undo his work and win back the Tory churchmen to his cause. But he did not remove the Catholic officers or suggest the restriction of the dispensing power. In October Sunderland was dismissed from office, but William was already on the seas, and, though driven back by a storm, he re-embarked and landed at Torbay on /j Nov., 1688. James at first prepareil to resist. The army was sent to intercept William, but by the characteristic treachery of Churchill, disafTection was spread, and the king, not knowing in whom he could place confidence, attempted to escape. At Sheerne.ss he was stopped and sent back to London, where he might have proved an embarras- sing prisoner had not his escape been connived at. On 23 Dec, 1688, he left England to take refuge with Louis XIV; the latter received him generously and granted him both palace and pension. On his first departure the mob had risen in London against the Catholics, and attacked chapels and houses, plunder- ing and carrying off the contents. Even the am- bassadors' houses were not spared, and the Spanish and Sardinian embassy chapels were destroyed. Bishops Giffard and Leyburn were arrested and com- mitted to the Tower. Father Petre had escai)ed, and the Nuncio disguised himself as a servant at the house of the envoy from Savoy, till he was en- abled to obtain from William a passport. So far as the English Catholics were concerned, the result of the Revolution was that their restoration to freedom of worship and liberation from the penal laws was delayed for a century and more.

So completfily had James lost the confidence of the nation that William experienced no opposition and the Revolution ran its course in an almost regular way. A Convention Parliament met on 22 .Jan., 1689, declared that James "having withdrawn him- self out of the kingdom, had abdicated the govern- ment, and that the throne was thereby vacant", and "that experience had shown it to be inconsistent with the safety and welfare of this Protestant king- dom to be governed by a Popish Prince". The crown was offercid to William and Mary, who ac- cepted the Declaration of Right, which laid dinvn the principles of the constitution with r(gard to the flis- pensiiig power, th(liberties of Parliament, and other matters. After their i)roclaination as king and (lueen, the Declaration was ratified by the Bill of Rights, and the work of tlu; Revolution was cnii)lete. English Catholics have indeed had good cause to lament the failure of th(! king's well-meant, if unwise, attempts to restore their liberty, and to regret that he did not act on the wise advice; of Pope Innocent XI and Cardinal Howard to proc(ed by slow degrees and obtain first the repeal of the penal laws b(fore going on to restore their full civil rights. But on the other hand we can now realize that the Revolution had the advantage of finally closing the long struggle between king and Parliament that had lasted for nearly a century, and of establishing general prin- ciples of religious toleration in which Catholics were bound sooner or later to be included.