Page:Guy Fawkes, or, The history of the gunpowder plot.pdf/6

6 had aerved the Kings of England, before the Reformation, in the highest offices of state, and whose honours and possessions were the proofs of royal favour and distinction conferred on their predecessors; when we consider, moreover, that these persons were thus impoverished and. disgraced for their adherence to that ancient religion to whose rites and ceremonies they were attached by early and hereditary associations, and whose power and influence they were bound by the strongest obligations to maintain and defend against what was to them an abominable heresy, we shall be at no loss to comprehend the bitter feelings of discontent which prevailed amongst the English Catholics under Elizabeth, and which produced a constant succession of plots and rebellions, more or less important and alarming, during the last twenty years of her reign.

Although it must be admitted that the laws in existence against the Catholics at this period were not constantly enforced against them, it must not, on the other hand, be supposed that they were merely suspended, in terrorem, over the heads of those against whom they were directed, for the purpose of restraining the seditious attempts of the disaffected. There is no doubt that they were often practically applied to a very severe extent; and there were few Catholic families who had not in some degree experienced their rigour. Of this, many instances might be adduced.

As Elizabeth’s life declined, it was natural that a party so oppressed should direct their attention with much anxiety to her probable successor. Having abandoned all expectation of an avowed Catholic heir to the crown, they