CHAPTER IX.

CHAP.

IX.

1686 .

Changein theopinionof theToriesconcern-ing thelawful-ness ofresist-ance.

The acquittal of the Bishops was not the only event whichmakes the thirtieth of June 1688 a great epoch in history. Onthat day, while the bells of a hundred churches were ringing,while multitudes were busied, from Hyde Park to Mile End,in piling faggots and dressing Popes for the rejoicings of thenight, was despatched from London to the Hague an instru-ment scarcely less important to the liberties of England thanthe Great Charter.

The prosecution of the Bishops, and the birth of thePrince of Wales, had produced a great revolution in thefeelings of many Tories. At the very moment at which theirChurch was suffering the last excess of injury and insult,they were compelled to renounce the hope of peaceful de-liverance. Hitherto they had flattered themselves that thetrial to which their loyalty was subjected would, thoughsevere, be temporary, and that their wrongs would shortlybe redressed without any violation of the ordinary rule ofsuccession. A very different prospect was now before them.As far as they could look forward they saw only misgovern-ment, such as that of the last three years, extending throughages. The cradle of the heir apparent of the crown was sur-rounded by Jesuits. Deadly hatred of that Church of whichhe would one day be the head would be studiously instilledinto his infant mind, would be the guiding principle of hislife, and would be bequeathed by him to his posterity. Thisvista of calamities had no end. It stretched beyond the lifeof the youngest man living, beyond the eighteenth century.None could say how many generations of Protestant Eng-lishmen might have to bear oppression, such as, even whenit had been believed to be short, had been found almost in-supportable. Was there then no remedy? One remedythere was, quick, sharp, and decisive, a remedy which the