The History of England from the Accession of James II, vol 2 | Page 7

Church was concerned, shrank from
no atrocity and could be bound by no oath. If there were in that age two
persons inclined by their judgment and by their temper to toleration,
those persons were Tillotson and Locke. Yet Tillotson, whose
indulgence for various kinds of schismatics and heretics brought on
him the reproach of heterodoxy, told the House of Commons from the
pulpit that it was their duty to make effectual provision against the
propagation of a religion more mischievous than irreligion itself, of a
religion which demanded from its followers services directly opposed
to the first principles of morality. His temper, he truly said, was prone
to lenity; but his duty to he community forced him to be, in this one
instance, severe. He declared that, in his judgment, Pagans who had

never heard the name of Christ, and who were guided only by the light
of nature, were more trustworthy members of civil society than men
who had been formed in the schools of the Popish casuists.7 Locke, in
the celebrated treatise in which he laboured to show that even the
grossest forms of idolatry ought not to be prohibited under penal
sanctions, contended that the Church which taught men not to keep
faith with heretics had no claim to toleration.8
It is evident that, in such circumstances, the greatest service which an
English Roman Catholic could render to his brethren in the faith was to
convince the public that, whatever some rash men might, in times of
violent excitement, have written or done, his Church did not hold that
any end could sanctify means inconsistent with morality. And this great
service it was in the power of James to render. He was King. He was
more powerful than any English King had been within the memory of
the oldest man. It depended on him whether the reproach which lay on
his religion should be taken away or should be made permanent.
Had he conformed to the laws, had be fulfilled his promises, had he
abstained from employing any unrighteous methods for the propagation
of his own theological tenets, had he suspended the operation of the
penal statutes by a large exercise of his unquestionable prerogative of
mercy, but, at the same time, carefully abstained from violating the
civil or ecclesiastical constitution of the realm, the feeling of his people
must have undergone a rapid change. So conspicuous an example of
good faith punctiliously observed by a Popish prince towards a
Protestant nation would have quieted the public apprehensions. Men
who saw that a Roman Catholic might safely be suffered to direct the
whole executive administration, to command the army and navy, to
convoke and dissolve the legislature, to appoint the Bishops and Deans
of the Church of England, would soon have ceased to fear that any
great evil would arise from allowing a Roman Catholic to be captain of
a company or alderman of a borough. It is probable that, in a few years,
the sect so long detested by the nation would, with general applause,
have been admitted to office and to Parliament.
If, on the other hand, James should attempt to promote the interest of

his Church by violating the fundamental laws of his kingdom and the
solemn promises which he had repeatedly made in the face of the
whole world, it could hardly be doubted that the charges which it had
been the fashion to bring against the Roman Catholic religion would be
considered by all Protestants as fully established. For, if ever a Roman
Catholic could be expected to keep faith with heretics, James might
have been expected to keep faith with the Anglican clergy. To them he
owed his crown. But for their strenuous opposition to the Exclusion
Bill he would have been a banished man. He had repeatedly and
emphatically acknowledged his obligation to them, and had vowed to
maintain them in all their legal rights. If he could not be bound by ties
like these, it must be evident that, where his superstition was concerned,
no tie of gratitude or of honour could bind him. To trust him would
thenceforth be impossible; and, if his people could not trust him, what
member of his Church could they trust? He was not supposed to be
constitutionally or habitually treacherous. To his blunt manner, and to
his want of consideration for the feelings of others, he owed a much
higher reputation for sincerity than he at all deserved. His eulogists
affected to call him James the Just. If then it should appear that, in
turning Papist, he had also turned dissembler and promisebreaker, what
conclusion was likely to be drawn by a nation already disposed to
believe that Popery had a pernicious influence on the moral character?
On these grounds many of the