the agitation of the
Catholics at this juncture; but as the latter appealed to the
principle which had been impressed on them by their missionaries, that
men had no duties to a king who was a heretic, the Parliament thought
it necessary to impose on them an oath which concerned the authority
of their Church as well as that of the State. Not only were they to be
compelled to acknowledge the King as their legitimate prince, to
defend him against every conspiracy and every attack, even when made
under the pretext of religion, and to promise to reveal any such to
him; they must also renounce the doctrine that the authority of the
Church gave the Pope the right of deposing a king, and absolving his
subjects from their oath of allegiance; and they must condemn as
impious and heretical the doctrine that princes excommunicated by the
Pope could be dethroned or put to death by their subjects.[340]
Attention was directed to the English regiment in the service of the
Archduke; and it was thought dangerous that so many malcontents should
be assembled there, and should practise the use of arms, in order
perhaps to turn them some day against their country. It was enacted
that the Oath of Supremacy should be imposed on every one who took
service abroad before his departure, with a pledge that he would not
be reconciled to the Papacy: even securities for the observance of the
oath were to be exacted.

In the spring of the year 1605 the whole state of England still showed
a tendency to clemency and conciliation. In the early part of 1606 the
opposite tendency had completely obtained the upper hand.

But this state of affairs necessarily reacted on Catholic countries
and governments. In Spain, where it was easiest to rouse the
susceptibilities of Catholicism, the severe measures of the Parliament
of themselves created a feeling of bitterness: but besides this, Irish
refugees resorted thither who gave an agitating account of the way in
which these measures were carried out in Ireland:[341] so that the
nation felt itself affronted in the persons of its co-religionists.
Both governments, that of Spain and that of the Netherlands, refused
to hand over to the English government men like Baldwin and Owen, who
were taxed with participating in the plot, or to banish others whom
the English government considered dangerous. The pious were reminded
of the will of Queen Mary, in which she had transferred her
hereditary right over England, France,