The terror of a Catholic
successor grew steadily throughout the country, and it was to meet this
terror that Danby devised his Bill for the security of the Church. By
this Bill it was provided that on the succession of any king who was not
a member of the Established Church the appointment of bishops should be
vested in the existing body of prelates, and that the king's children
should be placed in the guardianship of the Archbishop of Canterbury.

[Sidenote: The cry for War.]

The bill however failed in the Commons; and a grant of supply unchecked
by the appropriation of the money to special services, a limitation
which Charles steadily opposed, was only obtained by Danby's profuse
bribery. The progress of the war abroad indeed was rousing panic in
England faster than Danby could allay it. New successes of the French
arms in Flanders and a defeat of the Prince of Orange at Cassel stirred
the whole country to a cry for war. The two Houses united in an address
to the Crown which prayed that England might enter into the Great
Alliance that William had built up, but Charles parried the blow by
demanding a supply before the war was declared and by a new prorogation
of the House on a new refusal. Fresh and larger subsidies from France
enabled him to continue this prorogation for seven months. But the
silence of the Parliament did little to silence the country; and Danby
took advantage of the popular cry for war to press an energetic course
of action on the king. In its will to check French aggression the
Cavalier party was as earnest as the Puritan, and Danby aimed at
redeeming his failure at home by uniting the Parliament through a
vigorous policy abroad.

[Sidenote: Marriage of William and Mary.]

As usual Charles appeared to give way. He was himself for the moment
uneasy at the appearance of the French on the Flemish coast, and he
owned that "he could never live at ease with his subjects" if Flanders
were abandoned. He allowed Danby therefore to press on both parties the
necessity for mutual concessions, and to define the new attitude of
England by reviving the project for a match between Mary and William of
Orange. William's distrust of Arlington, by whom the proposal of it had
been made to him, had led the Prince at first to set aside the scheme.
But he had never lost sight of it, and the counsels of Sir William
Temple had brought him in 1677 to make overtures for its realization.
Charles and Danby had still the sam