As a Quaker and a Democrat, Penn of course had no sympathy with the political opinions of the King. When James was put under arrest at Feversham, he was informed among other disasters that Penn had been seized: he said he was sorry for it, but he was sure that no serious charge could be urged against him. His part had been open and consistent. He had done his utmost to prevent the necessity for recourse to a revolution; and it was not without deep anxiety that he saw the change of rulers. He believed James to be sincere in his desire to establish freedom of opinion; and as things then stood in England, this freedom was of far greater importance than any question which could seriously arise as to the limits of the royal prerogative. In William of Orange he saw a man of policy-not of ideas. His object was to be King; and whatever, in the secret depths of his own mind, he might think of tests-unknown in his own country-there was no hope that he would risk the least unpopularity by helping to remove them from the statute-book of England.2 CHAPTER X. 1688-1694. NIGHT AND MORNING. THE advance of William and the King's flight were the signals for a general movement. The tools, the favorites, the friends, the ministers of James, all thought it prudent to retire from public notice. Curious were the means of escape and ludicrous the incidents attending it in many instances. The redoubtable Jeffreys tried to escape in the dress of a common sailor; the subtle and intriguing Sunderland quitted his country in his wife's cap and petticoat. Of the men who had stood near the throne for the last three years and a half, Penn was almost the only one who remained in London. Conscious of no crime, he turned a deaf ear to every entreaty of his friends to provide for his personal safety by flight. 1 Harl. MSS. 6852, Art. 26. 3 Evelyn Mem. i. 660. 2 Letter to Popple, October 24. They urged-and with reason-that he had been too intimate with the late King to escape suspicion under the new reign; and if he did not choose to follow James into France, he had still an honorable refuge open to him in America, where he might remain in peace until the first heat of party vengeance had abated. But he would not change his own straight course. He said he had done nothing but what in his belief was for the honor and good of England, and he was not afraid to answer for it before all the princes in the world. He would not change his lodgings even; or keep in the shade more than he had done in his day of favor. As in the time of the late King, he appeared daily at Whitehall;1 which bold and open conduct soon provoked inquiry. The Lords of the Council who had assumed the general management of affairs on James' flight becoming known, resolving to pass him under examination, sent their messenger to him as he was taking his usual walk in Whitehall; and on being told that the Lords were then sitting, he at once obeyed the summons to attend. The moment was one of great excitement: the mob were already engaged in burning the houses of suspected persons; and to have been associated in any way with the court was enough to incur in their rude judgment the penalties of suspicion. When Penn appeared before them, the Lords of the Council inquired into his past conduct and present opinions. He courageously replied, that with regard to what was passed, he had always loved his country and the Protestant faith, and had ever done his best to promote their true interests. As to the present the King, he said, had been his friend and his father's friend, and therefore, though he no longer owed him allegiance as a subject, as a man he retained for him all the respect which in other days he had ever professed. He had done nothing, and should do nothing, but what he was willing to answer for before God and his country.2 The Lords were at a loss what to do. They were themselves acting under a power which they had usurped; and were afraid to take a step which might lead to failure and unpopularity. The only thing which appeared against the prisoner was his own confession of attachment to the fugitive King. Yet to discharge so conspicuous a friend of James, they dared not, being unaware how far the Prince of Orange might approve of the step. They got over their difficulty by taking security in 60007. for his appearance on the first day of the following term, to answer any charges which by that time might be made against him; and with the threat of prosecution hanging above his head, he was permitted to remain at large.1 Meantime the desires of the Prince of Orange were crowned with success; the government was settled, as he designed it should be from the first, entirely in his own interest; and he and his consort-the legitimate heir to the throne, setting the young Prince of Wales aside-were crowned King and Queen. But Penn was not left in peace. Some fresh cause of suspicion arose,-low spies and informers dogged his footsteps,he was believed to be rich, and there were many about the court who would gladly have shared in the spoils of his fortune, and at the end of February the Lords in Council issued a warrant for his arrest.2 But the intended victim had been secretly made aware of the new accusations against him, and of the low witnesses whose evidence was to be taken, and he prudently declined to surrender himself up until Easter term, as already fixed in his bond. However, not to sanction malicious reports by an apparent flight, he wrote to the Duke of Shrewsbury, to say that he was living at his own house in the country, attending to his private affairs and the concerns of his colony; that he did not feel justified in giving himself up an unbailable prisoner, seeing in how heavy a sum he was already bound over to appear on the first day of the ensuing term; that he could affirm, without reserve or equivocation, his entire ignorance of any plot or conspiracy against the new government. The King seems to have acceded to his request to be allowed to remain in the country until his day of trial. By Easter term, however, men's minds were calmer; and when Penn appeared in court to defend himself, not one of his secret accusers dared to confront him. Not a whisper was there uttered of his being a Jesuit. No man accused him of having done any wrong. The judge declared in open court that he stood cleared and free of every charge that had been made against him.1 2 3 Though now believing himself to be personally safe, he was 1 Ellis Correspondence, ii. 356. Privy Council Register, W. R. i. 24. Privy Council Office. 3 Penn to Shrewsbury, March 7, 1689. 4 Besse, i. 140. still anxious for his colony and his country. Even before the coronation of William and Mary, he foresaw the probabilities of a general war. The Prince of Orange had desired to be King of England chiefly that he might become a power in Europe. His thought by day and his dream by night was a grand coalition of the Protestant powers of the North and a war with France. A war with France, as the governor of Pennsylvania knew only too well, would materially affect his province; as the declaration itself would instantly lead to hostilities in North America. He was most anxious, therefore, to get out to Philadelphia before the troubles commenced in that region; and began to make preparation for the voyage. A few weeks later the unwelcome tidings were officially conveyed to all the plantations. The war with France, which was to upset so many colonial governments, had actually commenced.2 In the midst of these discouraging prospects, it was some consolation to find the new King of England true to the tolerant principles which he had expressed in the Hague conferences. At the risk of giving mortal offence to the Church party, he pressed for an Act of Toleration for Dissenters, and even declared it necessary to afford protection to the Papists.3 His own temper was not merciful, but he was a politic prince; and he knew the vast power which the position he aimed to acquire, as protector-general of Protestants, from the fiords of Norway to the banks of the Theiss and the Danube, would give him in the councils of Europe; and he naturally asked himself with what effect he could interfere in behalf of the Finn or the Hungarian, if he gave the Catholic at home a just cause of complaint? Even before his election to the throne he had entered into treaties with the Pope and the Emperor.4 The Act of Toleration was, of course, powerfully opposed by the Church; but the King was resolved to carry it through the two Houses, and he did so by a large majority. The existence of Dissenters was recognized. Their chapels and meeting-houses were made legal. They were no longer to be liable to fines and imprisonments for not attending the Es 1 Penn to Friends in Pennsylvania, January, 1689. 4 Dartmouth's Note to Burnet, iv. 21. tablished Church. The only exception to this general rule was made in the case of Unitarians. They were still beyond the pale-outlaws in their own land. But the number of persons professing simple Theism was not large in those days. The Quakers were not only included in the general list of Protestant sects, they were relieved from their old grievance of double taxes on making a declaration of fidelity to their Majesties; and a special clause was introduced in their behalf into the bill. Other dissenting bodies were required to take the usual oaths to the government: the followers of Fox were allowed to make a simple declaration. It was enacted that licenses should be taken out for the houses, chapels, or other buildings to be used for the performance of public worship; and that magistrates should have no power to refuse the license except on good and reasonable grounds. Henceforth every man could worship God according to his own notions, without the fear of stripes, stocks, fines, and imprisonment being constantly before his eyes. A great instalment of justice was paid down:-but it was only an instalment. The Test Act was still unrepealed. The members of the Established Church alone enjoyed the full rights of Englishmen. No Presbyterian, no Independent, no Quaker, could hold office-serve in the army or navy-sit on the bench as a magistrate act as guardian to any ward-enter either of the national Universities-or execute any legal trust. In relation to the state he was still an outlaw. The Catholic and the Socinian were in a still worse position. They were formally excluded from the Act of Toleration.3 Penn was highly gratified with the results obtained, though they fell so short of his own desires. The new Act disarmed the petty tyrant. It opened the prison-doors to crowds of his humble brethren. He hoped it would gradually lead to a still more liberal and enlightened policy, when the dominant parties became aware how great an accession of union and strength it would bring to the nation. But he had little time to indulge in these reflections. In the spring of 1690, before the King set out for Ireland, where the war was raging, a band of military one day beset his house and placed him under arrest. He had no conception of the cause of this 1 Parl. Hist. v. 473. 3 Burnet, iv. 16. 2 Statutes, 1689. |