To his credit, Charles II tried to decrease religious discord by issuing the Declaration of Breda, which among other things promised religious toleration.  But although Parliament initially supported the Declaration, they again started stirring up anti-Catholic feelings and even went to the extent of trying to prevent Charles’ Catholic brother, James II (Figure 26), from succeeding to the throne. The reverse of the medal, shown below, leaves no doubt as to James’ religious beliefs.


James II (1633-1701), King of England, Scotland and Ireland, was the third son to Charles I and Henrietta Maria, and the brother of Charles II. During the Civil War he fled to safety in France. He returned to England and became king after the death of his brother. Unlike his brother Charles, James maintained a strong adherence to the Roman Catholic faith.  However, his zealous piety and his determination to impress Catholicism on his subjects was to prove his downfall.  For within days of James' accession, Protestants were rallying around Charles' son, James, Duke of Monmouth, whom they believed should be king. The rebellion was easily quashed and Monmouth was beheaded. Continuing his religious campaign, James had Catholics promoted to high-status positions while he appointed the 'Bloody Assizes' to execute, torture or enslave Protestant rebels.

A critical turning point in his reign came when James II issued the Declaration of Indulgence (see Archbishop Sancroft and the Seven Bishops, Figure 17, above), which granted religious tolerance to Catholics and non-conformists.  In response, many turned against the king, with the Protestant Parliament aligning themselves with James' Protestant daughter Mary (Mary was the daughter of James' first wife Anne Hyde, a Protestant who raised her daughter in the same faith), and her husband William of Orange, who eventually took the throne of England as William and Mary (see below).

A significant figure in the epic battle of Protestants and Catholics for the throne of England was the second wife of James II, Mary (of Modena) Beatrice.  In 1673 she married James, then Duke of York, later James II of England, the marriage having been brought about through the influence of Louis XIV of France.  Mary of Modena was a devout Roman Catholic, who supported her husband's pro-Catholic policies and dedicated herself to the conversion of England to Catholicism, thereby making her unpopular in Protestant England. When she bore a son, James Francis Edward Stuart (the Elder Pretender), it was widely rumored that this Catholic heir to the throne was a changeling, and fear of a Catholic succession precipitated the so-called Glorious Revolution that overthrew James II and led to the invitation of William of Orange (the future William III) to England.  The Glorious Revolution, engendered by James’ Roman Catholicism, permanently established Parliament as the ruling power of England. James died in exile, the last Stuart monarch in the direct male line (Queen Anne being the last Stuart monarch). Mary fled to France with her son, James Stuart, and worked tirelessly to advance his claims to the English throne.

We will return to James Stuart, the Elder Pretender, shortly.  But first we must dispense with three more monarchs, who serve as a bridge between the Catholic James II and the seismic political and religious battle for the English throne that ended the Stuart line and  ushered in the Protestant Hanoverians.  These three, Mary II (Figure 27), William III (Figure 28), and Anne (Figure 29), who are illustrated below with more of the Dassier medals from his Series of Kings and Queens of England, were all raised Protestants, some for purely political reasons.



In 1701, as William and Mary were without heirs, Parliament, in order to assure that the crown not fall into the hands of a Catholic, passed the Act of Settlement, which had the effect of assuring that only Protestants could succeed to the English throne.  The act was later extended to Scotland as a result of a section of the Acts of Union (1707), and which, along with other Bills, remains today one of the main constitutional laws governing the succession to not only the throne of the United Kingdom but, following British colonialism, also to those of the other Commonwealth realms. It may be noted in passing that this type of religious prerequisite also extended to Jews.  Indeed, until late in the 19th century there were still laws preventing Jews from even serving in Parliament.  The consequences of the Act of Settlement are considered below in the discussion of how a German became to rule England, in the person of George I.  But first we must dispense with Anne, the last of the Stuart monarchs.