The king early put the loyalty of his Protestant friends to the proof.
While he was a subject he had been in the habit of hearing mass with
closed doors in a small oratory which had been fitted up for his wife.
He now ordered the doors to be thrown open, in order that all who came
to pay him their duty might see the ceremony. Soon a new pulpit was
erected in the palace, and during Lent sermons were preached there by
Popish divines, to the great displeasure of zealous churchmen.

A more serious innovation followed. Passion week came, and the king
determined to hear mass with the same pomp with which his predecessors
had been surrounded. The rites of the Church of Rome were once more,
after an interval of 127 years, performed at Westminster on Easter
Sunday with regal splendour.


_Monmouth and his Fate_


The English exiles in Holland induced the Duke of Monmouth, a natural
son of Charles II., to attempt an invasion of England, and on June 11,
1685, he landed with about 80 men at Lyme, where he knelt on the shore,
thanked God for having preserved the friends of liberty and pure
religion from the perils of the sea, and implored the divine blessing on
what was yet to be done by land. The little town was soon in an uproar
with men running to and fro, and shouting "A Monmouth! a Monmouth! the
Protestant religion!" An insurrection was inaugurated and recruits came
in rapidly. But Parliament was loyal, and the Commons ordered a bill of
attainder against Monmouth for high treason. The rebel army was defeated
in a fight at Sedgmore, and Monmouth in his misery complained bitterly