It is quite plain how great a blow the English would have sustained if the whole coasts of this part of the continent had fallen into the hands of these two neighbours, whose close alliance was in itself very offensive to them[30]. Against the danger of being entangled in continental affairs, and of feeling their reflex action in Great Britain, Charles I had to set off the other danger, if he held aloof from them, of seeing new powers develop during their progress, which might make his position most critical. In order to acquire the means of resisting the ascendancy of France and Holland, he was obliged to make fresh advances to Spain. We can hardly form an idea for ourselves how much the relations between England and Spain changed and shifted [A.D. 1634.] in the great conflict which was going on. In the year 1631 a scheme was drawn up for a great attack of the English and Spaniards upon the United Netherlands, as a result of which Zealand should fall to the lot of the former. As yet indeed there was no treaty, but only a plan sketched out for further consideration, which Charles I avoided accepting, although Cottington seems to have approved of it[31]. But we see at all events to what the aim of the Spaniards was directed. After a short time, when they found themselves deceived, they entertained designs of an entirely opposite character. A detailed plan of Count Olivarez is extant, according to which Spain and France were to undertake a general attack upon England[32]. England, Scotland, and Ireland, were each to be attacked separately, and internal animosities of every kind were to be invoked in aid of the invaders. An idea was entertained of placing the young Elector Palatine on the throne of England, under the condition that he guaranteed full religious liberty and restored the expelled Irish to their lost inheritance. On the other hand, in the summer of 1634 an alliance between Spain and England was again in progress. Weston, Cottington, and Windebank, took counsel with the Spanish resident, Don Juan Nicolalde, for this object, in such entire secrecy that even Coke, the Secretary of State, had no information about it. The King besought the court of Brussels, which on this occasion as on others he was obliged to take into his confidence, to apply to no one about this matter except himself and Windebank. The overtures which he made to Spain at that time are accounted for by the ascendancy of the Dutch marine and the rise of that of the French. The claim of England to exercise a sort of supremacy over the neighbouring seas, was once more called in question. The English contended for this right in learned treatises[33]; the King of France on the [A.D. 1635.] other hand showed a determination no longer to acknowledge it. For, as his ambassador said, everything must have its foundation in reason; the usage of the sea only required that the less powerful should show honour to the more