James II., brother of Charles II., in 1685 succeeded to the throne of England and Scotland. Educated like his brother, he had imbibed similar religious and political sentiments. While Duke of York he at first secretly, but afterwards openly, professed the Catholic faith. When, in the course of intrigue and conflict, the royal party had gained the ascendency in Scotland, he retired thither; and manifested his barbarous ferocity by personally assisting at the torturing of the Covenanters. The rapid strides which his brother had made towards the acquisition of absolute power, and the paralyzing dread which cruelty and tyranny had cast over the public mind, enabled James II. to succeed to the British throne without opposition. From the hour he became invested with the royal dignity, he adopted every expedient that craft could devise to convert his royal prerogatives into monarchial authority, and to secure the restoration of Catholicism as the religion of the kingdom. As virtue scorns to be the tool of vice, and as sycophants are the most pliable instruments of despotism, he adopted the policy of investing the most unscrupulous with official authority. Supreme among his base and cringing creatures stood Judge Jeffrey. The chief engineer of the papal machinery--the controlling spirit of the king and his councils; insolent, imperious, arbitrary and oppressive, this man was ready for any work that furnished sufficient blood and plunder. By barbarous and inhuman acts, and by the arbitrary execution of innocent subjects, this monster in human form succeeded in casting a deep gloom over the public mind, and in annihilating all apparent opposition to the tyrannical proceedure of the king. Amid the death-like silence which hung on the lips of the people the king threw off his disguise, entered into negotiation with the pope for the reception of England into the papal church, celebrated mass invested with the royal paraphernalia, assumed the power of parliament, nullified all test oaths, filled the councils and army with Catholics, governed Scotland and Ireland by his creatures, organized ecclesiastical tribunals to try such clergy as were suspected of holding liberal sentiments, committed bishops to the Tower for having remonstrated against the propriety of reading a document concerning a popish indulgence which he had commanded to be read in all the churches, and adopted every possible method to subvert civil and religious liberty, and to bind on his subjects the shackles of papal despotism. Towards the final consummation of his calamitous design he appeared to be making rapid strides; but, though the papal machinery was formidable, yet there was another power more formidable still; as wily and as secret: which was quietly maturing its strength for the hour of retribution. The oppressive measures of the king and the failure of every attempt at compromise and conciliation, had created a stern