Popery and tyranny, it was said, went hand in hand. It must soon have been seen by the Catholic managers that such a policy was hopeless. If this was not evident at first, it must have become more than plain when early in April 1676 the Duke of York took the momentous step of ceasing to go to the royal chapel, and all England knew that he was a Catholic. It was the first occasion for a long time on which he had acted not in consonance with the ideas of France. Rome was delighted and recognised him as a true son, but elsewhere the news was not hailed with such joy. James had obtained his brother’s consent only with difficulty. Pomponne marked the withdrawal of the declaration of indulgence as the beginning of the troubles that crowded on the royal authority in England. The duke’s declaration created a notable addition. The effect of his move was instantaneous. Throughout the country the feeling roused was intense, the penal laws were once more put into execution, and Charles told the French ambassador that if he were to die the duke would not be allowed to remain in the country eight days.[99] It is perhaps to this time that the abandonment of the second scheme sketched by Coleman to La Chaize should be referred.[100] There can at all events be no doubt that its impracticable nature soon became manifest. It was therefore along another line that the design proceeded from the summer of 1676 onwards. Since the year 1670 various ways of procuring success for the Catholic religion have thus been considered, adopted, and abandoned. The policy of the Dover treaty had been led by Charles. Had it been successful he would have been left at the head of a Catholic state, controlled and compact. That had been blown to the winds. The declaration of indulgence, faint resemblance of the plan which was to have been put into execution, was the direct result of royal authority. With its failure the king’s leadership in the last movement of the counter-reformation ceased. Then followed the two schemes which Coleman related to La Chaize. In the one the motive power was to be the king, backed by the ministers and Parliament; in the other Parliament, working on the king and supported by him. When these were deserted, practically every arrangement in which the king could figure as chief had been tried. The game of the Dover treaty had been opened by the king, backed by French force; that of the declaration by the king’s move alone; Coleman had suggested action by the king and Parliament, by Parliament and the king. Unless one of these moves was made again, Charles would stand in the background of the game; none would be made again, for each had been proved ineffective. Even by the last two the object had been to raise the authority not of the king, but of the Duke of York. The only remaining possibility was that the duke should be not only the object, but the leader of the game. He was the piece with which the move had to be made.