As it became evident that the king meant to have his own way, in spite of Parliament or public opinion, and that his way was probably to turn the government over to the followers of the Church of Rome, the dissenters flocked to the aid of the Church of England. Much as Presbyterians, Baptists, Quakers, and other dissenting people disagreed with the English Established Church, they all felt that it was far preferable to the Church of Rome. They knew that King James was hand in glove with the Pope and with the French king, Louis XIV., and they could foresee that if their sovereign should have his way, the country might quickly return to the conditions of the reign of "Bloody Mary." So practically all Protestants now opposed King James's illegal Declaration of Indulgence. But William Penn did not; he said he still trusted the king, and published a pamphlet entitled "Good Advice to Roman Catholic and Protestant Dissenters," in which he supported the king, although he published the pamphlet anonymously. Then he traveled over the country, trying to induce people to agree with his view of James.
The king next tried to seize the universities of Oxford and Cambridge for the Catholics. He made over to them Christ Church College and University College at Oxford, and when there was a vacancy in the office of president of Magdalen College, he ordered the fellows to elect a Catholic.
The fellows refused, and the king's officers broke down the college doors, turned out the president whom the fellows had elected, the fellows themselves, and the students, and turned the place into a Papal seminary. At first Penn remonstrated with the king about this, but soon afterward he changed and advised the college to yield. Here Penn made a grievous mistake; no wonder people began to think that the former champion of religious liberty was no longer a Quaker at heart.
King James went on with his schemes. He was growing so bold that he tried to run all the counties and boroughs, and force people to choose his own favorites for their officers. Wherever he could he turned out the old officers and put in his Catholic friends. Then, in April, 1688, he made another blunder. He issued another Declaration of Indulgence very similar to his first one, and said that he would appoint no one to public office except those who would support him in maintaining this indulgence, and then ordered that this new law should be read on two successive Sundays by the clergymen in all the churches of England. He meant in this way to humiliate the Church of England. But James had now gone too far. Only a few clergymen read the new Declaration, and in most cases where they did, the people left the churches as soon as they heard the first words of it. Seven bishops petitioned the king not to enforce his order to have the act read, and King James had these seven tried for libel, and imprisoned them in the Tower of London while they were awaiting trial because they refused to give bail. This was what became famous as the Case of the Seven Bishops, and roused men all over England to the wildest pitch of indignation. Penn opposed this arrest of the seven bishops, but he still acted as a friend of the king and tried to plead his cause.
About the same time a son was born to the king and queen, and the English people thought this meant that the Catholics would secure control of the government for the next reign. They were determined that this should not be, and so they invited William, the Protestant Prince of Orange, and his wife Mary, the daughter of James II., to come and take the throne of England. William landed and took the crown with very little opposition. James, deserted by his court, his army, and his navy, threw the Great Seal of England into the river Thames, and fled to France, where he lived the remainder of his days in a palace given to him by Louis XIV.
England was now in a much better way. The country had an honest king and queen who shortly proclaimed a religious liberty that was sincere. But Penn was under a cloud of suspicion. Men said that King James had sent him to William of Orange earlier to induce William to side with him in his Declaration of Indulgence, and men knew now that he was the author of that pamphlet "Good Advice to Roman Catholic and Protestant Dissenters" that had attempted to justify King James. Some of Penn's friends urged him to clear himself of the charges that were being spread concerning him. They told him that his own consciousness of innocence was giving him too great a contempt for the slanders and gossip that were rife about him. But in reply Penn only protested his friendship for James and his belief in the king's fairness, although it had become plain to the rest of the world that James was an unscrupulous deceiver.
His final reason for his unwavering support of James lay in these words of his: "To this let me add the relation my father had to this king's service, his particular favor in getting me released out of the Tower of London in 1669, my father's humble request to him upon his death-bed to protect me from the inconveniences and troubles my persuasion" [creed] "might expose me to, and his friendly promise to do it and exact performance of it from the moment I addressed myself to him; I say when all this is considered, anybody that has the least pretence to good nature, gratitude, or generosity, must needs know how to interpret my access to the king."
And that was probably the true explanation of William Penn's devotion to an unjust king,—his gratitude to a man who had been the friend of both his father and himself. That same strong trait of friendship was shown time and again in Penn's dealings with agents in Pennsylvania who, relying on his friendship, deceived him. It was, perhaps, a noble trait; but it placed this Quaker leader, a man who had fought so long and so earnestly to secure religious freedom in England, in the curious position of friend and supporter of a sovereign who had been doing his best to suppress liberty of religion. It is small wonder that many people in England failed to understand Penn's attitude; and small wonder that, when William and Mary came to the throne, Penn stood in a discredited and very difficult position.