The fine was afterwards remitted by the prince, when he mounted the throne.
This session, an address was also made, very disagreeable to the king, craving the severe execution of the laws against Catholics.

His answer was gracious and condescending;[***] though he declared against persecution, as being an improper measure for the suppression of any religion, according to the received maxim, "That the blood of the martyrs was the seed of the church." He also condemned an entire indulgence of the Catholics; and seemed to represent a middle course as the most humane and most politic.

He went so far as even to affirm with an oath, that he never had entertained any thoughts of granting a toleration to these religionists.[****] The liberty of exercising their worship in private houses, which he had secretly agreed to in the Spanish treaty, did not appear to him deserving that name; and it was probably by means of this explication, he thought that he had saved his honor.

And as Buckingham, in his narrative,[v] confessed that the king had agreed to a temporary suspension of the penal laws against the Catholics, which he distinguished from a toleration, (a term at that time extremely odious,) James naturally deemed his meaning to be sufficiently explained, and feared not any reproach of falsehood or duplicity, on account of this asseveration.
* Clarendon, vol.i.p.

23.
** Parl.Hist.