s the utter subduing of a pestilent heresy,
which has a long time domineered over a great part of this northern
world. There were never such hopes of success since the days of Queen
Mary, as now in our days. God has given us a prince," meaning the duke,
"who is become (may I say a miracle) zealous of being the author and
instrument of so glorious a work; but the opposition we are sure to meet
with is also like to be great: so that it imports us to get all the aid
and assistance we can." In another letter he said, "I can scarce believe
myself awake, or the thing real, when I think of a prince in such an age
as we live in, converted to such a degree of zeal and piety, as not to
regard any thing in the world in comparison of God Almighty's glory, the
salvation of his own soul, and the conversion of our poor kingdom."
In other passages, the interests of the crown of England, those of
the French king, and those of the Catholic religion, are spoken of
as inseparable. The duke is also said to have connected his interests
unalterably with those of Lewis. The king himself, he affirms, is always
inclined to favor the Catholics, when he may do it without hazard.
"Money," Coleman adds, "cannot fail of persuading the king to any thing.
There is nothing it cannot make him do, were it ever so much to his
prejudice. It has such an absolute power over him that he cannot resist
it. Logic, built upon money, has in our court more powerful charms than
any other sort of argument." For these reasons, he proposed to Father
La Chaise, that the French king should remit the sum of three hundred
thousand pounds, on condition that the parliament be dissolved; a
measure to which, he affirmed, the king was of himself sufficiently
inclined, were it not for his hopes of obtaining money from that
assembly. The parliament, he said, had already constrained the king
to make peace with Holland, contrary to the interests of the Catholic
religion, and of his most Christian majesty: and if they should meet
again, they would surely engage him further, even to the making of
war against France. It appears also from the same letters, that the
assembling of the parliament so late as April in the year 1675, had been
procured by the intrigues of the Catholic and French party, who thereby
intended to show the Dutch and their confederates that they could expect
no assistance from England.

When the contents of these letters were publicly known, they diffused
the panic