adventurers to take the oath, but whether he insisted on this is uncertain. Charles I of England generally recognised that Catholics could not conscientiously take the Oath of Supremacy, and frequently exerted his prerogative to help them to avoid it. On the other hand, his theory of the divine right of kings induced him to favour the Oath of Allegiance, and he was irritated with the Catholics who refused it or argued against it. Pope Urban VIII is said to have condemned the oath again in 1626, and the controversy continued. Preston still wrote in its defence; so also, at King Charles's order, did Sir William Howard (1634); this was probably the future William Howard, 1st Viscount Stafford. Their most important opponent was Jesuit Father Edward Courtney, who was therefore imprisoned by Charles. The matter is frequently mentioned in the dispatches and the "Relatione" of Panzani, the papal agent to Queen Henrietta Maria. The Sorbonne, on 30 June 1681, shortly before approving the Gallican articles, censored the English oath, and found in it very little to object to. References Sources 1606 in England 1606 in politics 17th-century documents History of Catholicism in England James VI and I Oaths of allegiance Political history of England