Henry Neville and the toleration of Catholics during the Exclusion Crisis

While the Popish Plot of the later seventeenth century is commonly seen as a fabrication by the political opposition employed to root out Catholicism and secure a Protestant succession in England, this article shows that there were also voices within the opposition that exposed the scapegoating of Catholics as a political ploy, backed the succession of the duke of York and even argued for a toleration of Catholics. Using the example of the republican Henry Neville, his political writings and correspondence with Cosimo III, this article calls for a reassessment of the political and religious divisions of the so-called Exclusion Crisis.