the people were happy to learn that the king and his sons survived the gunpowder plot. the next parliament had feelings of loyalty and goodwill, which salisbury used to get higher subsidies for the king than those granted in elizabeth's reign. in his speech to both houses on 9 november, james talked about two main topics: the divine right of kings and the catholic question. he insisted that the plot had been the work of only a few catholics, not of the english catholics as a whole, and he reminded the assembly to rejoice at his survival, since kings were divinely appointed and he owed his escape to a miracle.