Laws c. Now supposing 1. that thus it was that the King had before promised favour to them and instead of that had permitted the horrid and cruel Laws as he calls them to have their course is this sufficient to excuse their cursed Design or to prove that Religion was not concerned in it Was it upon any other account if we grant this than Religion when they hoped for Toleration and was it not Religion that put them upon Rebellion because they had not that Toleration But 2. indeed there was no such reason for their Conspiracy for they had no such assurances from the King Such a report was spread abroad by themselves as Watson doth acknowledge but with what truth will appear not only from Watson's Confession who two days before his death protested upon his Soul to the Earl of Northampton that he could never draw the smallest comfort from him in those degrees but also from Watson's Treason who would never have attempted that if he had been satisfied of the King 's good intentions towards those of his Religion It is not unlikely but that the King who after his coming in did receive them freely and favourably might before treat them after the same manner but how far it was from any promise Watson further declares I could never draw more from the King saith he than that he would have the Catholicks apprehend that as he was a stranger to this state so till he under stood in all points how those matters stood he would not promise favour any way But how far the King was from affording them any such favours as they pretend is further declared in a Memorandum in the Star-Chamber For some of the Puritans having spread a rumour that the King intended to grant a Toleration to Papists the Lords severally declared how the King was discontented with the said false rumour and had made but the day before a Protestation to them that he never intended it and that he would spend the last drop of blood in his body before he would do it and prayed that before any of his Issue should maintain any other Religion than what he truly professed and maintained that God would take them out of the World As false also and less ground is there for that of their Persecution For he was so far from it that he gave honour at his first coming to many of them and did admit all without distinction to his presence upon just occasion of access as the Earl of Northampton shews and took away the Mulcts that were laid upon them And in his first Speech in Parliament Mar. 19. 1603 the King did make a proposal of clearing the Laws of such interpretations as might tend to the hurt of the innocent as well as the guilty as he saith which Speech was made after the Treason of Watson was discovered that not provoking the King to change his behaviour toward any other of them than those that were Confederates in it So that if we truly enquire into the case unless Lenity and Favour is Persecution we shall hardly find what may be so called And so much indeed doth Suarez say that King James's kindnesses inasmuch as they proceeded from political reasons may be well esteemed part of their Persecution But 3. There could be no such reason for this Conspiracy for they had laid the foundation of it and were carrying it on before the King was settled in his Throne This Watson confess'd and it s also manifest for Christopher Wright was dispatched into Spain to engage that Kings assistance immediatly upon Queen Elizabeths death and the Powder Treason it self was formed in the first year of King James's Reign We see then they had no such provocation given them as is pretended and that if they had it doth not at all infer that they engaged upon this Design not upon the account of Religion But if we should grant that they had such a provocation and that the provocation and Religion did not go together in it Yet we have other reasons to shew that it was upon a religious account that this was undertaken and that I shall make evident 1. From the Principles which they went upon 2. From their own Declaration From their Principles As 1. They held that an Heretical Prince might and ought to be deposed So Faux said he was moved to this because the King was not his lawful Sovereign or the Anointed of God in respect he was an Heretick 2. That the Pope had sufficient power by vertue of his Supremacy to depose such This was Catesbye's reason for saith he if the Popes Breves were of force to keep him King James out they are also of no less Authority to thrust him out 3. That it was lawful for the good of the Church and the furtherance of the Catholick Cause to kill and to destroy This was the reason upon which Catesby and all the rest were satisfied and from whence Sir Everard did with a great confidence affirm I could give unanswerable reasons for the good that this would have done for the Catholick Cause Which it seems he was furnished with from a Latin Book that he met with perhaps Delrio If these and the like be not principles of their Religion then we are to seek for them and if these are the Principlss upon which they were satisfied then it was the Cause of Religion that they fought in 2. But if this will not do let us attend to their own Declarations I was moved hereunto said Faux only for Religion and Conscience sake the King not being my lawful Soveraign c. So Sir Everard Digby no other cause drew me to hazard my Fortune and Life but Zeal to Gods Religion From all which we have reason to say with King James that it cannot be denied that it was the only blind Superstition of their errors in Religion that led them to this desperate device And must think the Author of the Catholick Apology let fall a great Truth though against his own mind that when Dr. Stillingfleet had asserted that the Plotters motives were from their Religion doth reply ' T is as true that the Plot had its rise from Clem. 8. Breves For so it had in a great measure as I have before shewed SECT V. THey never gave to the World any real and good satisfaction of their abhorrency of this bloody Design The Catholick Apology doth tell us that Cardinal Bellarmin doth express the Treason not only by the name of Horrid but also adds I excuse not the Fact I abominate King-killing I detest Conspiracies And presently adds of his own Did ever Writer whether Priest or Lay-man English-man or Stranger own the real Plotters not to be Villains But the Question is First who are those he calls real Plotters not the Jesuits or hardly Catesby whom they do so much applaud not only for his Parts but his Piety
broke out So inconsistent are Persons with themselves when they have not truth on their side and so apt are they to catch at any little thing when they serve a Cause or a Party For is it not an easie thing to raise such a report and have we not reason to believe such will do it whose interest it is to discharge themselves of it and who as they would deny it if they could so would to be sure extenuat it when it is not to be denied Can we think that they who contrived to cast the whole upon the Puritans if it had succeeded were not as able and willing when it miscarried to place the name of Cecil in their Register as the Master-workman as the above said Author saith that Sanderson doth acknowledg and to make him the deviser of it Furthermore is it not usual for such as would be accounted Men of Wit which the Apol. saith Mr. Osborn was noted for to allow little of that in others and for such as pretend to be Inquisitive Politicoes as the Apol. saith Tacitus did to have every thing a Mystery can we think that he that slubbers over what K. James did well and continually exposeth him in what he thinks he did ill that will hardly allow him to have any sense of Honour and Religion would not be shy also of allowing him one dram of sagacity above other men to find out a Riddle or any greater title to divine Providence to help him to unfold it Can we think that he that was a frequenter of company and inquisitive as this Author saith Osborn was could be ignorant of such rumours as were scattered at that time abroad by the party concerned if such there were or that he that had a spite at the Court would not maliciously improve them And is there any reason to believe the one or the other upon their bare affirmation I do not think that the credit of such will pass at this time abroad without better Certificates and therefore since this honourable Person is he alone that hath urged some Arguments for it as he affirms I shall consider what he hath said And in the first place I think what he hath said concerning the Letter sent to the Lord Monteagle to be very remarkable upon which he observes That it 's pleasant to see in most of the Relations and Accounts of this Business how the Letter appeared Nonsence forsooth to Cecil and with what a particular adulation he seemed all along to admire the King's Comment and Exposition for though his Majesty had as much Wit as any man living yet the Affair was so plain that one of a far less capacity could not miscarry in it Herein I must confess he is very singular and I am of his mind when he saith perchance I have bin the first that urged the present Arguments For to this day all the World hath bin of another opinion and without doubt whoever had seen the Letter before the event did unriddle it must have no more thought of such a design then those that read the Case that Del Rio put of powder being placed so that the Prince and all that are in the City would be thereby destroyed could think of the respect which that had to England Will we hearken to their stout Apologist he acknowledgeth that Rex ingenio per se acer periculo factus acrior c. the King naturally of a sharp wit and by his danger made more quick when he could conceive no other way by which the Parliament should be destroyed suspected as it was that it must be by some Mine and so caused the place to be searched If Barclay be to be heeded the King was Divinely inspired Nay if Bellarmine be to be credited it was not discovered without a Miracle of Divine Providence And after all these it will be of some Authority with Protestants not only that King James in his Speech on that occasion saith it was miraculous and that when a general obscure Advertisement was given of some dangerous blow at this time I did saith he upon the instant interpret and apprehend some dark Phrases therein contrary to the ordinary Grammar construction of them and in another sort than I am sure any Divine or Lawyer in any Vniversity would have taken them to be meant by this horrible form of blowing us all up by Powder But also the Lords and Commons in Parliament declared that the Plot would have turned to the utter ruin of this whole Kingdom had it not pleased Almighty God by inspiring the King 's most excellent Majesty with a Divine Spirit to interpret some dark phrases of a Letter shewed to his Maiesty above and beyond all ordinary construction thereby miraculously discovering this hidden Treason After all which whether I shall with the aforesaid Author say that the words of that Letter are obvious and which he by way of scorn calls the Miraculous Letter or with Sir Edward Cook in his Speech say upon the Authority aforesaid that the King was divinely inspired by Almighty God the only Ruler of Princes like an Angel of God to direct and point out as it were to the very place to cause a search to be made out of those dark words of the Letter concerning a terrible Blow I leave the world to judg But he will not only have the Letter plain for the matter of it but also undertakes to find out the Authour which he will needs have to be the States-man and thinks to come off with a pretty Query or two Is it possible saith he to imagin that any Man could be so mad after he and his Partizans had brought their Plot to that perfection had so solemnly swore by the Trinity and Sacrament never to disclose it directly or indirectly by word or circumstance and had resolved to blow up all the Catholick Lords and the rest of their Friends c. To fancy that a man should write a Letter that had more in it of a Plot against the State than the bare saving of a Friend Again Suppose this yet what need was there to write that God and Man would punish the Parliament c. and a hundred other circumstances not only suspicious but to no manner of purpose unless intended for the detection of the whole Intrigue Besides no man really engaged in the Treason had he bin never so great a Fool would have given warning ten days before the Plot was to be executed And so he goes on to shew how this warning was quite opposite to the designs of a Conspirator c. but beneficial to a Machiavilian From all which we may observe how much may be said by a man of Wit to baffle any Cause that he undertakes to overthrow since this that he hath said is in the ground of it false as hath elsewhere bin shewedâ— and what if I had
kept secret were revealed as may be found in their printed Confessions 2. The Malefactors did accuse their Confessors and therefore certainly they would never have spared others had there been any guilty This cannot be supposed saith another that they had not Tenderness enough to leave any other undiscovered whose Conscience compelled them to expose their own Confessors to their deserved Penalty To which the last Author adds 3. That not one Nobleman or any other of the Catholick Gentry did know or approve of that wicked conspiracy because the Catholick Lords all of them saith the Cath. Apol. were to have undergone the same barbarous Fate with the rest But I cannot conceive the force of the first Argument for what if there were several particulars revealed by them which might easily have been kept secret Might not that be so and yet there be nothing of Sincerity and Conscience in the case Might it not be done for the connexion of one thing to another which often times makes Circumstances to be necessary as it is there Might it not be done to impose upon the Examiners and to let them think that when they are so exact in the less they will not let slip the greater And have we not just cause to think this to be the reason rather than what the Apologist doth offer for it If indeed these printed Confessions had been so exact as he will needs suppose then there had been some colour for what he says but when the contrary is manifest his Argument falls of it self And that this is so appears from what I have before observed for Faux and Winter upon second Examination confessed more and what they did afterward confess was so material as could not be forgotten by them before had they not been willing to have concealed it if they well could But again where is the consequence setting aside the conscience in it that because they did sometimes let fall some things of little importance therefore they must needs also reveal things of an higher nature therefore they must betray those Friends who had not by any overt Acts discovered themselves So that before this Argument must be granted we must grant that Faux and Winter were privy to the whole Plot and that part in which they were not personally concerned as well as what they were We must grant that they made conscience of not concealing any part or particular of it as far as they knew and we must further grant that all these particulars are contained in their printed Confessions Or else we may safely conclude that notwithstanding there are several Particulars revealed in their printed Confessions which might have been easily kept secret they might have a design to save their Friends and there might be more Persons in the Plot than are recorded in their Confessions and which is pity a pretty Argument is thereby lost and which is worse than that it might be a Popish and general Plot notwithstanding But however will they say if they were sincere in those Confessions then a part of it still remains good and what greater Argument can there be for that they were sincere than that they did accuse their own Confessors which is a thing that nothing but the power of truth can force them to and if they did not spare them they would certainly not spare others In answer to which I shall consider 1. Whether they did thus accuse their Confessors 2. Whether if they did their Conscience as is pleaded compelled them to it As to the first 1. It is notorious that there were several of them did not at all accuse their Confessors this is certain as to Sir Everard Digby that he against his own knowledg did all he could upon his Trial to vindicate them And if we peruse the printed Confessions we shall not find a word to that purpose If Faux and Winter did afterwards accuse any it was what they were if not very backward and cold yet very imperfect in For the Earl of Salisbury tells Garnet Let it not be forgotten that this interlocution of yours with Hall overheard by others appears to be digitus Dei for thereby had the Lords some light and proof of matter against you which might have been discovered otherwise by violence and coercion Implying as Morus observes that they had not matter before sufficient to charge him with The great thing charged upon him seems to be that some of the others confessed that his name was used to them by Catesby to justifie the lawfulness of the Act as Garnet in one of his Letters doth say but what he there adds that All did so confess is manifestly false Since besides what is abovesaid of Sir Everard Morus doth declare that nothing was confessed against the Jesuits but what Bates said of Greenwel or Greenway viz. that he was in the company of the Conspirators and which Sir Everard said he heard he should confess of Wally or Garnet So that when these late Apologists say the Traitors did all accuse and expose their Confessors it s more than was true and more than the Jesuits will thank them for For all of them that hitherto pleaded the cause of the Jesuits do say the contrary More shall speak for the rest who saith for ought I can perceive the accusation of the Jesuits hath no other foundation than the Confession of Bates who is said to have accused Greenway c. and he would perswade us also that Persons of good credit reported that while in Prison he confessed that he had accused him falsly How true this is I shall afterward consider but I produce this to shew what contrary things these men will say if it may serve their Cause when in the last age it was pleaded none did accuse the Jesuits and when in ours they would have it that they were accused by all But 2. Supposing they did accuse their Confessors yet it was not because their Conscience did compel them to it This More will have them so far from that he saith Bates did accuse them in hope of life and afterward recanted But whether Bates did so or no yet in point of reason it is evident that it was not from any such motive for then they that thus accused them would have repented of the Eact it self and look'd upon it as an Evil fit to be repented of For what could move them in point of Conscience thus to expose them if it was not that the Fact was evil which their Confessors together with them had been complicated in But this we find them far from acknowledging For Sir Everard Digby though for a little while after his imprisonment he doubted of the warrantableness of it yet being confirmed in it by the Letters of Gerard whom he calls Brother was so well satisfied that he calls it the best Cause Of the like mind were Robert Winter and Faux for having found an opportunity for Conference
And this leads me to the 3. General To shew the ground of that difference which is betwixt Plot and Plot Criminals and Criminals And the great instance is the Confession of the one and Denial of the other This an Author of theirs doth triumph in I challenge saith he all mankind to assign a Cause of this difference with the least colour of Reason and Humanity But as I have before said He must first prove that the Conspirators then did confess ingenuously candidly and freely For if they confess'd what they could not deny if they again would have denied what they had confessed if further they did often equivocate when they did pretend to confess if lastly they did deny and conceal more of what they knew then they did confess and discover as I have made it evident they did Then Garnets Confession is equal to Whitebread's Denial and Whitebread's Denial differs not materially from Garnet's Confession Both these may be and yet there be no new Creed nor new Faith since those days amongst them as the aforesaid Author would infer there must upon this different event if we allow not both to be innocent Denying and confessing are indeed in themselves incompatible and had it bin true which the above-cited Authors do say that all of the Conspirators in the Powder-Treason did acknowledge their Treasons and asked God and the King pardon which I have shewed to be otherwise and impartially confessed all that they knew of that matter then their Confession might be well opposed to these men's Denial but when the Confession was so restrained and qualified as I have above shewed it 's a plain sign that had there bin nothing but Conscience and Principles in their way as these pretend they would have taken another course and the Scaevola Faux that had the Courage to say and without doubt to do what he said that if he had happened to be within the House as he was without when they took him he would not have failed to have blown up Himself Them House and all and he that also laid all the blame upon himself and would own no Complices would have died with the same Roman resolution had not the Rack brought him to better manners This Sir Everard Digby did believe of him I knew saith he that he Faux had been imployed in great matters and till Torture sure he carried it very well There is a time that it is either not possible or to no purpose to deny and then there can be no trial of a Man's Principles Thus it was with Watson and Clark in King James's time who knew that they were betrayed by the Jesuits and so were thereby disabled to prevent the danger and scandal likely to befal their Party by their Confession had they been willing to swear they were innocent and to take it upon their death There was not an opportunity for them to make that Experiment upon themselves nor to give us an Evidence how far their Consciences would have dispensed with so doing And so it was no fit case for the above said Authour to oppose to this at present for that reason as well as another viz. that they were not Jesuits nor of their Party They must make the circumstances the same and shew that what was then confessed was sincere free full and particular that they never did deny when asked upon Oath nor equivocate in what they did confess nor ever unsay what they had said before we can believe they did confess meerly because their Consciences could not dispence with so horrid a thing as that Author calls it as swearing they were innocent and taking it upon their death But if they cannot prove this and the case is apparently otherwise as I have before shewed then for all this discourse and bustle of theirs in comparing the Powder-Treason with this Plot and the Passages and Comportments of the Criminals upon that occasion with these of our modern pretended as they say Conspirators we are still where we were and have good reason to believe that both Those then and These now did act by like Principles and Measures and that they did confess or deny with the like sincerity that our Author gave a Book that he writ in defence of the Papists and Popish Traitors the Title of the new Plot of the Papists to transform Traitors into Martyrs and call'd that a New Plot which we in England know to be as ancient as the days of Thomas a Becket FINIS CONTENTS of the Vindication Sect. 1. p. 2. THe Conspiracy of the Powder Treason was not the Contrivance of a Minister of State An Account of the Letter wrote to the Lord Monteagle that it was not written by a Decoy and that Tresham was no such A Character of the Apologists that wrote upon this subject The Correspondence that is maintained betwixt the Jesuits Their Calumnies An account of the Breves of Clement the 8th and of the Lord Balmerinoch's Letter Sect. 2. p. 20. That more were concerned in the Powder-Treason than were publickly known The Design it self considered The Character of the persons chiefly concerned in it The Provisions made for it The Prayers which were then used An account of the Evidence then given The Confession of the Traitors imperfect That what they confessed was not from Conscience Their Obstinacy especially in concealing the Priests Sect. 3. p. 53. Those that fled and suffered for the Powder Treason were really guilty What Jesuits were in it The Tryal of Garnet That something related in Confession may and ought to be discovered Garnet had the knowledg of the Plot out of Confession That He and the other Jesuits did satisfie the Consciences of the Scrupulous Sect. 4. p. 67. That the Powder-Treason was undertaken upon the account of Religion That King James gave them no assurance of Favour Sect. 5. p. 71. That the Church of Rome never gave any real and good satisfaction of the abhorrency of that Treason The Commendations which they give of the Traitors The Saintship which they give to Garnet and Hall The favour which those that fled for it found at Rome Sect. 6. p. 76. The Powder-Treason and the present Popish Plot compared That they agree in more things than they differ and what they differ in are not so material as what they do agree in Catholick-Apology with reply p 404. p. 412. Mori â—ist prov p. 310. Apol. p. 403 404. p. 538. Apol. p. 411. Baker's Chr. An. 1605. Wilson great Brit. p. 32. p. 412. Apol. p. 414. P. 236 P. 413. P. 410. P. 413. P. 413. V. Discourse of the original of the Powder-Plot p. 4. c. Apol. pro. Garneto p. 266. * Tortus p. 83. edit Colon. Act of Parliament for 5. Nov. P. 408. P. 405. Proceedings P. 118. P. 405. P. 406. P. 407. P. 409. P. 410. History of the Gunpowder-Treason p. 19. P. 410. P. 411. Advocate for Liberty p. 226. Proceedings p. 56. Proceedings