he was made to believe by his Companions that he should be bountifully rewarded for that his good service to the Catholick Cause now perceiving that on the contrary his Death had been contrived by them he thereupon freely confessed all that he knew concerning that horrid Conspiracy which before all the tortures of the rack could not force him unto The truth of all this was attested by Mr William Perkins an eminent Christian and Citizen of London to Dr Gouge which Mr Perkins had it from the mouth of Mr Clement Cotton that made our English Concordance who also had it from the Relation of Mr Pickering himself The Names of those that were first in this Treason and laboured in the Mine were Robert Catesby Robert Winter Esquires Thomas Percy Thomas Winter John Wright Christopher Wright Guy Fawkes Gentlemen and Bates Catesbies man Persons made acquainted with it and Promoters of it were Sir Everard Digby Knight Ambrose Rookwood Francis Tresham Esquires John Grant Gentleman Robert Keyes This prodigious contrivance did not only stupifie the whole Kingdom with consternation and amazement but Foreign Princes at least seemed to wonder at it also and though for the propagation of the Catholick cause they might have Conscience enough to wish that it had taken effect yet they had policy enough to congratulate the discoverers and some of them to take off the asperity of the suspect sweetned their expressions with many rich gifts to our King and Queen The Parliament by reason of the hurry occasioned hereby met not till the ninth of November at which time Henry Lord Mordant and Edward Lord Sturton not coming to the Parliament according to their Writ of Summons were suspected as having knowledge of the Conspiracy and so was the Earl of Northumberland from some presumptions and all three were Committed to the Tower The two Barons after a while were redeemed by fine in Starchamber but the Earl continued a Prisoner there for many years after How the Parliament was affected for this great deliverance of the whole Kingdom from ruine and destruction will appear by the Act which they made to have the fifth of November for ever solemnized with Publick Thanksgiving wherein they imputed the discovery of the Treason to the inspiring the King with a divine spirit to interpret some dark Phrases of the Letter above and beyond all ordinary construction they attainted also the blood of those Traytors that were executed as also of those that were slain at Holbach-House or that died in Prison and the King being not unmindful of the Lord Monteagle the first discoverer of this Treason gave him and his Heirs for ever two hundred pounds a year in Fee-Farm Rents and 500l l a year besides during his life as a reward for his good service But now to the Act it self An Act for a Publick Thanksgiving to Almighty God every year on the fifth of November FOrasmuch as Almighty God hath in all Ages shewed his Power and Mercy in the miraculous and gracious deliverance of his Church and in the protection of Religious Kings and States and that no Nation of the Earth hath been blessed with greater benefits than this Kingdom now enjoyeth having the true and free profession of the Gospel under our most Sovereign Lord King James the most Great Learned and Religious King that ever reigned therein enriched with a most hopeful and plentiful Progeny proceeding out of his Royal Loyns promising the continuance of this happiness and profession to all Posterity the which many malignant and Devillish Papists Jesuits and Seminary Priests much envying and fearing conspired most horribly when the Kings most Excellent Majesty the Queen the Prince and all the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons should have been Assembled in the Vpper House of Parliament upon the fifth day of November in the year of our Lord 1605. suddenly to have blown up the said House with Gunpowder an invention so inhumane barbarous and cruel as the like was never before heard of and was as some of the principal Conspirators confess purposely devised and concluded to be done in the said House that where sundry necessary and Religious Laws for preservation of the Church and State were made which they falsly and slanderously term cruel Laws enacted against them and their Religion both place and persons should be all destroyed and blown up at once which would have turned to the utter ruine of this whole Kingdom had it not pleased Almighty God by inspiring the Kings most Excellent Majesty with a divine spirit to interpret some dark phrases of a Letter shewed to his Majesty above and beyond all ordinary construction thereby miraculously discovering this hidden Treason not many hours before the appointed time for the Execution thereof Therefore the Kings most Excellent Majesty the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and all his Majesties faithful and loving Subjects do most justly acknowledge this great and infinite blessing to have proceeded meerly from Gods great mercy and to his most holy name do ascribe all Honour Glory and Praise And to the end this unfeigned thankfulness may never be forgotten but be had in a perpetual remembrance that all Ages to come may yield praises to his Divine Majesty for the same and have in memory this joyful day of deliverance Be it therefore enacted by the Kings most Excellent Majesty the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and by the Commons in this present Parliament assembled and by the Authority of the same That all and singular Ministers in every Cathedral and Parish Church or other usual place for Common-Prayer within this Realm of England and the Dominions of the same shall alwaies upon the fifth day of November say Morning Prayer and give unto Almighty God thanks for this most happy deliverance and that all and every person and persons inhabiting within this Realm of England and the Dominions of the same shall alwaies upon that day diligently and faithfully resort to the Parish Church or Chappel accustomed or to some usual Church or Chappel where the said Morning Prayer Preaching or other service of God shall be used and then and there to abide orderly and soberly during the time of the said Prayer Preaching or other service of God there to be used and ministred And because all and every person may be put in mind of this duty and be the better prepared to the said holy service Be it Enacted by the Authority aforesaid that every Minister shall give warning to his Parishioners publickly in the Church at Morning Prayer the Sunday before every such fifth of November for the due observation of the said day And that after Morning Prayer or Preaching on the said fifth day of November they read distinctly and plainly this present Act. Upon the Powder-Plot OH Murtherous Plot Posterity shall say 'S Vnholyness o'reshoots Caligula The Pope by this and such designs 't is plain Out-Babels Nimrod and out-Butchers Cain Monteagle's Letter was in dubious sence And seem'd a piece of
and Guy Fawkes had many meetings and Conferences about this business till at last Thomas Percy came puffing in to Catesby's Lodging at Lambeth saying What Gentlemes shall we alwaies be talking and never do any thing You cannot be ignorant how things proceed To whom Catesby answered that something was resolved on but first an Oath for secresie was to be administred for which purpose they appointed to meet some three days after behind Clements Church beyond Temple-Bar where being met Percy professed that for the Catholick cause himself would be the man to advance it were it with the slaughter of the King which he was there ready to undertake and do No Tom said Catesby thou shalt not adventure thy self to so small a purpose if thou wilt be a Traytor there is a Plot to greater advantage and such an one as can never be discovered Hereupon all of them took the Oath of Secresie heard a Mass and received the Sacrament after which Catesby told them his devilish device by Mine and Gunpowder to blow up the Parliament-House and so by one stroke with the destruction of many to effect that at once which had been many years attempting and for cause of Conscience to kill the innocent with the nocent he told them that it was warrantable by the Authority of Garnet himself the superiour of the English Jesuites and of Garrard and Tresmond Jesuitical Priests likewise who by their Apostolical Power did commend the fact and absolve the Actors The Oath was given them by the said Garrard in these words You shall swear by the blessed Trinity and by the Sacrament you now purpose to receive never to disclose directly nor indirectly by word or circumstance the matter that shall be proposed to you to keep secret nor desist from the execution thereof until the rest shall give you leave The Project being thus far carried on in the next place the first thing they sought after was an House wherein they might begin their work for which purpose no place was held fitter than a certain Edifice adjoining to the Wall of the Parliament House which served for a withdrawing room to the Assembled Lords and out of Parliament time was at the dispose of Mr. Winyard the Keeper of the place and Wardrobe thereto belonging these did Percy hire for his Lodgings entertaining Fawkes as his man who changing his name into Johnson had the Keyes and keeping of the rooms commended to him Besides this they hired another House to lay in provision of Powder and to frame and fit Wood in for the carrying on the Mine which Catesby provided at Lambeth and sware Robert Keies into their Conspiracy whom he made the Keeper of those provisions who by night conveyed the same unto Fawkes The appointed day for the Parliament being the seventh day of February It was thought fit to begin their work in October before but Fawkes returning out of the Country found Percies rooms appointed for the Scottish Lords to meet in who were to treat about the union of the two Kingdoms whereupon they forbore for a while to begin their work But that Assembly being soon dissolved upon the eleventh of December late in the night they entred upon their work of darkness beginning their Mine having tools aforehand prepared and baked meats provided the better to avoid suspicion in case they should send abroad for them They which first began the Mine were Robert Catesby Esquire the Arch-Contriver and Traitor and ruine of his name Thomas Percy Esquire a Kin to the Earl of Northumberland Thomas Winter John Wright Guy Fawkes Gentlemen and Thomas Bates Catesbies Man all of them well grounded in the Romish School and earnest labourers in this Vault of Villany so that by Christmas-Eve they had brought the Mine under an Entry adjoining to the Wall of the Parliament-House under-propping the Earth as they went with their framed Timber nor till that day were they seen abroad of any man During this undermining much consultation was had how to order the rest of the business when the deed should be accomplished the first was how to surprise the next Heir to the Crown for though they doubted not but that Prince Henry would Accompany his Father and perish with him yet they suspected that Duke Charles as too young to attend the Parliament would escape the train and perchance be so carefully guarded and attended at Court that he would be gotten into their hands hardly But Percy offered to be the remover of this rub resolving with some other Gentlemen to enter the Dukes Chamber which by reason of his acquaintance he might well do and others of his like acquaintance should be placed at several Doors of the Court so that when the blow was given and all men in a maze then would he carry away the Duke which he presumed would be easily done the most of the Court being then absent and for such as were present they would be altogether unprovided for resistance For the surprize of the Lady Elizabeth it was held a matter of far less difficulty she remaining at Comb Abbey in Warwickshire with the Lord Harrington and Ashbey Catesbies House being not far from the same whither under a pretence of an hunting upon Dunsmore Heath many Catholicks should be assembled who knowing for what purpose they were met had the full liberty in that distracted time to provide Money Horses Armor and other necessaries for War under pretence of strengthning and guarding the Heir Apparent to the Crown Then it was debated what Lords they should save from the Parliament and it was agreed that they should keep as many as they could that were Catholicks or Favourers of them but that all others should feel the smart and that the treason should be charged upon the Puritans to make them more odious to the World Next it was controverted what Foreign Princes they should make Privy to this Plot seeing they could not enjoin them secresie nor oblige them by Oath and this much troubled them For though Spain was held fittest to second their Plot yet he was slow in his preparations and France was too near and too dangerous to be dealth with and how the Hollanders stood affected to England they knew very well But while they were thus busying themselves and tormenting their brains the Parliament was again adjourned to the fifth day of October ensuing whereupon they brake off both discourse and work till Candlemas and then they laid in Powder and other Provisions beginning their work again and having in the mean time taken into their Company Christopher Wright and Robert Winter being first sworn and receiving the Sacrament for secresie the foundation Wall of the Parliament-House being very hard and nine foot thick with great difficulty they wrought half through Fawkes being their Centinel to give warning when any came near that the noise in digging might not be heard The Labourers thus working into the Wall were suddenly surprized with a great fear and casting away their
digging Tools betook themselves to their Weapons having sufficient shot and Powder in the House and fully resolving rather to die in the place than to yield or be taken The cause of this their fear was a noise that they heard in a room under the Parliament House under which they meant to have Mined which was directly under the Chair of State but now all on a sudden they were at a stand and their Countenances cast each upon other as doubtful what would be the Issue of their enterprize Fawkes scouted out to see what he could discover abroad and finding all safe and free from suspicion he returned and told them that the noise was only occasioned by the removal of Coals that were now upon Sale and that the Cellar was to be let which would be more commodious for their purpose and also would save their labour for the Mine Hereupon Thomas Percy under pretence of Stowage for his Winter provision and Coals went and hired the Cellar which done they began a new Conference wherein Catesby found the weight of the whole work too heavy for himself alone to support for besides the maintenance of so many persons and the several Houses for the several uses hired and paid for by him the Gunpowder and other Provisions would rise to a very great sum and indeed too much for one mans Purse He desired therefore that himself Percy and one more might call in such persons as they thought fit to help to maintain the charge alledging that they knew men of worth and wealth that would willingly assist but were not willing that their names should be known to the rest This request as necessary was approved and therefore ceasing to dig any further in the Vault knowing that the Cellar would be fitter for their purpose they removed into it twenty Barrels of Gunpowder which they covered with a thousand Billets and five hundred Faggots so that now their lodging rooms were cleared of all suspicious provision and might be freely entered into without danger of discovery But the Parliament being again Prorogued to the fifth of November following these persons thought sit that for a while they should again disperse themselves all things being already in so good a forwardness and that Guy Fawkes should go over to acquaint Sir William Stanley and Master Hugh Owen with these their proceedings yet so as the Oath of secresie should be first taken by them For their design was to have Sir Stanley's presence so soon as the fatal blow should be given to be a Leader to their intended stratagems whereof as they thought they should have great need and that Owen should remain where he was to hold correspondency with Foreign Princes to allay the odiousness of the fact and to impute the Treason to the discontented Puritanes Fawkes coming into Flanders found Owen unto whom after the Oath he declared the Plot which he very well approved of but Sir William Stanley being now in Spain Owen said that he would hardly be drawn into the business having suits at this time in the English Court yet he promised to ingage him all he could and to send him into England with the first so soon as their Plot had taken effect Upon this Fawkes to avoid further suspicion kept still in Flanders all the beginning of September and then returning received the Keyes of the Cellar and laid in more Powder Billets and Faggots which done he retired into the Country and there kept till the end of October In the mean time Catesby and Percy meeting at the Bath it was there concluded that because their number was but few Catesby himself should have power to call in whom he would to assist their design by which Authority he took in S ir Everard Digby of Rutlandshire and Francis Tresham Esquire of Northamptonshire both of them of sufficient state and wealth For Sir Everard offered fifteen hundred pounds to forward the action and Tresham two thousand But Percy disdaining that any should out-run him in evil promised four thousand pounds out of the Earl of Northumberlands Rents and ten swift Horses to be used when the blow was past Against which time to provide ammunition Catesby also took in Ambrose Rookwood and John Grant two Recusant Gentlemen and without doubt others were acquainted also with it had these two grand Electors been apprehended alive whose own tongues only could have given an account of it The business being thus forwarded abroad by their complices they at home were no less active For Percy Winter and Fawkes had stored this Cellar with thirty six Barrels of Gunpowder and instead of shot had laid upon them Bars of Iron logs of Timber massie Stones Iron Crowes Pick-Axes and all their working Tools and to cover all great store of Billets and Faggots so that nothing was wanting against that great and terrible day Neither were the Priests and Jesuits slack on their parts who usually concluded their Masses with Prayers for the good success of their expected hopes about which Garnet made these Verses Gentem aufer perfidam credentium de finibus Vt Christo laudes debitas persolvamus alacriter And others thus Prosper Lord their pains that labour in thy cause day and night Let Heresie vanish away like smoke Let their memory perish with a crack like the ruine and fall of a broken house Upon Thursday in the Evening ten days before the Parliament was to begin a Letter directed to the Lord Monteagle was delivered by an unknown person to his footman in the street with a strait charge to give it into his Lords own hands which accordingly he did The Letter had neither date nor subscription and was somewhat unlegible so that the Nobleman called for one of his servants to assist him in reading it the strange contents whereof much perplexed him he not knowing whether it was writ as a Pasquil to scare him from attendance at the Parliament or as matter of consequence and advice from some friend Howsoever though it were now Supper-time and the night very dark yet to shew his loyalty to his Sovereign he immediately repaired to Whitehall and imparted the Letter to the Earl of Salisbury then principal Secretary who reading the Letter and hearing how it came to the Lord Monteagles hands highly commended his Prudence and Loyalty for discovering it telling him plainly that whatsoever might be the event yet it put him in mind of divers Advertisements wherewithal he had acquainted both the King and his Council of some great business which the Papists were in hand with both at home and abroad against this Parliament pretending a Petition to the King and Parliament for a toleration of their Religion but withal giving out that it should be delivered in such an order and so well backed that the King should be loth to refuse their request Then did the Earl of Salisbury presently acquaint the Lord Chamberlain therewith who deemed the matter not a little to concern himself his Office
requiring him to oversee all the places to which his Majesty was to repair Hereupon these two Counsellors shewed the Letter to the Earls of Worcester and Northampton and all concluded how slight soever the contents seemed to appear to acquaint the King himself with the same which accordingly was done by the Earl of Salisbury who upon Friday in the Afternoon being All-Saints day taking the King into the Gallery at White-hall communicated the Letter to him which was as followeth My Lord OVT of the love I bear to some of your friends I have a care of your preservation Therefore I would advise you as you tender your life to devise some excuse to shift off your attendance at this Parliament For God and Man have concurred to punish the wickedness of this time And think not slightly of this advertisement but retire your self into your Country where you may expect the event in safety For though there be no appearance of any stir yet I say they shall receive a terrible blow this Parliament and yet they shall not see who hurts them This counsel is not to be contemned because it may do you good and can do you no harm For the danger is past so soon as you have burnt the Letter and I hope God will give you the Grace to make a good use of it to whose holy protection I commend you His Majesty after reading this Letter pausing a while and then reading it again delivered his judgment that the stile of it was too quick and pithy to be a Libel proceeding from the superfluities of an idle brain and by these words That they should receive a terrible blow at this Parliament and yet not see who hurt them he presently apprehended that a sudden danger by a blast of Gunpowder was intended by some base Villain in a Corner though no insurrection rebellion or desperate attempt appeared But the Earl of Salisbury perceiving the King to apprehend it deeplier than he expected told his Majesty that he judged by one sentence in it that it was written either by a Fool or a Mad-man For said he If the danger be past as soon as you have burnt the Letter then the warning is to little purpose when the burning of the Letter may prevent the danger But the King on the contrary considering the former sentence That they should receive a terrible blow at this Parliament and yet should not see who hurt them joining it with this other sentence did thereupon conclude that the danger mentioned should be very sudden by some blast of Gun-Powder interpreting as soon for as quickly and therefore wished that the rooms under the Parliament-House should be thoroughly searched before Himself or Peers should sit therein Hereupon it was concluded that the Lord Chamberlain according to his Office should view all the rooms above and below but yet to prevent idle rumors and to let things ripen further it was resolved that this search should be deferred till Munday the day immediately before the Parliament and that then it should be done with a seeming slight eye to avoid suspect According to this conclusion the Earl of Suffolk Lord Chamberlain upon Munday in the Afternoon accompanied with the Lord Monteagle repaired into those under rooms and finding the Cellar so fully stored with Wood and Coals demanded of Fawkes the counterfeit Johnson who stood there attending as a servant of small repute Who owed the place He answered that the Lodgings belonged to Mr Thomas Percy and the Cellar also to lay in his Winter-provision himself being the Keeper of it and Mr Percies Servant whereunto the Earl as void of any suspicion told him that his Master was well provided against Winter blasts But when they were come forth the Lord Monteagle told him that he did much suspect Percy to be the Inditer of the Letter knowing his affection in Religion and the friendship betwixt them professed so that his heart gave him as he said when he heard Percy named that his hand was in the act The Lord Chamberlain returning related to the King and Council what he had seen and the suspicion that the Lord Monteagle had of Percy and himself of Johnson his man all which increased his Majesties jealousie so that he insisted that a narrower search should be made and the Billets and Coals turned up to the bottom of the same mind also were all the Privy-Counsellors then present but for the manner how the search was to be made they agreed not among themselves For on the one part they were very solicitous for the Kings safety concluding that there could not be too much caution used for preventing his danger and yet on the other part they were all extreme loth in case this Letter should prove nothing but the evaporation of some idle brain that a too curious search should be made lest if nothing were found it should turn to the great scandal of the King and State as being so suspicious upon every light and frivolous toy Besides it would lay an ill-favoured imputation upon the Earl of Northumberland one of his Majesties greatest Subjects and Counsellors This Thomas Percy being his Kinsman and intimate Friend Yet at last the search was concluded to be made but under colour of searching for certain Hangings belonging to the House which were missing and conveyed away Sir Thomas Knevet a Gentleman of his Majesties Privy-Chamber and a Justice of Peace in Westminster was imployed herein who about midnight before the Parliament was to begin went to the place with a small but trusty number of persons and at the door of the entrance to the Cellar finding one who was Guy Fawkes at so unseasonable an hour Cloked and Booted he apprehended him and ransacking the Billets he found the Serpents Nest stored with thirty six Barrels of Powder and then searching the Villain he found about him a dark Lanthorn three Matches and other instruments for blowing up the Powder And Fawkes being no whit daunted instantly confessed his guiltiness and was so far from repentance as he vowed that had he been within the House as indeed he was but immediately come forth from his work he would certainly have blown up the House with himself and them all and being brought before the Council he lamented nothing so much as because the deed was not done saying that the Devil and not God was the discoverer of it And indeed when this Prisoner was first brought into Whitehall in respect of the strangeness of the thing no man was restrained from seeing and speaking with him and not long after the Lords of the Council examined him But he put on such a Romane resolution that both to the Council and to all others that spake to him that day he seemed fixed and settled in his resolution of concealing his complices and notwithstanding the horror of the fact the guiltiness of his Conscience his sudden surprize the terror which should have been stricken into him by coming into the presence of