In the Parabasis to the Clouds, performed two years after the Knights, the poet refers with pride to his attack on Cleon at his highest; but though he returns to the charge once and again, he makes no mention of any fine imposed upon him; which is in itself almost a sufficient refutation of the story mentioned in a previous note. The play was so relished as to gain the first prize, but there is not a jot of evidence to show that Cleon’s popularity was overclouded by it. Happily his reign only lasted for two years after it. His success at Pylus flattered him into a belief in his talents for war, and he took the command of the army in Thrace, opposed to Brasidas, the best Spartan general of his day. His incapacity lost the Athenians a battle, but the generals on both sides where slain; and the death of their greatest nuisance at home, and their worst enemy abroad, was an ample recompense for the injury incurred by his rashness. “When both Cleon and Brasidas were slain, the which on either side were most opposite to the peace: the one for that he had good success and honour in the war; the other, because in quiet times his evil actions would the more appear, and his calumniations be the less believed,”[115] peace, though of brief duration, was almost immediately concluded.
That Cleon should have succeeded to the influence of Pericles may well surprise the reader. But a very slight inequality will turn the course of a rapid current to the undermining of its own banks; and in like manner, when men’s minds are deeply moved, things in quiet times contemptible may acquire influence and importance commensurate with the force of that which they are enabled, by no intrinsic qualities, to control. By no other considerations can we explain—to justify it is impossible—the extravagance of terror and fury into which England was once goaded by a man, who for knavery and impudence may match the Athenian demagogue, and who, for some time, bore equal sway over the minds of his countrymen, Titus Oates, the discoverer, and probably the inventor of the Popish Plot. Some excuse is to be found in the political circumstances of the times; in the belief that the King adhered secretly to the Romish faith, as the Duke of York openly professed it; and especially in the known fact that the sovereign of Britain was pensioned by France, that he might dispense with parliaments, and the more easily establish himself on an absolute throne. The high character of many who promoted the inquiry is a sufficient warrant that they were actuated by no unworthy motives. But the revolting narrative of murders committed under form of law by perjured witnesses and corrupt judges, will remain for ever a blot in our history; a warning against adding gall to bitterness; against aggravating political dissension by religious discord.
The first information of the plot was given by one Dr. Tongue, in August, 1678; but the King, who was by no means deficient in penetration, pronounced it to be a forgery, and it might have slept for ever, had not the Duke of York, whose confessor was implicated, judged an inquiry necessary to clear himself from all suspicion. Tongue professed to have his information from Oates, and having brought the principal actor on the stage, took no further part in the action of the piece. On Michaelmas–eve Oates was examined before the council, and deposed to the existence of a most extensive conspiracy among the Jesuits to murder the King. He indicated Coleman, formerly secretary to the Duke of York, and at that time to the Duchess, as being acquainted with all the schemes under consideration. The effect of this announcement is thus described by a most amiable and unprejudiced contemporary.
“October 1, 1678. The parliament and the whole nation were alarmed about a conspiracy of some eminent Papists, for the destruction of the King, and introduction of Popery, discovered by one Oates and Dr. Tongue, which last I knew. I went to see and converse with him at Whitehall, with Mr. Oates, one that was lately an apostate to the church of Rome, and now returned again with this discovery. He seemed to be a bold man, and, in my thoughts, furiously indiscreet; but every body believed what he said, and it quite changed the genius and motions of the parliament, growing now corrupt, and interested with long sitting and court practices: but with all this, Popery would not go down. This discovery turned them all as one man against it, and nothing was done but to find out the depth of this. Gates was encouraged, and every thing he affirmed taken for gospel. The truth is, the Roman Catholics were exceedingly bold and busy everywhere, since the Duke forbore to go any longer to the chapel.”[116]
Coleman had notice of his danger, and secreted a part, but not the whole, of his papers. The remainder were seized, and clearly proved that he had maintained a correspondence with the confessor of Louis XIV., the object of which was the reconversion of England. Besides appearing before the council, Gates made oath to the truth of his Narrative, which he published before Sir Edmundbury Godfrey, a zealous Protestant, and active justice of peace, and yet one that lived on good terms both with Non–conformists and Papists. Very shortly afterwards Godfrey was murdered. He was found in a ditch, with his own sword sticking in his body, which had not been plundered; and marks of strangling were thought to be visible about his neck, and some contusions on his breast. It has ever been a mystery by whom this crime was perpetrated; it was of course charged on the Papists, and retorted by them on the contrivers and assertors of the plot. But the support given to Gates’s story by this event, conjointly with Coleman’s papers, threw the whole country into a ferment. Vast crowds flocked to behold the corpse; the funeral excited equal interest, and the wish of its conductors to inflame the people is visible in some extraordinary precautions said to have been taken against a danger which no man could have apprehended seriously. The following account is taken from a contemporary of high tory principles, and animated by a most especial hatred of Gates.
This medal appears to have been struck in ridicule of the notion that Godfrey had murdered himself; he is represented as walking with the halter about his neck, apparently towards Primrose Hill, seen in the distance with its double head. The legend, “Ergo pares sumus,”—Therefore we are alike,—intimates that those, and those only, who can believe the well–known story of St. Denys, could believe the Papistical account that Godfrey had killed himself.