Were we disposed to enter still more minutely into an examination of these writings, it would not be difficult to show, as Goodall, Tytler, Whittaker and Chalmers, have in various instances done, that they abound in many other symptoms of forgery, which, though not perhaps conclusive, when taken separately, make up, when combined, a very strong presumption against them. It might be shown, for example, first, that as Mary, in all probability, did not set off for Glasgow till Friday the 24th of January 1567, and staid a night at Callendar on the way, it is quite impossible she could have been at Glasgow on Saturday the 25th, though her second letter ends with these words:—“From Glasgow, this Saturday, in the morning.”[263] She is thus made to have written two letters from Glasgow, one of them a very long one, by Saturday morning; while, in point of fact, she could not have reached that town till Saturday afternoon. “Non sunt hæc satis divisa temporibus.”[264] It might be shown, second, that these letters were neither addressed, signed, nor sealed; and that, in the words of Whittaker, “it violates every principle of probability to suppose, that letters with such a plenitude of murderous evidence in them should be sent open.”[265] It might be shown, third, that before the appearance of the letters, they were differently described at different times, as if they were gradually undergoing changes;—that in the Act of Privy Council, in which they are first referred to, they are mentioned as Mary’s “Privy Letters, written and subscribed with her own hand;”—but in the Act of Parliament passed a few weeks afterwards, they are only spoken of as “written wholly with her own hand,” not, “written and subscribed;”[266]—that though at first nothing was spoken of as having been found in the box but the “Privy Letters,” “written and subscribed with her own hand,” and afterwards only “wholly written with her own hand,” yet, before the box made its appearance at York, love-sonnets and contracts of marriage were also found in it;—and that at York and Westminster only five letters were laid before the Commissioners, though the number afterwards printed was eight. “Did the three remaining letters,” asks Whittaker, “lie still lower in the box, under the contracts and sonnets, and so escape the notice of the rebels?”[267] It might be shown, fourth, that all the letters are contradicted and overthrown by the first three lines of the ninth sonnet, which are, in French,
——“Pour luy aussi J’ay jeté mainte larme,
Premier qu’il fust de ce corps possesseur,
Du quel alors il n’avoit pas le cœur;”
and in English—“For him also I shed many a tear, when he first made himself possessor of this body, of which he did not then possess the heart.”[268] In the letters, Mary is made, with the most violent protestations of love, to suggest arrangements for her pretended abduction by Bothwell; yet here she expressly says, that when he first carried her off, he did not possess her heart. How then could she have written him love-letters before this event? These and other things might be insisted on. The sonnets and contracts of marriage might be also minutely examined and proved, both to contradict one another, and to be liable, in a still stronger degree, to almost all the objections which have been advanced against the letters.[269] But it is much better to rest Mary’s innocence on the broad basis of her life and character, and a distinct statement of leading and incontrovertible facts, than on wranglings about dates, or disputations concerning detached incidents and ill-authenticated papers.
From a full review of the proof on both sides, and an ample examination of all the principal facts advanced in the controversy, it appears evident that one of two conclusions must be formed. Either that Mary, having formed a criminal attachment to Bothwell, encouraged him to perpetrate the murder, and that, having thus become responsible for at least an equal share of the guilt, was justly imprisoned and dethroned; or that, never having had any excessive love for Bothwell, she was altogether ignorant of his designs, and irresponsible for his crimes, of which his own lawless ambition made her the victim, and with which the treachery of Murray, Morton and Elizabeth, too successfully contrived to involve her for the remainder of her life. That the latter conclusion is that to which impartial inquiry must inevitably lead, these Memoirs, it is hoped, have sufficiently established. That the arguments in Mary’s favour, drawn from the history of her life and death, are not invalidated by the contents of the “gilt coffer,” it has been the object of the present Examination to prove.
It has been seen, first, by external evidence, that these papers are spurious, because the notorious ambition of Morton and Murray, and the perilous predicament in which it finally placed them, rendered their fabrication necessary to save themselves from ruin,—because Mary could not have written any love-letters or sonnets to Bothwell, for whom, at best, she never felt any thing but common regard, and who was obliged to seize and carry off her person, in order to force her into an unwilling marriage,—because such letters, if they had been written, would not have been preserved by Bothwell, or, if preserved, would have been more numerous,—because the story of their discovery is altogether improbable, since Bothwell, for the most satisfactory reasons, would never have thought of sending for them to the Castle of Edinburgh on the 20th of June 1567,—because not a word was said about them long after they were discovered, but, on the contrary, motives quite inconsistent with their contents assigned for sequestrating Mary’s person in Loch-Leven,—because, though Dalgleish was tried, condemned, and executed, not a question was put to him, as appears by his examination, still extant, concerning these letters,—because the originals were only produced twice, and that under suspicious and unsatisfactory circumstances,—because nothing but translations, and translations from translations, of these originals, now exist, from which no fair arguments can be drawn,—because Murray and his associates have been convicted of open forgery in several other instances, and are therefore the more liable to be doubted in this,—because Bothwell not only never accused Mary, but was unable to show Morton any writing of her’s sanctioning the murder, and, by subsequent declarations, seems to have exculpated her from all share in it,—because Mary herself invariably denied that she had ever written such letters, undertaking to prove that they were fabrications, if the originals, or even copies, were shown to her,—because Lady Lennox, Darnley’s mother, many of the most respectable of the Scottish nobility, Norfolk, and a numerous party in England, and all her Continental friends, avowed their belief of her innocence,—because the confessions and depositions of Bothwell’s accomplices, so far from implicating, tended to acquit her of all blame, though the persons by whom the depositions were made had every inducement to accuse her, if it had been in their power,—and because the external evidence, advanced in support of the letters by Robertson and others, is entirely nugatory.
It has been seen, second, by internal evidence, that the Letters are spurious,—because the translations differ from each other,—because the style and composition of many passages, are not such as could ever have come from Mary’s pen,—because every facility was given to forgery by the nature of her handwriting, and by the access which the forgers had to genuine letters and papers, of which they could make a partial use,—because, at the time in which they are alleged to have been written, Mary was, in all probability, not at the places from which they are dated,—because the letters contradict each other, and are all contradicted by the sonnets,—and because the arguments in support of them, drawn from internal evidence by Robertson and others, are equally inconclusive with their external proofs.
If Mary’s innocence, from all the blacker crimes with which she has been charged, must still continue matter of doubt, it is not too much to declare all history uncertain, and virtue and vice merely convertible terms.