Therefore, in the case of so astute and clever a man, as all the evidence we have concerning Oldcorne to demonstration proves him to have been, it is rendered probable, to the degree of moral certainty, that the great casuist had some far stronger reason latent within him than the reason he chose to put forth for couching an answer to Humphrey Littleton, sounding in partial truth alone.
Besides the sufficient, indeed, yet inferior reason,
grounded on the primal instinct of personal self-preservation, or, in other words, to put the matter bluntly, the mere brute instinct of not being entrapped, wisdom suggests that Oldcorne must — his moral character being what we know it was — have had a reason latent deep down within the depths of his conscious being, which was not only a sufficient but superior reason, not only a true but a sublime reason, for severing in this grave matter, and holding suspended, truth in thought from truth in action.
Yea, Father Oldcorne, I maintain, gave Humphrey Littleton the flanking, evasive answer that he did give him, notwithstanding the inevitable, possible, and even probable dangers attendant thereon, because he (Oldcorne) felt within himself, “to the finest fibre of his being,” a freedom, a three-fold freedom, which warranted, justified, and vindicated him in so answering.
Now this freedom was a three-fold freedom, because it was a thrice-purchased freedom.
And it was a thrice-purchased freedom because it had been purchased by the merits: —
(1) Of the personal, actual repentance of the revealing plotter himself. By the merits
(2) Of the imputed (or constructive) repentance of that penitent’s co-plotters. And by the merits
(3) Of the laudable action of Oldcorne himself.