“Now God I call to witness, Who must be my Judge, that I did never know of it before the rumour of the country brought it to the place where I was, after the treason was publicly discovered. And if this protestation be not sincerely true, without any equivocation, and the words thereof so understood by me, as they sound to others, I neither desire nor expect any favour at God's hand when I shall stand before His tribunal. But because this protestation doth only clear me in their opinion who are so persuaded of my conscience that they think I would not condemn my soul to save my body (which I hope by God's grace shall never be my mind): therefore, to give more full proof of my innocency to those also may doubt the truth of my words, I take witness to yourself whether you, upon your certain knowledge, cannot clear me. I wrote a letter before Christmas which I hoped would be sufficient to have cleared me; wherein, beside a most serious protestation (such as no honest man can use if he were guilty, as for my part my conscience doth persuade me), I alleged some other reasons which did make it more than probable, in my opinion, that I was neither to be charged with this late treason, nor chargeable with former dealing in State matters. But I did of purpose forbear this proof (which now I allege), although I did assure myself it would clear me from all just suspicion of being privy to that last and greatest treason; and I did forbear to set it down, in regard I would not take knowledge of any personal acquaintance with you, especially at your own house, not knowing how far you were to be touched for your life, and therefore would not add unto your danger. But now that it appears by your confession and trial in the country that you stand at the King's mercy for greater matters than your acquaintance with a Priest, I hope you will not be loath I should [pg ccxxxvi] publish that which cannot hurt you, and may help myself in a matter of such importance. And as I know you could never like to stoop to so base and unworthy a humour as to flatter or dissemble with any man, so much less can I fear that now (being in the case you are in) you can ever think it fit to dissemble with God, or not to utter your every knowledge, being required as from Him, and in the behalf of truth. Therefore I desire you will bear witness of the truth which followeth (if it be true that I affirm of my demand to you, growing upon my ignorance in the matter then in hand) as you expect truth and mercy at God's hand hereafter.
“First, I desire you to bear witness whether, coming to your house upon All Souls' Day last, before dinner, with intention and hope to celebrate there, and finding all things hid out of the way and many of your household gone, you did not perceive me to be astonished at it, as a thing much contrary to my expectation. Whereupon I asked you what was become of them. And when you told me you had sent them into Warwickshire, and your hounds also, and yourself were going presently after, about a hunting match which you had made, though I seemed satisfied for the present because a stranger was there with you, yet whether I did not soon after (when I had compared many particulars together which seemed strange unto me) draw you into a chamber apart, and there urge you to tell me what was the reason both of that sudden alteration in your house and of divers other things which I had observed before, but did not until then reflect upon them so much, as, for example, the number of horses that you had not long before in your stable, the sums of money which I had been told you had made of your stock and grounds, which (said I) in one of your judgment and provident care of your estate, are not likely to be done without some great cause, and seemed to think you had something in hand for the Catholic cause. Your answer was, ‘No, there was nothing in hand that you knew of, or could tell me of.’ And when I replied that I had some fear of it by those signs, considering you would not hurt your estate so much in likelihood without some cause equivalent (for I knew very well you meant to pay the statute, and so stood not in fear of losing your stock), and therefore willed you to look [pg ccxxxvii] well that you followed counsel in your proceedings, or else you might hurt both yourself and the cause, your answer was (which I have remembered often since), ‘That you respected the Catholic cause much more than your own commodity, as it should well appear whensoever you undertook anything.’ I asked you once again whether, then, there were anything to be done, and whether you expected any help by foreign power, whereunto you answered, holding up the end of your finger, that you would not adventure so much in hope thereof. Then I said, ‘I pray God you follow counsel in your doings. If there be any matter in hand, doth Mr. Walley know of it?’ You answered, ‘In truth, I think he doth not.’ Then I said further, ‘In truth, Sir Everard Digby, if there should be anything in hand, and that you retire yourself and company into Warwickshire, as into a place of most safety, I should think you did not perform the part of a friend to some of your neighbours not far off, and persons that, as you know, deserve every respect, and to whom you have professed much friendship, that they are left behind, and have not any warning to make so much provision for their own safety as were needful in such a time, but to defend themselves from rogues.’ Your answer was (as I will be sworn), ‘I warrant you it shall not need.’ And so you gave me assurance that, if there had been anything needful for them or me to know, you would assuredly have told me. So I rested satisfied and parted from you, and after that I never saw you nor any of the conspirators. These were my questions unto you. And thus clear I was from the knowledge of that Plot against the Parliament House, whereof, notwithstanding, I am accused and proclaimed to be a practiser with the principal conspirators. But I refer me to God and your conscience, who are able to clear me, and I challenge the conscience of any one that certainly expecteth death, and desireth to die in the fear of God and with hope of his salvation, to accuse me of it if he can. God, of His mercy, grant unto us all grace to see and do His will, and to live and die His servants, for they only are and shall be happy for ever.
“Your companion in tribulation though not in the cause,
“John Gerard.”
Postcript—“I hope you will also witness with me that you have ever seen me much averted from such violent courses, and hopeful rather of help by favour than by force. And, indeed, if I had not now been satisfied by your assurance that there was nothing in hand, it should presently have appeared how much I had misliked any forcible attempts, the counsel of Christ and the commandment of our superiors requiring the contrary, and that in patience we should possess our souls.”
Addressed—“To Sir Everard Digby, prisoner in the Tower.”
Endorsed in Cecil's hand—“Gerard the Priest to Sir Everard Digby.”
From Father Bartoli[217] we take a letter written from Rome, twenty-five years after the Powder Plot, addressed by Father Gerard to Dr. Smith, Bishop of Chalcedon, and Vicar Apostolic of England. The translation from Bartoli's Italian version is a very old one; the date of the letter is September 1, 1630.
“My Lord,—Not long since I received information that a manuscript dissertation, with the title of Brevis Inquisitio, &c., had been circulated in your parts; in the course of which it is pretended that a certain person continues to glory, to the present day, that by working under ground in the mine of Mr. Catesby and other conspirators, by excavating and carrying out the soil with his own hands, he has often found his shirt wet through and dripping with sweat as copiously as if it had been dragged through a river; and that this person is no other than myself, according to the opinion expressed in the letter. I despised such an idle tale as undeserving of an answer, knowing it, as most others must know it, to be not only most false, but, moreover, most remote, from probability. I only begged of a good Priest, who was setting out for England, to make known to your lordship what I had heard concerning such a deed laid to my charge, so contrary to all truth and justice; and that I hoped you would not give credit to it, but rather on hearing it mentioned by any one, would show the falsehood as it is. But in the meantime, [pg ccxxxix] while the Priest is yet on his journey, I have learned from good authority that the book has been printed and published, curtailed indeed of that story, which is, however, circulated in manuscript through the hands of many, with every circumstance and embellishment; whence has arisen the general opinion that I am the person there spoken of, the testimony of a Priest being alleged, who says that he has heard me boast of it. Truly I cannot sufficiently express my astonishment on perceiving that there can be found a Catholic, and if a Priest so much the worse, who has so shameless a conscience as to dare assert what he must necessarily know to be false, and injurious to one who never did him any harm or injury whatever. This I can affirm of myself with respect to every Priest in England, to many of whom I have often afforded assistance, but, to my knowledge, have never offended one. Your lordship, moreover, must be aware how very improbable it is that I should boast of a crime so false, so horrible. Now, with all due reverence, I call God to witness that I had no more knowledge of the conspiracy than a new-born infant might have; that I never heard any one mention it; that I had not even a suspicion of the provision of gunpowder for the mine, excepting only when the Plot was detected, made public, and known to every one, and when the conspirators appeared openly in arms in the county of Warwick; then only did I hear of it for the first time, by a message brought to the place where I resided; and this place was so ill provided that of itself it proved I could have no knowledge of the conspiracy, either from the expressions of others or from my own suspicions; there being in that place neither men nor arms sufficient to defend us from the marauders, who on every occasion of similar commotions issue forth and unite in bodies for plunder. Neither did this happen for want of sufficient means to furnish and reinforce the house with men and arms, but solely because we had no suspicion of a commotion, much less any knowledge of a conspiracy. Besides this, the accomplices in the Plot were subjected to the most rigorous examination, and questioned concerning me; and although some of them under the torture named one or others of those who were privy to the conspiracy, nevertheless all constantly denied it of me. Sir Everard Digby, who of all the others, [pg ccxl] for many reasons, was most suspected of having possibly revealed the secret to me, protested in open court and declared that he had often been instigated to say I knew something of the Plot, but that he had always answered in the negative, alleging the reason why he had never dared to disclose it to me, because, he said, he feared lest I should dissuade him from it. Therefore the greater part of the Privy Councillors considered my innocence established, it being proved by the concurrent testimony of so many, and by a letter in which I defended and cleared myself from such a groundless suspicion. In that letter, besides the reasons therein produced in proof of my innocence, I protested before Heaven and earth that, so far from being engaged in the conspiracy, I was as ignorant of it as man could be. Being at that time in imminent danger of falling into the hands of the Privy Councillors, who with the most refined diligence sent in every direction in quest of me, I had thoughts of surrendering myself up to every torment imaginable, and what is more to be regarded, to the terrible and disgraceful charge of perjury, if having me in their power they could convict me, by legal proof, of being privy to the conspiracy. There was a time, when under Elizabeth they held me prisoner for something more than three years, during which period, many times and in as many ways as they chose, did they examine me, to discover in general if I had ever meddled in affairs of State. I challenged them to produce in proof a single character in my hand, a single word, or anything else sufficient to show it, and then to punish me when convicted with the most cruel death that could be inflicted. There never was brought forward the smallest trace or shadow of a proof. How much more improbable is it that I should consent to a Plot so inhuman, I who, from the natural disposition of my soul, independently of supernatural motives, hold in abhorrence everything that has the smallest appearance of cruelty. This I can affirm with truth, that from the time I first embraced the profession of life in which I am engaged, down to the present moment, I have never, by God's mercy, desired the grievous harm, much less the death, of any man in the world, although he may have been my most inveterate enemy: how could I then have had any hand or part in the sudden, unexpected, and on [pg ccxli] that account tremendous death of so many personages of such high quality, for whom I have ever borne the greatest respect. A person was employed to scatter copies of my forementioned letter through various streets of London, and one in particular was delivered to the Earl of Northampton, and by him laid before the King, on whom my reasons so far prevailed to his satisfaction that he would have desisted from the rigorous search made after me, had not Cecil, for his own private ends, rendered him more violent than ever. For being persuaded that some of the conspirators had plotted against his life in particular, and knowing that most of them were my friends, he hoped if he could once lay hold of me, to find out from me how many and who were the conspirators. For this sole reason he never rested until he had again persuaded the King, as a thing evidently known to him and clearly demonstrated, that I was not only an accomplice but the ringleader in the Plot, and therefore to be the first named in the proclamation; which was so done. Perceiving from this that the persecution was not likely to abate, and that I might be discovered and arrested, I took the advice to withdraw myself for a time, and to ‘give place to wrath,’ and, after so many years of hard labour in England, with the Apostles ‘to come apart into a desert place and rest a little:’ nor was there any other principal motive of my leaving the kingdom. In fine, this is the simple naked truth; I was totally ignorant of the provision of gunpowder and of the mine; I was and I am as innocent of this and of every other conspiracy as your lordship or any other man living; and this I affirm and swear upon my soul, without any equivocation whatsoever; in such sort, that if the facts do not correspond truly to the meaning of the words, or if I had any information of the forementioned Plot before it was made public to the whole world, as I have before said, I own myself guilty of perjury before God and men; and as far as it is true that I had no knowledge of it, so far and no more do I ask mercy at the throne of God: and it is very probable that it will not be long before I must appear at the divine tribunal, considering my age and the present contagion in the neighbourhood; for if it should reach us it is hardly possible I can escape, on account of the assistance which it is my duty to render to this Community, [pg ccxlii] whose souls are committed to my care.[218] Therefore I am induced to hope that your lordship will not consider me so careless and prodigal of my eternal salvation, after having spent so many years in no other employment than that of seeking to know and to accomplish the will of God, and of teaching the same to others, as to be now willing to burthen my conscience and risk the salvation of my soul by a protestation so solemn and spontaneous, if my conscience were not pure, my cause evident, and my words true in all sincerity. Now, as I doubt not that God, the Supreme Judge, Who sees and knows all things, will pass sentence on my cause according to its merits, so I hope that your lordship, now knowing me to be innocent, will not wish me to appear guilty, by permitting to stand against me without contradiction an accusation so false and of such enormous infamy. Since this accusation derives its greatest force from the authority of your lordship, who, it is publicly said, gives credit and support to it, I beseech you, by that love which you have for charity and justice, to oppose the falsity of the calumny by the truth of this my justification. With respect to the Priest, whoever he may be, by whose false allegation your lordship appears to have been deceived, I desire with all my heart he may meet with true repentance before he dies, so that we may all live together and love God in a blessed eternity.”
Next, we find, in Father Henry More's History of the English Province S.J.,[219] a letter from Father Thomas Fitzherbert, Rector of the English College at Rome, of which house Father Gerard was then Confessor. It is not necessary for us to translate it from his Latin version, as it exists in English amongst the Stonyhurst MSS.[220] It is dated some months later than the foregoing letter of Father Gerard, and was sent by Mutius Vitelleschi, General of the Society, to the Bishop of Chalcedon, by the hands of Fathers Henry Floyd and Thomas Bapthorpe, who were at the same time bearers of a second letter from Father Gerard to Bishop Smith, extracts from which we subjoin, translated from Bartoli.[221]