[98] November 25th, 1605, Stowe MSS. 168, 61.
CHAPTER III.
THE OPINION OF CONTEMPORARIES AND HISTORIANS.
We have now for so long a period been accustomed to accept the official story regarding the Gunpowder Plot, that most readers will be surprised to hear that at the time of its occurrence, and for more than a century afterwards, there were, to say the least, many intelligent men who took for granted that in some way or other the actual conspirators were but the dupes and instruments of more crafty men than themselves, and in their mad enterprise unwittingly played the game of ministers of State.
From the beginning the government itself anticipated this, as is evidenced by the careful and elaborate account of the whole affair drawn up on the 7th of November, 1605—two days after the "discovery"—seemingly for the benefit of the Privy Council.[99] This important document, which is in the handwriting of Levinus Munck, Cecil's secretary, with numerous and significant emendations from the hand of Cecil himself, speaks, amongst other things, of the need of circumspection, "considering how apt the world is nowadays to think all providence and intelligences to be but practices." The result did not falsify the expectation. Within five weeks we find a letter written from London to a correspondent abroad,[100] wherein it is said: "Those that have practical experience of the way in which things are done, hold it as certain that there has been foul play, and that some of the Council secretly spun the web to entangle these poor gentlemen, as did Secretary Walsingham in other cases," and it is clear that the writer has but recorded an opinion widely prevalent. To this the government again bear witness, for they found it advisable to issue an official version of the history, in the True and Perfect Relation, and the Discourse of the Manner of the Discovery of the Gunpowder Plot, the appearance of which was justified expressly on the ground that "there do pass from hand to hand divers uncertain, untrue, and incoherent reports and relations," and that it is very important "for men to understand the birth and growth of the said abominable and detestable conspiracy." The accounts published with this object are, by the common consent of historians, flagrantly untruthful and untrustworthy.[101] We likewise find Secretary Cecil writing to instruct Sir E. Coke, the Attorney-General, as to his conduct of the case against the conspirators, in view of the "lewd" reports current in regard of the manner in which it had been discovered.[102] The same minister, in the curious political manifesto which he issued in connection with the affair,[103] again bears witness to the same effect, when he declares that the papists, after the manner of Nero, were throwing the blame of their crime upon others.
Clearly, however, it was not to the papists alone that such an explanation commended itself. The Puritan Osborne[104] speaks of the manner in which the "discovery" was managed as "a neat device of the Treasurer's, he being very plentiful in such plots." Goodman, Anglican Bishop of Gloucester, another contemporary, is even more explicit. After describing the indignation of the Catholics when they found themselves deceived in their hopes at the hands of James, he goes on: "The great statesman had intelligence of all this, and because he would show his service to the State, he would first contrive and then discover a treason, and the more odious and hateful the treason were, his service would be the greater and the more acceptable."[105] Another notable witness is quoted by the Jesuit Father Martin Grene, in a letter to his brother Christopher, January 1st, 1665-6:[106] "I have heard strange things, which, if ever I can make out, will be very pertinent: for certain, the late Bishop of Armagh, Usher, was divers times heard to say, that if papists knew what he knew, the blame of the Gunpowder Treason would not lie on them." In like manner we find it frequently asserted on the authority of Lord Cobham and others,[107] that King James himself, when he had time to realize the truth of the matter, was in the habit of speaking of the Fifth of November as "Cecil's holiday."
Such a belief must have been widely entertained, otherwise it could not have been handed on, as it was, for generations. It is not too much to say that historians for almost a century and a half, if they did not themselves favour the theory of the government's complicity, at least bore witness how widely that idea prevailed. Thus, to confine ourselves at present to Protestant writers, Sanderson,[108] acknowledging that the secretary was accused of having manipulated the transaction, says no word to indicate that he repudiates such a charge. Welwood[109] is of opinion that Cecil was aware of the Plot long before the "discovery," and that the famous letter to Monteagle was "a contrivance of his own." Oldmixon writes[110] "notwithstanding the general joy, ... there were some who insinuated that the Plot was of the King's own making, or that he was privy to it from first to last." Carte[111] does not believe that James knew anything of it, but considers it "not improbable" that Cecil was better informed. Burnet[112] complains of the impudence of the papists of his day, who denied the conspiracy, and pretended it was an artifice of the minister's "to engage some desperate men into a plot, which he managed so that he could discover it when he pleased." Fuller[113] bears witness to the general belief, but considers it inconsistent with the well-known piety of King James. Bishop Kennet, in his Fifth of November sermon at St. Paul's, in 1715, talks in a similar strain. So extreme, indeed, does the incredulity and uncertainty appear to have been, that the Puritan Prynne[114] is inclined to suspect Bancroft, the Archbishop of Canterbury, of having been engaged in the conspiracy; while one of the furious zealots who followed the lead of Titus Oates, mournfully testified that there were those in his day who looked upon the Powder Treason "as upon a romantic story, or a politic invention, or a State trick," giving no more credence to it than to the histories of the "Grand Cyrus, or Guy of Warwick, or Amadis de Gaul,"—or, as we should now say, Jack the Giant Killer.
The general scope and drift of such suspicions are well indicated by Bevil Higgons, "This impious design," he writes[115] of the Plot, "gave the greatest blow to the Catholic interest in England, by rendering that religion so odious to the people. The common opinion concerning the discovery of the Plot, by a letter to the Lord Mounteagle, has not been universally allowed to be the real truth of the matter, for some have affirmed that this design was first hammered in the forge of Cecil, who intended to have produced this plot in the time of Queen Elizabeth, but prevented by her death he resumed his project in this reign, with a design to have so enraged the nation as to have expelled all Roman Catholics, and confiscated their estates. To this end, by his secret emissaries, he enticed some hot-headed men of that persuasion, who, ignorant whence the design first came, heartily engaged in this execrable Powder Treason.... Though this account should not be true," he continues, "it is certain that the Court of England had notice of this Plot from France and Italy long before the pretended discovery; upon which Cecil ... framed that letter to the Lord Mounteagle, with a design to make the discovery seem the more miraculous, and at the same time magnify the judgment of the king, who by his deep penetration was to have the honour of unravelling so ambiguous and dark a riddle."