The date of this letter was August 29, 1604,[173] that is to say, more than a year before Sir Everard Digby had ever heard of the Plot. Now, will it be believed that when he was asked by Sir Everard Digby what the meaning of “the Pope’s Brief was”[174] [which “Brief”it may have been matters little to my purpose; Lingard[175] thought it referred to that of July 19, 1603], Father Garnet was weak enough—can I use a milder term?—to reply “that they were not (meaning Priests) to undertake or procure stirrs: but yet they would not hinder any, neither was it the Pope’s mind they should, that should be undertaken for Catholick good.”And this after all his anxiety that the Pope should be induced to “forbid all Catholics to stir!”I say “after,”for if the conversation had taken place very much earlier, what reason would Sir Everard have had for saying:—“This answer, with Mr [Catesby’s] proceedings with him and me gave me absolute belief that the matter in general was approved, though every particular was not known.”If the point be pressed that it may have been earlier, I would reply, be it so; for in the very initiatory stages of the Plot, Father Garnet learned that some scheme was in hand, although he knew nothing of its details, and even then he was most anxious to prevent any “stirr.”Let me quote Father Pollen.[176] “About midsummer 1604, some steps in the Plot having been already taken, Catesby intimated that they had something in hand, but entered into no particulars. Father Garnet dissuaded him. Catesby answered, ‘Why were we commanded before to keep out one that was not a Catholic, and now may not exclude him?’ And this he thought an ‘invincible argument,’ and ‘was so resolved in conscience that it was lawful to take arms for religion, that no man could dissuade it, but by the Pope’s prohibition. Whereupon I [i.e., Garnet] urged that the Pope himself had given other orders, &c.’”Yet Garnet told Sir Everard Digby that priests “would not hinder any”“stirs”“that should be undertaken for the Catholick good,”“neither was it the Pope’s mind that they should.”
A friend of my own, who is a great admirer of Father Garnet, as well as a deeply read student of his times, disagrees with me in my view of Father Garnet’s speech to Sir Everard about the “stirrs.”He writes:—“It seems to me you make too much of one word, and not enough of the known tenour of his instructions.” Well, in the first place, this one word is the chief thing that I have to deal with, in respect to Father Garnet. I am not writing a life of Garnet, but of Sir Everard Digby; and as Sir Everard stated that on that one word, to a great extent, depended his belief that the plot was approved of by the Jesuits, and consequently his consent to join in that plot, it is scarcely possible for me to “make too much of it.” Moreover, I expressly pointed out that it was contrary to “the known tenour of his instructions,”and I emphasised the fact that it was a direct contradiction to those instructions, as well as to his wishes, and that it was given in a moment of good-natured weakness; but I venture to suggest that that weakness, instead of being contrary to what we know of his character, was in remarkable accordance with it.
I will admit that I long hesitated to use the word “weakness”in connection with Father Garnet; but he himself practically owned that he was not always free from it.
“I acknowledge,”he wrote,[177] before his death, “that I was bound to reveal all knowledge that I had of this or any other treason out of the sacrament of confession. And whereas, partly upon hope of prevention, partly for that I would not betray my friend, I did not reveal the general knowledge of Mr Catesby’s intention, which I had by him, I do acknowledge myself highly guilty to have offended God, the King’s Majesty and Estate, and humbly ask of all forgiveness, exhorting all Catholics that they no way follow my example.”To Father Greenway, again, he wrote:—[178]“Indeed, I might have revealed a general knowledge I had of Mr Catesby out of confession, but hoping of the Pope’s prevention, and being loth to hurt my friend, I acknowledge to have so far forth offended God and the king.”
With all humility, I beg to submit that a feeble, unguarded, nervous and indulgent speech such as that about the “stirrs,”attributed by Sir Everard Digby to Father Garnet, is not very inconsistent with that good Father’s conduct, as described by himself in the above manuscripts.
The question whether Father Garnet did, or did not, die a martyr, however interesting, is altogether apart from my subject; a life of Sir Everard Digby is in no way affected by that controversy; nor am I taking upon myself the offices of Devil’s Advocate in Garnet’s case, when I endeavour to do justice to that of Sir Everard.
I fully admit that if Father Garnet was weak, his weakness was owing to an excess of kindheartedness and a loyalty to his friends that bordered on extravagance. I am well aware that it is easy to be “wise after the event,”and that that sort of wisdom is too cheap to justify confident or summary sentences on those whose surroundings in their own times were so complicated as to make it impossible to put ourselves exactly in their places. Again, it may be that Sir Everard misheard or misunderstood Garnet, that his memory failed him, or even that he lied. Yet, again, it is possible that Digby’s letter may have been incorrectly transcribed, though I can see no reason for thinking this at all likely to be the case.
There is, however, another side to the question. The mischief which may be wrought by a holy, amiable, but weak man, especially one whose dread of giving pain to others, or putting them into bad faith, or making them give up all religion by saying more than they can bear, when it is his duty to speak plainly, fully, and decidedly, is almost unlimited; and if we are to hesitate to form opinions of the actions and characters of those who have lived in the past, for the reasons given above, we must relinquish historical studies once and for ever. Lastly, we ought not to extol one character at the expense of another. Father Garnet’s weak speech, if weak it was, to some extent excuses, or rather somewhat lessens, the guilt of Sir Everard Digby. We must try to put ourselves in Digby’s place as well as in Garnet’s; nor do I see that Sir Everard’s evidence need be discredited. It was not extorted under examination; on the contrary, it was deliberately written to his wife, and whatever his faults may have been, deceit and dishonesty do not appear to have been among them.
But let me say one word now as to the difficulties in which Father Garnet was placed. Familiar as we are with the means through which he came to know of the plot, I will take the liberty of reminding my readers of them.[179] Suspecting that Catesby was scheming some mischief, he had taxed him with it, and told him that, being against the Pope’s will, it would not prosper. Catesby had replied that, if the Pope knew what he intended to do, he would not hinder it. Then Father Garnet urged him to let the Pope know all about the whole affair. Catesby said he would not do so for the world, lest it should be discovered; but he offered to impart his project to Father Garnet. This Father Garnet refused to hear. Catesby, with all his double-dealing, seems to have become filled with remorse and anxiety, for he revealed the plot to Father Greenway in confession, giving him leave to reveal it in his turn to Father Garnet, in the same manner and under the same seal.
It is difficult for Protestants to realise the secresy of the confessional. Not only can the confessor say nothing of what he has heard in it to anyone else, but he may not even speak of it to the penitent himself, unless the penitent specially requests him to do so, except in confession; nor can he in any way act towards him, or concerning him, on the strength of it. On the other hand, the penitent, although sometimes bound in honour and honesty not to reveal what the priest may say to him confidentially, as man to man, is theologically free to repeat anything that the priest may have said to him in the confessional to the whole world if he so wills; he can also, if he pleases, set the priest at liberty to speak either to himself about it, outside the confessional, or to any other particular person or persons whom he may choose to name, or to everybody, if he likes; but, unless so liberated, if the confessor hears that his penitent is publicly or privately giving a wrong version of the advice given him in confession, he cannot set himself right by giving the true one.