Now, regard being had to the fact that “there is seldom smoke except there
be, at least, some little fire, the question arises: Is it possible to
account, on rational grounds, for any such statement of the worthy person
still in being in 1680 as Dr. Williams credits him with?
(Nash’s evidence, in the absence of proof of a _continuous_ tradition, is
not one whit more worthy of credence than Dr. Williams’ impalpability.)
It is possible.
For, it is well within the bounds of rational probability that what Mr.
Abington said to some person or persons unknown (assuming that he ever
said anything whatever) was _not_ that his wife _“had writ the Letter,”
but that_ his wife “_knew, or thought she knew, who had writ the Letter_.”
The way in which to test the matter is this: Supposing, for the sake of
argument, that my hypothesis be true, and that Father Oldcorne _did_
actually pen that Letter which was the instrument, not only of the
temporal salvation of Mrs. Abington’s brother, the Lord Mounteagle, but
also of her father, the Lord Morley, together with many others of her
kinsfolk, friends, and acquaintance, as well as of her lawful Sovereign
and His Royal Consort, _is it, or is it not, probable that Mrs. Abington
would guess, in some way or another, the mighty secret_?
It is probable.
For let it be remembered who and what Mrs. Abington was.
The Honourable Mary Parker, the daughter of Edward Parker Lord Morley and
the Honourable Elizabeth Stanley, was the mother of William Abington, the
well-known poet[118] of that name, who was born, in fact, on or about the
5th of November, 1605.
Therefore Mrs. Abington was the mother of a son who was a man of
distinguished intellectual parts.
Moreover, seeing that usually it is from the mother that a son’s
capabilities are derived rather than from the father, it is more, rather
than less, likely that Mrs. Abington herself was a naturally clear-minded,
acute, discerning woman, gifted with that marvellous faculty which
constitutes cleverness in a woman——sympathetic, imaginative insight.
Now if this were so, Mrs. Abington’s native perspicacity would be surely
potent enough to enable her to form a judgment, at once penetrating and
accurate, in reference to such a thing as the penmanship of the great
Letter——a document which had come home, as events had proved, with such
peculiar closeness to her own “business and bosom.”[119]
In these circumstances, may the Lady of Hindlip not, in after days, when
the tragic scenes of those fateful years 1605 and 1606 had become a sad,
pathetic memory merely, have recalled to mind certain special aspects in
the play of the countenance, in the tone of the voice, aye, in the general
mien of Father Edward Oldcorne that she had noted shortly from and after
the Michaelmas of that unhappy year 1605, forming evidence whence she
might draw her own shrewd, wise conclusions?
May not this honourable woman——honourable by nature as well as by
name——have recollected that _she_ had then observed that the holy man
sought more than hitherto had been his wont the retirement of his “secret
chamber?” That, at that period, he seemed more than ever absorbed, nay
hidden, in thought?
May she not have recalled that at that “last” Christmastide, too, he, who
was by nature so severely yet sweetly just, and the humblest among men,
had shown himself disposed to judge those wicked wrong-doers with a
mildness and a leniency that assuredly, perforce, betokened——what? I
answer, a consciousness of some high prerogative, some kingly right,
abiding in him, whereby he was _warranted_ in thus speaking.
Again; did he not _then_ manifest a disposition, remarkable even in _him_,
to act in diametrical opposition to the ordinary way of men, which is so
well expressed by the sarcastic, cynical, yet only too true saying, that
“the world is ready enough to laugh with a man, but it leaves him to weep
alone.” And this, when “a compassionate silence” (save in extraordinary
circumstances) was the utmost that Justice and Charity alike would prompt
even a Priest and a Jesuit (nay, even a Priest and a Jesuit of the type of
Edward Oldcorne) to display towards the wretched, erring victims of that
“_ineluctabile fatum_,” that resistless decree of the Universe——“The
guilty suffer.”
Now, I submit, with sure confidence for an affirmative answer, to the
judgment of my candid readers——of my candid readers that know something of
_human_ nature, its workings, its windings, and its ways——the question:
Whether or not it is not merely possible, but probable, that Mrs. Abington
_divined that stupendous secret_, through and by means of the subtle, yet
all-potent, _mental sympathy_, which must have subsisted betwixt herself
and the disciplined, exalted, stately soul, who, as a Priest——aye! as a
very Prophet——this high-born lady, or at least her spouse, had “counted it
all honour and all joy” to have harboured, as a beloved spiritual Father,
“elect and precious,” for no less than sixteen years?[120]