_After the body of the letter there is a post scriptum._
Now, there are nine words in the _post scriptum_ that suffice to clench
the argument of this book.
And why? Because, I respectfully submit, those nine words show that
between the 4th day of October, 1605, _and_ the 21st day of October,
Garnet had received from somewhere _intelligence to the effect that
machinery was being put into motion whereby the Plot would be squashed_.
For the _post scriptum_ to this letter of Father Garnet is as follows:——
“_21º Octobris._
“This letter being returned unto me again, FOR REASON OF A
FRIEND’S STAY IN THE WAY, I blotted out some words, purposing to
write the same by the next opportunity, as I will do apart.
“I have a letter from Field, the Journeyman in Ireland, who
telleth me that of late, there was a very severe proclamation
against all ecclesiastical persons, and a general command for
going to the churches, with a solemn protestation that the King
never promised nor meant to give toleration.
“I pray you speak to Claude, and to grant them, or obtain for
them all the faculties we have here; for so he earnestly
desireth, and is scrupulous. I gave unto two of them, that
passed by me, all we have; and I think it sufficient in law; for
being here, they were my subjects, and we have our faculties
also for Ireland, for the most part. I pray you procure them a
general grant for their comfort.”
The letter and the _post scriptum_ are alike unsigned. The letter and the
_post scriptum_ are still in existence, and, I believe, are preserved in
London in the archives of the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Westminster.
I am indebted for my copy to the work entitled, “_A True Account of the
Gunpowder Plot_,” by “Vindicator” (Dolman), 1851——taken from Tierney’s
Edition of “_Dodd’s Church History_.”
The Claude referred to in the _post scriptum_ is Father Claude Aquaviva,
the then General of the Jesuits, who lived in Rome.
(Irish Catholics will not fail to notice the interest this afflicted,
much-tried Englishman took in their case on the 21st October, 1605.)
Father Gerard says in his “_Narrative of the Plot_,” p. 269: “Father
Oldcorne his indictment was so framed that one might see they much desired
to have withdrawn him within the compass of some participation in this
late Treason; to which effect they first did seem to suppose it as likely
that he should send letters up and down to prepare men’s minds for the
insurrection.”
Again; respecting Ralph Ashley, the Jesuit lay-brother and servant of
Father Oldcorne, Gerard says, on p. 271: “Ralph was also indicted and
condemned upon supposition that he had carried letters to and fro about
this conspiracy.”
_Now, my deliberate conjectures are these: That Edward Oldcorne had indeed
sent “Letters” which his servant Ralph Ashley had carried concerning “this
conspiracy.” That one of those Letters was sent and carried to Henry
Garnet. And another to William Parker fourth Lord Mounteagle._
On the 12th of March, 1605-6, Father Garnet, when a prisoner in the Tower
of London, before the Lord Chief Justice Popham, Sir Edward Coke, Sir
William Waade (Lieutenant of the Tower), and John Corbett, “confessed that
Father Parsons wrote to him certain letters last summer [_i.e._, 1605]
_which he received about Michaelmas last_, wherein he requested this
examinat to advertise him what plotts the Catholiques of England had then
in hand; _whereunto for that this examinat was on his journey he made no
answere_.”
Yea, indeed, this was a part of the truth, no doubt. _But the remainder of
the truth, I suggest, was that the Plot of Plots Garnet had learned, a few
days after the aforesaid Michaelmas, was being assuredly squashed by
Edward Oldcorne._
Poor Henry Garnet, a sorry, pathetic figure in the history of his Country,
surely. Yet, because _much_ was lost, he knew that it did not therefore
follow that _all_ was lost. For this gifted, distraught, erring man still
held “something sacred, something undefiled, some _pledge_ and keepsake of
his better nature.”
_That something was his point of honour as a Priest of the Catholic
Church._[A]
[Footnote A: How many a gallant soldier and sailor in our own day, young
and old, has been sustained in life and death by the consoling _infinite
thought of fidelity to the commands of a lawful superior_; by the
comforting _transcendental thought of duty done_! _Cf._, Frederic Denison
Maurice’s fine passage on the inspiring and ennobling idea of Duty, in his
“_Lectures on the Epistles of St. John_ (Macmillan); also Wordsworth’s
magnificent “Ode to Duty.”]