<265>On the morning of November 5, the news of the great deliverance ran like wildfire along the streets of London. Nov. 5.The suspicions of the people were naturally directed against the Spaniards who happened to be in the City, and especially against the Spanish Ambassador. If measures had not been promptly taken, it might have gone ill with the object of the popular dislike.[349] In the evening all the bells were ringing, and the sky was reddened with the bonfires which were blazing in every street.[350]
On the following morning Fawkes was carried to the Tower. The King, hearing that he refused to implicate any of his accomplices, Nov. 6.Examination of Fawkes.sent a string of questions to which he was required to answer, and ordered that, if he refused, he should be put to the torture,[351] though recourse was not to be had to the rack unless he continued obstinate. These questions were put to him on the same afternoon, but nothing was obtained from him beyond a fictitious account of his own origin and life. He still insisted that his name was Johnson.
At first the Government had only received sufficient <266>information to enable them to issue a proclamation for the arrest of Percy. Nov. 7.On the 7th they obtained, from some unknown source, intelligence which put them in possession of the names of the other conspirators. A proclamation was set forth, in which the names of all of them were mentioned, excepting Tresham, who was still in London, and on whom the Government could lay their hands whenever they pleased. On the same day Fawkes was again examined, probably after one of those gentler tortures which James had recommended. He gave some further particulars of the plot, and acknowledged that his name was Fawkes.[352]
On the 8th, the day of the final catastrophe at Holbeche, much additional information was obtained from him. The next day Nov. 9.he was undoubtedly subjected to torture of no common severity. The signature which he affixed to his examination is written in a trembling broken hand, as by a man who had lost all command over his limbs. The motive for the employment of torture was the hope that it might be possible to trace the connection which was suspected to exist between the conspirators and the priests. Fawkes admitted that the design had been communicated to Owen, who, as he knew, was safe in Flanders, beyond the power of the English Government. He acknowledged that the conspirators had, after taking the oath of secrecy, received the sacrament from the hands of Gerard; but he expressly added that Gerard knew nothing of their intentions. With respect to Garnet, he only stated that they had used his house in Enfield Chase as a rendezvous.[353]
On Sunday a solemn thanksgiving was offered in all the churches. The news of Nov. 10.The Bishop of Rochester’s sermon.the occurrences at Holbeche, which had been received that very morning, was given to the public by the Bishop of <267>Rochester. On the 12th Nov. 12.Thomas Winter arrived, and by degrees the particulars, which were still unknown, were wormed out of him and those of his fellow-conspirators who survived.
Among those who were thus examined was Tresham. He was not sent for till the 12th. Tresham’s imprisonment and death.It is possible that he was spared out of regard for Monteagle, until, by the death of so many witnesses, his testimony was rendered indispensable. If Salisbury still had any wish to treat him favourably, this wish was not shared by others at the Court. There were many who were already eager for the division of the spoil. Within a day or two of his committal, Sir Thomas Lake had obtained from the King a promise of one of his manors in the event of his conviction.[354]
The great object of the Government now was to obtain evidence against the priests. Of their connection with the great conspiracy it soon became evident that Tresham knew nothing. But he might be able to tell something of the share which they had taken in the mission to Spain in 1602. He was examined on this point, and after flatly denying that he knew anything of the matter at all, was finally brought to confess, not only his own share in the transaction, but that both Garnet and Greenway had been made aware of what was being done.[355]
During these days he was seized by the disease under which he gradually sank. He had no reason to complain of his treatment. During his illness his wife was allowed to remain with him, and his servant Vavasour was also permitted to have access to him at all times.[356]
On December 5, Coke, in searching Tresham’s chamber at the Temple, came upon a manuscript bearing the title of ‘A Treatise on Equivocation,’[357] in which the Jesuit doctrine concerning the lawfulness of giving false evidence under certain circumstances was advocated. Tresham, <268>who had already given proof how apt a scholar he had become in that evil school in which he had been brought up, was soon to give another proof of how completely he had mastered the principles of this book. Dec. 9.On the 9th he was questioned about the book, and made a statement professing an ignorance of all circumstances connected with it, which he could hardly have expected to be believed. As the days passed on, and he felt more and more that he was a dying man, he was haunted by remorse for his acknowledgment that Garnet had been acquainted with the mission to Spain. He determined to crown his life with a deliberate falsehood. One or two days before his death he dictated to Vavasour a declaration in which he not only affirmed that Garnet had taken no part in the negotiations, but, as if in mere recklessness of lying, he added that he had neither seen him nor heard from him for sixteen years.[358] Dec. 22.He died on the 22nd, leaving it as his last charge to his wife to forward this declaration to Salisbury. She did so and the ridiculous untruth of the statement thus volunteered must have weighed much against any reasons for treating his memory with leniency. Henceforward his name appears on the same footing as that of the other conspirators. His body, according to the barbarous practice of those times, was beheaded, and his head was exposed to the public gaze at Northampton.[359]
On January 27 the surviving conspirators, Fawkes, the two Winters, Keyes, Bates, Rokewood, Grant, and Digby, were brought up for 1606.Jan. 27.Trial of the plotters.trial in Westminster Hall, in the presence of an immense concourse of spectators.[360] Digby alone pleaded Guilty. The others pleaded Not Guilty, not with any hope of obtaining an acquittal, but in order to have an opportunity of contradicting some statements of minor importance contained in the indictment. The main facts were too plain to be denied, and Coke had no difficulty in obtaining a verdict against the prisoners. Digby having stated that promises had been broken with the Catholics, <269>Northampton rose and denied that the King had ever made them any promise at all before he came to England — an assertion which was certainly untrue. Salisbury drew a distinction between promises of toleration, or permission to enjoy the free exercise of their religion, and promises of exemption from fines, a distinction which has often been lost sight of. When, however, he proceeded to say that, in answer to the deputation which had waited upon the Council in July 1603, nothing more had been promised than that the arrears then accruing should be remitted, he said what he must have known to be untrue. The promise had been that, as long as the Catholics remained loyal, no fines should be levied; and this promise had been broken.
On the 31st, Digby, Robert Winter, Grant, and Bates were executed in St. Paul’s Churchyard. On the following day Fawkes, Thomas Winter, Rokewood, and Keyes Jan. 31.Feb. 1.Execution of eight of the conspirators.suffered death at Westminster. As far as we know, these men, unlike those who perished at Holbeche, died in the firm persuasion that they were suffering as martyrs in the cause of God. As they passed along the streets, each of them, according to custom, dragged upon his separate hurdle, even these iron men must have longed for some sympathy as they looked up at the long line of hostile faces. Nor was this altogether withheld from them: as the miserable procession passed along the Strand, they came to the house in which Rokewood’s wife was lodging. She had not shunned the spectacle, but had placed herself at an open window. Her husband, catching sight of her, begged her to pray for him. Without faltering, she answered: “I will! I will! and do you offer yourself with a good heart to God and your Creator. I yield you to Him with as full an assurance that you will be accepted of Him as when He gave you to me.”[361]
The whole story of the plot, as far as it relates to the lay conspirators, rests upon indisputable evidence. But as soon as we approach Evidence against the priests.the question of the complicity of the priests, we find ourselves upon more uncertain ground. Of those who were implicated by the evidence of the <270>plotters, Owen the Jesuit and Baldwin were beyond the reach of the Government, under the protection of the Archduke. Of the three who had been in England, Gerard and Greenway had contrived to make their escape, and Garnet alone was brought to trial. Catesby, who knew better than any man what Garnet’s connection with the plot really was, was dead. So that the whole case against Garnet rested upon circumstantial evidence.
It was not till December 4 that any one of the priests[362] was actually implicated in the plot by any of the conspirators.[363] Bates, Dec. 4, 1605.on that day, acknowledged that he had revealed the whole plot to Greenway in confession. On January 13 he gave a further clue by narrating the history of his visit to Coughton after the discovery of the plot.[364] Upon this a proclamation was issued for the arrest of Gerard, Greenway, and Garnet. The first two succeeded in escaping. Garnet was less fortunate. He had remained at Coughton till December 4, Movements of Garnet.but had then moved to Hindlip, in consequence of the invitation of a priest named Oldcorne, who had himself received shelter in Abington’s house, and acted as his chaplain. The house was amply provided with means for secreting fugitives. There was scarcely a room which did not contain some secret mode of egress to a hiding-place constructed in the thickness of the walls. Even the chimneys led to rooms, the doors of which were covered with a lining of bricks, which, blackened as it was with smoke, was usually sufficient to prevent detection.[365]
On January 20 Sir Henry Bromley, a magistrate of the county, proceeded, in consequence of directions from Salisbury, to Jan. 20.The search at Hindlip.search the house.[366] Several of the hiding-places were discovered, but nothing was found <271>in them excepting what Bromley described as ‘a number of Popish trash.’ He was not satisfied with these results, and determined to keep watch, in hopes of making further discoveries. On the fourth day of his watch, he heard that two men had crept out from behind the wainscot in one of the rooms. They proved to be Garnet’s servant, Owen, and Chambers, who acted in the same capacity to Oldcorne. They declared that they could hold out no longer, as they had had no more than a single apple to eat during the time of their concealment.
Two or three days after this, Bromley, who did not relax in his watchfulness, was encouraged by hearing that Humphrey Littleton had bought his life Garnet and Oldcorne surrender.by confessing his knowledge that Oldcorne was at that moment in hiding at Hindlip.[367] On the 30th his patience was rewarded.[368] To the astonishment of the man who was set to keep watch, the two priests, who could bear the confinement no longer, suddenly stepped out from their hiding-place. The sentinel immediately ran away, expecting to be shot. The priests had been in no danger of starvation. There was a communication between their place of concealment and one of the rooms of the house by means of a quill, through which they had received constant supplies of broth. They had suffered principally from want of air. The closet in which they were had not been prepared for their reception, and it was half filled with books and furniture. Garnet afterwards stated his belief that, if these had been removed, he could have held out easily for three months. “As it was,” he said, “we were well wearied, for we continually sat, save that sometimes we could half stretch ourselves, the place being not high enough; and we had our legs so straitened that we could not, sitting, find place for them, so that we both were in continual pain of our legs; and both our legs, especially mine, were much swollen. … When we came forth we appeared like two ghosts, yet I the stronger, though my weakness lasted longer.”
The two priests were sent up to London. They were <272>allowed to travel by easy stages; and by Salisbury’s express orders they were well treated during the whole journey. Owen and Chambers, as well as Abington and two of his servants, were sent with them.
On February 13, Garnet was examined by the Council. As he was conducted to Whitehall, the streets were Feb. 13.Garnet examined by the Council.crowded with multitudes, who were eager to catch a sight of the head of the Jesuits in England. He heard one man say, ‘that he was a provincial,’ whilst another shouted out, “There goes a young Pope.” It was found impossible to extract from him any confession of his complicity in the plot. During the following days, he was repeatedly examined with equal want of success. At one time he was threatened with torture. It was all alike. Nothing could be gained from him, either by fear or by persuasion. It was a mere threat, as the King had strictly forbidden the use of torture in his case.
Torture was, however, used upon Owen, who exasperated the Commissioners appointed to conduct the examinations by declaring that Owen’s torture and suicide.he did not know either Oldcorne[369] or his own master. An acknowledgment of his acquaintance with Garnet was extracted from him[370] by fastening his thumbs to a beam above his head. His fear lest the torture should be repeated worked upon his mind to such an extent, that on the following day he committed suicide.[371]
The Government having in vain tried all ordinary means of shaking Garnet’s constancy, determined to Admission obtained from Garnet by stratagem.resort to stratagem. He and Oldcorne were removed to two rooms adjoining one another, between which a communication existed by means of a door. Two persons were placed in a concealed position, from which they <273>might be able to overhear all that passed.[372] By these means the Government was put in possession of information which enabled it to frame its questions so as to obtain more satisfactory answers.
Garnet at first denied that he had ever conversed with Oldcorne through the door at all. At last, after he had been subjected to much questioning, March.Garnet’s confession.he discovered both that he could not hope to escape, and that there was no one still in England who would be endangered by a full confession. Accordingly, on March 8, he told the whole story of his own connection with the plotters, and this story, as far at least as the facts of the case are concerned, may probably, when taken together with subsequent additions, be regarded as substantially true. He now admitted that he had been for some length of time in communication with the principal conspirators. He said that soon after James’s accession Catesby told him that, ‘there would be some stirring, seeing the King kept not promise;’[373] that, about Midsummer 1604, he came to him again, and ‘insinuated that he had something in hand,’ but told him no particulars; and that, soon afterwards, Greenway informed him that there was some scheme on foot, upon which he expressed his disapproval both to Catesby and to Greenway. About Easter, 1605, when Fawkes went to Flanders, he gave him a letter of introduction to Baldwin; and on June 8, in the same year,[374] Catesby asked him a question which was intended to draw out his opinion on the <274>lawfulness of the action in which he was engaged, without letting him know what that action was. The question was, whether it was lawful to enter upon any undertaking for the good of the Catholic cause if it should be impossible to avoid the destruction of some innocent persons together with the guilty; to which Garnet, understanding it to refer to military operations in Flanders against some fortified town in which innocent persons would share the fortunes of the garrison, answered in the affirmative. After Catesby was gone, Garnet began to doubt whether Catesby’s question were as abstract as it appeared at first. He took an early opportunity of warning Catesby that to make the opinion which he had given about the innocents worth anything, it was absolutely necessary that the cause in which they were to be sacrificed should be in itself lawful. Catesby broke off the conversation, and turned away to join Monteagle and Tresham, who were in the room at the time. Garnet gathered from his manner that some plan of insurrection was in hand.[375]
Garnet took alarm. He was under orders from Rome to discountenance any commotion amongst the Catholics; and those orders were repeated in the most stringent form shortly after this meeting, in a letter from Aquaviva, the General of the Society.
When Garnet next saw Catesby, he showed him the Pope’s letter. “Whatever I mean to do,” said Catesby, “if the Pope knew, he would not hinder for the general good of our country.” Garnet replied that those who did not keep quiet would fly in the teeth of the direct prohibition of the Pope. “I am not bound,” replied Catesby, “to take knowledge by you of the Pope’s will.” Would he not, pleaded Garnet, acquaint the <275>Pope with the project. No, said Catesby, ‘he would not for all the world make his particular project known to him for fear of discovery.’ Catesby, however, at last engaged to do nothing till the Pope had been informed in general terms of the state of matters in England, and it was then arranged that Sir Edward Baynham, who was starting for Flanders, should convey the information to the Nuncio at Brussels, if not to Rome itself. To Catesby’s offer to acquaint him with the plot which he had in his mind, Garnet returned a distinct refusal, on the ground of the prohibition which had come from Rome.
That Garnet was fully aware that violence of some kind was contemplated it is impossible to doubt. It is equally clear that he had no objection on principle to such a movement. By his own account he argues against it on the ground of the orders of the Pope, but he expresses no opinion on the wickedness of righting wrongs with a strong hand, and he prefers to know nothing of particulars, though to know particulars would increase his facilities for arguing against the use of violence. On the other hand, he may have thought, from the message sent by Baynham, that the plot, whatever it was, was not to be executed for some time to come.
This last conversation with Catesby took place early in July. A few days later the Jesuit Greenway visited him and offered to acquaint him with Catesby’s design. After some hesitation, Garnet consented to hear the story, provided that it was told him in confession. Upon this Greenway informed him of everything, walking about the room as he spoke, and afterwards kneeling down to place his statement under the formal safeguard of confession.[376]
According to Garnet’s statement, he was thrown into the greatest perplexity by this revelation. “Every day,” he says, “I did offer up all my devotions and masses, that God of His <276>mercy and infinite providence would dispose all for the best, and find the best means which were pleasing unto Him to prevent so great a mischief; and if it were His holy will and pleasure to ordain some sweeter means for the good of Catholics.” He wrote, still in general terms to Rome, saying that he ‘feared some particular desperate courses,’ and he obtained merely such an answer as such vague information was likely to receive. Garnet’s horror and perplexity were natural enough, but they were not of that overpowering nature which would have driven him to sacrifice ease and life itself to make the villany impossible. He still comforted himself with the reflection that nothing might be done till Baynham’s return, and that Catesby would fulfil a promise which he had made of visiting him in the beginning of November, and would so give him the opportunity of remonstrating with him; but he did not put his own neck in danger by leaving his hiding-place to seek him out, in order to plead against the crime with all the authority of his calling. Nor does the language which he used to Greenway, when the first discovery was made, testify to any very strong initial horror. “Good Lord!” he said, “if this matter go forward, the Pope will send me to the galleys; for he will assuredly think I was privy to it.”
Garnet no doubt had, as it were, an official conscience. He might to a great extent succeed in bringing himself into that frame of mind which his duty required him to be in. He may even have shrunk with horror from the cruelties involved in the execution of the plot. After all, however, he was a man whose dearest friends were exposed to bitter persecution, and who was himself liable at any moment to a cruel and ignominious death by the sentence of a law which he thoroughly believed to be the work of traitors to the divine government. In such a position he might easily grow callous to the misery involved in the destruction of the enemies of the Church, and even when he had awakened to some sense of the horrible nature of the crime, would hardly throw himself with much energy into the work of averting its execution.
Garnet’s trial took place at Guildhall[377] on March 28. The <277>point which was selected as affording a proof of his complicity, was the conversation with Catesby on June 9. Garnet’s trial.No evidence which would have satisfied a modern jury was produced; but it would be unfair to censure the Government for disregarding the principles of evidence while as yet those principles were unrecognised. In fact, the scene at Guildhall was a political rather than a judicial spectacle. Neither those who were the principal actors, nor the multitude who thronged every approach to the hall, regarded it as the sole or even as the chief question, whether the old man who stood hopeless but undaunted at the bar, and who, even by his own confession, had been acquainted with the recent conspiracy, had looked upon it with favour or with abhorrence. It was to them rather an opportunity which had at last been gained, of striking a blow against that impalpable system which seemed to meet them at every turn, and which was the more terrible to the imagination because it contained elements with which the sword and the axe were found to be incapable of dealing. Any man who should have hinted that it was inexpedient that men should be put to death unless their guilt could be proved by the clearest evidence, would have been looked upon as a dreamer. The Pope was still too much dreaded to make it possible that fair play should be granted to the supporters of his influence. He was not yet what he became in the days of Bunyan, the old man sitting in his cave, hopelessly nursing his impotent wrath. His power was, to Burghley and Salisbury, a power which was only a little less, and which might any day become greater, than their own. They thought that if they could get the wolf by the ears, it was the wisest policy, as well as the strictest justice, to hold it fast.
In his speech for the prosecution,[378] Coke attempted to show that the conspiracies which had from time to time broken out in late years Coke’s speech.had their root in the practices of the Jesuit Society. He asserted that all the plots which had disturbed the repose of Elizabeth had originated with the priests. He told the story of the breves which had been <278>received by Garnet before the death of Elizabeth, in which all Catholics were charged not to submit to any successor unless he would not only give toleration, but also would ‘with all his might set forward the Catholic religion, and, according to the custom of Catholic princes, submit himself to the See Apostolical.’ Garnet had kept these breves till after the death of the Queen, and had only destroyed them when he found them to be of no avail. Coke then mentioned the two interviews in which Catesby had thrown out vague hints of his intentions, and then passed to the conversation of June 9, which was the act of treason with which Garnet was charged in the indictment. The question was whether, in declaring it to be lawful to destroy some innocent persons together with the guilty, Garnet had merely given an answer to an abstract question, or whether he knew that Catesby referred to a plot against the King. If the latter were the case, he was both technically and morally guilty of treason.
Of this knowledge there was no legal proof whatever. Here, therefore, in our days the case would at once have broken down. Want of proof of the real nature of the conversation with Catesby.But there was strong corroborative evidence derived from Garnet’s apparent approval of the plot at a subsequent period, of which Coke was not slow to avail himself. He showed that Garnet was acquainted by Greenway with the conspiracy at least as early as in July;[379] and he then proceeded to allege facts[380] which certainly went to show that he had never evinced any disapproval of the plot. When Baynham was sent by the traitors into Flanders, it was Garnet who furnished him with a recommendation. In September, Garnet went down to Goathurst, the house of Sir Everard Digby, from whence he proceeded on a pilgrimage to St. Winifred’s Well, together with a large number of persons, most of whom were in some way connected with the conspiracy. Was it possible that he would have been allowed to accompany the party as a priest if he <279>had expressed his abhorrence, as he said that he had, of that which was undoubtedly the subject of the prayers which many of them offered on this occasion? Even if this had been the case, he would surely have left the party as soon as possible. Instead of that, he remained at Goathurst, until the family removed to Coughton, when he accompanied them to the very place which had been selected as most appropriate for carrying out the scheme of insurrection which was to follow upon the success of the plot. When there, he requested his little congregation, on All Saints’ Day, to pray ‘for some good success for the Catholic cause at the beginning of Parliament.’[381] It was not likely that the jury would think that, knowing what he knew, he merely asked that they should pray for the mitigation of the penal laws.
It is worthy of notice, that while the indictment charged Garnet with an act of treason which it was impossible to prove, The indictment avoids mentioning the interview with Greenway.it neglected to mention the conversation with Greenway to which Coke referred in his speech, and about which no doubt whatever existed. In taking this course the members of Government were probably influenced by a not unnatural want of moral courage. They knew that the jury would not be particular in inquiring into the proof of the charge which they brought, and they probably considered the indictment to be a merely formal act. On the other hand, they were aware that the knowledge which Garnet derived from Greenway was obtained under the seal of confession, and they were certain that they would be assailed with the most envenomed acrimony by the whole Catholic world, if they executed a priest whose crime was that he had not revealed a secret entrusted to him in confession. They shrank from taking their stand upon the moral principle that <280>no religious duty, real or supposed, can excuse a man who allows a crime to be committed which he might have prevented, and they preferred to be exposed to the charge of having brought an accusation which they were unable to prove.[382]
Garnet’s defence was, that he had never heard of the plot, excepting in confession. To this he added the improbable statement, which was Garnet’s defence.certainly not the whole of the truth, that when Catesby offered to give him full information, he refused to hear him, because ‘his soul was so troubled with the mislike of that particular, as he was loth to hear any more of it.’[383] As a matter of course, the jury found a verdict of Guilty.
The execution was deferred. Garnet was again examined several times after his conviction, and there may possibly have His ideas on truth and falsehood.been some inclination on the part of the King to save his life. But the Jesuitical doctrine on the subject of truth and falsehood which he openly professed was enough to ruin any man. There was nothing to make anyone believe in his innocence, except his own assertions, and the weight of these was reduced to nothing by his known theory and practice. His doctrine was that of the Treatise of Equivocation which had been found in Tresham’s room, and which had been corrected by his own hand. He not only justified the use of falsehood by a prisoner when defending himself, on the ground that the magistrate had no right to require him to accuse himself, but he held the far more immoral doctrine of equivocation. According to this doctrine, the immorality of a lie did not consist in the deception practised upon <281>the person who was deceived, but in the difference between the words uttered and the intended meaning of the speaker. If, therefore, the speaker could put any sense, however extravagant, upon the words of which he made use, he might lawfully deceive the hearer, without taking any account of the fact that he would be certain to attach some other and more probable meaning to the words. The following example given in the treatise, was adopted by Garnet:[384] “A man cometh unto Coventry in time of a suspicion of plague. At the gates the officers meet him, and upon his oath examine him whether he come from London or no, where they think certainly the plague to be. This man, knowing for certain the plague not to be in London, or at least knowing that the air is not there infectious, and that he only rid through some secure place of London, not staying there, may safely swear that he came not from London, answering to their final intention in their demand, that is, whether he came so from London that he may endanger their city of the plague, although their immediate intention were to know whether he came from London or no. This man the very light of nature would clear from perjury.”
If all liars had been subject to punishment, it would have gone hard with those members of the Government, whoever they were, who, in order to involve the Jesuits in the charge of complicity with the plot, deliberately suppressed the words in which both Winter and Fawkes declared that Gerard, when he administered the Sacrament to the original conspirators, was ignorant of the oath which they had previously taken. But the popular feeling was right in fixing upon equivocation as more demoralising than downright lying, because a person who in self-defence tells a falsehood, knowing it to be such, is far less likely to deceive habitually than one who deceives with words so framed as to enable him to imagine that he is in reality telling no falsehood at all. That popular feeling found a voice <282>in the words of the Porter in ‘Macbeth’: “’Faith, here’s an equivocator, that could swear in both scales against either scale; who committed treason enough for God’s sake, yet could not equivocate to heaven.”[385]
At last, on May 3, when it was evident that no further confession could be extracted from him Garnet was executed, April.the King May 3.Execution of Garnet.having given orders that he should not be cut down until he was dead, so that he might be spared the torture of the usual barbarities. On the scaffold he persisted in his denial that he had had The probable truth about Garnet.any positive information of the plot except in confession, though he allowed, as he had acknowledged before, that he had had a general and confused knowledge from Catesby.[386] In all probability, this is the exact truth.
Soon after the execution, all Catholic Europe was listening with eager credulity to the story of Garnet’s straw. It was said that Garnet’s straw.one of the straws used upon the scaffold had a minute likeness of the martyr’s head on one of the husks. The miracle was trumpeted abroad by those who should have known better, and found its way from common conversation into the pages of grave writers. An inquiry was instituted by the Government, and it was found that some who had seen the straw declared that there was nothing wonderful in the matter at all, and that the drawing could have been easily executed by any artist of moderate skill.
Oldcorne was taken to Worcester, where he was convicted <283>of treason and executed. Abington also was Execution of Oldcorne.sentenced to death, but was finally pardoned. The priests and others implicated in the plot, who were now in Flanders, were beyond the reach of the Government, as the Archduke steadily refused to give them up.
It only remained to deal with the lords who had given cause of suspicion by absenting themselves from the meeting of Parliament. Montague escaped from the Star Chamber with a fine of 4,000l., Stourton with one of 1,000l., whilst Mordaunt was set free upon paying 200l. to the Lieutenant of the Tower.[387]
Northumberland was a prisoner of greater importance. His connection[388] with Percy March.Suspicions against Northumberland.brought him under suspicion, and the fact that Percy had come down to Sion House to speak to him the day before the meeting of Parliament, was certain to strengthen whatever suspicions were entertained.
The Earl was examined on the nature of his dealings with Percy, but nothing was elicited to his disadvantage. At least up to March 3, Salisbury expressed his belief in his innocence, though he supposed that he had probably received some general warning from Percy.[389] On June 27, June 27.His trial in the Star Chamber.he was brought before the Star Chamber, and was forced to listen to a long and passionate harangue from Coke, who, after mentioning, as he had done in Raleigh’s case, all manner of plots with which he was unable to prove that the prisoner had ever been connected, charged him with having committed certain contempts and misdemeanours against the King. His employment of Percy to carry letters to James in Scotland was brought against him, as if he had attempted to put himself at the head of the Catholic party. It was also objected that after the discovery of the plot he had written letters to his tenants, directing them to keep his rents out of Percy’s hands, but saying nothing about the apprehension of the traitor. Amidst these trivialities appeared a charge of a graver nature. On <284>June 9, 1604, at the very time when Percy had just signed the lease for the house in Westminster, that traitor had been admitted as one of the gentlemen pensioners, whose office it was to be in daily attendance upon the King. Not only had Northumberland admitted him to this post, in virtue of his position as Captain of the Pensioners, but he had admitted him without requiring the Oath of Supremacy, and, if Coke is to be believed, had afterwards denied the fact that the oath had not been administered. Northumberland must have committed this dereliction of duty with his eyes open, as shortly after the King’s accession he had received a letter from James, distinctly ordering that no one was to be admitted as a pensioner who refused to take the oath.[390] By this weakness — for undoubtedly it was no more than a weakness — he had disobeyed the orders given him, and had placed about the person of the King a man who was engaged in plotting his death. Indeed, it was by the opportunities offered to him by his position as a pensioner that Percy hoped to be able to carry out that part of the plot which related to the seizure of Prince Charles.[391]
The sentence was, that the Earl should forfeit all the offices which he held under the Crown, should be imprisoned The sentence.during the King’s pleasure, and should pay a fine of 30,000l., a sum which was afterwards reduced to 11,000l.
It was supposed at the time,[392] and it has since been generally believed, that this harsh sentence was dictated by political feeling, and by a desire to get rid of a spirited rival. It may have been so, and it would have been strange if, with a court composed as the Star Chamber was, such feelings had been altogether excluded. Yet it must be remembered that the admission of Percy without requiring the oath from him was no light fault, and that it was one which was likely to make its <285>full impression upon the timid mind of James. It is possible that the nature of this fault had not come to light till a short time before the trial, as Cecil, in a letter of March 3, does not refer at all to the omission of the oath.[393] Perhaps it may have been the full discovery of the particulars of this transaction which turned the scale against the Earl.
Undisturbed by the discovery of the danger which had been so happily averted, the Parliament for which such a sudden destruction had been prepared, Nov. 5, 1605.Meeting of Parliament.had quietly met on November 5. In the Upper House no business was done, but the Commons with extraordinary self-command, applied themselves to the regular routine of business. It is difficult to understand how these men, scarcely snatched from death, betook themselves, without apparent emotion, to such matters as the appointment of a committee to inquire into the regulations of the Spanish trade, and the discussion of the petition of a member who asked to be relieved from his Parliamentary duties because he was suffering from a fit of the gout.
On the 9th the King commanded Nov. 9.Adjournment.an adjournment to January 21, in order that time might be given for further inquiry into the ramifications of the conspiracy.
<286>On their reassembling, the attention of the Houses was necessarily directed to the danger from which they had escaped. 1606.Jan. 21.The 5th of November set apart as a day of thanksgiving.A Bill was eagerly passed, by which November 5 was ordered to be kept as a day of thanksgiving for ever.[394] That Act continued in force for more than two centuries and a half, and was only repealed when the service which was originally the outpouring of thankful hearts had long become an empty form.
A Bill of Attainder[395] was also passed, in which the names of Owen, who was still bidding defiance to the law, and of Tresham, who had died in prison, Bill of Attainder.were included with those of the conspirators who had been killed at Holbeche, or who had been executed in London. The immediate effect of such an Act was that the lands and goods of the whole number were at once forfeited to the Crown.
There had been, indeed, some who thought these proceedings insufficient. A few days before the prisoners were brought up for trial, a member of the House of Commons Jan. 24.Proposal to inflict extraordinary punishment on the offenders.moved for a petition to the King, praying him to stay judgment until Parliament should have time to consider of some extraordinary mode of punishment, which might surpass in horror even the scenes which usually occurred at the execution of traitors.[396] To the credit of the House, this proposal met with little favour, and was rejected without a division. A similar attempt in the House of Lords Jan. 30.met with the same fate.[397] It is pleasant to know that the times were already past in which men could be sentenced by Act of Parliament to be boiled alive, and that, in the seventeenth century, if London had some horrible sights still to see, it was, at least, not disgraced by scenes such as those which, a few years later, gathered the citizens of Paris round the scaffold of Ravaillac.
It can hardly surprise us that, in spite of this general feeling against the infliction of extraordinary punishments, Parliament had no scruple in <287>New laws against the recusants.increasing the severity of the recusancy laws.[398] For the first time, a sacramental test was to be introduced into the service of persecution. It was not to be enough that a recusant had been brought to conformity, and had begun once more to attend the parish church; unless he would consent to receive the sacrament from the hands of the Protestant minister, he was to be called upon to pay a heavy fine. It is impossible to conceive a greater degradation of that rite which the whole Christian Church agrees in venerating.
In order to stimulate the activity of the churchwardens and the parish constables, it was enacted that a fine of twenty shillings should be laid upon them whenever they neglected to present persons who absented themselves from church; and that, on the other hand, they should receive a reward of double the amount upon every conviction obtained through their means.
Up to this time, the very rich had escaped the extreme penalties of recusancy, as, when once they had paid the monthly fine, the law had no further claim upon them, though the amount of their fine might be of far less value than the two-thirds of the profits of their estate which would have been taken from them if they had been poorer men. The King was now empowered to refuse the fine and to seize the land at once. In order that the poorer Catholics might feel the sting of the law, a penalty of 10l. was to be laid every month upon all persons keeping servants who absented themselves from church. By this means, it was thought that the numerous servants in the houses of the Catholic gentry would be driven into conformity or deprived of their employment.
This was not all: it was ordered that no recusant should appear at Court, or even remain within ten miles of London, unless he were actually engaged in some recognised trade or employment. A statute of the late reign was also confirmed, which prohibited recusants from leaving their houses for any distance above five miles.[399] It may be allowed that recent experience justified the exclusion of the Catholics from all public offices in the State; but it was hard to forbid them, as the new <288>statute did, from practising at the bar, from acting as attorneys or as physicians, or from executing trusts committed to them by a relative as executors to his will, or as guardians to his children. Further penalties awaited them if they were married, or suffered their children to be baptized, with any other rites than those of the Church of England. All books inculcating the principles of their religion were to be destroyed, and permission was given to the justices of the peace to visit their houses at any time, in order to deprive them of all arms beyond the little stock which might be considered necessary for the defence of their lives and property.
These harsh measures were accompanied by the imposition of a new oath of allegiance. This oath was framed for the purpose of The new oath.making a distinction between the Catholics who still upheld the Pope’s deposing power and those who were willing to denounce that tenet. Objectionable as all political oaths are, and unjust as are the penalties which are inflicted on those who refuse to take them, the introduction of a declaration of loyalty might, at this time, have been a step in the right direction. If it was thought necessary that Catholics should be punished at all, it was better that they should suffer for refusing to acknowledge that their Sovereign possessed an independent authority than that they should suffer for refusing to go to church. It was in some degree creditable to James and his ministers that, at such a time, they were able to remember the possibility of making a distinction between the loyal and the disloyal amongst the Catholics; but that which might have been an instrument of good, became in their hands an instrument of persecution. It was enacted that the oath might be tendered to all recusants not being noblemen or noble women, and that those who refused to take it should incur the harsh penalties of a premunire, whilst those who took it still remained subject to the ordinary burdens of recusancy. The oath which might have been used to lighten the severity of the laws which pressed so heavily even upon the loyal Catholics, was only employed to increase the burdens upon those who refused to declare their disbelief in a tenet which was inculcated by the most venerated teachers of their <289>Church, and which might be held innocuously by thousands who would never dream of putting it in practice.
Parliament had thus acted, as it was only too likely to act, under the influence of panic. It had replied to the miserable crime of a few fanatics by the enactment of an unjust and barbarous statute. Canons drawn up by Convocation.Convocation determined to seize the opportunity of enunciating those principles of government which were considered by its members to be the true antidote against such attempts. Under Bancroft’s guidance, a controversial work[400] was produced, to which, as well as to the canons which were interspersed amongst its pages, that body gave its unanimous consent. These canons, as well as the arguments by which they were accompanied, have been, in later times, justly condemned as advocating, at least indirectly, an arbitrary form of government. It should, however, in justice to the men by whom they were drawn up, be remembered that, if the solution which they proposed for the difficulties of the time was not a happy one, it was at least put forward with the intention of meeting actual and recognised evils. Their argument indeed struck at Papist and Presbyterian alike, but it was evident that it was intended as a manifesto against the Church of Rome. That Church had based its assaults on the national sovereignties of Europe upon two distinct theories: at times the right of the Pope to depose kings had been placed in the foreground; at other times resistance was encouraged against constituted authorities under the guise of the democratic doctrine of popular sovereignty. In the name of the one theory, England had been exposed to invasion, and Elizabeth had been marked out for the knife of the assassin; in the name of the other theory, the fair plains of France had been deluged with blood, and her ancient monarchy had been shattered to the base. All true-hearted Englishmen were of one mind in condemning the falsehood of the principles which had produced such results as these. Government, they believed, was of Divine institution, and was of far too high a nature to be allowed to depend upon the arbitrary will of the <290>Pope, or of any body of clergy whatever; still less should it depend upon the equally arbitrary will of the people; it ought not to be based upon will at all; it was only upon right that it could rest securely.
Such a theory had evidently a better side than those are accustomed to perceive who malign the Church of England as a mere handmaid of tyranny. It was a recognition, in the only way which, in that age, was possible, of the truth that society is a whole and that religious teachers cannot rightfully claim a place apart from it, as if they were removed from the errors and failings of human nature. Where those who held this theory went astray was in the mistake which they made as to the permanence of the special organization of the society in which they lived. They fancied that the Elizabethan monarchy ought to be perpetual. It was not unnatural that they should fancy that James was even greater than Elizabeth had been; that he was indeed the rising sun, come to take the place of a ‘bright, occidental star.’ Not a suspicion ever crossed their minds that their ecclesiastical cause was not the cause of God, and they knew that for the support of that cause they could depend upon the King alone. It was one of the first articles of their creed, that the people could be moulded into piety by their system, and it was plain that, without the King’s help, their system would crumble into dust. Was it wonderful, then, that they thought less of the law and more of the Sovereign than their lay fellow-countrymen? Was it strange that they read history and Scripture with jaundiced eyes, and that they saw nothing there but the doctrine that, in each nation, the power of the Sovereign who for the time being occupied the throne, was held by the special appointment of God, and that this power was of such a nature that under no imaginable circumstances was it lawful to resist it? The fact was, that the rule of James appeared to them as the rule of right over lawlessness, and that they gladly elevated into a principle that which, in their eyes, was true in the individual case.
But whatever may have been the circumstances under which the doctrine of non-resistance originated, it is certain <291>that it was false in itself, and that Consequences of the doctrine of non-resistance.it hung like a blight for many years over the energies of England. If it had ever obtained general recognition, it would have cut at the root of all that has made the nation to be what it is; it would have eaten out that sense of right, and that respect for the law, which is at the bottom of all the progress of the country.
Strange as it may seem, the first blow directed against this elaborately-constructed theory came from James’s letter to Abbot.the King himself. A doctrine which based his claim to the obedience of his subjects merely upon the fact of his being in possession of the crown, was not likely to find much favour in his eyes. According to this reasoning, as he justly observed, if the King of Spain should ever conquer England, his own subjects would be precluded from attempting to shake off the yoke of the invader. Nor was it only to that part of the canons which struck at his own hereditary title that James objected: he told the astonished clergy plainly that, whatever they might think, it was not true that tyranny could ever be of God’s appointment. He was himself desirous to maintain the independence of the Dutch, and he did not believe that in so doing he was assisting them to throw off an authority ordained of God.[401] He accordingly refused to give his consent to this unlucky production of the Convocation.
If the theories of the Bishops gave offence to the King, they were far more likely to provoke opposition on the part of those who were The Commons protest against the opinion that Convocation can pass canons binding without consent of Parliament.looking to the law of England as the one great safeguard against arbitrary power of every description. The Canons of 1604 had given umbrage to the Commons, especially as, in ratifying them, James had commanded them to ‘be diligently observed, executed, and equally kept by all our loving subjects of this our kingdom.’[402] The Commons, of course, resented this claim of the clergy to legislate for the whole people of England, and especially their attempt to create punishable offences, a right which they held to be inherent in <292>Parliament alone. A Bill was accordingly brought in, in the course of the following session, for the purpose of restraining the execution of all canons which had not been confirmed by Parliament. The Bishops, however, had sufficient influence to procure its rejection by the House of Lords.
Whatever the Catholics may have thought of this production of the Convocation, the oath of allegiance was to them The oath of allegiance.a far more serious matter. It had been, indeed, framed with the intention of making it acceptable to all loyal persons. The Pope’s claim to excommunicate Sovereigns was left unquestioned. The oath was solely directed against his supposed right of pronouncing their deposition, and of authorising their subjects to take up arms against them. Those who took it were to declare that no such right existed, to promise that they would take no part in any traitorous conspiracies, and to abjure the doctrine that excommunicated princes might be deposed or murdered by their subjects.
To the oath itself it is impossible to find any reasonable objection. If there had ever been a time when the infant nations The deposing power of the Popes.required the voice of the Pope to summon them to resist tyranny, that time had long passed by. The deposing power in the hands of the Popes of the sixteenth century had been an unmixed evil. The oath too may fairly be regarded as a serious attempt to draw a line of separation between the loyal and the disloyal Catholics, and if it had been accompanied with a relaxation of the penal laws in favour of those who were willing to take it, it would have been no inconsiderable step in advance. Its framers, however, forgot that there would be large numbers, even of the loyal Catholics, who would refuse to take the oath. Men who would have been satisfied to allow the deposing power to be buried in the folios of theologians, and who would never have thought of allowing it to have any practical influence upon their actions, were put upon their mettle as soon as they were required to renounce a theory which they had been taught from their childhood to believe in almost as one of the articles of their faith. Nor would their tenacity be without a certain moral dignity. Unfounded and pernicious as the Papal theory was, it certainly gains by comparison with that <293>mere adoration of existing power which had just been put forward by Convocation as the doctrine of the Church of England.
In the midst of its discussions on weightier matters, Parliament had found some time to devote to the consideration of the King’s necessities. Emptiness of the Exchequer.Ever since James’s accession, the state of the Exchequer had been such as to cause no little trouble to those who were responsible for the administration of the finances. The long war had considerably affected, at least for a time, the resources of the Crown. Parsimonious as she was, Elizabeth had been compelled, during the last five years of her reign, to sell land to the value of 372,000l.,[403] and had besides contracted a debt of 400,000l. There was indeed, when James came to the throne, a portion still unpaid of the subsidies which had been voted in the time of his predecessor, which was estimated as being about equal in amount to the debt, yet if this money were applied to the extinction of the debt it was difficult to see how the expenses of the Government were to be met. If the King had modelled his expenditure upon that of Elizabeth, he could hardly succeed in reducing it much below 330,000l., and during the past years of his reign his income from other than Parliamentary sources fell short of this by more than 30,000l.[404] It is probable, indeed, that some of the revenue which should have supplied the wants of James had been anticipated by his predecessor. Either from this cause, or from some other reason connected with the returning prosperity consequent upon the cessation of the war, the receipts of 1604 were much larger than those of the preceding year. But whatever hope might be entertained on this account, was counterbalanced by the confusion caused by the extraordinary expenses which were likely for some time to press upon the Exchequer. The funeral of <294>the late Queen, the King’s entry and coronation, the entertainment of the Spanish ambassadors, and other necessary expenses, would entail a charge of at least 100,000l., a sum which bore about the same relation to the income of 1603 as a sudden demand for 26,000,000l. would bear to the revenue of the present day.
The financial position of James, therefore, was beset with difficulties. But it was not hopeless. If he had consented to Prospects of a remedy.regulate his expenditure, not indeed by the scale of the late parsimonious reign, but in such a way as a man of ordinary business habits would have been certain to approve of, he might, in the course of a few years, have found himself independent of Parliament, excepting in times of extraordinary emergency. There were many ways in which the revenue was capable of improvement, and it would not be many years before a balance might once more be struck between the receipts and the outgoings of the Exchequer; but there was little hope that, even if James had been less extravagant than he was, the needful economy would be practised. Elizabeth had been her own minister of finance, and had kept in check the natural tendency to extravagance which exists wherever there is no control over the heads of the various departments of the State and of the Household. With her death this salutary control was at an end, and no official body similar to the present Board of Treasury was at hand to step into the vacant place. James, indeed, from time to time, was ready enough to express his astonishment at what was going on. He never failed to promise retrenchment whenever his attention was called to the state of his finances, and to declare that he had at last made up his mind to change his habits; but no sooner had some new fancy struck him, or some courtier approached him with a tale of distress, than he was sure to fling his prudence to the winds. The unlucky Treasurer was only called upon, when it was too late to remonstrate, to find the money as he could.
Every year the expenditure was growing. In the twelve months which came to an end at Michaelmas 1605, Growth of the expenditure and of the debt.it had reached what in those days was considered to be,[405] for a year of peace, the enormous sum of <295>466,000l.[406] To meet this every nerve had been strained in vain. The revenue had been improved, and the subsidies voted in the time of Elizabeth had been diverted from the repayment of the debt, in order to meet the current expenditure. Large debts had been incurred in addition to the debt which was already in existence. Money had been obtained by a forced loan bearing no interest, which had been raised by Privy Seals immediately after the close of the session of 1604, and in addition to this easy mode of putting off the difficulty, recourse had been had to the method of borrowing considerable sums at what was then the ordinary rate of 10 per cent. After all this, it was still found to be necessary to leave many bills unpaid. At the beginning of 1606, the whole debt amounted to 735,000l.,[407] and it was calculated that the annual deficit would reach 51,000l., without allowing for those extraordinary expenses to which, under James’s management, it was impossible to place any limit, but which seldom fell short of 100,000l. a year.
The King’s extravagance had shown itself in various ways. About 40,000l. were annually given away, either in presents or in annuities paid to men who had done little or nothing to merit the favour which they had received.[408] Those into whose <296>pockets the golden stream was flowing were not the statesmen who were consulted by the King on every question of importance; they were the men who, whether of Scottish or of English birth, had raised themselves by their ability to tickle their patron’s ear with idle jests, and to minister to his amusements in his leisure hours. Under such conditions, the expenses of the Court swelled every year. The pension list grew longer, the jewels more costly, and the robes more gorgeous than those with which Elizabeth had been content. In political life, indeed, the Ramsays and the Herberts were as yet kept in the background. As long as Salisbury lived, such as they were not allowed to meddle with appointments to office, or to sway the destinies of the State; but their very presence at Court must have been highly obnoxious to the grave and sober men who formed so large a part of the House of Commons.
Yet, unless the Commons could be persuaded to come forward with liberal supplies, James would not only be Oct. 18.1605.James wishes to be economical.compelled to pause in his career of extravagance, but would be unable to meet the most justifiable demands on the Exchequer. Salisbury, who knew that it would be necessary to make application to Parliament, had been urgent with James to retrench. Within three weeks of the meeting of Parliament, James had done all that words could do to show how completely he recognised the danger of his situation. “I cannot,” he wrote to Salisbury on October 18, “but be sensible of that needless and unreasonable profusion of expenses, whereof you wrote me in your last. My only hope that upholds me is my good servants, that will sweat and labour for my relief. Otherwise I could rather have wished, with Job, never to have been, than that the glorious sunshine of my first entry here should be so soon overcast with the dark clouds of irreparable misery. I have promised, and I will perform it, that there shall be no default in me; my only comfort will be to know it is mendable. For my apprehension of this state — however I disguise it outwardly — hath done me more harm already than ye would be glad of.”[409]
On February 10, whilst the feelings of the Commons were <297>still under the influence of their great deliverance, Feb. 10.1606.Supply proposed in the Commons.the subject of a supply was brought forward. The greater number of speakers proposed a grant of two subsidies and four fifteenths, which would amount to about 250,000l.[410] The whole matter was, however, referred to a Committee, which was to meet on the following afternoon.
Of this Committee Bacon was a member. He was now looking forward again to promotion. In October, 1604, the Solicitor-Generalship had been vacant, but Bacon’s position in the House.he had once more been passed over in favour of Sir John Doderidge. He can hardly have failed to gain the King’s favour, a few weeks later, by the zeal which he showed in the consultations of the Commissioners on the Union; and it had become evident, by the course taken by the Commons in the last session, that it was more than ever necessary to secure the services of a man of ability and talent, who might take the lead in the debates. Such a part was exactly to his mind. In October 1605, he had completed his great work on ‘The Advancement of Learning,’ and he was now eager to devote himself to politics. Anxious as he was for reform, he wished to see it proceed from the Crown, and he had not given up hope that the mistakes of James were a <298>mere passing cloud, which would be removed as soon as he was rendered accessible to good advice. To serve the King in any capacity which would enable him to share in the councils of the State had long been the object of his ambition. In this session, however, there were few difficulties of a nature to call for the exercise of superior powers. The effect of the discovery of the Gunpowder plot had been to produce a strong feeling in the King’s favour.[411] On Feb. 10.The King thanks the House.the first morning after the appointment of the Committee, the King thanked the House for its offer to supply his wants, and signified his readiness to allow the question of purveyance to be again taken into consideration. A few days afterwards, however, Feb. 14.The King’s necessities explained.at a conference held on this subject, the Lord Treasurer took the opportunity of expatiating on the King’s necessities. A month passed before the question was taken up by the House itself, and then, on March 14, Subsidies granted.a proposition was made to increase the supply to which they had already agreed.[412] There was some opposition, and the debate was adjourned till the 18th. When the House met on that day, a message was brought from the King, begging them to come to a speedy decision, one way or the other, upon the proposed supply, as he was unwilling to see his necessities exposed to any further discussion. Upon this, after some debate, an additional subsidy with its accompanying two fifteenths was voted, and a Committee was appointed to draw up the Bill. On the 25th, Bacon reported the recommendations of the Committee. A debate ensued upon the length of time which was to be allowed for March 25.the payment of the six portions into which the supply granted was to be divided; and it was not without difficulty that Bacon carried his proposal that the whole grant should be levied before May, 1610.
<299>His arguments were rendered more palatable by a circumstance which had occurred a few days previously. On the 22nd March 22.Rumours of the King’s death.a rumour reached London that the King had been murdered, and when the report proved false, the members must have felt that, much as they might dislike many of James’s actions, they could hardly afford to lose him. Prince Henry was still a child, and the prospect of a minority at such a time was not to be regarded with complacency.
The readiness with which this supply was granted was the more remarkable because the efforts of the Commons to pass a Efforts to restrain the abuses of purveyance.Bill against the abuses of purveyance had been wrecked on the resistance of the Lords. Nor were they satisfied by a proclamation in which the King put an end to most of those abuses, as he left untouched the claim of his officers to settle at their pleasure the prices which they would give. It appears, however, that the officers took care not to revert to their old malpractices, and some years later the counties agreed to a composition by which a sum of money was to be paid annually in lieu of the burden of purveyance.
Not only did the Commons pass their subsidy bill in spite of this treatment, but they did not insist upon obtaining an immediate answer to The petition of grievances.the petition of grievances which they had drawn up. They contented themselves with leaving it for the consideration of the Government during the recess. On May 27 Parliament was prorogued, and the King and the Lower House parted in far better humour with one another than at the close of the preceding session.
A few days after the prorogation, the death of Sir Francis Gawdy, the Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, threw into the hands of the Crown June 29.Coke’s promotion.one of the most important of the legal appointments in its gift. The place was given to Coke, whose services during the trials of the Gunpowder conspirators thus obtained their reward. Coke’s removal opened Bacon hopes to become Solicitor-General.a prospect of promotion to Bacon, as the two men were on such bad terms with one another that they could not be expected to work together in offices so closely connected as were those of the two chief legal advisers of the Crown. At the time when Bacon was engaged in <300>supporting the Government in Parliament during the session which was just concluded, he had received promises of promotion both from Salisbury and from the King himself. Ellesmere, who always looked with favour upon Bacon, had suggested tnat whenever the Attorney-General should go up to the Bench, Doderidge, the Solicitor-General, might rise to the post of King’s Serjeant. Bacon might then succeed Doderidge, and the Attorney-General’s place, to which he made no claim, would be at the disposal of the Government.[413] Accordingly, when the vacancy occurred, July 4.Hobart becomes Attorney-General.the Attorneyship was conferred on Sir Henry Hobart, a sound lawyer and an upright man, who had Salisbury’s good word on his side. Doderidge, however, remained Solicitor-General for another year, and Bacon is not promoted.Bacon failed to receive the appointment which he had been led to expect, though the reasons of his failure are left to conjecture.
From cares of state James easily turned aside to his pleasures. Scarcely was the session over when he was looking anxiously for July 17.Visit of the King of Denmark.the arrival of his brother-in-law, Christian IV. of Denmark. The two kings enjoyed one another’s company, hunted together, and feasted together. Christian was an able ruler, but he was addicted to drinking beyond all bounds of moderation. The English court caught the infection of evil. At a feast given by Salisbury to their Majesties at Theobalds, English ladies, who were to have taken part in a masque, reeled about the hall in a state of intoxication, and the King of Denmark was carried off to bed when he was no longer able to stand.[414] James showed no sign of displeasure that these things had taken place in his presence. If he did not do evil himself, he was without the power of checking those who did.
[349] Waad to Salisbury, Nov. 5, G. P. B.
[350] Chamberlain to Carleton, Nov. 7, S. P. Dom. xvi. 23.
[351] Torture, though unknown to the common law, had, for upwards of a century, been frequently used to extract evidence. The infliction of it was considered to be part of the Royal prerogative, which enabled the King to override the common law. It could, therefore, be employed only by express command of the King, or of the Council acting in his name. (See Jardine On the Use of Torture in the Criminal Law of England.)
[352] The King’s words were, ‘The gentler tortures are to be first used unto him, et sic per gradus ad ima tenditur, and so God speed your good work.’ The King to the Lords Commissioners, Nov. 6, G. P. B. Sir E. Hoby wrote to Sir T. Edmondes, ‘Since Johnson’s being in the Tower, he beginneth to speak English, and yet he was never upon the rack, but only by the arms upright’ (Court and Times of James I. i. 53). The letter is dated Nov. 9, but was evidently written piecemeal. This part was apparently written on the evening of the 7th, or the morning of the 8th.
[353] Examination of Fawkes, Nov. 9, G. P. B.
[354] The King to Dorset, Nov. 18. S. P. Dom. xvi. 86.
[355] Examination of Tresham, Nov. 29, G. P. B.
[356] Would this have been allowed if he had been, as Mr. Jardine supposes, the depositary of an important State secret?
[357] This copy, made by Vavasour, is in the Bodleian Library, and has been published by Mr. Jardine.
[358] Coke to Salisbury, March 24, 1606, G. P. B.
[359] Phelippes to Owen, Dec. 1605, S. P. Dom. xvii. 62.
[360] State Trials, ii. 193.
[361] Greenway’s MS. quoted by Mr. Jardine, Narrative, p. 154.
[362] That Salisbury was not anxious to take any steps against the priests, unless upon clear evidence, appears from the fact that, though Lady Markham on Jan. 3 offered to act as a spy from Gerard, he took no notice of her offer till the 15th. — S. P. Dom. xviii. 4, 19.
[363] Examination of Bates, Dec. 4, 1605, G. P. B.
[365] There is a description and an engraving of the house in Nash’s Worcestershire, i. 584. Compare Jardine, p. 182.
[366] Harl. MSS. 360, fol. 92. Bromley to Salisbury, Jan. 23, printed in Jardine, p. 185.
[367] H. Littleton’s relation, Add. MSS. 6178, fol. 693.
[368] Bromley to Salisbury, Jan. 30, S. P. Dom. xviii. 52. Garnet to Mrs. Vaux, printed in Jardine, App. i. He speaks of having been in the hole seven days and seven nights. If this is correct, he must have been removed to a safer place on the 23rd.
[369] This was his real name. Like the other priests, he had many aliases, and at this time he was generally known as Hall.
[370] Examination of Owen, Feb. 26 and March 1, 1606, G. P. B.
[371] Antilogia, p. 114. The Catholics accused the Government of torturing him to death. “There is, perhaps, no great difference,” observes Mr. Jardine, “between the guilt of homicide by actual torture, and that of urging to suicide by the insupportable threat of its renewal” (p. 200).
[372] The reports of the overheard conversations are printed in Jardine, App. ii. He remarks on them (p. 203): “It is impossible to peruse the notes of these conferences without being struck with the remarkable fact that, although speaking the whole secrets of his heart unreservedly to his friend, Garnet does not utter a word in denial of his knowledge of the plot, and his acquiescence in it; nor a word from which it can be implied that in his conscience he knew that he was untruly accused in this respect. On the contrary, the whole scope and object of his conversation is the arrangement of the means by which he may baffle examination and elude detection — his only care being to ‘contrive safe answers,’ and — to use his own language — ‘to wind himself out of this matter.’”
[373] Declaration of Garnet, March 13, S. P. Dom. xix. 41.
[374] Examination of Garnet, March 12, S. P. Dom. xix. 40. He says <274>that this took place on the Saturday after the Octave of Corpus Christi. In 1605 the Octave fell on June 6, and the Saturday after was June 8. The 9th is the day mentioned in Garnet’s indictment; but the error of a single day is not material.
[375] So I interpret the words: “‘Oh, saith he, let me alone for that; for do you not see how I seek to enter into familiarity with this lord?’ — which made me imagine that something he intended amongst the nobility.” Garnet’s Declaration, March 8, Hatfield MSS. 110, fol. 30.
[376] Garnet states that Greenway said: ‘Being not master of other men’s secrets, he would not tell it me but by way of confession, for to have my direction; but because it was too tedious to relate so long a discourse in confession kneeling, if I would take it as a confession walking, and after take his confession kneeling, then, or at any other time, he would tell me.’ — Garnet’s Declaration, March 8, Hatfield MS. 110, fol. 30.
[377] State Trials, ii. 218. Harl. MSS. 360. fol. 109.
[378] State Trials ii. 229.
[379] ‘June,’ in State Trials, ii. 229; but see Examination of Garnet, March 12, S. P. Dom. xix. 40.
[380] Coke merely states facts, without attempting any argument. The arguments which are here given are extracted and abridged from Mr. Jardine’s admirable chapter on the question of Garnet’s guilt.
[381] He also sung the following verse of a hymn:
“Gentem auferte perfidamCredentium de finibus;Ut Christo laudes debitasPersolvamus alacritèr.”
Mr. Jardine states that the hymn from which this verse is taken was authorised to be used on All Saints’ Day. There can, however, be no doubt that on this occasion it was sung with peculiar fervour.
[382] Both Andrewes and Abbot urge the plea that whoever becomes acquainted with an intended crime, and neglects to reveal it, becomes an accomplice; but they do not give it the prominence that it deserves. — Tortura Torti, Works of Bishop Andrewes, Oxford, 1851, p. 365, and Antilogia, cap. 13.
[383] State Trials, ii. 242. The very long statement by Garnet from the Hatfield MSS. 110, fol. 50, of which I have made so much use, is endorsed by Salisbury:— ”This was forbidden by the King to be given in evidence.“ Was the reason because the Queen was spoken of in it as ‘most regarded of the Pope,’ or simply that in it Garnet denied that he knew of the plot out of confession?
[384] Treatise on Equivocation, p. 80. See the quotation from Casaubon’s letter to Fronto Ducæus, in Jardine, p. 334. Garnet held that equivocation was only to be used ‘where it becomes necessary to an individual for his defence, or for avoiding any injustice or loss, without danger or mischief to any other person.’
[385] Professor Hales, in an article which appeared in Fraser’s Magazine for April 1878, in which he pointed out the fact that many of the places connected with the plot lay round Stratford-on-Avon, drew attention to the connection between this passage and Garnet’s principles.
[386] The following version of this part of his speech puts this clearly:— “De crimine quod objicitur tormentarii pulveris, … ita moriar in Domino, ac non sum conscius nisi a confessione. … Mihi quidem narrabat R. Catesbeius, universè tantum ac confusè, pro sublevandâ fide Catholicâ afflictissimâ jamque prostratâ, aliquid esse tentandum. Nihil vero certi exploratique narrabat.” Account of Garnet’s death, May 3, Roman Transcripts, R. O.
[387] The original fines were, as usual, larger than those ultimately demanded.
[389] Salisbury to Edmonds, Dec. 2. 1605. Birch., Negotiations, 242. Salisbury to Brouncker, March 3, 1606, S. P. Ireland.
[390] The King to Northumberland, May 18, 1603, S. P. Dom. i. 81.
[391] Proceedings against Northumberland, Harl. MSS. 589, fol. 111. Compare Add. MSS. 5494, fol. 61.
[392] Boderie to Villeroi, June 26⁄July 6, 1606. Ambassades de M. De la Boderie, L. 180. This letter proves that the sentence was agreed upon at least the day before the trial.
[393] This letter to Brouncker, before quoted, reads like the production of a man who meant what he said. Besides, there was no conceivable reason for a hypocrite to mention the subject at all in writing to the President of Munster. Salisbury writes: “For the other great man, you know the King’s noble disposition to be always such as, although he may not in such a case as this forget the providence and foresight necessary in cases public, and therefore was constrained, upon many concurring circumstances, to restrain liberty where he had cause of jealousy, yet, considering the greatness of his house, and the improbability that he should be acquainted with such a barbarous plot, being a man of honour and valour, his Majesty is rather induced to believe that whatsoever any of the traitors have spoken of him, hath been rather their vaunts than upon any other good ground; so as I think his liberty will, the next term, be granted upon honourable and gracious terms, which, for my own part, though there hath never been any extraordinary dearness between us, I wish, because this state is very barren of men of great blood and great sufficiency together.”
[394] 3 Jac. I. cap. 1.
[395] 3 Jac. I. cap. 2.
[396] C. J. Jan. 24, i. 259.
[397] L. J. Jan. 30, ii. 365.
[398] 3 Jac. I. cap. 4 and 5.
[399] 35 Eliz. cap. 2.
[400] Published in 1690, under the title of Bishop Overall’s Convocation Book.
[401] The King to Abbot. Wilkins’s Conc. iv. 405
[402] Cardwell’s Synodalia, 328.
[403] Comparative review of the Receipts and Expenditure, July 24, 1608, S. P. Dom. xxxv. 29.
[404] Compare the calculations in Lansd. MSS. 164, fols. 435, 436, 505, 507, with those in Parliamentary Debates in 1610, Camd. Soc., Introd. x. The latter do not include the Court of Wards and the Duchy of Lancaster, and they commence the year at Easter instead of at Michaelmas. The amount of the debt at James’s accession, which is variously stated in different reports of speeches, is fixed by the official account in the S. P. Dom. xix. 45.
[405] That is to say, the income from unparliamentary sources. The <295>subsidies were uncertain, and should have been applied to the redemption of the debt.
[406] When Parliament met in 1606
The ordinary issues were 366,790
The ordinary receipts 314,959
Excess of issues 51,831
(S. P. Dom. xix. 46.) Besides this, it was found that the actual receipts had fallen short of the estimates by 6,000l. The extraordinary expenditure appears from the Pells Declarations to have been about 100,000l., making a total expenditure of about 466,000l.
[407] By Dorset’s declaration
The King’s debt at his accession was 400,000
His extraordinary expenses during three years 104,000
The new debt 231,280
735,280
(S. P. Dom. xix. 45.)
[408] Parliamentary debates in 1610. Camd. Soc. Introd. p. xiii.
[409] Hatfield MSS. 134, fol. 72.
[410] A subsidy was an income-tax of 4s. in the pound upon the annual value of land worth 20s. a-year, and a property-tax of 2s. 8d. in the pound upon the actual value of all personal property worth 3l. and upwards. Personal property was, therefore, much more heavily burdened than real property. The tenths and fifteenths were levied upon the counties and boroughs at a fixed rate, settled by a valuation made in the reign of Edward III. Each county or borough was responsible for a certain sum, which was levied by persons appointed by its representatives in the House of Commons. The subsidies were levied by Commissioners appointed by the Chancellor from amongst the inhabitants of the county or borough. Apparently, from the laxity of these Commissioners, the receipts had been steadily decreasing. Thus—
One subsidy of the laity, with two 10ths and 15ths, produced in 13 Eliz. 175,690
Ditto in 35 Eliz. 152,290
Ditto in 43 Eliz. 134,470
Ditto in 3 Jac. 123,897
Oct. 28, 1608. — S. P. Dom. xxxvii. 38.
[411] C. J. i. 266.
[412] C. J. i. 271. There is no mention of the report of the Committee, but it must be supposed that they recommended a Bill for two subsidies and four fifteenths, as Salisbury speaks, on March 9, of the grant as already made, though nothing had been done formally (Salisbury to Mar, March, 1606, S. P. Dom. ix. 27).
[413] Bacon to the King, Letters and Life, iii. 293.
[414] Harington’s Nugæ antiquæ, ii. 126.