XXVIII.

XXVIII.To this Novitiate at Louvain we now turn, as it was thither that Father Gerard was next sent. It was the foundation of Donna Luisa de Carvajal, who by her will146dated Valladolid, Dec. 22, 1604, left 12,000 ducats for the establishment of an English Novitiate. The document is an admirable specimen of true Spanish devotion and humility. After commending her soul to[pg cxciv]God by the intercession of our Blessed Lady, she proceeds—“For the love of God I humbly pray the Superiors of the Society of Jesus and the Præpositus of the Professed House, as a favour, to grant me some little place in their church where my body may be buried, in consideration of the devotion I have ever entertained for their holy Religious Order: to which Order, in the manner that I have thought would be most to the glory of God, I offer, with the greatest affection, a gift which, though but small, is all that I have. And if a burial-place be refused me in that church, my executors will obtain for me a resting-place in some other church of the Society: and if they are unable to obtain this, let me be buried in some monastery in which, for the love of God, they may be willing to give burial to a poor person like myself; and let my funeral be conducted in accordance with this my poverty. As executors I name Father Richard Walpole, the Vice-Prefect of the English Mission, and the Confessor of the English College in this city, or their successors. After them (and I have named them first from respect to their priestly dignity) I name the Condessa de Miranda, Donna Maria de Zuniga, Donna Maria Gasca, Don Frances de Contreras, Melchior de Molina, and Don Luis de Carrillo e Toledo, Conde de Caracena. First of all I declare that many years ago, when I was with my uncle, I made a vow to God to dedicate all my goods to His glory and greatest service. Then His Divine Majesty gave me large desires and vehement attraction to spend myself above all things for the preservation and advancement of the English Fathers of the Society of Jesus, who sustain that kingdom like strong columns, defend it from an otherwise inevitable ruin, and supply efficacious means of salvation for thousands and thousands of souls. Wherefore I offer them to the most holy Virgin our Lady, I place them under her protection, and I name and leave her universal heir of all my goods.... And I give possession of them henceforward to the most glorious Virgin, and in her name and place to Father Robert Persons, or failing him, to the Father who shall succeed him as Superior of the Mission: but with this condition and obligation, that such goods shall be applied to the founding of a Novitiate of English Religious of the Society of Jesus, in whatever kingdom or part of the world shall seem to Father Persons to be[pg cxcv]to the greater glory of God. But in the case that England shall be brought back to the faith and obedience of the Roman Church, my will is that the said revenue be transferred into that kingdom, for the foundation of a Novitiate of the Society there, unless it shall seem better to Father Persons, for reasons concerning the Catholic religion, to leave the Novitiate beyond the kingdom.”Time was not lost in carrying out the intentions of this pious benefactress.147In 1606, Father Persons obtained possession of a large house in Louvain, which had been inhabited by the Knights of Malta, and thus came to be called St. John's, though the church attached to it was dedicated to St. Gregory the Apostle of England and other Saints. Father More, who lived there with Father Gerard, tells us that it was on high ground commanding the whole city; below was a walled garden, and on the slope of the hill pleasant walks amongst the vines which were ranged in terraces, and the whole, though within the city walls, as quiet and calm as befitted a house of prayer.We do not know exactly the date of Father Gerard's arrival at Louvain, or the office to which he was first appointed there. The letter of the 17th August, 1612, to the General, from which we have already given a large extract concerning Mrs. Vaux, is dated from Louvain. It proceeds with an account of a miraculous cure at the intercession of Father Thomas Garnett, the nephew of the Provincial, who was martyred at Tyburn on the 3rd of June, 1608. This father was the first Novice of St. John's, Louvain. That Noviceship commenced in February, 1607, with six Priests, two Scholastics, and five Lay-brothers, Novices, under Father Thomas Talbot as their Novice Master. In 1614, St. John's received students in philosophy and theology, as well as Novices, when a house in the garden was fitted up for the Novitiate and Father Henry Silisdon was installed in St. John's as Rector of the new College. This arrangement did not last long, for at the end of the year the Novitiate was transferred to Liége. No less than fifteen letters have come down to us written by Father Gerard in the year 1614, addressed to the Prefect of the English Mission, Father Thomas Owen, Rector of the English College at Rome. They treat chiefly of the purchase of the new house at Liége,[pg cxcvi]and the transfer of the Novitiate to that city. Some extracts relating to Father Gerard himself will be found interesting. Some of them are signed John Nelson and others John Tomson. In later years he seems to have been known only by the name of Tomson.The choice of Liége as a residence seems to have been mainly owing to the disquiet caused to the Catholics in the Low Countries by the remonstrances of the English Government. We have some specimens of it in the following extracts, in which we find Father Gerard true to the natural fearlessness of his character.“Concerning148my wariness in avoiding the eyes of spies, I have been all this year more sparing in that kind than divers friends here did think needful, although some one or two did think it dangerous to go any journey, as doubting I might be killed by the way, but this was but according to their accustomed fears with which I have been long acquainted. But, indeed, Father, I am so far from desire to go many journeys, that it is a pain to me to think of going anywhither, and the reason why I never went to any of those places your Reverence mentioneth in this year past (but only the last Lent to Maclin for Mr. Rouse) was not that I thought it dangerous (being known so well to live here public that it cannot be unknown to any spies), nor for that I wanted leave, for I had the other Provincial's particular and willing grant, without my own asking, to go to any place of these countries; but it was because I had rather be at home: and in the town of Lovaine itself, I go not abroad half so much as I think were needful for the contentment of others. I was not at the Teresians, where the Mother of the House (to whom I gave the Exercise four years ago) and Father Scott's149sister do much desire my often coming, any more than once since the last Lent. At the Monastery of St. Monica's, my cousin Shurley hath requested my coming thither for these three or four months, to bestow one afternoon upon her and some younger Nuns whom she hath charge of, that they may altogether ask me what spiritual questions they may like best,[pg cxcvii]and I have never yet found a fit time for it; and, indeed, I doubt I am to blame for it. The gentlemen in the town150I doubt I visit not once in a quarter of a year, and I have some reason to think that either they think me careless of them, or afraid to be seen abroad, as though my case were very dangerous, which would also make them or any other that should come to town more fearful to come into my company, and consequently hinder the little good that I might do with them. But I hope I shall be as wary as your Reverence wisheth, and if this course go forwards of being Rector without the name of Rector, there will be less inconvenience, whosoever see me seeing me still as a private man.”In this he alludes to a plan of his own, that Father Blackfan should have the title of Rector, although he himself had been appointed to the Rectorship of the Novitiate.The next letter is dated April 6, 1614.151“I have yours of the 15th March, and see in that, as in all of yours, your fatherly care of me, which, by the grace of God, I will labour to deserve. I am well satisfied with Father General's order, and shall endeavour to get this building finished for the Novitiate as soon as I can, and then will settle to my book as much as my health and letters will permit.... Having writ thus far, I was called to go to Bruxels with Father Rector (by Father Blacfan's and Father Percy his advice) to speak with the Duke's152Secretary, who telling Father Percy the last week that the Agent did solicit against me, and that he could not well answer him, unless he delivered him some reasons in writing for my innocency, this writing was promised him by Father Percy; but I being loath to have any such writing sent, as thinking it the likeliest means to raise a new persecution against me, though for the Secretary's satisfaction we drew and delivered him a brief note of four or[pg cxcviii]five effectual proofs, yet both to the Secretary first, and afterwards to the Nuncio, I told this day that if any such writing were sent it would do me great harm, for Canterbury having such a writing would doubtless show it at the Council table, and then those lords who secretly do know me to be innocent, and wish me well, will be, as it were, forced to speak against me, lest they should seem to favour me, and so the King should be more incensed. The Nuncio did promise Father Rector and me that he would seriously deal both with the Secretary and the Prince himself in the cause.”Writing under date April 18, 1614,153he shows that he thinks that too much importance had been given to the Agent's interference.“I think your Reverence was made to believe by letters sent about Easter, that there was some new troubles against me here, out of England, and consequently that there was need of such information to the Nuncio and Father Provincial as had been given. But when I heard of it, I said it was nothing but Trumbol his own device, in hope to work upon the weakness of the Prince; and so now it proves, for I am going to the Secretary himself with our Father Rector, as I wrote from Bruxells, and giving him a paper of some few points for my innocency, with the request he would not deliver it, but show it if he would to the Agent. The Secretary answered he would advertise me if it were needful; but since the note was showed unto Trumbol, and he showed to be satisfied with it, and afterwards meeting the Secretary told him that he took it to be only matter of religion; but that being now made matter of State, he, being a servant employed in matter of State, could not but seek to concur with them that employed him, as it were granting that himself was satisfied, and yielding a reason why he had moved the matter. And this being understood both by the Prince and the Nuncio, they were very glad of it.... I write this from Maclin, whither Sir William [Stanley] was desirous to have me come for his comfort now and after the death and funeral of his lady.”But such a man as Father Gerard was not likely to be left in peace in those intriguing times. In the August following, Father[pg cxcix]Silisdon writes to Father Owen.154“Even now I have advice that His Majesty of England hath made two complaints to the Prince, and that the first is against Father Gerard's being in his dominions.”The consequence was that a transfer to another territory became desirable, and Father Gerard set his heart on migrating with his Novices to Liége. He writes from that city, under the signature of John Nelson, Sept. 19, 1614.155“There be many causes to be alleged why here, rather than in any place; as the commodity of dealing with our English in the summer, the opportunity of keeping our Novices unknown, the excellent seat far beyond Lovaine, and that bestowed on us, the present helps sent for this beginning, with great likelihood of much more; the great favour which is to be expected from this Prince and his family, and is to be strengthened by my two cousins, Sir William and Mr. Morton, and Sir William hath written to him that he doth much joy in his cousin who is there to be Rector.”The two cousins of whom Father Gerard here speaks were two very powerful friends. The one was Sir William Stanley, who showed himself a kind friend to Father Gerard and his charge by negotiating the purchase of the property at Liége in his own name, and advancing the purchase money—at least, that portion of it which had to be paid down156—probably (as Father Gerard speaks of the“seat being bestowed upon us”) regarding it as a gift. Whatever else was requisite for the purchase was provided by Brother William Browne, who, though157grandson, brother, and uncle of Viscounts Montague,—his grandfather was Queen Mary's Ambassador to the Holy See—was himself content to spend his life in the humble duties of a Jesuit Lay-brother.The“Mr. Morton”was Sir George Talbot of Grafton, afterwards[pg cc]ninth Earl of Shrewsbury. He was a scholar of some repute,158and an intimate friend of Maximilian, Duke of Bavaria. As Ferdinand, the Prince-Bishop of Liége, was Maximilian's brother, it was no little help to Father Gerard to be on“cousinly”terms with George Talbot. The Duke became a generous benefactor to the new House at Liége. In 1618 he sent Father Gerard, through Sir George Talbot, 5,000 florins for the Noviceship.159In a letter dated Jan. 25, 1620, the Duke writes to Father Gerard, who had promised to pray that he might have a son:“I bound myself once by vow to your Blessed Ignatius, that if he would obtain this favour for me, I would give my son the name of Ignatius, and would build and endow a College of the Society wherever Father General might judge it most useful. What if God should purpose thus to provide for you?”160In July of the same year he wrote:“We have sent you a contribution of 1,300 German florins by Father Mayer for a tabernacle for the Blessed Sacrament, and for a niche for an image of the Blessed Virgin.”Even after Father Gerard's departure from the House, Duke Maximilian's liberality to it did not fail. Father Silisdon, Father Gerard's successor as Master of Novices, removed the Novitiate to Watten,161and not long after the Duke settled a permanent endowment upon the College of Liége, which was begun in the House that Father Gerard had established.Father Gerard's Socius or“Compagnion,”as he calls him,[pg cci]was Father Henry More, subsequently the historian of the Province. When discussing, before his appointment, those Fathers who were fitted for that office, after mentioning others, he says:“Father Nicholson is far short of either of them for my turn, for he is no good Latinist, I think little better than myself, though he be much better scholar; neither hath he any other language but Spanish, of which I shall have small use. Father Henry More hath French well, Dutch prettily, and Italian sufficiently, besides Spanish very well, and Latin as I would wish him.”162As to his first Novices, he had twelve, which made what he styled“a pretty beginning.”163They were“the two that expect at Liége, the two that are come from Rome, and four out of Spain, with Mr. Lewkner and Mr. Whitmore, besides Grafton, when he comes, and a tailor now servant in this house, who by all judgments here is as fit to be received as Brother Silvester, the young tailor now in the Noviceship, is fit to be dismissed.”164Of the two that“expected at Liége,”a previous letter had said,“Here be also Mr. Mansel and Mr. Owen Shelley, by the names of Mr. Griffin and Mr. Titchborn: both expect, the first with some loathness to stay long, the second is wholly resigned. The first is a pious man, and to those that know his fashion will be profitable for some uses in the Society, but the second will be practical and fit for anything, and in truth I think he will do very well.”165This Father Owen Shelley was afterwards Rector of the College of Liége, and justified Father Gerard's judgment of his character.Amongst the“four which are come out of Spain”were two that must have constantly served to remind their Rector at Liége of the Gunpowder Plot, as the remonstrances of King James' Agent had managed to do at Louvain.“One of them,”he says,“is akin to Father Garnett, and of his name, though we call him Gilford, as he was called at St. Omers. William Ellis, but we call him John Williams, for he was page166to Sir[pg ccii]Everard Digby, and taken with him, though he might have escaped, for his master offered him horse and money to shift for himself, but the youth said he would live and die with him; and so, being taken, was condemned at Stafford, and should have been executed. He was offered to have his life if he would go to their church, which he refused. In the end they saved him and some others. He never [yielded] in the least point. He hath good friends near Sir Everard Digby's whom I know, and he is heir to 80l.a year, if his father do him right.”167At the close of this short notice of Father Gerard's Rectorship it will be but right to record an unfavourable judgment passed upon him, as it will help us to form a true appreciation of his character. It is the only instance that has come down to us of blame on the part of one of his own brethren.“I see a general fear in all ours, those of best judgment, of the success of Father Nelson's government, and unless he hath a companion that may moderate him, his zeal will, I fear, carry him too far; and I fear it so much the more because I see him loath to have anybody with him who is likely to propose anything to him contrary to his own zealous desires.”This is in a confidential letter168from Father Silisdon to Father Owen, dated Oct. 31, 1614, so that, as it was written before the transfer to Liége, it was a misgiving lest he should be indiscreet as a Rector, rather than a judgment on his actual conduct as a Superior.XXIX.During his residence at Liége, amongst Father Gerard's correspondents were two venerable servants of God, Robert Cardinal Bellarmine, and Father Luis de la Puente, better known by the Latinized form of his name, de Ponte. As by a man's friends we can obtain an insight into his character, we have thought it desirable to give the few letters from these two holy men to Father Gerard that have come down to us. Cardinal Bellarmine's autograph is preserved at Stonyhurst.169We translate the letter from the original Latin.[pg cciii]“Very Rev. and beloved Father in Christ,—I have received your Reverence's letter dated from Liége the 23rd November, with the little presents inclosed in it, an English knife, a little case (either bone or ivory, I do not know which), and three small toothpicks. I do not know whether these were sent me for use, or as having some special meaning. Whichever it be they were welcome, as a proof of friendship and brotherhood.“The memory of that excellent Mr. Oliver,170whose acquaintance I made very late, has brought me no little sadness, or rather grief, not on his account, who is translated from this world to the joys of Paradise, but for the sake of many whom without doubt he would have converted to a good life if Divine Providence had permitted him to live awhile longer. But the good pleasure of God must ever be fulfilled, and the very same, in order that it may be fulfilled, must ever be pleasing to us under all circumstances.“I was pleased to read what your Reverence relates in your[pg cciv]letter of your journeys; of your office of Master of Novices; of the building which you have bought at Liége; of the visitation of His Serene Highness Ferdinand, the Prince-Bishop of Liége, and of the promise that the Priory, at its next vacancy, shall be applied to the College. If my assistance in carrying this out can be of any use to you with the Pope, it shall not be wanting.“Of Dr. Singleton I have heard much, and have defended him to the best of my power, as long as I could, but the party opposed to him has prevailed. Nor do I see how I can help him at so great a distance, and especially as I should be suspected, because I am a Jesuit. The devil is envious of the harmony between the English at Douay and the Fathers of the Society, for which the good Cardinal Allen cared so much; but all means must be tried to re-establish a true and sincere friendship, and agreement in teaching; otherwise a kingdom divided against itself shall be brought to desolation. For many reasons I say freely that nothing can be done by me in his behalf; first, as I was just saying, because I should be under suspicion, being a Jesuit. Then because I am an old man of seven-and-seventy years of age, and I daily expect the dissolution of my tabernacle. Thirdly, because I cannot think of any manner in which I could help him. The common way of helping men of this sort is to give them ecclesiastical benefices, but here in Rome the multitude of those who aspire to and seek after such benefits is so great that their number is almost infinite. Nor are they only Italians, but Spaniards also, Frenchmen, Germans, who look for nothing but benefices at Rome. I myself, who was thought to have some influence with the Pope, have laboured for more than ten years for a Spaniard, an excellent man and a great friend of mine, to obtain for him a good benefice falling vacant in his own country. I could say the same of Flemish and German friends of mine. What then would be the case with English people, in whose country there are no ecclesiastical benefices for Catholics? But, since these temporal things are nothing when compared to eternal benefices, our friend Dr. Singleton must not be cast down if our Lord treats him now, as of old He treated His Apostles, who He willed should enter into the Kingdom of Heaven through many tribulations. But I must not be too lengthy, for I know[pg ccv]that both he and your Reverence stand in no need of my exhortations. I know that your Reverence will have hard work to read my bad writing, but Father Coffin171would have it that I should write to you with my own hand.“With this I bid your Reverence farewell. Commend me to the prayers of Dr. Singleton, and of all your College; but your Reverence's self especially, for our old friendship and brotherhood, must diligently commend me to the Lord our God.“From Rome, on Christmas Day, December 25, 1618.172“Your Reverence's brother and servant in Christ,“Robert Card. Bellarmine.”“To the Very Rev. Father John Tomson, S.J.,“Rector of the College of the English Novices at Liége.”The two letters which have come down to us, addressed to Father Gerard by the venerable Father Luis de la Puente, were written just as his residence173at Liége was drawing to a close. We translate from Father Grene's transcript of the originals.174“I. H. S.“P.C.“When I received your Reverence's letters, I was unable to answer them at once, for I was suffering from extreme weakness, which usually afflicts me every year all through the winter. Blessed be our great God, from Whose providence come health and sickness, life and death, and whatever prosperity and adversity there is in this world. The height of felicity in this life is to be[pg ccvi]superior to all these things, seeking only God's good pleasure in all things, for life in His will, and health, honour, happiness, spiritual progress, and all sanctity consist in the fulfilment of the will of God: and so every day I would that at every breath I could say, May Thy most holy and most sweet will be done in me, concerning me, and by me and about me, in all things and by all things, now and always and for ever. Amen.175God always pours His spirit of prayer into those who so submit their will to His; wherefore the Psalmist says—‘Be subject unto the Lord and pray to Him,’for when any one with prompt obedience and entire resignation humbly submits himself to God, God Himself, Who does the will of those that fear Him, in a certain way is made subject to him, so that He does whatever is asked, God becoming obedient to the voice of a man—not of any man soever, but of the man who obeys God. Oh, wonderful power of prayer and of obedience! Let us pray, my Father, that we may be perfectly obedient, and let us obey, that we may be able to pray, and to speak worthily with God.“It will help wonderfully both one and the other, to meditate profoundly on these two things: to wit, Who God is in Himself, and what He is towards us, and then what we are of ourselves, and what towards God. For whilst I think of God, His Trinity and Unity, most beautiful, most wise, most holy, most full of love for me, immense and everywhere present, the fountain of all good things that are in me and beyond me, from Whom I myself depend, and all that is mine, and everything that I use and enjoy, how can I do otherwise than love Him with all my strength? How shall I not praise Him and thank Him constantly? How shall I not give my whole self to His service? And these affections become the more ardent as I ponder that I have nothing of myself; that I am nothing, and that I and all that is mine would be reduced to nothing unless I were preserved by Him. Now whilst, within this immensity of God, I consider what I have been and what I am towards Him, I am horrified and tremble as I ponder on my malice, my ingratitude, my slothfulness.[pg ccvii]Hence arise feelings of hatred of self, of humiliation and self-denial, and various acts and exercises of penance, which not only nourish humility by which a man, through a truthful knowledge of himself, becomes vile to himself, but they also arouse a most ardent charity by which he loves his Supreme Benefactor, Who has conferred and still confers so many and such great benefits on one who is ungrateful and unworthy. Thus the mind is elevated to perfect contemplation and union with God Himself, and, as it were forgetful of itself, is immersed in Him, or rather God hides it in the concealment of His countenance from all disturbance of men.“Here is a short epitome of my mystical theology, which I have put out at rather greater length in my book; but why should I teach these things to a doctor of others and my own master? Surely I have become foolish, but your letters compelled me. Would that you would help me by your prayers, that what I write in my letters I may perform in deed. Forgive my humble and poor style, for I know not any more elegant; but I am sure that you do not care for words, but for the sense that is in the words. I value very highly the cross which you have sent me, and I will always bear it with me. I hope, by the intercession of the Blessed Virgin, who appeared in that tree,176and who confers such benefits on those who are there and those who visit her, that I may be a partaker of those benefits, for though I am absent in the body I am present in spirit.“I humbly commend myself to the Holy Sacrifices of your Reverence.“Your Reverence's unworthy servant in Christ,“[Cross]Ludovicus de Ponte.[Cross]“Valladolid, March 23, 1621.Postscript—“By God's help I have finished a great work. Its title is,Expositio Moralis in Canticum Canticorum, containing exhortations on all the mysteries and virtues of the Christian religion. It is divided into two volumes, and each volume into five books. The arrangement is new and singular, but not without[pg ccviii]foundation in the Sacred Text. The matter is grave in itself, and very copious, taken out of Holy Scripture and the holy Fathers. The style is humble, but clear and chaste, and not out of harmony with matter that is spiritual and sacred, and therefore elevated. It is printed at Paris, and will soon reach Germany and Belgium. Would that it may be to the glory of God, the edification of the Church, and of use to one's neighbour.”The other letter from the same Father was written in reply to one from Father Gerard announcing that he was about to leave Belgium.“I. H. S.“P.C.“May the Almighty and most pitiful Lord accompany you in the journey that you begin, for with such a Guide and Companion you will be everywhere safe and cheerful, and making true progress. Let Him ever dwell in your memory, understanding, and will, for His most sweet providence especially protects those who make their journeys from obedience to Superiors, as Jacob did, who at his father's bidding journeyed through the desert into Mesopotamia, where he heard the voice of the Lord, which said to him,‘I will be thy Keeper whithersoever thou goest.’Trusting to this hope, and protected by this guardianship, you will happily fulfil what you have begun.“I commend myself to your Reverence's Sacrifices and prayers, for my weakness oppresses me much; but may the will of God be done in me and about me in all things and by all things, to Whom concerning all things be glory for ever. Amen.“[Cross]Ludovicus de la Puente.[Cross]“Valladolid, Feb. 2, 1622.”With these saintly words our materials for writing the life of Father John Gerard abruptly fail us. Beyond what has been recorded we only know that he was sent first to Spain, and then to Rome, which he reached Jan. 15, 1623.177He was Confessor to the English College till his death, July 27, 1637, at the ripe age of seventy-three, and upwards.[pg ccix]XXX.In this Autobiography Father Gerard has laid before us his life in all the freedom and unreserve of a confidential communication with his Religious brethren and Superiors. It is not possible, we are convinced, for any impartial person to rise from its perusal without a deep conviction that Father Gerard was a gentleman and a Christian, a man of honour and religious principle; and in many cases this sense of his integrity will be accompanied with some of that personal regard and affection with which he inspired those who lived in intimacy with him. He bore too much for principle, and made too great sacrifices, for us to think that he would deliberately and perseveringly commit sin to free himself from blame. Yet this is the supposition that is involved in an attack upon his veracity in the compilation of his Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot.It is quite true that he, and many others, considered themselves justified, when their own lives or those of innocent persons were at stake, in the use of assertions that were simple falsehoods in the ordinary sense of the terms employed. These they called equivocations; and we find no trace in the period of which we are writing of the modern sense of the word, that is, of a true expression which is really beside the point, though it is so employed that it is very unlikely to be seen to be so by the person to whom it is addressed, who thus is said rather to be suffered to deceive himself than to be deceived. Practically the distinction is hard to draw, and it has the disadvantage of seeming to make the morality of the expression depend on the quickness and readiness of the person in danger, who may be able to think of phrases containing a real ambiguity but which yet would throw the hearers off the right scent.According to modern feeling, Father Gerard would have been quite justified in examining the trees and hedges in search of a falcon178he had not lost, and inquiring of all he met whether they had heard the tinkling of the bird's bells, although it was to make them think that he had lost a falcon, in other words, to deceive[pg ccx]them; but by the same modern feeling he would be held to be guilty of a lie when he said that he was the servant of a lord in a neighbouring county, though he might, without guilt, have worn that lord's livery as a disguise if he could have obtained it, which would have been a more effectual deception than any words.Again, according to modern judgment, John Lilly would be held guilty of a lie when he said179of Gerard's books and manuscripts,“They are mine;”but quite guiltless when, with the same intention of making the magistrates believe him to be a Priest when he was not, he said,“I do not say I am a Priest, that is for you to prove.”Yet the latter expression was far more likely to deceive than the former. It was more like what a Priest, under the circumstances, would have said. Present feeling would condemn him of a lie for saying simply, that the books were his, when it would acquit him if he had thought of using far more deceptive expressions, such as“I am not bound to compromise myself by saying whose they are.”The only difference between modern morality and that on which Father Gerard acted was that now-a-days men say,“Have recourse to evasions.”Then men said,“Say what you like, it is their fault if they think it true.”It is evident that of the two courses of proceeding, the plain-spoken old way is the least open to abuse. No one certainly would have recourse to it excepting from a well-weighed plea of a sorrowful necessity. Whereas, on the other hand, evasions are not startling, and the conscience may lay but little stress on the presence or absence of justifying circumstances. For it is most necessary to bear seriously in mind that all Catholic divines then held, and now hold, that to make use of equivocation excepting under those peculiar circumstances that make it lawful, is in itself a sin, and thus no escape from the sin of lying. So Father Garnett plainly said when on his trial,180“As I say it is never lawful to equivocate in matters of faith, so also in matters of human conversation, it may not be used promiscually or at our pleasure, as in matters of contract, in matters of testimony, or before a competent judge, or[pg ccxi]to the prejudice of any third person: in which cases we judge it altogether unlawful.”It is but fair that, in reading the narrative of times when many lives hung on successful disguise and concealment, we should remember that the modern sense of equivocation was then unknown. Protestant moralists have spoken out their minds plainly enough on this subject.“Great English authors, Jeremy Taylor, Milton, Paley, Johnson, men of very distinct schools of thought, distinctly say that under certain extreme circumstances it is allowable to tell a lie. Taylor says:‘To tell a lie for charity, to save a man's life, the life of a friend, of a husband, of a prince, of a useful and a public person, hath not only been done at all times, but commended by great and wise and good men. Who would not save his father's life, at the charge of a harmless lie, from persecutors or tyrants?’Again, Milton says:‘What man in his senses would deny that there are those whom we have the best ground for considering that we ought to deceive, as boys, madmen, the sick, the intoxicated, enemies, men in error, thieves? I would ask, by which of the Commandments is lying forbidden? You will say, by the ninth. If then my lie does not injure my neighbour, certainly it is not forbidden by this Commandment.’Paley says:‘There are falsehoods which are not lies, that is, which are not criminal.’Johnson:‘The general rule is, that truth should never be violated; there must, however, be some exceptions. If, for instance, a murderer should ask you which way a man is gone.’”181Thislanguagewould not have been used by Catholics. With them the word“lie”signified a simple falsehood; and an“equivocation”was a false expression used under such circumstances that if they to whom it was addressed were deceived by it,[pg ccxii]it was their own fault. They had then no right to the truth, and even in some cases it would have been a sin to tell them the truth.In substance, however, though not in form, the doctrine of Gerard, Southwell, and Garnett, was the same as that of Taylor, Milton, and Johnson. But to confine ourselves to the practice of Father Gerard, this doctrine is not necessary for his defence, and if his conduct be fairly examined, he will be held, even from the modern point of view, to have done no wrong. Protestant moralists, as we have seen, permit men under certain circumstances to tell a lie with intent to deceive. And Catholic moralists permit under such circumstances assertions which would lead the hearers to deceive themselves by neglecting to advert to the limit of the speaker's obligation to tell the truth. But with regard to Father Gerard's legal interrogations, we may waive the question whether they are right or wrong in their morality, for we see clearly that he so expressed himself as to show that his words were not intended to be believed.The real parallel to them, alleged by Gerard himself, as we shall shortly see, is the prisoner's usual plea of“Not guilty.”This is the only form in which thequestionis now put to a person accused. But in those days the question was put over and over again, and in every variety of form. To deny was really to plead“Not guilty,”and if this be lawful once, it was lawful whenever they were forced to repeat it. Not only was it a capital offence to be a Priest within the realm, but it was high treason to be reconciled to the Church, or absolved by a Priest, or to harbour or comfort one. Thus the interrogations addressed to prisoners were always intended to make them criminate themselves or others; that is, in the one case to cause them to plead guilty, so that they might be condemned to death on their own confessions; or, in the other case, to force them to become Queen's evidence, and be accessory to the infliction upon others of the extremest penalties enacted by an unjust law.The first instance that occurs in Father Gerard's Life, is that when, after his apprehension, on being questioned he declared that he was quite unacquainted with the family of the Wisemans, and those who were examining him betrayed their informer[pg ccxiii]by crying out,“What lies you tell! Did you not say so-and-so before such a lady as you read your servant's letter?”Then he adds,“But I still denied it,giving them good reasons however why, even if it had been true, I could and ought to have denied it.”182Another time183he was confronted with three servants of Lord Henry Seymour, who avouched that he had dined with their mistress and her sister, the Lady Mary Percy, that it was in Lent, and they told how their mistress ate meat, while Lady Mary and Father Gerard ate nothing but fish.“Young flung this charge in my teeth with an air of triumph, as though I could not help acknowledging it, and thereby disclosing some of my acquaintances. I answered that I did not know the men whom he had brought up.“‘But we know you,’said they,‘to be the same that was at such a place on such a day.’“‘You wrong your mistress,’said I,‘in saying so. I, however, will not so wrong her.’“‘What a barefaced fellow you are!’exclaimed Young.“‘Doubtless,’I answered,‘were these men's statements true.As for me, I cannot in conscience speak positively in the matter, for reasons that I have often alleged; let them look to the truth and justice of what they say.’”A third instance is the interview184between Father Gerard and the widow Wiseman, in the presence of the Dean of Westminster, Topcliffe, and others.“They wanted to see if she recognized me. So when I came into the room where they brought me, I found her already there. When she saw me coming in with the gaolers, she almost jumped for joy; but she controlled herself, and said to them:‘Is that the person you spoke of? I do not know him; but he looks like a Priest.’“Upon this she made me a very low reverence, and I bowed in return. Then they asked me if I did not recognize her?“I answered:‘I do not recognize her.At the same time, you know this is my usual way of answering, and I will never mention any places, or give the names of any persons that are known to me(which this lady, however, is not);because to do[pg ccxiv]so, as I have told you before, would be contrary both to justice and charity.’”Lastly, when examined185by the Attorney General, after having received a letter from Father Garnett, warning him to prepare himself for death, and after having freely confessed that he was a Priest and a Jesuit, and that he had reconciled others to the Pope, and drawn them away from the faith and religious profession which was approved in England,“answers,”he says himself,“which furnished quite sufficient matter for my condemnation, according to their laws,”and after having denied that he had meddled in political matters; his examination proceeded as follows.“Hereupon Mr. Attorney kept silence for a time, and then he began afresh to ask me what Catholics I knew; did I know such-and-such? I answered,‘I do not know them.’And I added the usual reasons why I should still make the same answer even if I did know them.186Upon this, he digressed to the question of equivocation, and began to inveigh against Father Southwell, because on his trial he denied that he knew the woman who was brought forward to accuse him.187She swore that he had come to her father's house and was received there as a Priest; this he positively denied, though he had been taken in that house and was found in a hiding-place, having been betrayed by this wretched woman. (A dutiful daughter truly, who thus betrayed to death both her spiritual and her natural father! Christ our Lord, however, came not to send peace, but a sword to divide between the good and the bad; and in this case he divided the bad daughter from the good parents.) Good Father Southwell, then, though he marvelled at the impudence of this miserable wench, yet denied what she asserted, andgave good reasons for his denial, well knowing and solidly proving that it was not lawful for him[pg ccxv]to do otherwise, lest he should add to the injury of those who were already suffering for the Faith, and for charity shown to him. Taking this occasion, therefore, he showed very learnedly that it was lawful in some cases, nay, even necessary perhaps, to use equivocation; which doctrine he established and confirmed by strong arguments and copious authorities, drawn as well from Holy Scripture as from the writings of the Doctors of the Church.“The Attorney General inveighed much against this, and tried to make out that this was to foster lying, and so destroy all reliable communications between men, and, therefore, all bonds of society. I, on the other hand, maintained that this was not falsehood, nor supposed an intention of deceiving, which is necessary to constitute a lie, but merely a keeping back of the truth, and that where one is not bound to declare it: consequently there is no deception, because nothing is refused which the other has a right to claim. I showed, moreover, that our doctrine did no way involve a destruction of the bonds of society, because the use of equivocation is never allowed in making contracts, since all are bound to give their neighbour his due, and in making of contracts truth is due to the party contracting. It should be remarked also, I said, that it is not allowed to use equivocation in ordinary conversation to the detriment of plain truth and Christian simplicity, much less in matters properly falling under the cognizance of civil authority,188since it is not lawful to deny even a capital crime if the accused is questioned juridically. He asked me, therefore, what I considered a juridical questioning. I answered that the questioners must be really superiors and judges in the matter under examination; then, the matter itself must be some crime hurtful to the common weal, in order that it may come under their jurisdiction; for sins merely internal were reserved for God's judgment. Again, there must be some trustworthy testimony brought against the accused; thus, it is the custom in England that all who are put[pg ccxvi]on their trial, when first asked by the Judge if they are guilty or not, answer,‘Not guilty,’before any witness is brought against them, or any verdict found by the jury; and though they answer the same way, whether really guilty or not, yet no one accuses them of lying. Therefore I laid down this general principle, that no one is allowed to use equivocation except in the case when something is asked him, either actually or virtually, which the questioner has no right to ask, and the declaration of which will turn to his own hurt, if he answers according to the intention of the questioner. I showed that this had been our Lord's practice, and that of the Saints. I showed that it was the practice of all prudent men, and would certainly be followed by my interrogators themselves in case they were asked about some secret sin, for example, or were asked by robbers where their money was hid.“They asked me, therefore, when our Lord ever made use of equivocations; to which I replied,‘When He told His Apostles that no one knew the Day of Judgment, not even the Son of Man; and again, when He said that He was not going up to the Festival at Jerusalem, and yet He went; yea, and He knew that He should go when He said He would not.’“Wade here interrupted me, saying,‘Christ really did not know the Day of Judgment, as Son of Man.’“‘It cannot be,’said I,‘that the Word of God Incarnate, and with a human nature hypostatically united to God, should be subject to ignorance; nor that He Who was appointed Judge by God the Father should be ignorant of those facts which belonged necessarily to His office; nor that He should be of infinite wisdom, and yet not know what intimately concerned Himself.’In fact, these heretics do not practically admit what the Apostle teaches (though they boast of following his doctrines), namely, that all the fulness of the Divinity resided corporally in Christ, and that in Him were all the treasures of the wisdom and knowledge of God. It did not, however, occur to me at the moment to adduce this passage of St. Paul.”In every one of these instances words are carefully introduced to show that the denials in question were uttered not with the intent of deceiving the hearers (though even that, according to[pg ccxvii]the grave Protestant authorities recently quoted, would have been lawful), nor of allowing them to deceive themselves if they did not choose to advert to the circumstances in which the denials were made (as Catholic divines would have permitted);189but avowedly in order that they might not be available as legal evidence against the speaker or his friends.To Father Gerard's defence of himself it may be as well to add that of Father Southwell,190who was assailed by Sir Edward Coke.“The Father would have spoken further on this point [obedience to the laws] had they not attacked him on another,”[pg ccxviii]objecting to him a statement of Anne Bellamy's, who deposed that Father Robert had instructed her, that if asked by searchers or persecutors if there was a Priest in the house, she could say“No,”though she knew there was one: nay, that if asked on oath, she could swear there was not. No sooner was this brought out than the Judges and officers of the court showed themselves highly scandalized, and were for stopping their ears:191as if, forsooth, the seeking for Catholic Priests to put them to a traitor's death, or force them to apostatize, were a proceeding so clearly and so indubitably just, as to make it as clearly and indubitably unjust to hide them from such an ordeal, or to deny them to their pursuers: nor, indeed, would the harm be confined to the cruel execution of the Priest, but with him the whole of the family in whose house he was found would be liable to the same death of traitors. Coke, therefore, the Attorney General, made the most he could of this matter, insisting that such a pernicious doctrine tended to destroy all truth, and all reliance of men in each other's veracity, and if allowed to prevail, would upset all good government. Topcliffe also inveighed against it so exorbitantly, that Judge Popham silenced him. Father Robert then, as soon as he was allowed to reply, explained briefly what he had said to the witness, whose statement was not altogether exact, and addressing the Judge, said:“‘If you will have the patience to listen to me, I shall be able to prove to you from the Holy Scriptures, from the Fathers, from theologians, and from reason, that in case a demand is made against justice and with the view of doing grievous harm to an innocent person, to give an answer not according to the intent of the questioner is no offence against either the divine law or the natural law. Nay, I will prove that this doctrine in no wise threatens the good government of states and kingdoms: and that, where the other necessary conditions of an oath are present, there is nothing wrong in confirming such an answer in that manner. Now I ask you, Mr. Attorney, Supposing the[pg ccxix]King of France (which God forbid) were to invade this country successfully, and having obtained full possession of this city, were to make search for Her Majesty the Queen, whom you knew to be hidden in a secret apartment of the palace: supposing, moreover, that you were seized in the palace and brought before the King, and that he asked you where the Queen was, and would receive no profession of ignorance from you except on oath: what would you do? To palter or hesitate is to show that she is there: to refuse to swear is equivalent to a betrayal. What would you answer? I suppose, forsooth, you would point out the place! Yet who of all who now hear me would not cry out upon you for a traitor? You would then, if you had any sense, swear at once, either that you knew not where she was, or that you knew she was not in the palace, in order that your knowledge might not become instrumental to her harm. Of this kind, in fact, was the answer of Christ in the Gospel, when He said that concerning the Day of Judgment no one had any knowledge, neither the Angels in Heaven, nor the Son: that is, according to the interpretation of the Fathers, such knowledge that He could communicate to others. Now this is the condition of Catholics in England: they are in peril of their liberty, their fortunes, and their lives, if they should have a Priest in their houses. How can it be forbidden them to escape these evils by an equivocal answer, and to confirm this answer, if necessary, by an oath? For in such a case, three things must be remembered: first, that a wrong is done unless you swear; secondly, that no one is obliged to answer everybody's questions about everything; thirdly, that an oath is always lawful, if made with truth, with judgment, and with justice, all which are found in this case.’192“He went on to exemplify his position by supposed queries of robbers and highwaymen; but he was interrupted by abuse.”[pg ccxx]Father Garnett has defended himself at sufficient length in his speech on his trial;193but as he there refers to his previous answers, we have thought it best to give insertion here to an autograph paper of his preserved in the Public Record Office.194“Concerning equivocation, which I seemed to condemn in moral things, my meaning was in moral and human conversation, in which the virtue of verity is required among friends, for otherwise it were injurious to all humanity. Neither is equivocation at all to be justified, but in case of necessary defence from injustice or wrong, or the obtaining some good of great importance, when there is no danger of harm to others, as in the case of Coventry,195wherein I suppose it is a great advantage to me for to be admitted, and no harm can ensue to the city. For the city seeketh nothing but to be free from the sickness, and if it were possible that the city knew me to be free of certainty, they would admit me presently, which is confirmed by the custom of places beyond [sea], where, though they know a man to come from a place infected, yet after they have kept him in some several place, with convenient diet, for forty days, they admit him.“As for Mr. Tresham's equivocation, I am loath to judge; yet I think ignorance might excuse him, because he might think it lawful in that case to equivocate for the excuse of his friend, yet would I be loath to allow of it or practise it: he being not then urged, but voluntarily offering it himself, contrary to that which he had before set down, and especially being in case of manifest treason, as I will after explain. But in case a man be urged at the hour of his death, it is lawful for to equivocate,with such due circumstances as are required in his life. An example we may bring in another matter. For the divines hold that in some cases a man may be bound to concealsomething in his confession, because of some great harm which may ensue of it. And as he may do so in his life, so may he at his death, if the danger of the harm continue still.“The case being propounded, supposing that I knew Gerard[pg ccxxi]acquainted with this treason, and having been often demanded thereof, I still denying it, by way of equivocation, whether at the hour of my death, either natural or by course of justice, I may by equivocation seek to clear him again.“I answer, that in case I be not urged I may not, but I must leave the matter in case in which it stand; but if I be urged, then I may clear him by equivocation, whereas otherwise my silence would be accounted an accusation. But all this I understand when the case is such that I am bound to conceal Gerard's treason, as if I had heard it in confession. For this is a general rule, that in cases of true and manifest treason,196a man is bound voluntarily in utter and very truth by no way to equivocate, if he know it not by way of confession, in which case also he is bound to seek all lawful ways to discover,salvo sigillo.“Henry Garnett.“29° Martii.“All the Doctors that hold equivocation to be lawful do maintain that it is not lawful when the examinate is bound to tell the simple truth, that is, according to the civil law, when there is a competent judge, and the cause subject to his jurisdiction, and sufficient proofs. But in case of treason a man is bound to confess of another without any witness at all, yea, voluntarily to disclose it; not so of himself.[pg ccxxii]“And how far the common law bindeth in cases that are not treason a man to confess of himself, I know not. In the civil law, it is sufficient to havesemiplenam probationem, that is,unum testem omni exceptione majorem, ormanifesta indicia.“Our law I take to be more mild, and that a man may put all to witnesses without confessing, except in cases of treason. For, according to our law,non pervertitur judicium tacendo vel negando, as in the civil law, where is requiredreus confitens. But generally, when a man is bound to confess, there is no place of equivocation. And when he is not bound to confess according to the laws of each country, then may he equivocate.”In the last paper Father Garnett is not speaking of equivocation used in defence of an innocent person, but of what we may call the persistent plea of“Not guilty,”and he there draws an interesting distinction between the Roman civil law and our own, which he calls“more mild,”in that it professed to regard a prisoner as innocent till he is proved to be guilty. Happily this is our practice now, as well as our profession, and our quotations are needed to enable us to form judgments of conduct in times that have happily passed away.But with regard to the trustworthiness of Father John Gerard's evidence, as we have it before us in his Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot, even if the lawfulness of his proceedings were not admitted, all that we are concerned to show is, that untrue statements, made by a man under circumstances which, rightly or wrongly, he considers to justify him in making them, furnish no presumption whatever that, under other circumstances, affording to his conscience no such justification, his word cannot be trusted. It is an evident instance of the maxim that the exception proves the rule. Restraining himself carefully within the limits of what he held to be lawful under circumstances of extreme difficulty and great personal danger, are we not rather to conclude that, under far less pressure, he will as carefully confine himself to the laws imposed by his conscience? Clearly there is nothing in Father Gerard's practice under examination to cause us to hesitate in placing implicit trust in his word when he speaks as an historian; and, in addition, we are sure that no one will rise[pg ccxxiii]from the perusal of the exculpatory letters which we propose to subjoin, without a full conviction of his innocence and truthfulness.

XXVIII.To this Novitiate at Louvain we now turn, as it was thither that Father Gerard was next sent. It was the foundation of Donna Luisa de Carvajal, who by her will146dated Valladolid, Dec. 22, 1604, left 12,000 ducats for the establishment of an English Novitiate. The document is an admirable specimen of true Spanish devotion and humility. After commending her soul to[pg cxciv]God by the intercession of our Blessed Lady, she proceeds—“For the love of God I humbly pray the Superiors of the Society of Jesus and the Præpositus of the Professed House, as a favour, to grant me some little place in their church where my body may be buried, in consideration of the devotion I have ever entertained for their holy Religious Order: to which Order, in the manner that I have thought would be most to the glory of God, I offer, with the greatest affection, a gift which, though but small, is all that I have. And if a burial-place be refused me in that church, my executors will obtain for me a resting-place in some other church of the Society: and if they are unable to obtain this, let me be buried in some monastery in which, for the love of God, they may be willing to give burial to a poor person like myself; and let my funeral be conducted in accordance with this my poverty. As executors I name Father Richard Walpole, the Vice-Prefect of the English Mission, and the Confessor of the English College in this city, or their successors. After them (and I have named them first from respect to their priestly dignity) I name the Condessa de Miranda, Donna Maria de Zuniga, Donna Maria Gasca, Don Frances de Contreras, Melchior de Molina, and Don Luis de Carrillo e Toledo, Conde de Caracena. First of all I declare that many years ago, when I was with my uncle, I made a vow to God to dedicate all my goods to His glory and greatest service. Then His Divine Majesty gave me large desires and vehement attraction to spend myself above all things for the preservation and advancement of the English Fathers of the Society of Jesus, who sustain that kingdom like strong columns, defend it from an otherwise inevitable ruin, and supply efficacious means of salvation for thousands and thousands of souls. Wherefore I offer them to the most holy Virgin our Lady, I place them under her protection, and I name and leave her universal heir of all my goods.... And I give possession of them henceforward to the most glorious Virgin, and in her name and place to Father Robert Persons, or failing him, to the Father who shall succeed him as Superior of the Mission: but with this condition and obligation, that such goods shall be applied to the founding of a Novitiate of English Religious of the Society of Jesus, in whatever kingdom or part of the world shall seem to Father Persons to be[pg cxcv]to the greater glory of God. But in the case that England shall be brought back to the faith and obedience of the Roman Church, my will is that the said revenue be transferred into that kingdom, for the foundation of a Novitiate of the Society there, unless it shall seem better to Father Persons, for reasons concerning the Catholic religion, to leave the Novitiate beyond the kingdom.”Time was not lost in carrying out the intentions of this pious benefactress.147In 1606, Father Persons obtained possession of a large house in Louvain, which had been inhabited by the Knights of Malta, and thus came to be called St. John's, though the church attached to it was dedicated to St. Gregory the Apostle of England and other Saints. Father More, who lived there with Father Gerard, tells us that it was on high ground commanding the whole city; below was a walled garden, and on the slope of the hill pleasant walks amongst the vines which were ranged in terraces, and the whole, though within the city walls, as quiet and calm as befitted a house of prayer.We do not know exactly the date of Father Gerard's arrival at Louvain, or the office to which he was first appointed there. The letter of the 17th August, 1612, to the General, from which we have already given a large extract concerning Mrs. Vaux, is dated from Louvain. It proceeds with an account of a miraculous cure at the intercession of Father Thomas Garnett, the nephew of the Provincial, who was martyred at Tyburn on the 3rd of June, 1608. This father was the first Novice of St. John's, Louvain. That Noviceship commenced in February, 1607, with six Priests, two Scholastics, and five Lay-brothers, Novices, under Father Thomas Talbot as their Novice Master. In 1614, St. John's received students in philosophy and theology, as well as Novices, when a house in the garden was fitted up for the Novitiate and Father Henry Silisdon was installed in St. John's as Rector of the new College. This arrangement did not last long, for at the end of the year the Novitiate was transferred to Liége. No less than fifteen letters have come down to us written by Father Gerard in the year 1614, addressed to the Prefect of the English Mission, Father Thomas Owen, Rector of the English College at Rome. They treat chiefly of the purchase of the new house at Liége,[pg cxcvi]and the transfer of the Novitiate to that city. Some extracts relating to Father Gerard himself will be found interesting. Some of them are signed John Nelson and others John Tomson. In later years he seems to have been known only by the name of Tomson.The choice of Liége as a residence seems to have been mainly owing to the disquiet caused to the Catholics in the Low Countries by the remonstrances of the English Government. We have some specimens of it in the following extracts, in which we find Father Gerard true to the natural fearlessness of his character.“Concerning148my wariness in avoiding the eyes of spies, I have been all this year more sparing in that kind than divers friends here did think needful, although some one or two did think it dangerous to go any journey, as doubting I might be killed by the way, but this was but according to their accustomed fears with which I have been long acquainted. But, indeed, Father, I am so far from desire to go many journeys, that it is a pain to me to think of going anywhither, and the reason why I never went to any of those places your Reverence mentioneth in this year past (but only the last Lent to Maclin for Mr. Rouse) was not that I thought it dangerous (being known so well to live here public that it cannot be unknown to any spies), nor for that I wanted leave, for I had the other Provincial's particular and willing grant, without my own asking, to go to any place of these countries; but it was because I had rather be at home: and in the town of Lovaine itself, I go not abroad half so much as I think were needful for the contentment of others. I was not at the Teresians, where the Mother of the House (to whom I gave the Exercise four years ago) and Father Scott's149sister do much desire my often coming, any more than once since the last Lent. At the Monastery of St. Monica's, my cousin Shurley hath requested my coming thither for these three or four months, to bestow one afternoon upon her and some younger Nuns whom she hath charge of, that they may altogether ask me what spiritual questions they may like best,[pg cxcvii]and I have never yet found a fit time for it; and, indeed, I doubt I am to blame for it. The gentlemen in the town150I doubt I visit not once in a quarter of a year, and I have some reason to think that either they think me careless of them, or afraid to be seen abroad, as though my case were very dangerous, which would also make them or any other that should come to town more fearful to come into my company, and consequently hinder the little good that I might do with them. But I hope I shall be as wary as your Reverence wisheth, and if this course go forwards of being Rector without the name of Rector, there will be less inconvenience, whosoever see me seeing me still as a private man.”In this he alludes to a plan of his own, that Father Blackfan should have the title of Rector, although he himself had been appointed to the Rectorship of the Novitiate.The next letter is dated April 6, 1614.151“I have yours of the 15th March, and see in that, as in all of yours, your fatherly care of me, which, by the grace of God, I will labour to deserve. I am well satisfied with Father General's order, and shall endeavour to get this building finished for the Novitiate as soon as I can, and then will settle to my book as much as my health and letters will permit.... Having writ thus far, I was called to go to Bruxels with Father Rector (by Father Blacfan's and Father Percy his advice) to speak with the Duke's152Secretary, who telling Father Percy the last week that the Agent did solicit against me, and that he could not well answer him, unless he delivered him some reasons in writing for my innocency, this writing was promised him by Father Percy; but I being loath to have any such writing sent, as thinking it the likeliest means to raise a new persecution against me, though for the Secretary's satisfaction we drew and delivered him a brief note of four or[pg cxcviii]five effectual proofs, yet both to the Secretary first, and afterwards to the Nuncio, I told this day that if any such writing were sent it would do me great harm, for Canterbury having such a writing would doubtless show it at the Council table, and then those lords who secretly do know me to be innocent, and wish me well, will be, as it were, forced to speak against me, lest they should seem to favour me, and so the King should be more incensed. The Nuncio did promise Father Rector and me that he would seriously deal both with the Secretary and the Prince himself in the cause.”Writing under date April 18, 1614,153he shows that he thinks that too much importance had been given to the Agent's interference.“I think your Reverence was made to believe by letters sent about Easter, that there was some new troubles against me here, out of England, and consequently that there was need of such information to the Nuncio and Father Provincial as had been given. But when I heard of it, I said it was nothing but Trumbol his own device, in hope to work upon the weakness of the Prince; and so now it proves, for I am going to the Secretary himself with our Father Rector, as I wrote from Bruxells, and giving him a paper of some few points for my innocency, with the request he would not deliver it, but show it if he would to the Agent. The Secretary answered he would advertise me if it were needful; but since the note was showed unto Trumbol, and he showed to be satisfied with it, and afterwards meeting the Secretary told him that he took it to be only matter of religion; but that being now made matter of State, he, being a servant employed in matter of State, could not but seek to concur with them that employed him, as it were granting that himself was satisfied, and yielding a reason why he had moved the matter. And this being understood both by the Prince and the Nuncio, they were very glad of it.... I write this from Maclin, whither Sir William [Stanley] was desirous to have me come for his comfort now and after the death and funeral of his lady.”But such a man as Father Gerard was not likely to be left in peace in those intriguing times. In the August following, Father[pg cxcix]Silisdon writes to Father Owen.154“Even now I have advice that His Majesty of England hath made two complaints to the Prince, and that the first is against Father Gerard's being in his dominions.”The consequence was that a transfer to another territory became desirable, and Father Gerard set his heart on migrating with his Novices to Liége. He writes from that city, under the signature of John Nelson, Sept. 19, 1614.155“There be many causes to be alleged why here, rather than in any place; as the commodity of dealing with our English in the summer, the opportunity of keeping our Novices unknown, the excellent seat far beyond Lovaine, and that bestowed on us, the present helps sent for this beginning, with great likelihood of much more; the great favour which is to be expected from this Prince and his family, and is to be strengthened by my two cousins, Sir William and Mr. Morton, and Sir William hath written to him that he doth much joy in his cousin who is there to be Rector.”The two cousins of whom Father Gerard here speaks were two very powerful friends. The one was Sir William Stanley, who showed himself a kind friend to Father Gerard and his charge by negotiating the purchase of the property at Liége in his own name, and advancing the purchase money—at least, that portion of it which had to be paid down156—probably (as Father Gerard speaks of the“seat being bestowed upon us”) regarding it as a gift. Whatever else was requisite for the purchase was provided by Brother William Browne, who, though157grandson, brother, and uncle of Viscounts Montague,—his grandfather was Queen Mary's Ambassador to the Holy See—was himself content to spend his life in the humble duties of a Jesuit Lay-brother.The“Mr. Morton”was Sir George Talbot of Grafton, afterwards[pg cc]ninth Earl of Shrewsbury. He was a scholar of some repute,158and an intimate friend of Maximilian, Duke of Bavaria. As Ferdinand, the Prince-Bishop of Liége, was Maximilian's brother, it was no little help to Father Gerard to be on“cousinly”terms with George Talbot. The Duke became a generous benefactor to the new House at Liége. In 1618 he sent Father Gerard, through Sir George Talbot, 5,000 florins for the Noviceship.159In a letter dated Jan. 25, 1620, the Duke writes to Father Gerard, who had promised to pray that he might have a son:“I bound myself once by vow to your Blessed Ignatius, that if he would obtain this favour for me, I would give my son the name of Ignatius, and would build and endow a College of the Society wherever Father General might judge it most useful. What if God should purpose thus to provide for you?”160In July of the same year he wrote:“We have sent you a contribution of 1,300 German florins by Father Mayer for a tabernacle for the Blessed Sacrament, and for a niche for an image of the Blessed Virgin.”Even after Father Gerard's departure from the House, Duke Maximilian's liberality to it did not fail. Father Silisdon, Father Gerard's successor as Master of Novices, removed the Novitiate to Watten,161and not long after the Duke settled a permanent endowment upon the College of Liége, which was begun in the House that Father Gerard had established.Father Gerard's Socius or“Compagnion,”as he calls him,[pg cci]was Father Henry More, subsequently the historian of the Province. When discussing, before his appointment, those Fathers who were fitted for that office, after mentioning others, he says:“Father Nicholson is far short of either of them for my turn, for he is no good Latinist, I think little better than myself, though he be much better scholar; neither hath he any other language but Spanish, of which I shall have small use. Father Henry More hath French well, Dutch prettily, and Italian sufficiently, besides Spanish very well, and Latin as I would wish him.”162As to his first Novices, he had twelve, which made what he styled“a pretty beginning.”163They were“the two that expect at Liége, the two that are come from Rome, and four out of Spain, with Mr. Lewkner and Mr. Whitmore, besides Grafton, when he comes, and a tailor now servant in this house, who by all judgments here is as fit to be received as Brother Silvester, the young tailor now in the Noviceship, is fit to be dismissed.”164Of the two that“expected at Liége,”a previous letter had said,“Here be also Mr. Mansel and Mr. Owen Shelley, by the names of Mr. Griffin and Mr. Titchborn: both expect, the first with some loathness to stay long, the second is wholly resigned. The first is a pious man, and to those that know his fashion will be profitable for some uses in the Society, but the second will be practical and fit for anything, and in truth I think he will do very well.”165This Father Owen Shelley was afterwards Rector of the College of Liége, and justified Father Gerard's judgment of his character.Amongst the“four which are come out of Spain”were two that must have constantly served to remind their Rector at Liége of the Gunpowder Plot, as the remonstrances of King James' Agent had managed to do at Louvain.“One of them,”he says,“is akin to Father Garnett, and of his name, though we call him Gilford, as he was called at St. Omers. William Ellis, but we call him John Williams, for he was page166to Sir[pg ccii]Everard Digby, and taken with him, though he might have escaped, for his master offered him horse and money to shift for himself, but the youth said he would live and die with him; and so, being taken, was condemned at Stafford, and should have been executed. He was offered to have his life if he would go to their church, which he refused. In the end they saved him and some others. He never [yielded] in the least point. He hath good friends near Sir Everard Digby's whom I know, and he is heir to 80l.a year, if his father do him right.”167At the close of this short notice of Father Gerard's Rectorship it will be but right to record an unfavourable judgment passed upon him, as it will help us to form a true appreciation of his character. It is the only instance that has come down to us of blame on the part of one of his own brethren.“I see a general fear in all ours, those of best judgment, of the success of Father Nelson's government, and unless he hath a companion that may moderate him, his zeal will, I fear, carry him too far; and I fear it so much the more because I see him loath to have anybody with him who is likely to propose anything to him contrary to his own zealous desires.”This is in a confidential letter168from Father Silisdon to Father Owen, dated Oct. 31, 1614, so that, as it was written before the transfer to Liége, it was a misgiving lest he should be indiscreet as a Rector, rather than a judgment on his actual conduct as a Superior.XXIX.During his residence at Liége, amongst Father Gerard's correspondents were two venerable servants of God, Robert Cardinal Bellarmine, and Father Luis de la Puente, better known by the Latinized form of his name, de Ponte. As by a man's friends we can obtain an insight into his character, we have thought it desirable to give the few letters from these two holy men to Father Gerard that have come down to us. Cardinal Bellarmine's autograph is preserved at Stonyhurst.169We translate the letter from the original Latin.[pg cciii]“Very Rev. and beloved Father in Christ,—I have received your Reverence's letter dated from Liége the 23rd November, with the little presents inclosed in it, an English knife, a little case (either bone or ivory, I do not know which), and three small toothpicks. I do not know whether these were sent me for use, or as having some special meaning. Whichever it be they were welcome, as a proof of friendship and brotherhood.“The memory of that excellent Mr. Oliver,170whose acquaintance I made very late, has brought me no little sadness, or rather grief, not on his account, who is translated from this world to the joys of Paradise, but for the sake of many whom without doubt he would have converted to a good life if Divine Providence had permitted him to live awhile longer. But the good pleasure of God must ever be fulfilled, and the very same, in order that it may be fulfilled, must ever be pleasing to us under all circumstances.“I was pleased to read what your Reverence relates in your[pg cciv]letter of your journeys; of your office of Master of Novices; of the building which you have bought at Liége; of the visitation of His Serene Highness Ferdinand, the Prince-Bishop of Liége, and of the promise that the Priory, at its next vacancy, shall be applied to the College. If my assistance in carrying this out can be of any use to you with the Pope, it shall not be wanting.“Of Dr. Singleton I have heard much, and have defended him to the best of my power, as long as I could, but the party opposed to him has prevailed. Nor do I see how I can help him at so great a distance, and especially as I should be suspected, because I am a Jesuit. The devil is envious of the harmony between the English at Douay and the Fathers of the Society, for which the good Cardinal Allen cared so much; but all means must be tried to re-establish a true and sincere friendship, and agreement in teaching; otherwise a kingdom divided against itself shall be brought to desolation. For many reasons I say freely that nothing can be done by me in his behalf; first, as I was just saying, because I should be under suspicion, being a Jesuit. Then because I am an old man of seven-and-seventy years of age, and I daily expect the dissolution of my tabernacle. Thirdly, because I cannot think of any manner in which I could help him. The common way of helping men of this sort is to give them ecclesiastical benefices, but here in Rome the multitude of those who aspire to and seek after such benefits is so great that their number is almost infinite. Nor are they only Italians, but Spaniards also, Frenchmen, Germans, who look for nothing but benefices at Rome. I myself, who was thought to have some influence with the Pope, have laboured for more than ten years for a Spaniard, an excellent man and a great friend of mine, to obtain for him a good benefice falling vacant in his own country. I could say the same of Flemish and German friends of mine. What then would be the case with English people, in whose country there are no ecclesiastical benefices for Catholics? But, since these temporal things are nothing when compared to eternal benefices, our friend Dr. Singleton must not be cast down if our Lord treats him now, as of old He treated His Apostles, who He willed should enter into the Kingdom of Heaven through many tribulations. But I must not be too lengthy, for I know[pg ccv]that both he and your Reverence stand in no need of my exhortations. I know that your Reverence will have hard work to read my bad writing, but Father Coffin171would have it that I should write to you with my own hand.“With this I bid your Reverence farewell. Commend me to the prayers of Dr. Singleton, and of all your College; but your Reverence's self especially, for our old friendship and brotherhood, must diligently commend me to the Lord our God.“From Rome, on Christmas Day, December 25, 1618.172“Your Reverence's brother and servant in Christ,“Robert Card. Bellarmine.”“To the Very Rev. Father John Tomson, S.J.,“Rector of the College of the English Novices at Liége.”The two letters which have come down to us, addressed to Father Gerard by the venerable Father Luis de la Puente, were written just as his residence173at Liége was drawing to a close. We translate from Father Grene's transcript of the originals.174“I. H. S.“P.C.“When I received your Reverence's letters, I was unable to answer them at once, for I was suffering from extreme weakness, which usually afflicts me every year all through the winter. Blessed be our great God, from Whose providence come health and sickness, life and death, and whatever prosperity and adversity there is in this world. The height of felicity in this life is to be[pg ccvi]superior to all these things, seeking only God's good pleasure in all things, for life in His will, and health, honour, happiness, spiritual progress, and all sanctity consist in the fulfilment of the will of God: and so every day I would that at every breath I could say, May Thy most holy and most sweet will be done in me, concerning me, and by me and about me, in all things and by all things, now and always and for ever. Amen.175God always pours His spirit of prayer into those who so submit their will to His; wherefore the Psalmist says—‘Be subject unto the Lord and pray to Him,’for when any one with prompt obedience and entire resignation humbly submits himself to God, God Himself, Who does the will of those that fear Him, in a certain way is made subject to him, so that He does whatever is asked, God becoming obedient to the voice of a man—not of any man soever, but of the man who obeys God. Oh, wonderful power of prayer and of obedience! Let us pray, my Father, that we may be perfectly obedient, and let us obey, that we may be able to pray, and to speak worthily with God.“It will help wonderfully both one and the other, to meditate profoundly on these two things: to wit, Who God is in Himself, and what He is towards us, and then what we are of ourselves, and what towards God. For whilst I think of God, His Trinity and Unity, most beautiful, most wise, most holy, most full of love for me, immense and everywhere present, the fountain of all good things that are in me and beyond me, from Whom I myself depend, and all that is mine, and everything that I use and enjoy, how can I do otherwise than love Him with all my strength? How shall I not praise Him and thank Him constantly? How shall I not give my whole self to His service? And these affections become the more ardent as I ponder that I have nothing of myself; that I am nothing, and that I and all that is mine would be reduced to nothing unless I were preserved by Him. Now whilst, within this immensity of God, I consider what I have been and what I am towards Him, I am horrified and tremble as I ponder on my malice, my ingratitude, my slothfulness.[pg ccvii]Hence arise feelings of hatred of self, of humiliation and self-denial, and various acts and exercises of penance, which not only nourish humility by which a man, through a truthful knowledge of himself, becomes vile to himself, but they also arouse a most ardent charity by which he loves his Supreme Benefactor, Who has conferred and still confers so many and such great benefits on one who is ungrateful and unworthy. Thus the mind is elevated to perfect contemplation and union with God Himself, and, as it were forgetful of itself, is immersed in Him, or rather God hides it in the concealment of His countenance from all disturbance of men.“Here is a short epitome of my mystical theology, which I have put out at rather greater length in my book; but why should I teach these things to a doctor of others and my own master? Surely I have become foolish, but your letters compelled me. Would that you would help me by your prayers, that what I write in my letters I may perform in deed. Forgive my humble and poor style, for I know not any more elegant; but I am sure that you do not care for words, but for the sense that is in the words. I value very highly the cross which you have sent me, and I will always bear it with me. I hope, by the intercession of the Blessed Virgin, who appeared in that tree,176and who confers such benefits on those who are there and those who visit her, that I may be a partaker of those benefits, for though I am absent in the body I am present in spirit.“I humbly commend myself to the Holy Sacrifices of your Reverence.“Your Reverence's unworthy servant in Christ,“[Cross]Ludovicus de Ponte.[Cross]“Valladolid, March 23, 1621.Postscript—“By God's help I have finished a great work. Its title is,Expositio Moralis in Canticum Canticorum, containing exhortations on all the mysteries and virtues of the Christian religion. It is divided into two volumes, and each volume into five books. The arrangement is new and singular, but not without[pg ccviii]foundation in the Sacred Text. The matter is grave in itself, and very copious, taken out of Holy Scripture and the holy Fathers. The style is humble, but clear and chaste, and not out of harmony with matter that is spiritual and sacred, and therefore elevated. It is printed at Paris, and will soon reach Germany and Belgium. Would that it may be to the glory of God, the edification of the Church, and of use to one's neighbour.”The other letter from the same Father was written in reply to one from Father Gerard announcing that he was about to leave Belgium.“I. H. S.“P.C.“May the Almighty and most pitiful Lord accompany you in the journey that you begin, for with such a Guide and Companion you will be everywhere safe and cheerful, and making true progress. Let Him ever dwell in your memory, understanding, and will, for His most sweet providence especially protects those who make their journeys from obedience to Superiors, as Jacob did, who at his father's bidding journeyed through the desert into Mesopotamia, where he heard the voice of the Lord, which said to him,‘I will be thy Keeper whithersoever thou goest.’Trusting to this hope, and protected by this guardianship, you will happily fulfil what you have begun.“I commend myself to your Reverence's Sacrifices and prayers, for my weakness oppresses me much; but may the will of God be done in me and about me in all things and by all things, to Whom concerning all things be glory for ever. Amen.“[Cross]Ludovicus de la Puente.[Cross]“Valladolid, Feb. 2, 1622.”With these saintly words our materials for writing the life of Father John Gerard abruptly fail us. Beyond what has been recorded we only know that he was sent first to Spain, and then to Rome, which he reached Jan. 15, 1623.177He was Confessor to the English College till his death, July 27, 1637, at the ripe age of seventy-three, and upwards.[pg ccix]XXX.In this Autobiography Father Gerard has laid before us his life in all the freedom and unreserve of a confidential communication with his Religious brethren and Superiors. It is not possible, we are convinced, for any impartial person to rise from its perusal without a deep conviction that Father Gerard was a gentleman and a Christian, a man of honour and religious principle; and in many cases this sense of his integrity will be accompanied with some of that personal regard and affection with which he inspired those who lived in intimacy with him. He bore too much for principle, and made too great sacrifices, for us to think that he would deliberately and perseveringly commit sin to free himself from blame. Yet this is the supposition that is involved in an attack upon his veracity in the compilation of his Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot.It is quite true that he, and many others, considered themselves justified, when their own lives or those of innocent persons were at stake, in the use of assertions that were simple falsehoods in the ordinary sense of the terms employed. These they called equivocations; and we find no trace in the period of which we are writing of the modern sense of the word, that is, of a true expression which is really beside the point, though it is so employed that it is very unlikely to be seen to be so by the person to whom it is addressed, who thus is said rather to be suffered to deceive himself than to be deceived. Practically the distinction is hard to draw, and it has the disadvantage of seeming to make the morality of the expression depend on the quickness and readiness of the person in danger, who may be able to think of phrases containing a real ambiguity but which yet would throw the hearers off the right scent.According to modern feeling, Father Gerard would have been quite justified in examining the trees and hedges in search of a falcon178he had not lost, and inquiring of all he met whether they had heard the tinkling of the bird's bells, although it was to make them think that he had lost a falcon, in other words, to deceive[pg ccx]them; but by the same modern feeling he would be held to be guilty of a lie when he said that he was the servant of a lord in a neighbouring county, though he might, without guilt, have worn that lord's livery as a disguise if he could have obtained it, which would have been a more effectual deception than any words.Again, according to modern judgment, John Lilly would be held guilty of a lie when he said179of Gerard's books and manuscripts,“They are mine;”but quite guiltless when, with the same intention of making the magistrates believe him to be a Priest when he was not, he said,“I do not say I am a Priest, that is for you to prove.”Yet the latter expression was far more likely to deceive than the former. It was more like what a Priest, under the circumstances, would have said. Present feeling would condemn him of a lie for saying simply, that the books were his, when it would acquit him if he had thought of using far more deceptive expressions, such as“I am not bound to compromise myself by saying whose they are.”The only difference between modern morality and that on which Father Gerard acted was that now-a-days men say,“Have recourse to evasions.”Then men said,“Say what you like, it is their fault if they think it true.”It is evident that of the two courses of proceeding, the plain-spoken old way is the least open to abuse. No one certainly would have recourse to it excepting from a well-weighed plea of a sorrowful necessity. Whereas, on the other hand, evasions are not startling, and the conscience may lay but little stress on the presence or absence of justifying circumstances. For it is most necessary to bear seriously in mind that all Catholic divines then held, and now hold, that to make use of equivocation excepting under those peculiar circumstances that make it lawful, is in itself a sin, and thus no escape from the sin of lying. So Father Garnett plainly said when on his trial,180“As I say it is never lawful to equivocate in matters of faith, so also in matters of human conversation, it may not be used promiscually or at our pleasure, as in matters of contract, in matters of testimony, or before a competent judge, or[pg ccxi]to the prejudice of any third person: in which cases we judge it altogether unlawful.”It is but fair that, in reading the narrative of times when many lives hung on successful disguise and concealment, we should remember that the modern sense of equivocation was then unknown. Protestant moralists have spoken out their minds plainly enough on this subject.“Great English authors, Jeremy Taylor, Milton, Paley, Johnson, men of very distinct schools of thought, distinctly say that under certain extreme circumstances it is allowable to tell a lie. Taylor says:‘To tell a lie for charity, to save a man's life, the life of a friend, of a husband, of a prince, of a useful and a public person, hath not only been done at all times, but commended by great and wise and good men. Who would not save his father's life, at the charge of a harmless lie, from persecutors or tyrants?’Again, Milton says:‘What man in his senses would deny that there are those whom we have the best ground for considering that we ought to deceive, as boys, madmen, the sick, the intoxicated, enemies, men in error, thieves? I would ask, by which of the Commandments is lying forbidden? You will say, by the ninth. If then my lie does not injure my neighbour, certainly it is not forbidden by this Commandment.’Paley says:‘There are falsehoods which are not lies, that is, which are not criminal.’Johnson:‘The general rule is, that truth should never be violated; there must, however, be some exceptions. If, for instance, a murderer should ask you which way a man is gone.’”181Thislanguagewould not have been used by Catholics. With them the word“lie”signified a simple falsehood; and an“equivocation”was a false expression used under such circumstances that if they to whom it was addressed were deceived by it,[pg ccxii]it was their own fault. They had then no right to the truth, and even in some cases it would have been a sin to tell them the truth.In substance, however, though not in form, the doctrine of Gerard, Southwell, and Garnett, was the same as that of Taylor, Milton, and Johnson. But to confine ourselves to the practice of Father Gerard, this doctrine is not necessary for his defence, and if his conduct be fairly examined, he will be held, even from the modern point of view, to have done no wrong. Protestant moralists, as we have seen, permit men under certain circumstances to tell a lie with intent to deceive. And Catholic moralists permit under such circumstances assertions which would lead the hearers to deceive themselves by neglecting to advert to the limit of the speaker's obligation to tell the truth. But with regard to Father Gerard's legal interrogations, we may waive the question whether they are right or wrong in their morality, for we see clearly that he so expressed himself as to show that his words were not intended to be believed.The real parallel to them, alleged by Gerard himself, as we shall shortly see, is the prisoner's usual plea of“Not guilty.”This is the only form in which thequestionis now put to a person accused. But in those days the question was put over and over again, and in every variety of form. To deny was really to plead“Not guilty,”and if this be lawful once, it was lawful whenever they were forced to repeat it. Not only was it a capital offence to be a Priest within the realm, but it was high treason to be reconciled to the Church, or absolved by a Priest, or to harbour or comfort one. Thus the interrogations addressed to prisoners were always intended to make them criminate themselves or others; that is, in the one case to cause them to plead guilty, so that they might be condemned to death on their own confessions; or, in the other case, to force them to become Queen's evidence, and be accessory to the infliction upon others of the extremest penalties enacted by an unjust law.The first instance that occurs in Father Gerard's Life, is that when, after his apprehension, on being questioned he declared that he was quite unacquainted with the family of the Wisemans, and those who were examining him betrayed their informer[pg ccxiii]by crying out,“What lies you tell! Did you not say so-and-so before such a lady as you read your servant's letter?”Then he adds,“But I still denied it,giving them good reasons however why, even if it had been true, I could and ought to have denied it.”182Another time183he was confronted with three servants of Lord Henry Seymour, who avouched that he had dined with their mistress and her sister, the Lady Mary Percy, that it was in Lent, and they told how their mistress ate meat, while Lady Mary and Father Gerard ate nothing but fish.“Young flung this charge in my teeth with an air of triumph, as though I could not help acknowledging it, and thereby disclosing some of my acquaintances. I answered that I did not know the men whom he had brought up.“‘But we know you,’said they,‘to be the same that was at such a place on such a day.’“‘You wrong your mistress,’said I,‘in saying so. I, however, will not so wrong her.’“‘What a barefaced fellow you are!’exclaimed Young.“‘Doubtless,’I answered,‘were these men's statements true.As for me, I cannot in conscience speak positively in the matter, for reasons that I have often alleged; let them look to the truth and justice of what they say.’”A third instance is the interview184between Father Gerard and the widow Wiseman, in the presence of the Dean of Westminster, Topcliffe, and others.“They wanted to see if she recognized me. So when I came into the room where they brought me, I found her already there. When she saw me coming in with the gaolers, she almost jumped for joy; but she controlled herself, and said to them:‘Is that the person you spoke of? I do not know him; but he looks like a Priest.’“Upon this she made me a very low reverence, and I bowed in return. Then they asked me if I did not recognize her?“I answered:‘I do not recognize her.At the same time, you know this is my usual way of answering, and I will never mention any places, or give the names of any persons that are known to me(which this lady, however, is not);because to do[pg ccxiv]so, as I have told you before, would be contrary both to justice and charity.’”Lastly, when examined185by the Attorney General, after having received a letter from Father Garnett, warning him to prepare himself for death, and after having freely confessed that he was a Priest and a Jesuit, and that he had reconciled others to the Pope, and drawn them away from the faith and religious profession which was approved in England,“answers,”he says himself,“which furnished quite sufficient matter for my condemnation, according to their laws,”and after having denied that he had meddled in political matters; his examination proceeded as follows.“Hereupon Mr. Attorney kept silence for a time, and then he began afresh to ask me what Catholics I knew; did I know such-and-such? I answered,‘I do not know them.’And I added the usual reasons why I should still make the same answer even if I did know them.186Upon this, he digressed to the question of equivocation, and began to inveigh against Father Southwell, because on his trial he denied that he knew the woman who was brought forward to accuse him.187She swore that he had come to her father's house and was received there as a Priest; this he positively denied, though he had been taken in that house and was found in a hiding-place, having been betrayed by this wretched woman. (A dutiful daughter truly, who thus betrayed to death both her spiritual and her natural father! Christ our Lord, however, came not to send peace, but a sword to divide between the good and the bad; and in this case he divided the bad daughter from the good parents.) Good Father Southwell, then, though he marvelled at the impudence of this miserable wench, yet denied what she asserted, andgave good reasons for his denial, well knowing and solidly proving that it was not lawful for him[pg ccxv]to do otherwise, lest he should add to the injury of those who were already suffering for the Faith, and for charity shown to him. Taking this occasion, therefore, he showed very learnedly that it was lawful in some cases, nay, even necessary perhaps, to use equivocation; which doctrine he established and confirmed by strong arguments and copious authorities, drawn as well from Holy Scripture as from the writings of the Doctors of the Church.“The Attorney General inveighed much against this, and tried to make out that this was to foster lying, and so destroy all reliable communications between men, and, therefore, all bonds of society. I, on the other hand, maintained that this was not falsehood, nor supposed an intention of deceiving, which is necessary to constitute a lie, but merely a keeping back of the truth, and that where one is not bound to declare it: consequently there is no deception, because nothing is refused which the other has a right to claim. I showed, moreover, that our doctrine did no way involve a destruction of the bonds of society, because the use of equivocation is never allowed in making contracts, since all are bound to give their neighbour his due, and in making of contracts truth is due to the party contracting. It should be remarked also, I said, that it is not allowed to use equivocation in ordinary conversation to the detriment of plain truth and Christian simplicity, much less in matters properly falling under the cognizance of civil authority,188since it is not lawful to deny even a capital crime if the accused is questioned juridically. He asked me, therefore, what I considered a juridical questioning. I answered that the questioners must be really superiors and judges in the matter under examination; then, the matter itself must be some crime hurtful to the common weal, in order that it may come under their jurisdiction; for sins merely internal were reserved for God's judgment. Again, there must be some trustworthy testimony brought against the accused; thus, it is the custom in England that all who are put[pg ccxvi]on their trial, when first asked by the Judge if they are guilty or not, answer,‘Not guilty,’before any witness is brought against them, or any verdict found by the jury; and though they answer the same way, whether really guilty or not, yet no one accuses them of lying. Therefore I laid down this general principle, that no one is allowed to use equivocation except in the case when something is asked him, either actually or virtually, which the questioner has no right to ask, and the declaration of which will turn to his own hurt, if he answers according to the intention of the questioner. I showed that this had been our Lord's practice, and that of the Saints. I showed that it was the practice of all prudent men, and would certainly be followed by my interrogators themselves in case they were asked about some secret sin, for example, or were asked by robbers where their money was hid.“They asked me, therefore, when our Lord ever made use of equivocations; to which I replied,‘When He told His Apostles that no one knew the Day of Judgment, not even the Son of Man; and again, when He said that He was not going up to the Festival at Jerusalem, and yet He went; yea, and He knew that He should go when He said He would not.’“Wade here interrupted me, saying,‘Christ really did not know the Day of Judgment, as Son of Man.’“‘It cannot be,’said I,‘that the Word of God Incarnate, and with a human nature hypostatically united to God, should be subject to ignorance; nor that He Who was appointed Judge by God the Father should be ignorant of those facts which belonged necessarily to His office; nor that He should be of infinite wisdom, and yet not know what intimately concerned Himself.’In fact, these heretics do not practically admit what the Apostle teaches (though they boast of following his doctrines), namely, that all the fulness of the Divinity resided corporally in Christ, and that in Him were all the treasures of the wisdom and knowledge of God. It did not, however, occur to me at the moment to adduce this passage of St. Paul.”In every one of these instances words are carefully introduced to show that the denials in question were uttered not with the intent of deceiving the hearers (though even that, according to[pg ccxvii]the grave Protestant authorities recently quoted, would have been lawful), nor of allowing them to deceive themselves if they did not choose to advert to the circumstances in which the denials were made (as Catholic divines would have permitted);189but avowedly in order that they might not be available as legal evidence against the speaker or his friends.To Father Gerard's defence of himself it may be as well to add that of Father Southwell,190who was assailed by Sir Edward Coke.“The Father would have spoken further on this point [obedience to the laws] had they not attacked him on another,”[pg ccxviii]objecting to him a statement of Anne Bellamy's, who deposed that Father Robert had instructed her, that if asked by searchers or persecutors if there was a Priest in the house, she could say“No,”though she knew there was one: nay, that if asked on oath, she could swear there was not. No sooner was this brought out than the Judges and officers of the court showed themselves highly scandalized, and were for stopping their ears:191as if, forsooth, the seeking for Catholic Priests to put them to a traitor's death, or force them to apostatize, were a proceeding so clearly and so indubitably just, as to make it as clearly and indubitably unjust to hide them from such an ordeal, or to deny them to their pursuers: nor, indeed, would the harm be confined to the cruel execution of the Priest, but with him the whole of the family in whose house he was found would be liable to the same death of traitors. Coke, therefore, the Attorney General, made the most he could of this matter, insisting that such a pernicious doctrine tended to destroy all truth, and all reliance of men in each other's veracity, and if allowed to prevail, would upset all good government. Topcliffe also inveighed against it so exorbitantly, that Judge Popham silenced him. Father Robert then, as soon as he was allowed to reply, explained briefly what he had said to the witness, whose statement was not altogether exact, and addressing the Judge, said:“‘If you will have the patience to listen to me, I shall be able to prove to you from the Holy Scriptures, from the Fathers, from theologians, and from reason, that in case a demand is made against justice and with the view of doing grievous harm to an innocent person, to give an answer not according to the intent of the questioner is no offence against either the divine law or the natural law. Nay, I will prove that this doctrine in no wise threatens the good government of states and kingdoms: and that, where the other necessary conditions of an oath are present, there is nothing wrong in confirming such an answer in that manner. Now I ask you, Mr. Attorney, Supposing the[pg ccxix]King of France (which God forbid) were to invade this country successfully, and having obtained full possession of this city, were to make search for Her Majesty the Queen, whom you knew to be hidden in a secret apartment of the palace: supposing, moreover, that you were seized in the palace and brought before the King, and that he asked you where the Queen was, and would receive no profession of ignorance from you except on oath: what would you do? To palter or hesitate is to show that she is there: to refuse to swear is equivalent to a betrayal. What would you answer? I suppose, forsooth, you would point out the place! Yet who of all who now hear me would not cry out upon you for a traitor? You would then, if you had any sense, swear at once, either that you knew not where she was, or that you knew she was not in the palace, in order that your knowledge might not become instrumental to her harm. Of this kind, in fact, was the answer of Christ in the Gospel, when He said that concerning the Day of Judgment no one had any knowledge, neither the Angels in Heaven, nor the Son: that is, according to the interpretation of the Fathers, such knowledge that He could communicate to others. Now this is the condition of Catholics in England: they are in peril of their liberty, their fortunes, and their lives, if they should have a Priest in their houses. How can it be forbidden them to escape these evils by an equivocal answer, and to confirm this answer, if necessary, by an oath? For in such a case, three things must be remembered: first, that a wrong is done unless you swear; secondly, that no one is obliged to answer everybody's questions about everything; thirdly, that an oath is always lawful, if made with truth, with judgment, and with justice, all which are found in this case.’192“He went on to exemplify his position by supposed queries of robbers and highwaymen; but he was interrupted by abuse.”[pg ccxx]Father Garnett has defended himself at sufficient length in his speech on his trial;193but as he there refers to his previous answers, we have thought it best to give insertion here to an autograph paper of his preserved in the Public Record Office.194“Concerning equivocation, which I seemed to condemn in moral things, my meaning was in moral and human conversation, in which the virtue of verity is required among friends, for otherwise it were injurious to all humanity. Neither is equivocation at all to be justified, but in case of necessary defence from injustice or wrong, or the obtaining some good of great importance, when there is no danger of harm to others, as in the case of Coventry,195wherein I suppose it is a great advantage to me for to be admitted, and no harm can ensue to the city. For the city seeketh nothing but to be free from the sickness, and if it were possible that the city knew me to be free of certainty, they would admit me presently, which is confirmed by the custom of places beyond [sea], where, though they know a man to come from a place infected, yet after they have kept him in some several place, with convenient diet, for forty days, they admit him.“As for Mr. Tresham's equivocation, I am loath to judge; yet I think ignorance might excuse him, because he might think it lawful in that case to equivocate for the excuse of his friend, yet would I be loath to allow of it or practise it: he being not then urged, but voluntarily offering it himself, contrary to that which he had before set down, and especially being in case of manifest treason, as I will after explain. But in case a man be urged at the hour of his death, it is lawful for to equivocate,with such due circumstances as are required in his life. An example we may bring in another matter. For the divines hold that in some cases a man may be bound to concealsomething in his confession, because of some great harm which may ensue of it. And as he may do so in his life, so may he at his death, if the danger of the harm continue still.“The case being propounded, supposing that I knew Gerard[pg ccxxi]acquainted with this treason, and having been often demanded thereof, I still denying it, by way of equivocation, whether at the hour of my death, either natural or by course of justice, I may by equivocation seek to clear him again.“I answer, that in case I be not urged I may not, but I must leave the matter in case in which it stand; but if I be urged, then I may clear him by equivocation, whereas otherwise my silence would be accounted an accusation. But all this I understand when the case is such that I am bound to conceal Gerard's treason, as if I had heard it in confession. For this is a general rule, that in cases of true and manifest treason,196a man is bound voluntarily in utter and very truth by no way to equivocate, if he know it not by way of confession, in which case also he is bound to seek all lawful ways to discover,salvo sigillo.“Henry Garnett.“29° Martii.“All the Doctors that hold equivocation to be lawful do maintain that it is not lawful when the examinate is bound to tell the simple truth, that is, according to the civil law, when there is a competent judge, and the cause subject to his jurisdiction, and sufficient proofs. But in case of treason a man is bound to confess of another without any witness at all, yea, voluntarily to disclose it; not so of himself.[pg ccxxii]“And how far the common law bindeth in cases that are not treason a man to confess of himself, I know not. In the civil law, it is sufficient to havesemiplenam probationem, that is,unum testem omni exceptione majorem, ormanifesta indicia.“Our law I take to be more mild, and that a man may put all to witnesses without confessing, except in cases of treason. For, according to our law,non pervertitur judicium tacendo vel negando, as in the civil law, where is requiredreus confitens. But generally, when a man is bound to confess, there is no place of equivocation. And when he is not bound to confess according to the laws of each country, then may he equivocate.”In the last paper Father Garnett is not speaking of equivocation used in defence of an innocent person, but of what we may call the persistent plea of“Not guilty,”and he there draws an interesting distinction between the Roman civil law and our own, which he calls“more mild,”in that it professed to regard a prisoner as innocent till he is proved to be guilty. Happily this is our practice now, as well as our profession, and our quotations are needed to enable us to form judgments of conduct in times that have happily passed away.But with regard to the trustworthiness of Father John Gerard's evidence, as we have it before us in his Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot, even if the lawfulness of his proceedings were not admitted, all that we are concerned to show is, that untrue statements, made by a man under circumstances which, rightly or wrongly, he considers to justify him in making them, furnish no presumption whatever that, under other circumstances, affording to his conscience no such justification, his word cannot be trusted. It is an evident instance of the maxim that the exception proves the rule. Restraining himself carefully within the limits of what he held to be lawful under circumstances of extreme difficulty and great personal danger, are we not rather to conclude that, under far less pressure, he will as carefully confine himself to the laws imposed by his conscience? Clearly there is nothing in Father Gerard's practice under examination to cause us to hesitate in placing implicit trust in his word when he speaks as an historian; and, in addition, we are sure that no one will rise[pg ccxxiii]from the perusal of the exculpatory letters which we propose to subjoin, without a full conviction of his innocence and truthfulness.

XXVIII.To this Novitiate at Louvain we now turn, as it was thither that Father Gerard was next sent. It was the foundation of Donna Luisa de Carvajal, who by her will146dated Valladolid, Dec. 22, 1604, left 12,000 ducats for the establishment of an English Novitiate. The document is an admirable specimen of true Spanish devotion and humility. After commending her soul to[pg cxciv]God by the intercession of our Blessed Lady, she proceeds—“For the love of God I humbly pray the Superiors of the Society of Jesus and the Præpositus of the Professed House, as a favour, to grant me some little place in their church where my body may be buried, in consideration of the devotion I have ever entertained for their holy Religious Order: to which Order, in the manner that I have thought would be most to the glory of God, I offer, with the greatest affection, a gift which, though but small, is all that I have. And if a burial-place be refused me in that church, my executors will obtain for me a resting-place in some other church of the Society: and if they are unable to obtain this, let me be buried in some monastery in which, for the love of God, they may be willing to give burial to a poor person like myself; and let my funeral be conducted in accordance with this my poverty. As executors I name Father Richard Walpole, the Vice-Prefect of the English Mission, and the Confessor of the English College in this city, or their successors. After them (and I have named them first from respect to their priestly dignity) I name the Condessa de Miranda, Donna Maria de Zuniga, Donna Maria Gasca, Don Frances de Contreras, Melchior de Molina, and Don Luis de Carrillo e Toledo, Conde de Caracena. First of all I declare that many years ago, when I was with my uncle, I made a vow to God to dedicate all my goods to His glory and greatest service. Then His Divine Majesty gave me large desires and vehement attraction to spend myself above all things for the preservation and advancement of the English Fathers of the Society of Jesus, who sustain that kingdom like strong columns, defend it from an otherwise inevitable ruin, and supply efficacious means of salvation for thousands and thousands of souls. Wherefore I offer them to the most holy Virgin our Lady, I place them under her protection, and I name and leave her universal heir of all my goods.... And I give possession of them henceforward to the most glorious Virgin, and in her name and place to Father Robert Persons, or failing him, to the Father who shall succeed him as Superior of the Mission: but with this condition and obligation, that such goods shall be applied to the founding of a Novitiate of English Religious of the Society of Jesus, in whatever kingdom or part of the world shall seem to Father Persons to be[pg cxcv]to the greater glory of God. But in the case that England shall be brought back to the faith and obedience of the Roman Church, my will is that the said revenue be transferred into that kingdom, for the foundation of a Novitiate of the Society there, unless it shall seem better to Father Persons, for reasons concerning the Catholic religion, to leave the Novitiate beyond the kingdom.”Time was not lost in carrying out the intentions of this pious benefactress.147In 1606, Father Persons obtained possession of a large house in Louvain, which had been inhabited by the Knights of Malta, and thus came to be called St. John's, though the church attached to it was dedicated to St. Gregory the Apostle of England and other Saints. Father More, who lived there with Father Gerard, tells us that it was on high ground commanding the whole city; below was a walled garden, and on the slope of the hill pleasant walks amongst the vines which were ranged in terraces, and the whole, though within the city walls, as quiet and calm as befitted a house of prayer.We do not know exactly the date of Father Gerard's arrival at Louvain, or the office to which he was first appointed there. The letter of the 17th August, 1612, to the General, from which we have already given a large extract concerning Mrs. Vaux, is dated from Louvain. It proceeds with an account of a miraculous cure at the intercession of Father Thomas Garnett, the nephew of the Provincial, who was martyred at Tyburn on the 3rd of June, 1608. This father was the first Novice of St. John's, Louvain. That Noviceship commenced in February, 1607, with six Priests, two Scholastics, and five Lay-brothers, Novices, under Father Thomas Talbot as their Novice Master. In 1614, St. John's received students in philosophy and theology, as well as Novices, when a house in the garden was fitted up for the Novitiate and Father Henry Silisdon was installed in St. John's as Rector of the new College. This arrangement did not last long, for at the end of the year the Novitiate was transferred to Liége. No less than fifteen letters have come down to us written by Father Gerard in the year 1614, addressed to the Prefect of the English Mission, Father Thomas Owen, Rector of the English College at Rome. They treat chiefly of the purchase of the new house at Liége,[pg cxcvi]and the transfer of the Novitiate to that city. Some extracts relating to Father Gerard himself will be found interesting. Some of them are signed John Nelson and others John Tomson. In later years he seems to have been known only by the name of Tomson.The choice of Liége as a residence seems to have been mainly owing to the disquiet caused to the Catholics in the Low Countries by the remonstrances of the English Government. We have some specimens of it in the following extracts, in which we find Father Gerard true to the natural fearlessness of his character.“Concerning148my wariness in avoiding the eyes of spies, I have been all this year more sparing in that kind than divers friends here did think needful, although some one or two did think it dangerous to go any journey, as doubting I might be killed by the way, but this was but according to their accustomed fears with which I have been long acquainted. But, indeed, Father, I am so far from desire to go many journeys, that it is a pain to me to think of going anywhither, and the reason why I never went to any of those places your Reverence mentioneth in this year past (but only the last Lent to Maclin for Mr. Rouse) was not that I thought it dangerous (being known so well to live here public that it cannot be unknown to any spies), nor for that I wanted leave, for I had the other Provincial's particular and willing grant, without my own asking, to go to any place of these countries; but it was because I had rather be at home: and in the town of Lovaine itself, I go not abroad half so much as I think were needful for the contentment of others. I was not at the Teresians, where the Mother of the House (to whom I gave the Exercise four years ago) and Father Scott's149sister do much desire my often coming, any more than once since the last Lent. At the Monastery of St. Monica's, my cousin Shurley hath requested my coming thither for these three or four months, to bestow one afternoon upon her and some younger Nuns whom she hath charge of, that they may altogether ask me what spiritual questions they may like best,[pg cxcvii]and I have never yet found a fit time for it; and, indeed, I doubt I am to blame for it. The gentlemen in the town150I doubt I visit not once in a quarter of a year, and I have some reason to think that either they think me careless of them, or afraid to be seen abroad, as though my case were very dangerous, which would also make them or any other that should come to town more fearful to come into my company, and consequently hinder the little good that I might do with them. But I hope I shall be as wary as your Reverence wisheth, and if this course go forwards of being Rector without the name of Rector, there will be less inconvenience, whosoever see me seeing me still as a private man.”In this he alludes to a plan of his own, that Father Blackfan should have the title of Rector, although he himself had been appointed to the Rectorship of the Novitiate.The next letter is dated April 6, 1614.151“I have yours of the 15th March, and see in that, as in all of yours, your fatherly care of me, which, by the grace of God, I will labour to deserve. I am well satisfied with Father General's order, and shall endeavour to get this building finished for the Novitiate as soon as I can, and then will settle to my book as much as my health and letters will permit.... Having writ thus far, I was called to go to Bruxels with Father Rector (by Father Blacfan's and Father Percy his advice) to speak with the Duke's152Secretary, who telling Father Percy the last week that the Agent did solicit against me, and that he could not well answer him, unless he delivered him some reasons in writing for my innocency, this writing was promised him by Father Percy; but I being loath to have any such writing sent, as thinking it the likeliest means to raise a new persecution against me, though for the Secretary's satisfaction we drew and delivered him a brief note of four or[pg cxcviii]five effectual proofs, yet both to the Secretary first, and afterwards to the Nuncio, I told this day that if any such writing were sent it would do me great harm, for Canterbury having such a writing would doubtless show it at the Council table, and then those lords who secretly do know me to be innocent, and wish me well, will be, as it were, forced to speak against me, lest they should seem to favour me, and so the King should be more incensed. The Nuncio did promise Father Rector and me that he would seriously deal both with the Secretary and the Prince himself in the cause.”Writing under date April 18, 1614,153he shows that he thinks that too much importance had been given to the Agent's interference.“I think your Reverence was made to believe by letters sent about Easter, that there was some new troubles against me here, out of England, and consequently that there was need of such information to the Nuncio and Father Provincial as had been given. But when I heard of it, I said it was nothing but Trumbol his own device, in hope to work upon the weakness of the Prince; and so now it proves, for I am going to the Secretary himself with our Father Rector, as I wrote from Bruxells, and giving him a paper of some few points for my innocency, with the request he would not deliver it, but show it if he would to the Agent. The Secretary answered he would advertise me if it were needful; but since the note was showed unto Trumbol, and he showed to be satisfied with it, and afterwards meeting the Secretary told him that he took it to be only matter of religion; but that being now made matter of State, he, being a servant employed in matter of State, could not but seek to concur with them that employed him, as it were granting that himself was satisfied, and yielding a reason why he had moved the matter. And this being understood both by the Prince and the Nuncio, they were very glad of it.... I write this from Maclin, whither Sir William [Stanley] was desirous to have me come for his comfort now and after the death and funeral of his lady.”But such a man as Father Gerard was not likely to be left in peace in those intriguing times. In the August following, Father[pg cxcix]Silisdon writes to Father Owen.154“Even now I have advice that His Majesty of England hath made two complaints to the Prince, and that the first is against Father Gerard's being in his dominions.”The consequence was that a transfer to another territory became desirable, and Father Gerard set his heart on migrating with his Novices to Liége. He writes from that city, under the signature of John Nelson, Sept. 19, 1614.155“There be many causes to be alleged why here, rather than in any place; as the commodity of dealing with our English in the summer, the opportunity of keeping our Novices unknown, the excellent seat far beyond Lovaine, and that bestowed on us, the present helps sent for this beginning, with great likelihood of much more; the great favour which is to be expected from this Prince and his family, and is to be strengthened by my two cousins, Sir William and Mr. Morton, and Sir William hath written to him that he doth much joy in his cousin who is there to be Rector.”The two cousins of whom Father Gerard here speaks were two very powerful friends. The one was Sir William Stanley, who showed himself a kind friend to Father Gerard and his charge by negotiating the purchase of the property at Liége in his own name, and advancing the purchase money—at least, that portion of it which had to be paid down156—probably (as Father Gerard speaks of the“seat being bestowed upon us”) regarding it as a gift. Whatever else was requisite for the purchase was provided by Brother William Browne, who, though157grandson, brother, and uncle of Viscounts Montague,—his grandfather was Queen Mary's Ambassador to the Holy See—was himself content to spend his life in the humble duties of a Jesuit Lay-brother.The“Mr. Morton”was Sir George Talbot of Grafton, afterwards[pg cc]ninth Earl of Shrewsbury. He was a scholar of some repute,158and an intimate friend of Maximilian, Duke of Bavaria. As Ferdinand, the Prince-Bishop of Liége, was Maximilian's brother, it was no little help to Father Gerard to be on“cousinly”terms with George Talbot. The Duke became a generous benefactor to the new House at Liége. In 1618 he sent Father Gerard, through Sir George Talbot, 5,000 florins for the Noviceship.159In a letter dated Jan. 25, 1620, the Duke writes to Father Gerard, who had promised to pray that he might have a son:“I bound myself once by vow to your Blessed Ignatius, that if he would obtain this favour for me, I would give my son the name of Ignatius, and would build and endow a College of the Society wherever Father General might judge it most useful. What if God should purpose thus to provide for you?”160In July of the same year he wrote:“We have sent you a contribution of 1,300 German florins by Father Mayer for a tabernacle for the Blessed Sacrament, and for a niche for an image of the Blessed Virgin.”Even after Father Gerard's departure from the House, Duke Maximilian's liberality to it did not fail. Father Silisdon, Father Gerard's successor as Master of Novices, removed the Novitiate to Watten,161and not long after the Duke settled a permanent endowment upon the College of Liége, which was begun in the House that Father Gerard had established.Father Gerard's Socius or“Compagnion,”as he calls him,[pg cci]was Father Henry More, subsequently the historian of the Province. When discussing, before his appointment, those Fathers who were fitted for that office, after mentioning others, he says:“Father Nicholson is far short of either of them for my turn, for he is no good Latinist, I think little better than myself, though he be much better scholar; neither hath he any other language but Spanish, of which I shall have small use. Father Henry More hath French well, Dutch prettily, and Italian sufficiently, besides Spanish very well, and Latin as I would wish him.”162As to his first Novices, he had twelve, which made what he styled“a pretty beginning.”163They were“the two that expect at Liége, the two that are come from Rome, and four out of Spain, with Mr. Lewkner and Mr. Whitmore, besides Grafton, when he comes, and a tailor now servant in this house, who by all judgments here is as fit to be received as Brother Silvester, the young tailor now in the Noviceship, is fit to be dismissed.”164Of the two that“expected at Liége,”a previous letter had said,“Here be also Mr. Mansel and Mr. Owen Shelley, by the names of Mr. Griffin and Mr. Titchborn: both expect, the first with some loathness to stay long, the second is wholly resigned. The first is a pious man, and to those that know his fashion will be profitable for some uses in the Society, but the second will be practical and fit for anything, and in truth I think he will do very well.”165This Father Owen Shelley was afterwards Rector of the College of Liége, and justified Father Gerard's judgment of his character.Amongst the“four which are come out of Spain”were two that must have constantly served to remind their Rector at Liége of the Gunpowder Plot, as the remonstrances of King James' Agent had managed to do at Louvain.“One of them,”he says,“is akin to Father Garnett, and of his name, though we call him Gilford, as he was called at St. Omers. William Ellis, but we call him John Williams, for he was page166to Sir[pg ccii]Everard Digby, and taken with him, though he might have escaped, for his master offered him horse and money to shift for himself, but the youth said he would live and die with him; and so, being taken, was condemned at Stafford, and should have been executed. He was offered to have his life if he would go to their church, which he refused. In the end they saved him and some others. He never [yielded] in the least point. He hath good friends near Sir Everard Digby's whom I know, and he is heir to 80l.a year, if his father do him right.”167At the close of this short notice of Father Gerard's Rectorship it will be but right to record an unfavourable judgment passed upon him, as it will help us to form a true appreciation of his character. It is the only instance that has come down to us of blame on the part of one of his own brethren.“I see a general fear in all ours, those of best judgment, of the success of Father Nelson's government, and unless he hath a companion that may moderate him, his zeal will, I fear, carry him too far; and I fear it so much the more because I see him loath to have anybody with him who is likely to propose anything to him contrary to his own zealous desires.”This is in a confidential letter168from Father Silisdon to Father Owen, dated Oct. 31, 1614, so that, as it was written before the transfer to Liége, it was a misgiving lest he should be indiscreet as a Rector, rather than a judgment on his actual conduct as a Superior.XXIX.During his residence at Liége, amongst Father Gerard's correspondents were two venerable servants of God, Robert Cardinal Bellarmine, and Father Luis de la Puente, better known by the Latinized form of his name, de Ponte. As by a man's friends we can obtain an insight into his character, we have thought it desirable to give the few letters from these two holy men to Father Gerard that have come down to us. Cardinal Bellarmine's autograph is preserved at Stonyhurst.169We translate the letter from the original Latin.[pg cciii]“Very Rev. and beloved Father in Christ,—I have received your Reverence's letter dated from Liége the 23rd November, with the little presents inclosed in it, an English knife, a little case (either bone or ivory, I do not know which), and three small toothpicks. I do not know whether these were sent me for use, or as having some special meaning. Whichever it be they were welcome, as a proof of friendship and brotherhood.“The memory of that excellent Mr. Oliver,170whose acquaintance I made very late, has brought me no little sadness, or rather grief, not on his account, who is translated from this world to the joys of Paradise, but for the sake of many whom without doubt he would have converted to a good life if Divine Providence had permitted him to live awhile longer. But the good pleasure of God must ever be fulfilled, and the very same, in order that it may be fulfilled, must ever be pleasing to us under all circumstances.“I was pleased to read what your Reverence relates in your[pg cciv]letter of your journeys; of your office of Master of Novices; of the building which you have bought at Liége; of the visitation of His Serene Highness Ferdinand, the Prince-Bishop of Liége, and of the promise that the Priory, at its next vacancy, shall be applied to the College. If my assistance in carrying this out can be of any use to you with the Pope, it shall not be wanting.“Of Dr. Singleton I have heard much, and have defended him to the best of my power, as long as I could, but the party opposed to him has prevailed. Nor do I see how I can help him at so great a distance, and especially as I should be suspected, because I am a Jesuit. The devil is envious of the harmony between the English at Douay and the Fathers of the Society, for which the good Cardinal Allen cared so much; but all means must be tried to re-establish a true and sincere friendship, and agreement in teaching; otherwise a kingdom divided against itself shall be brought to desolation. For many reasons I say freely that nothing can be done by me in his behalf; first, as I was just saying, because I should be under suspicion, being a Jesuit. Then because I am an old man of seven-and-seventy years of age, and I daily expect the dissolution of my tabernacle. Thirdly, because I cannot think of any manner in which I could help him. The common way of helping men of this sort is to give them ecclesiastical benefices, but here in Rome the multitude of those who aspire to and seek after such benefits is so great that their number is almost infinite. Nor are they only Italians, but Spaniards also, Frenchmen, Germans, who look for nothing but benefices at Rome. I myself, who was thought to have some influence with the Pope, have laboured for more than ten years for a Spaniard, an excellent man and a great friend of mine, to obtain for him a good benefice falling vacant in his own country. I could say the same of Flemish and German friends of mine. What then would be the case with English people, in whose country there are no ecclesiastical benefices for Catholics? But, since these temporal things are nothing when compared to eternal benefices, our friend Dr. Singleton must not be cast down if our Lord treats him now, as of old He treated His Apostles, who He willed should enter into the Kingdom of Heaven through many tribulations. But I must not be too lengthy, for I know[pg ccv]that both he and your Reverence stand in no need of my exhortations. I know that your Reverence will have hard work to read my bad writing, but Father Coffin171would have it that I should write to you with my own hand.“With this I bid your Reverence farewell. Commend me to the prayers of Dr. Singleton, and of all your College; but your Reverence's self especially, for our old friendship and brotherhood, must diligently commend me to the Lord our God.“From Rome, on Christmas Day, December 25, 1618.172“Your Reverence's brother and servant in Christ,“Robert Card. Bellarmine.”“To the Very Rev. Father John Tomson, S.J.,“Rector of the College of the English Novices at Liége.”The two letters which have come down to us, addressed to Father Gerard by the venerable Father Luis de la Puente, were written just as his residence173at Liége was drawing to a close. We translate from Father Grene's transcript of the originals.174“I. H. S.“P.C.“When I received your Reverence's letters, I was unable to answer them at once, for I was suffering from extreme weakness, which usually afflicts me every year all through the winter. Blessed be our great God, from Whose providence come health and sickness, life and death, and whatever prosperity and adversity there is in this world. The height of felicity in this life is to be[pg ccvi]superior to all these things, seeking only God's good pleasure in all things, for life in His will, and health, honour, happiness, spiritual progress, and all sanctity consist in the fulfilment of the will of God: and so every day I would that at every breath I could say, May Thy most holy and most sweet will be done in me, concerning me, and by me and about me, in all things and by all things, now and always and for ever. Amen.175God always pours His spirit of prayer into those who so submit their will to His; wherefore the Psalmist says—‘Be subject unto the Lord and pray to Him,’for when any one with prompt obedience and entire resignation humbly submits himself to God, God Himself, Who does the will of those that fear Him, in a certain way is made subject to him, so that He does whatever is asked, God becoming obedient to the voice of a man—not of any man soever, but of the man who obeys God. Oh, wonderful power of prayer and of obedience! Let us pray, my Father, that we may be perfectly obedient, and let us obey, that we may be able to pray, and to speak worthily with God.“It will help wonderfully both one and the other, to meditate profoundly on these two things: to wit, Who God is in Himself, and what He is towards us, and then what we are of ourselves, and what towards God. For whilst I think of God, His Trinity and Unity, most beautiful, most wise, most holy, most full of love for me, immense and everywhere present, the fountain of all good things that are in me and beyond me, from Whom I myself depend, and all that is mine, and everything that I use and enjoy, how can I do otherwise than love Him with all my strength? How shall I not praise Him and thank Him constantly? How shall I not give my whole self to His service? And these affections become the more ardent as I ponder that I have nothing of myself; that I am nothing, and that I and all that is mine would be reduced to nothing unless I were preserved by Him. Now whilst, within this immensity of God, I consider what I have been and what I am towards Him, I am horrified and tremble as I ponder on my malice, my ingratitude, my slothfulness.[pg ccvii]Hence arise feelings of hatred of self, of humiliation and self-denial, and various acts and exercises of penance, which not only nourish humility by which a man, through a truthful knowledge of himself, becomes vile to himself, but they also arouse a most ardent charity by which he loves his Supreme Benefactor, Who has conferred and still confers so many and such great benefits on one who is ungrateful and unworthy. Thus the mind is elevated to perfect contemplation and union with God Himself, and, as it were forgetful of itself, is immersed in Him, or rather God hides it in the concealment of His countenance from all disturbance of men.“Here is a short epitome of my mystical theology, which I have put out at rather greater length in my book; but why should I teach these things to a doctor of others and my own master? Surely I have become foolish, but your letters compelled me. Would that you would help me by your prayers, that what I write in my letters I may perform in deed. Forgive my humble and poor style, for I know not any more elegant; but I am sure that you do not care for words, but for the sense that is in the words. I value very highly the cross which you have sent me, and I will always bear it with me. I hope, by the intercession of the Blessed Virgin, who appeared in that tree,176and who confers such benefits on those who are there and those who visit her, that I may be a partaker of those benefits, for though I am absent in the body I am present in spirit.“I humbly commend myself to the Holy Sacrifices of your Reverence.“Your Reverence's unworthy servant in Christ,“[Cross]Ludovicus de Ponte.[Cross]“Valladolid, March 23, 1621.Postscript—“By God's help I have finished a great work. Its title is,Expositio Moralis in Canticum Canticorum, containing exhortations on all the mysteries and virtues of the Christian religion. It is divided into two volumes, and each volume into five books. The arrangement is new and singular, but not without[pg ccviii]foundation in the Sacred Text. The matter is grave in itself, and very copious, taken out of Holy Scripture and the holy Fathers. The style is humble, but clear and chaste, and not out of harmony with matter that is spiritual and sacred, and therefore elevated. It is printed at Paris, and will soon reach Germany and Belgium. Would that it may be to the glory of God, the edification of the Church, and of use to one's neighbour.”The other letter from the same Father was written in reply to one from Father Gerard announcing that he was about to leave Belgium.“I. H. S.“P.C.“May the Almighty and most pitiful Lord accompany you in the journey that you begin, for with such a Guide and Companion you will be everywhere safe and cheerful, and making true progress. Let Him ever dwell in your memory, understanding, and will, for His most sweet providence especially protects those who make their journeys from obedience to Superiors, as Jacob did, who at his father's bidding journeyed through the desert into Mesopotamia, where he heard the voice of the Lord, which said to him,‘I will be thy Keeper whithersoever thou goest.’Trusting to this hope, and protected by this guardianship, you will happily fulfil what you have begun.“I commend myself to your Reverence's Sacrifices and prayers, for my weakness oppresses me much; but may the will of God be done in me and about me in all things and by all things, to Whom concerning all things be glory for ever. Amen.“[Cross]Ludovicus de la Puente.[Cross]“Valladolid, Feb. 2, 1622.”With these saintly words our materials for writing the life of Father John Gerard abruptly fail us. Beyond what has been recorded we only know that he was sent first to Spain, and then to Rome, which he reached Jan. 15, 1623.177He was Confessor to the English College till his death, July 27, 1637, at the ripe age of seventy-three, and upwards.[pg ccix]XXX.In this Autobiography Father Gerard has laid before us his life in all the freedom and unreserve of a confidential communication with his Religious brethren and Superiors. It is not possible, we are convinced, for any impartial person to rise from its perusal without a deep conviction that Father Gerard was a gentleman and a Christian, a man of honour and religious principle; and in many cases this sense of his integrity will be accompanied with some of that personal regard and affection with which he inspired those who lived in intimacy with him. He bore too much for principle, and made too great sacrifices, for us to think that he would deliberately and perseveringly commit sin to free himself from blame. Yet this is the supposition that is involved in an attack upon his veracity in the compilation of his Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot.It is quite true that he, and many others, considered themselves justified, when their own lives or those of innocent persons were at stake, in the use of assertions that were simple falsehoods in the ordinary sense of the terms employed. These they called equivocations; and we find no trace in the period of which we are writing of the modern sense of the word, that is, of a true expression which is really beside the point, though it is so employed that it is very unlikely to be seen to be so by the person to whom it is addressed, who thus is said rather to be suffered to deceive himself than to be deceived. Practically the distinction is hard to draw, and it has the disadvantage of seeming to make the morality of the expression depend on the quickness and readiness of the person in danger, who may be able to think of phrases containing a real ambiguity but which yet would throw the hearers off the right scent.According to modern feeling, Father Gerard would have been quite justified in examining the trees and hedges in search of a falcon178he had not lost, and inquiring of all he met whether they had heard the tinkling of the bird's bells, although it was to make them think that he had lost a falcon, in other words, to deceive[pg ccx]them; but by the same modern feeling he would be held to be guilty of a lie when he said that he was the servant of a lord in a neighbouring county, though he might, without guilt, have worn that lord's livery as a disguise if he could have obtained it, which would have been a more effectual deception than any words.Again, according to modern judgment, John Lilly would be held guilty of a lie when he said179of Gerard's books and manuscripts,“They are mine;”but quite guiltless when, with the same intention of making the magistrates believe him to be a Priest when he was not, he said,“I do not say I am a Priest, that is for you to prove.”Yet the latter expression was far more likely to deceive than the former. It was more like what a Priest, under the circumstances, would have said. Present feeling would condemn him of a lie for saying simply, that the books were his, when it would acquit him if he had thought of using far more deceptive expressions, such as“I am not bound to compromise myself by saying whose they are.”The only difference between modern morality and that on which Father Gerard acted was that now-a-days men say,“Have recourse to evasions.”Then men said,“Say what you like, it is their fault if they think it true.”It is evident that of the two courses of proceeding, the plain-spoken old way is the least open to abuse. No one certainly would have recourse to it excepting from a well-weighed plea of a sorrowful necessity. Whereas, on the other hand, evasions are not startling, and the conscience may lay but little stress on the presence or absence of justifying circumstances. For it is most necessary to bear seriously in mind that all Catholic divines then held, and now hold, that to make use of equivocation excepting under those peculiar circumstances that make it lawful, is in itself a sin, and thus no escape from the sin of lying. So Father Garnett plainly said when on his trial,180“As I say it is never lawful to equivocate in matters of faith, so also in matters of human conversation, it may not be used promiscually or at our pleasure, as in matters of contract, in matters of testimony, or before a competent judge, or[pg ccxi]to the prejudice of any third person: in which cases we judge it altogether unlawful.”It is but fair that, in reading the narrative of times when many lives hung on successful disguise and concealment, we should remember that the modern sense of equivocation was then unknown. Protestant moralists have spoken out their minds plainly enough on this subject.“Great English authors, Jeremy Taylor, Milton, Paley, Johnson, men of very distinct schools of thought, distinctly say that under certain extreme circumstances it is allowable to tell a lie. Taylor says:‘To tell a lie for charity, to save a man's life, the life of a friend, of a husband, of a prince, of a useful and a public person, hath not only been done at all times, but commended by great and wise and good men. Who would not save his father's life, at the charge of a harmless lie, from persecutors or tyrants?’Again, Milton says:‘What man in his senses would deny that there are those whom we have the best ground for considering that we ought to deceive, as boys, madmen, the sick, the intoxicated, enemies, men in error, thieves? I would ask, by which of the Commandments is lying forbidden? You will say, by the ninth. If then my lie does not injure my neighbour, certainly it is not forbidden by this Commandment.’Paley says:‘There are falsehoods which are not lies, that is, which are not criminal.’Johnson:‘The general rule is, that truth should never be violated; there must, however, be some exceptions. If, for instance, a murderer should ask you which way a man is gone.’”181Thislanguagewould not have been used by Catholics. With them the word“lie”signified a simple falsehood; and an“equivocation”was a false expression used under such circumstances that if they to whom it was addressed were deceived by it,[pg ccxii]it was their own fault. They had then no right to the truth, and even in some cases it would have been a sin to tell them the truth.In substance, however, though not in form, the doctrine of Gerard, Southwell, and Garnett, was the same as that of Taylor, Milton, and Johnson. But to confine ourselves to the practice of Father Gerard, this doctrine is not necessary for his defence, and if his conduct be fairly examined, he will be held, even from the modern point of view, to have done no wrong. Protestant moralists, as we have seen, permit men under certain circumstances to tell a lie with intent to deceive. And Catholic moralists permit under such circumstances assertions which would lead the hearers to deceive themselves by neglecting to advert to the limit of the speaker's obligation to tell the truth. But with regard to Father Gerard's legal interrogations, we may waive the question whether they are right or wrong in their morality, for we see clearly that he so expressed himself as to show that his words were not intended to be believed.The real parallel to them, alleged by Gerard himself, as we shall shortly see, is the prisoner's usual plea of“Not guilty.”This is the only form in which thequestionis now put to a person accused. But in those days the question was put over and over again, and in every variety of form. To deny was really to plead“Not guilty,”and if this be lawful once, it was lawful whenever they were forced to repeat it. Not only was it a capital offence to be a Priest within the realm, but it was high treason to be reconciled to the Church, or absolved by a Priest, or to harbour or comfort one. Thus the interrogations addressed to prisoners were always intended to make them criminate themselves or others; that is, in the one case to cause them to plead guilty, so that they might be condemned to death on their own confessions; or, in the other case, to force them to become Queen's evidence, and be accessory to the infliction upon others of the extremest penalties enacted by an unjust law.The first instance that occurs in Father Gerard's Life, is that when, after his apprehension, on being questioned he declared that he was quite unacquainted with the family of the Wisemans, and those who were examining him betrayed their informer[pg ccxiii]by crying out,“What lies you tell! Did you not say so-and-so before such a lady as you read your servant's letter?”Then he adds,“But I still denied it,giving them good reasons however why, even if it had been true, I could and ought to have denied it.”182Another time183he was confronted with three servants of Lord Henry Seymour, who avouched that he had dined with their mistress and her sister, the Lady Mary Percy, that it was in Lent, and they told how their mistress ate meat, while Lady Mary and Father Gerard ate nothing but fish.“Young flung this charge in my teeth with an air of triumph, as though I could not help acknowledging it, and thereby disclosing some of my acquaintances. I answered that I did not know the men whom he had brought up.“‘But we know you,’said they,‘to be the same that was at such a place on such a day.’“‘You wrong your mistress,’said I,‘in saying so. I, however, will not so wrong her.’“‘What a barefaced fellow you are!’exclaimed Young.“‘Doubtless,’I answered,‘were these men's statements true.As for me, I cannot in conscience speak positively in the matter, for reasons that I have often alleged; let them look to the truth and justice of what they say.’”A third instance is the interview184between Father Gerard and the widow Wiseman, in the presence of the Dean of Westminster, Topcliffe, and others.“They wanted to see if she recognized me. So when I came into the room where they brought me, I found her already there. When she saw me coming in with the gaolers, she almost jumped for joy; but she controlled herself, and said to them:‘Is that the person you spoke of? I do not know him; but he looks like a Priest.’“Upon this she made me a very low reverence, and I bowed in return. Then they asked me if I did not recognize her?“I answered:‘I do not recognize her.At the same time, you know this is my usual way of answering, and I will never mention any places, or give the names of any persons that are known to me(which this lady, however, is not);because to do[pg ccxiv]so, as I have told you before, would be contrary both to justice and charity.’”Lastly, when examined185by the Attorney General, after having received a letter from Father Garnett, warning him to prepare himself for death, and after having freely confessed that he was a Priest and a Jesuit, and that he had reconciled others to the Pope, and drawn them away from the faith and religious profession which was approved in England,“answers,”he says himself,“which furnished quite sufficient matter for my condemnation, according to their laws,”and after having denied that he had meddled in political matters; his examination proceeded as follows.“Hereupon Mr. Attorney kept silence for a time, and then he began afresh to ask me what Catholics I knew; did I know such-and-such? I answered,‘I do not know them.’And I added the usual reasons why I should still make the same answer even if I did know them.186Upon this, he digressed to the question of equivocation, and began to inveigh against Father Southwell, because on his trial he denied that he knew the woman who was brought forward to accuse him.187She swore that he had come to her father's house and was received there as a Priest; this he positively denied, though he had been taken in that house and was found in a hiding-place, having been betrayed by this wretched woman. (A dutiful daughter truly, who thus betrayed to death both her spiritual and her natural father! Christ our Lord, however, came not to send peace, but a sword to divide between the good and the bad; and in this case he divided the bad daughter from the good parents.) Good Father Southwell, then, though he marvelled at the impudence of this miserable wench, yet denied what she asserted, andgave good reasons for his denial, well knowing and solidly proving that it was not lawful for him[pg ccxv]to do otherwise, lest he should add to the injury of those who were already suffering for the Faith, and for charity shown to him. Taking this occasion, therefore, he showed very learnedly that it was lawful in some cases, nay, even necessary perhaps, to use equivocation; which doctrine he established and confirmed by strong arguments and copious authorities, drawn as well from Holy Scripture as from the writings of the Doctors of the Church.“The Attorney General inveighed much against this, and tried to make out that this was to foster lying, and so destroy all reliable communications between men, and, therefore, all bonds of society. I, on the other hand, maintained that this was not falsehood, nor supposed an intention of deceiving, which is necessary to constitute a lie, but merely a keeping back of the truth, and that where one is not bound to declare it: consequently there is no deception, because nothing is refused which the other has a right to claim. I showed, moreover, that our doctrine did no way involve a destruction of the bonds of society, because the use of equivocation is never allowed in making contracts, since all are bound to give their neighbour his due, and in making of contracts truth is due to the party contracting. It should be remarked also, I said, that it is not allowed to use equivocation in ordinary conversation to the detriment of plain truth and Christian simplicity, much less in matters properly falling under the cognizance of civil authority,188since it is not lawful to deny even a capital crime if the accused is questioned juridically. He asked me, therefore, what I considered a juridical questioning. I answered that the questioners must be really superiors and judges in the matter under examination; then, the matter itself must be some crime hurtful to the common weal, in order that it may come under their jurisdiction; for sins merely internal were reserved for God's judgment. Again, there must be some trustworthy testimony brought against the accused; thus, it is the custom in England that all who are put[pg ccxvi]on their trial, when first asked by the Judge if they are guilty or not, answer,‘Not guilty,’before any witness is brought against them, or any verdict found by the jury; and though they answer the same way, whether really guilty or not, yet no one accuses them of lying. Therefore I laid down this general principle, that no one is allowed to use equivocation except in the case when something is asked him, either actually or virtually, which the questioner has no right to ask, and the declaration of which will turn to his own hurt, if he answers according to the intention of the questioner. I showed that this had been our Lord's practice, and that of the Saints. I showed that it was the practice of all prudent men, and would certainly be followed by my interrogators themselves in case they were asked about some secret sin, for example, or were asked by robbers where their money was hid.“They asked me, therefore, when our Lord ever made use of equivocations; to which I replied,‘When He told His Apostles that no one knew the Day of Judgment, not even the Son of Man; and again, when He said that He was not going up to the Festival at Jerusalem, and yet He went; yea, and He knew that He should go when He said He would not.’“Wade here interrupted me, saying,‘Christ really did not know the Day of Judgment, as Son of Man.’“‘It cannot be,’said I,‘that the Word of God Incarnate, and with a human nature hypostatically united to God, should be subject to ignorance; nor that He Who was appointed Judge by God the Father should be ignorant of those facts which belonged necessarily to His office; nor that He should be of infinite wisdom, and yet not know what intimately concerned Himself.’In fact, these heretics do not practically admit what the Apostle teaches (though they boast of following his doctrines), namely, that all the fulness of the Divinity resided corporally in Christ, and that in Him were all the treasures of the wisdom and knowledge of God. It did not, however, occur to me at the moment to adduce this passage of St. Paul.”In every one of these instances words are carefully introduced to show that the denials in question were uttered not with the intent of deceiving the hearers (though even that, according to[pg ccxvii]the grave Protestant authorities recently quoted, would have been lawful), nor of allowing them to deceive themselves if they did not choose to advert to the circumstances in which the denials were made (as Catholic divines would have permitted);189but avowedly in order that they might not be available as legal evidence against the speaker or his friends.To Father Gerard's defence of himself it may be as well to add that of Father Southwell,190who was assailed by Sir Edward Coke.“The Father would have spoken further on this point [obedience to the laws] had they not attacked him on another,”[pg ccxviii]objecting to him a statement of Anne Bellamy's, who deposed that Father Robert had instructed her, that if asked by searchers or persecutors if there was a Priest in the house, she could say“No,”though she knew there was one: nay, that if asked on oath, she could swear there was not. No sooner was this brought out than the Judges and officers of the court showed themselves highly scandalized, and were for stopping their ears:191as if, forsooth, the seeking for Catholic Priests to put them to a traitor's death, or force them to apostatize, were a proceeding so clearly and so indubitably just, as to make it as clearly and indubitably unjust to hide them from such an ordeal, or to deny them to their pursuers: nor, indeed, would the harm be confined to the cruel execution of the Priest, but with him the whole of the family in whose house he was found would be liable to the same death of traitors. Coke, therefore, the Attorney General, made the most he could of this matter, insisting that such a pernicious doctrine tended to destroy all truth, and all reliance of men in each other's veracity, and if allowed to prevail, would upset all good government. Topcliffe also inveighed against it so exorbitantly, that Judge Popham silenced him. Father Robert then, as soon as he was allowed to reply, explained briefly what he had said to the witness, whose statement was not altogether exact, and addressing the Judge, said:“‘If you will have the patience to listen to me, I shall be able to prove to you from the Holy Scriptures, from the Fathers, from theologians, and from reason, that in case a demand is made against justice and with the view of doing grievous harm to an innocent person, to give an answer not according to the intent of the questioner is no offence against either the divine law or the natural law. Nay, I will prove that this doctrine in no wise threatens the good government of states and kingdoms: and that, where the other necessary conditions of an oath are present, there is nothing wrong in confirming such an answer in that manner. Now I ask you, Mr. Attorney, Supposing the[pg ccxix]King of France (which God forbid) were to invade this country successfully, and having obtained full possession of this city, were to make search for Her Majesty the Queen, whom you knew to be hidden in a secret apartment of the palace: supposing, moreover, that you were seized in the palace and brought before the King, and that he asked you where the Queen was, and would receive no profession of ignorance from you except on oath: what would you do? To palter or hesitate is to show that she is there: to refuse to swear is equivalent to a betrayal. What would you answer? I suppose, forsooth, you would point out the place! Yet who of all who now hear me would not cry out upon you for a traitor? You would then, if you had any sense, swear at once, either that you knew not where she was, or that you knew she was not in the palace, in order that your knowledge might not become instrumental to her harm. Of this kind, in fact, was the answer of Christ in the Gospel, when He said that concerning the Day of Judgment no one had any knowledge, neither the Angels in Heaven, nor the Son: that is, according to the interpretation of the Fathers, such knowledge that He could communicate to others. Now this is the condition of Catholics in England: they are in peril of their liberty, their fortunes, and their lives, if they should have a Priest in their houses. How can it be forbidden them to escape these evils by an equivocal answer, and to confirm this answer, if necessary, by an oath? For in such a case, three things must be remembered: first, that a wrong is done unless you swear; secondly, that no one is obliged to answer everybody's questions about everything; thirdly, that an oath is always lawful, if made with truth, with judgment, and with justice, all which are found in this case.’192“He went on to exemplify his position by supposed queries of robbers and highwaymen; but he was interrupted by abuse.”[pg ccxx]Father Garnett has defended himself at sufficient length in his speech on his trial;193but as he there refers to his previous answers, we have thought it best to give insertion here to an autograph paper of his preserved in the Public Record Office.194“Concerning equivocation, which I seemed to condemn in moral things, my meaning was in moral and human conversation, in which the virtue of verity is required among friends, for otherwise it were injurious to all humanity. Neither is equivocation at all to be justified, but in case of necessary defence from injustice or wrong, or the obtaining some good of great importance, when there is no danger of harm to others, as in the case of Coventry,195wherein I suppose it is a great advantage to me for to be admitted, and no harm can ensue to the city. For the city seeketh nothing but to be free from the sickness, and if it were possible that the city knew me to be free of certainty, they would admit me presently, which is confirmed by the custom of places beyond [sea], where, though they know a man to come from a place infected, yet after they have kept him in some several place, with convenient diet, for forty days, they admit him.“As for Mr. Tresham's equivocation, I am loath to judge; yet I think ignorance might excuse him, because he might think it lawful in that case to equivocate for the excuse of his friend, yet would I be loath to allow of it or practise it: he being not then urged, but voluntarily offering it himself, contrary to that which he had before set down, and especially being in case of manifest treason, as I will after explain. But in case a man be urged at the hour of his death, it is lawful for to equivocate,with such due circumstances as are required in his life. An example we may bring in another matter. For the divines hold that in some cases a man may be bound to concealsomething in his confession, because of some great harm which may ensue of it. And as he may do so in his life, so may he at his death, if the danger of the harm continue still.“The case being propounded, supposing that I knew Gerard[pg ccxxi]acquainted with this treason, and having been often demanded thereof, I still denying it, by way of equivocation, whether at the hour of my death, either natural or by course of justice, I may by equivocation seek to clear him again.“I answer, that in case I be not urged I may not, but I must leave the matter in case in which it stand; but if I be urged, then I may clear him by equivocation, whereas otherwise my silence would be accounted an accusation. But all this I understand when the case is such that I am bound to conceal Gerard's treason, as if I had heard it in confession. For this is a general rule, that in cases of true and manifest treason,196a man is bound voluntarily in utter and very truth by no way to equivocate, if he know it not by way of confession, in which case also he is bound to seek all lawful ways to discover,salvo sigillo.“Henry Garnett.“29° Martii.“All the Doctors that hold equivocation to be lawful do maintain that it is not lawful when the examinate is bound to tell the simple truth, that is, according to the civil law, when there is a competent judge, and the cause subject to his jurisdiction, and sufficient proofs. But in case of treason a man is bound to confess of another without any witness at all, yea, voluntarily to disclose it; not so of himself.[pg ccxxii]“And how far the common law bindeth in cases that are not treason a man to confess of himself, I know not. In the civil law, it is sufficient to havesemiplenam probationem, that is,unum testem omni exceptione majorem, ormanifesta indicia.“Our law I take to be more mild, and that a man may put all to witnesses without confessing, except in cases of treason. For, according to our law,non pervertitur judicium tacendo vel negando, as in the civil law, where is requiredreus confitens. But generally, when a man is bound to confess, there is no place of equivocation. And when he is not bound to confess according to the laws of each country, then may he equivocate.”In the last paper Father Garnett is not speaking of equivocation used in defence of an innocent person, but of what we may call the persistent plea of“Not guilty,”and he there draws an interesting distinction between the Roman civil law and our own, which he calls“more mild,”in that it professed to regard a prisoner as innocent till he is proved to be guilty. Happily this is our practice now, as well as our profession, and our quotations are needed to enable us to form judgments of conduct in times that have happily passed away.But with regard to the trustworthiness of Father John Gerard's evidence, as we have it before us in his Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot, even if the lawfulness of his proceedings were not admitted, all that we are concerned to show is, that untrue statements, made by a man under circumstances which, rightly or wrongly, he considers to justify him in making them, furnish no presumption whatever that, under other circumstances, affording to his conscience no such justification, his word cannot be trusted. It is an evident instance of the maxim that the exception proves the rule. Restraining himself carefully within the limits of what he held to be lawful under circumstances of extreme difficulty and great personal danger, are we not rather to conclude that, under far less pressure, he will as carefully confine himself to the laws imposed by his conscience? Clearly there is nothing in Father Gerard's practice under examination to cause us to hesitate in placing implicit trust in his word when he speaks as an historian; and, in addition, we are sure that no one will rise[pg ccxxiii]from the perusal of the exculpatory letters which we propose to subjoin, without a full conviction of his innocence and truthfulness.

XXVIII.To this Novitiate at Louvain we now turn, as it was thither that Father Gerard was next sent. It was the foundation of Donna Luisa de Carvajal, who by her will146dated Valladolid, Dec. 22, 1604, left 12,000 ducats for the establishment of an English Novitiate. The document is an admirable specimen of true Spanish devotion and humility. After commending her soul to[pg cxciv]God by the intercession of our Blessed Lady, she proceeds—“For the love of God I humbly pray the Superiors of the Society of Jesus and the Præpositus of the Professed House, as a favour, to grant me some little place in their church where my body may be buried, in consideration of the devotion I have ever entertained for their holy Religious Order: to which Order, in the manner that I have thought would be most to the glory of God, I offer, with the greatest affection, a gift which, though but small, is all that I have. And if a burial-place be refused me in that church, my executors will obtain for me a resting-place in some other church of the Society: and if they are unable to obtain this, let me be buried in some monastery in which, for the love of God, they may be willing to give burial to a poor person like myself; and let my funeral be conducted in accordance with this my poverty. As executors I name Father Richard Walpole, the Vice-Prefect of the English Mission, and the Confessor of the English College in this city, or their successors. After them (and I have named them first from respect to their priestly dignity) I name the Condessa de Miranda, Donna Maria de Zuniga, Donna Maria Gasca, Don Frances de Contreras, Melchior de Molina, and Don Luis de Carrillo e Toledo, Conde de Caracena. First of all I declare that many years ago, when I was with my uncle, I made a vow to God to dedicate all my goods to His glory and greatest service. Then His Divine Majesty gave me large desires and vehement attraction to spend myself above all things for the preservation and advancement of the English Fathers of the Society of Jesus, who sustain that kingdom like strong columns, defend it from an otherwise inevitable ruin, and supply efficacious means of salvation for thousands and thousands of souls. Wherefore I offer them to the most holy Virgin our Lady, I place them under her protection, and I name and leave her universal heir of all my goods.... And I give possession of them henceforward to the most glorious Virgin, and in her name and place to Father Robert Persons, or failing him, to the Father who shall succeed him as Superior of the Mission: but with this condition and obligation, that such goods shall be applied to the founding of a Novitiate of English Religious of the Society of Jesus, in whatever kingdom or part of the world shall seem to Father Persons to be[pg cxcv]to the greater glory of God. But in the case that England shall be brought back to the faith and obedience of the Roman Church, my will is that the said revenue be transferred into that kingdom, for the foundation of a Novitiate of the Society there, unless it shall seem better to Father Persons, for reasons concerning the Catholic religion, to leave the Novitiate beyond the kingdom.”Time was not lost in carrying out the intentions of this pious benefactress.147In 1606, Father Persons obtained possession of a large house in Louvain, which had been inhabited by the Knights of Malta, and thus came to be called St. John's, though the church attached to it was dedicated to St. Gregory the Apostle of England and other Saints. Father More, who lived there with Father Gerard, tells us that it was on high ground commanding the whole city; below was a walled garden, and on the slope of the hill pleasant walks amongst the vines which were ranged in terraces, and the whole, though within the city walls, as quiet and calm as befitted a house of prayer.We do not know exactly the date of Father Gerard's arrival at Louvain, or the office to which he was first appointed there. The letter of the 17th August, 1612, to the General, from which we have already given a large extract concerning Mrs. Vaux, is dated from Louvain. It proceeds with an account of a miraculous cure at the intercession of Father Thomas Garnett, the nephew of the Provincial, who was martyred at Tyburn on the 3rd of June, 1608. This father was the first Novice of St. John's, Louvain. That Noviceship commenced in February, 1607, with six Priests, two Scholastics, and five Lay-brothers, Novices, under Father Thomas Talbot as their Novice Master. In 1614, St. John's received students in philosophy and theology, as well as Novices, when a house in the garden was fitted up for the Novitiate and Father Henry Silisdon was installed in St. John's as Rector of the new College. This arrangement did not last long, for at the end of the year the Novitiate was transferred to Liége. No less than fifteen letters have come down to us written by Father Gerard in the year 1614, addressed to the Prefect of the English Mission, Father Thomas Owen, Rector of the English College at Rome. They treat chiefly of the purchase of the new house at Liége,[pg cxcvi]and the transfer of the Novitiate to that city. Some extracts relating to Father Gerard himself will be found interesting. Some of them are signed John Nelson and others John Tomson. In later years he seems to have been known only by the name of Tomson.The choice of Liége as a residence seems to have been mainly owing to the disquiet caused to the Catholics in the Low Countries by the remonstrances of the English Government. We have some specimens of it in the following extracts, in which we find Father Gerard true to the natural fearlessness of his character.“Concerning148my wariness in avoiding the eyes of spies, I have been all this year more sparing in that kind than divers friends here did think needful, although some one or two did think it dangerous to go any journey, as doubting I might be killed by the way, but this was but according to their accustomed fears with which I have been long acquainted. But, indeed, Father, I am so far from desire to go many journeys, that it is a pain to me to think of going anywhither, and the reason why I never went to any of those places your Reverence mentioneth in this year past (but only the last Lent to Maclin for Mr. Rouse) was not that I thought it dangerous (being known so well to live here public that it cannot be unknown to any spies), nor for that I wanted leave, for I had the other Provincial's particular and willing grant, without my own asking, to go to any place of these countries; but it was because I had rather be at home: and in the town of Lovaine itself, I go not abroad half so much as I think were needful for the contentment of others. I was not at the Teresians, where the Mother of the House (to whom I gave the Exercise four years ago) and Father Scott's149sister do much desire my often coming, any more than once since the last Lent. At the Monastery of St. Monica's, my cousin Shurley hath requested my coming thither for these three or four months, to bestow one afternoon upon her and some younger Nuns whom she hath charge of, that they may altogether ask me what spiritual questions they may like best,[pg cxcvii]and I have never yet found a fit time for it; and, indeed, I doubt I am to blame for it. The gentlemen in the town150I doubt I visit not once in a quarter of a year, and I have some reason to think that either they think me careless of them, or afraid to be seen abroad, as though my case were very dangerous, which would also make them or any other that should come to town more fearful to come into my company, and consequently hinder the little good that I might do with them. But I hope I shall be as wary as your Reverence wisheth, and if this course go forwards of being Rector without the name of Rector, there will be less inconvenience, whosoever see me seeing me still as a private man.”In this he alludes to a plan of his own, that Father Blackfan should have the title of Rector, although he himself had been appointed to the Rectorship of the Novitiate.The next letter is dated April 6, 1614.151“I have yours of the 15th March, and see in that, as in all of yours, your fatherly care of me, which, by the grace of God, I will labour to deserve. I am well satisfied with Father General's order, and shall endeavour to get this building finished for the Novitiate as soon as I can, and then will settle to my book as much as my health and letters will permit.... Having writ thus far, I was called to go to Bruxels with Father Rector (by Father Blacfan's and Father Percy his advice) to speak with the Duke's152Secretary, who telling Father Percy the last week that the Agent did solicit against me, and that he could not well answer him, unless he delivered him some reasons in writing for my innocency, this writing was promised him by Father Percy; but I being loath to have any such writing sent, as thinking it the likeliest means to raise a new persecution against me, though for the Secretary's satisfaction we drew and delivered him a brief note of four or[pg cxcviii]five effectual proofs, yet both to the Secretary first, and afterwards to the Nuncio, I told this day that if any such writing were sent it would do me great harm, for Canterbury having such a writing would doubtless show it at the Council table, and then those lords who secretly do know me to be innocent, and wish me well, will be, as it were, forced to speak against me, lest they should seem to favour me, and so the King should be more incensed. The Nuncio did promise Father Rector and me that he would seriously deal both with the Secretary and the Prince himself in the cause.”Writing under date April 18, 1614,153he shows that he thinks that too much importance had been given to the Agent's interference.“I think your Reverence was made to believe by letters sent about Easter, that there was some new troubles against me here, out of England, and consequently that there was need of such information to the Nuncio and Father Provincial as had been given. But when I heard of it, I said it was nothing but Trumbol his own device, in hope to work upon the weakness of the Prince; and so now it proves, for I am going to the Secretary himself with our Father Rector, as I wrote from Bruxells, and giving him a paper of some few points for my innocency, with the request he would not deliver it, but show it if he would to the Agent. The Secretary answered he would advertise me if it were needful; but since the note was showed unto Trumbol, and he showed to be satisfied with it, and afterwards meeting the Secretary told him that he took it to be only matter of religion; but that being now made matter of State, he, being a servant employed in matter of State, could not but seek to concur with them that employed him, as it were granting that himself was satisfied, and yielding a reason why he had moved the matter. And this being understood both by the Prince and the Nuncio, they were very glad of it.... I write this from Maclin, whither Sir William [Stanley] was desirous to have me come for his comfort now and after the death and funeral of his lady.”But such a man as Father Gerard was not likely to be left in peace in those intriguing times. In the August following, Father[pg cxcix]Silisdon writes to Father Owen.154“Even now I have advice that His Majesty of England hath made two complaints to the Prince, and that the first is against Father Gerard's being in his dominions.”The consequence was that a transfer to another territory became desirable, and Father Gerard set his heart on migrating with his Novices to Liége. He writes from that city, under the signature of John Nelson, Sept. 19, 1614.155“There be many causes to be alleged why here, rather than in any place; as the commodity of dealing with our English in the summer, the opportunity of keeping our Novices unknown, the excellent seat far beyond Lovaine, and that bestowed on us, the present helps sent for this beginning, with great likelihood of much more; the great favour which is to be expected from this Prince and his family, and is to be strengthened by my two cousins, Sir William and Mr. Morton, and Sir William hath written to him that he doth much joy in his cousin who is there to be Rector.”The two cousins of whom Father Gerard here speaks were two very powerful friends. The one was Sir William Stanley, who showed himself a kind friend to Father Gerard and his charge by negotiating the purchase of the property at Liége in his own name, and advancing the purchase money—at least, that portion of it which had to be paid down156—probably (as Father Gerard speaks of the“seat being bestowed upon us”) regarding it as a gift. Whatever else was requisite for the purchase was provided by Brother William Browne, who, though157grandson, brother, and uncle of Viscounts Montague,—his grandfather was Queen Mary's Ambassador to the Holy See—was himself content to spend his life in the humble duties of a Jesuit Lay-brother.The“Mr. Morton”was Sir George Talbot of Grafton, afterwards[pg cc]ninth Earl of Shrewsbury. He was a scholar of some repute,158and an intimate friend of Maximilian, Duke of Bavaria. As Ferdinand, the Prince-Bishop of Liége, was Maximilian's brother, it was no little help to Father Gerard to be on“cousinly”terms with George Talbot. The Duke became a generous benefactor to the new House at Liége. In 1618 he sent Father Gerard, through Sir George Talbot, 5,000 florins for the Noviceship.159In a letter dated Jan. 25, 1620, the Duke writes to Father Gerard, who had promised to pray that he might have a son:“I bound myself once by vow to your Blessed Ignatius, that if he would obtain this favour for me, I would give my son the name of Ignatius, and would build and endow a College of the Society wherever Father General might judge it most useful. What if God should purpose thus to provide for you?”160In July of the same year he wrote:“We have sent you a contribution of 1,300 German florins by Father Mayer for a tabernacle for the Blessed Sacrament, and for a niche for an image of the Blessed Virgin.”Even after Father Gerard's departure from the House, Duke Maximilian's liberality to it did not fail. Father Silisdon, Father Gerard's successor as Master of Novices, removed the Novitiate to Watten,161and not long after the Duke settled a permanent endowment upon the College of Liége, which was begun in the House that Father Gerard had established.Father Gerard's Socius or“Compagnion,”as he calls him,[pg cci]was Father Henry More, subsequently the historian of the Province. When discussing, before his appointment, those Fathers who were fitted for that office, after mentioning others, he says:“Father Nicholson is far short of either of them for my turn, for he is no good Latinist, I think little better than myself, though he be much better scholar; neither hath he any other language but Spanish, of which I shall have small use. Father Henry More hath French well, Dutch prettily, and Italian sufficiently, besides Spanish very well, and Latin as I would wish him.”162As to his first Novices, he had twelve, which made what he styled“a pretty beginning.”163They were“the two that expect at Liége, the two that are come from Rome, and four out of Spain, with Mr. Lewkner and Mr. Whitmore, besides Grafton, when he comes, and a tailor now servant in this house, who by all judgments here is as fit to be received as Brother Silvester, the young tailor now in the Noviceship, is fit to be dismissed.”164Of the two that“expected at Liége,”a previous letter had said,“Here be also Mr. Mansel and Mr. Owen Shelley, by the names of Mr. Griffin and Mr. Titchborn: both expect, the first with some loathness to stay long, the second is wholly resigned. The first is a pious man, and to those that know his fashion will be profitable for some uses in the Society, but the second will be practical and fit for anything, and in truth I think he will do very well.”165This Father Owen Shelley was afterwards Rector of the College of Liége, and justified Father Gerard's judgment of his character.Amongst the“four which are come out of Spain”were two that must have constantly served to remind their Rector at Liége of the Gunpowder Plot, as the remonstrances of King James' Agent had managed to do at Louvain.“One of them,”he says,“is akin to Father Garnett, and of his name, though we call him Gilford, as he was called at St. Omers. William Ellis, but we call him John Williams, for he was page166to Sir[pg ccii]Everard Digby, and taken with him, though he might have escaped, for his master offered him horse and money to shift for himself, but the youth said he would live and die with him; and so, being taken, was condemned at Stafford, and should have been executed. He was offered to have his life if he would go to their church, which he refused. In the end they saved him and some others. He never [yielded] in the least point. He hath good friends near Sir Everard Digby's whom I know, and he is heir to 80l.a year, if his father do him right.”167At the close of this short notice of Father Gerard's Rectorship it will be but right to record an unfavourable judgment passed upon him, as it will help us to form a true appreciation of his character. It is the only instance that has come down to us of blame on the part of one of his own brethren.“I see a general fear in all ours, those of best judgment, of the success of Father Nelson's government, and unless he hath a companion that may moderate him, his zeal will, I fear, carry him too far; and I fear it so much the more because I see him loath to have anybody with him who is likely to propose anything to him contrary to his own zealous desires.”This is in a confidential letter168from Father Silisdon to Father Owen, dated Oct. 31, 1614, so that, as it was written before the transfer to Liége, it was a misgiving lest he should be indiscreet as a Rector, rather than a judgment on his actual conduct as a Superior.

To this Novitiate at Louvain we now turn, as it was thither that Father Gerard was next sent. It was the foundation of Donna Luisa de Carvajal, who by her will146dated Valladolid, Dec. 22, 1604, left 12,000 ducats for the establishment of an English Novitiate. The document is an admirable specimen of true Spanish devotion and humility. After commending her soul to[pg cxciv]God by the intercession of our Blessed Lady, she proceeds—“For the love of God I humbly pray the Superiors of the Society of Jesus and the Præpositus of the Professed House, as a favour, to grant me some little place in their church where my body may be buried, in consideration of the devotion I have ever entertained for their holy Religious Order: to which Order, in the manner that I have thought would be most to the glory of God, I offer, with the greatest affection, a gift which, though but small, is all that I have. And if a burial-place be refused me in that church, my executors will obtain for me a resting-place in some other church of the Society: and if they are unable to obtain this, let me be buried in some monastery in which, for the love of God, they may be willing to give burial to a poor person like myself; and let my funeral be conducted in accordance with this my poverty. As executors I name Father Richard Walpole, the Vice-Prefect of the English Mission, and the Confessor of the English College in this city, or their successors. After them (and I have named them first from respect to their priestly dignity) I name the Condessa de Miranda, Donna Maria de Zuniga, Donna Maria Gasca, Don Frances de Contreras, Melchior de Molina, and Don Luis de Carrillo e Toledo, Conde de Caracena. First of all I declare that many years ago, when I was with my uncle, I made a vow to God to dedicate all my goods to His glory and greatest service. Then His Divine Majesty gave me large desires and vehement attraction to spend myself above all things for the preservation and advancement of the English Fathers of the Society of Jesus, who sustain that kingdom like strong columns, defend it from an otherwise inevitable ruin, and supply efficacious means of salvation for thousands and thousands of souls. Wherefore I offer them to the most holy Virgin our Lady, I place them under her protection, and I name and leave her universal heir of all my goods.... And I give possession of them henceforward to the most glorious Virgin, and in her name and place to Father Robert Persons, or failing him, to the Father who shall succeed him as Superior of the Mission: but with this condition and obligation, that such goods shall be applied to the founding of a Novitiate of English Religious of the Society of Jesus, in whatever kingdom or part of the world shall seem to Father Persons to be[pg cxcv]to the greater glory of God. But in the case that England shall be brought back to the faith and obedience of the Roman Church, my will is that the said revenue be transferred into that kingdom, for the foundation of a Novitiate of the Society there, unless it shall seem better to Father Persons, for reasons concerning the Catholic religion, to leave the Novitiate beyond the kingdom.”

Time was not lost in carrying out the intentions of this pious benefactress.147In 1606, Father Persons obtained possession of a large house in Louvain, which had been inhabited by the Knights of Malta, and thus came to be called St. John's, though the church attached to it was dedicated to St. Gregory the Apostle of England and other Saints. Father More, who lived there with Father Gerard, tells us that it was on high ground commanding the whole city; below was a walled garden, and on the slope of the hill pleasant walks amongst the vines which were ranged in terraces, and the whole, though within the city walls, as quiet and calm as befitted a house of prayer.

We do not know exactly the date of Father Gerard's arrival at Louvain, or the office to which he was first appointed there. The letter of the 17th August, 1612, to the General, from which we have already given a large extract concerning Mrs. Vaux, is dated from Louvain. It proceeds with an account of a miraculous cure at the intercession of Father Thomas Garnett, the nephew of the Provincial, who was martyred at Tyburn on the 3rd of June, 1608. This father was the first Novice of St. John's, Louvain. That Noviceship commenced in February, 1607, with six Priests, two Scholastics, and five Lay-brothers, Novices, under Father Thomas Talbot as their Novice Master. In 1614, St. John's received students in philosophy and theology, as well as Novices, when a house in the garden was fitted up for the Novitiate and Father Henry Silisdon was installed in St. John's as Rector of the new College. This arrangement did not last long, for at the end of the year the Novitiate was transferred to Liége. No less than fifteen letters have come down to us written by Father Gerard in the year 1614, addressed to the Prefect of the English Mission, Father Thomas Owen, Rector of the English College at Rome. They treat chiefly of the purchase of the new house at Liége,[pg cxcvi]and the transfer of the Novitiate to that city. Some extracts relating to Father Gerard himself will be found interesting. Some of them are signed John Nelson and others John Tomson. In later years he seems to have been known only by the name of Tomson.

The choice of Liége as a residence seems to have been mainly owing to the disquiet caused to the Catholics in the Low Countries by the remonstrances of the English Government. We have some specimens of it in the following extracts, in which we find Father Gerard true to the natural fearlessness of his character.“Concerning148my wariness in avoiding the eyes of spies, I have been all this year more sparing in that kind than divers friends here did think needful, although some one or two did think it dangerous to go any journey, as doubting I might be killed by the way, but this was but according to their accustomed fears with which I have been long acquainted. But, indeed, Father, I am so far from desire to go many journeys, that it is a pain to me to think of going anywhither, and the reason why I never went to any of those places your Reverence mentioneth in this year past (but only the last Lent to Maclin for Mr. Rouse) was not that I thought it dangerous (being known so well to live here public that it cannot be unknown to any spies), nor for that I wanted leave, for I had the other Provincial's particular and willing grant, without my own asking, to go to any place of these countries; but it was because I had rather be at home: and in the town of Lovaine itself, I go not abroad half so much as I think were needful for the contentment of others. I was not at the Teresians, where the Mother of the House (to whom I gave the Exercise four years ago) and Father Scott's149sister do much desire my often coming, any more than once since the last Lent. At the Monastery of St. Monica's, my cousin Shurley hath requested my coming thither for these three or four months, to bestow one afternoon upon her and some younger Nuns whom she hath charge of, that they may altogether ask me what spiritual questions they may like best,[pg cxcvii]and I have never yet found a fit time for it; and, indeed, I doubt I am to blame for it. The gentlemen in the town150I doubt I visit not once in a quarter of a year, and I have some reason to think that either they think me careless of them, or afraid to be seen abroad, as though my case were very dangerous, which would also make them or any other that should come to town more fearful to come into my company, and consequently hinder the little good that I might do with them. But I hope I shall be as wary as your Reverence wisheth, and if this course go forwards of being Rector without the name of Rector, there will be less inconvenience, whosoever see me seeing me still as a private man.”In this he alludes to a plan of his own, that Father Blackfan should have the title of Rector, although he himself had been appointed to the Rectorship of the Novitiate.

The next letter is dated April 6, 1614.151“I have yours of the 15th March, and see in that, as in all of yours, your fatherly care of me, which, by the grace of God, I will labour to deserve. I am well satisfied with Father General's order, and shall endeavour to get this building finished for the Novitiate as soon as I can, and then will settle to my book as much as my health and letters will permit.... Having writ thus far, I was called to go to Bruxels with Father Rector (by Father Blacfan's and Father Percy his advice) to speak with the Duke's152Secretary, who telling Father Percy the last week that the Agent did solicit against me, and that he could not well answer him, unless he delivered him some reasons in writing for my innocency, this writing was promised him by Father Percy; but I being loath to have any such writing sent, as thinking it the likeliest means to raise a new persecution against me, though for the Secretary's satisfaction we drew and delivered him a brief note of four or[pg cxcviii]five effectual proofs, yet both to the Secretary first, and afterwards to the Nuncio, I told this day that if any such writing were sent it would do me great harm, for Canterbury having such a writing would doubtless show it at the Council table, and then those lords who secretly do know me to be innocent, and wish me well, will be, as it were, forced to speak against me, lest they should seem to favour me, and so the King should be more incensed. The Nuncio did promise Father Rector and me that he would seriously deal both with the Secretary and the Prince himself in the cause.”

Writing under date April 18, 1614,153he shows that he thinks that too much importance had been given to the Agent's interference.“I think your Reverence was made to believe by letters sent about Easter, that there was some new troubles against me here, out of England, and consequently that there was need of such information to the Nuncio and Father Provincial as had been given. But when I heard of it, I said it was nothing but Trumbol his own device, in hope to work upon the weakness of the Prince; and so now it proves, for I am going to the Secretary himself with our Father Rector, as I wrote from Bruxells, and giving him a paper of some few points for my innocency, with the request he would not deliver it, but show it if he would to the Agent. The Secretary answered he would advertise me if it were needful; but since the note was showed unto Trumbol, and he showed to be satisfied with it, and afterwards meeting the Secretary told him that he took it to be only matter of religion; but that being now made matter of State, he, being a servant employed in matter of State, could not but seek to concur with them that employed him, as it were granting that himself was satisfied, and yielding a reason why he had moved the matter. And this being understood both by the Prince and the Nuncio, they were very glad of it.... I write this from Maclin, whither Sir William [Stanley] was desirous to have me come for his comfort now and after the death and funeral of his lady.”

But such a man as Father Gerard was not likely to be left in peace in those intriguing times. In the August following, Father[pg cxcix]Silisdon writes to Father Owen.154“Even now I have advice that His Majesty of England hath made two complaints to the Prince, and that the first is against Father Gerard's being in his dominions.”The consequence was that a transfer to another territory became desirable, and Father Gerard set his heart on migrating with his Novices to Liége. He writes from that city, under the signature of John Nelson, Sept. 19, 1614.155“There be many causes to be alleged why here, rather than in any place; as the commodity of dealing with our English in the summer, the opportunity of keeping our Novices unknown, the excellent seat far beyond Lovaine, and that bestowed on us, the present helps sent for this beginning, with great likelihood of much more; the great favour which is to be expected from this Prince and his family, and is to be strengthened by my two cousins, Sir William and Mr. Morton, and Sir William hath written to him that he doth much joy in his cousin who is there to be Rector.”The two cousins of whom Father Gerard here speaks were two very powerful friends. The one was Sir William Stanley, who showed himself a kind friend to Father Gerard and his charge by negotiating the purchase of the property at Liége in his own name, and advancing the purchase money—at least, that portion of it which had to be paid down156—probably (as Father Gerard speaks of the“seat being bestowed upon us”) regarding it as a gift. Whatever else was requisite for the purchase was provided by Brother William Browne, who, though157grandson, brother, and uncle of Viscounts Montague,—his grandfather was Queen Mary's Ambassador to the Holy See—was himself content to spend his life in the humble duties of a Jesuit Lay-brother.

The“Mr. Morton”was Sir George Talbot of Grafton, afterwards[pg cc]ninth Earl of Shrewsbury. He was a scholar of some repute,158and an intimate friend of Maximilian, Duke of Bavaria. As Ferdinand, the Prince-Bishop of Liége, was Maximilian's brother, it was no little help to Father Gerard to be on“cousinly”terms with George Talbot. The Duke became a generous benefactor to the new House at Liége. In 1618 he sent Father Gerard, through Sir George Talbot, 5,000 florins for the Noviceship.159In a letter dated Jan. 25, 1620, the Duke writes to Father Gerard, who had promised to pray that he might have a son:“I bound myself once by vow to your Blessed Ignatius, that if he would obtain this favour for me, I would give my son the name of Ignatius, and would build and endow a College of the Society wherever Father General might judge it most useful. What if God should purpose thus to provide for you?”160In July of the same year he wrote:“We have sent you a contribution of 1,300 German florins by Father Mayer for a tabernacle for the Blessed Sacrament, and for a niche for an image of the Blessed Virgin.”Even after Father Gerard's departure from the House, Duke Maximilian's liberality to it did not fail. Father Silisdon, Father Gerard's successor as Master of Novices, removed the Novitiate to Watten,161and not long after the Duke settled a permanent endowment upon the College of Liége, which was begun in the House that Father Gerard had established.

Father Gerard's Socius or“Compagnion,”as he calls him,[pg cci]was Father Henry More, subsequently the historian of the Province. When discussing, before his appointment, those Fathers who were fitted for that office, after mentioning others, he says:“Father Nicholson is far short of either of them for my turn, for he is no good Latinist, I think little better than myself, though he be much better scholar; neither hath he any other language but Spanish, of which I shall have small use. Father Henry More hath French well, Dutch prettily, and Italian sufficiently, besides Spanish very well, and Latin as I would wish him.”162

As to his first Novices, he had twelve, which made what he styled“a pretty beginning.”163They were“the two that expect at Liége, the two that are come from Rome, and four out of Spain, with Mr. Lewkner and Mr. Whitmore, besides Grafton, when he comes, and a tailor now servant in this house, who by all judgments here is as fit to be received as Brother Silvester, the young tailor now in the Noviceship, is fit to be dismissed.”164

Of the two that“expected at Liége,”a previous letter had said,“Here be also Mr. Mansel and Mr. Owen Shelley, by the names of Mr. Griffin and Mr. Titchborn: both expect, the first with some loathness to stay long, the second is wholly resigned. The first is a pious man, and to those that know his fashion will be profitable for some uses in the Society, but the second will be practical and fit for anything, and in truth I think he will do very well.”165This Father Owen Shelley was afterwards Rector of the College of Liége, and justified Father Gerard's judgment of his character.

Amongst the“four which are come out of Spain”were two that must have constantly served to remind their Rector at Liége of the Gunpowder Plot, as the remonstrances of King James' Agent had managed to do at Louvain.“One of them,”he says,“is akin to Father Garnett, and of his name, though we call him Gilford, as he was called at St. Omers. William Ellis, but we call him John Williams, for he was page166to Sir[pg ccii]Everard Digby, and taken with him, though he might have escaped, for his master offered him horse and money to shift for himself, but the youth said he would live and die with him; and so, being taken, was condemned at Stafford, and should have been executed. He was offered to have his life if he would go to their church, which he refused. In the end they saved him and some others. He never [yielded] in the least point. He hath good friends near Sir Everard Digby's whom I know, and he is heir to 80l.a year, if his father do him right.”167

At the close of this short notice of Father Gerard's Rectorship it will be but right to record an unfavourable judgment passed upon him, as it will help us to form a true appreciation of his character. It is the only instance that has come down to us of blame on the part of one of his own brethren.“I see a general fear in all ours, those of best judgment, of the success of Father Nelson's government, and unless he hath a companion that may moderate him, his zeal will, I fear, carry him too far; and I fear it so much the more because I see him loath to have anybody with him who is likely to propose anything to him contrary to his own zealous desires.”This is in a confidential letter168from Father Silisdon to Father Owen, dated Oct. 31, 1614, so that, as it was written before the transfer to Liége, it was a misgiving lest he should be indiscreet as a Rector, rather than a judgment on his actual conduct as a Superior.

XXIX.During his residence at Liége, amongst Father Gerard's correspondents were two venerable servants of God, Robert Cardinal Bellarmine, and Father Luis de la Puente, better known by the Latinized form of his name, de Ponte. As by a man's friends we can obtain an insight into his character, we have thought it desirable to give the few letters from these two holy men to Father Gerard that have come down to us. Cardinal Bellarmine's autograph is preserved at Stonyhurst.169We translate the letter from the original Latin.[pg cciii]“Very Rev. and beloved Father in Christ,—I have received your Reverence's letter dated from Liége the 23rd November, with the little presents inclosed in it, an English knife, a little case (either bone or ivory, I do not know which), and three small toothpicks. I do not know whether these were sent me for use, or as having some special meaning. Whichever it be they were welcome, as a proof of friendship and brotherhood.“The memory of that excellent Mr. Oliver,170whose acquaintance I made very late, has brought me no little sadness, or rather grief, not on his account, who is translated from this world to the joys of Paradise, but for the sake of many whom without doubt he would have converted to a good life if Divine Providence had permitted him to live awhile longer. But the good pleasure of God must ever be fulfilled, and the very same, in order that it may be fulfilled, must ever be pleasing to us under all circumstances.“I was pleased to read what your Reverence relates in your[pg cciv]letter of your journeys; of your office of Master of Novices; of the building which you have bought at Liége; of the visitation of His Serene Highness Ferdinand, the Prince-Bishop of Liége, and of the promise that the Priory, at its next vacancy, shall be applied to the College. If my assistance in carrying this out can be of any use to you with the Pope, it shall not be wanting.“Of Dr. Singleton I have heard much, and have defended him to the best of my power, as long as I could, but the party opposed to him has prevailed. Nor do I see how I can help him at so great a distance, and especially as I should be suspected, because I am a Jesuit. The devil is envious of the harmony between the English at Douay and the Fathers of the Society, for which the good Cardinal Allen cared so much; but all means must be tried to re-establish a true and sincere friendship, and agreement in teaching; otherwise a kingdom divided against itself shall be brought to desolation. For many reasons I say freely that nothing can be done by me in his behalf; first, as I was just saying, because I should be under suspicion, being a Jesuit. Then because I am an old man of seven-and-seventy years of age, and I daily expect the dissolution of my tabernacle. Thirdly, because I cannot think of any manner in which I could help him. The common way of helping men of this sort is to give them ecclesiastical benefices, but here in Rome the multitude of those who aspire to and seek after such benefits is so great that their number is almost infinite. Nor are they only Italians, but Spaniards also, Frenchmen, Germans, who look for nothing but benefices at Rome. I myself, who was thought to have some influence with the Pope, have laboured for more than ten years for a Spaniard, an excellent man and a great friend of mine, to obtain for him a good benefice falling vacant in his own country. I could say the same of Flemish and German friends of mine. What then would be the case with English people, in whose country there are no ecclesiastical benefices for Catholics? But, since these temporal things are nothing when compared to eternal benefices, our friend Dr. Singleton must not be cast down if our Lord treats him now, as of old He treated His Apostles, who He willed should enter into the Kingdom of Heaven through many tribulations. But I must not be too lengthy, for I know[pg ccv]that both he and your Reverence stand in no need of my exhortations. I know that your Reverence will have hard work to read my bad writing, but Father Coffin171would have it that I should write to you with my own hand.“With this I bid your Reverence farewell. Commend me to the prayers of Dr. Singleton, and of all your College; but your Reverence's self especially, for our old friendship and brotherhood, must diligently commend me to the Lord our God.“From Rome, on Christmas Day, December 25, 1618.172“Your Reverence's brother and servant in Christ,“Robert Card. Bellarmine.”“To the Very Rev. Father John Tomson, S.J.,“Rector of the College of the English Novices at Liége.”The two letters which have come down to us, addressed to Father Gerard by the venerable Father Luis de la Puente, were written just as his residence173at Liége was drawing to a close. We translate from Father Grene's transcript of the originals.174“I. H. S.“P.C.“When I received your Reverence's letters, I was unable to answer them at once, for I was suffering from extreme weakness, which usually afflicts me every year all through the winter. Blessed be our great God, from Whose providence come health and sickness, life and death, and whatever prosperity and adversity there is in this world. The height of felicity in this life is to be[pg ccvi]superior to all these things, seeking only God's good pleasure in all things, for life in His will, and health, honour, happiness, spiritual progress, and all sanctity consist in the fulfilment of the will of God: and so every day I would that at every breath I could say, May Thy most holy and most sweet will be done in me, concerning me, and by me and about me, in all things and by all things, now and always and for ever. Amen.175God always pours His spirit of prayer into those who so submit their will to His; wherefore the Psalmist says—‘Be subject unto the Lord and pray to Him,’for when any one with prompt obedience and entire resignation humbly submits himself to God, God Himself, Who does the will of those that fear Him, in a certain way is made subject to him, so that He does whatever is asked, God becoming obedient to the voice of a man—not of any man soever, but of the man who obeys God. Oh, wonderful power of prayer and of obedience! Let us pray, my Father, that we may be perfectly obedient, and let us obey, that we may be able to pray, and to speak worthily with God.“It will help wonderfully both one and the other, to meditate profoundly on these two things: to wit, Who God is in Himself, and what He is towards us, and then what we are of ourselves, and what towards God. For whilst I think of God, His Trinity and Unity, most beautiful, most wise, most holy, most full of love for me, immense and everywhere present, the fountain of all good things that are in me and beyond me, from Whom I myself depend, and all that is mine, and everything that I use and enjoy, how can I do otherwise than love Him with all my strength? How shall I not praise Him and thank Him constantly? How shall I not give my whole self to His service? And these affections become the more ardent as I ponder that I have nothing of myself; that I am nothing, and that I and all that is mine would be reduced to nothing unless I were preserved by Him. Now whilst, within this immensity of God, I consider what I have been and what I am towards Him, I am horrified and tremble as I ponder on my malice, my ingratitude, my slothfulness.[pg ccvii]Hence arise feelings of hatred of self, of humiliation and self-denial, and various acts and exercises of penance, which not only nourish humility by which a man, through a truthful knowledge of himself, becomes vile to himself, but they also arouse a most ardent charity by which he loves his Supreme Benefactor, Who has conferred and still confers so many and such great benefits on one who is ungrateful and unworthy. Thus the mind is elevated to perfect contemplation and union with God Himself, and, as it were forgetful of itself, is immersed in Him, or rather God hides it in the concealment of His countenance from all disturbance of men.“Here is a short epitome of my mystical theology, which I have put out at rather greater length in my book; but why should I teach these things to a doctor of others and my own master? Surely I have become foolish, but your letters compelled me. Would that you would help me by your prayers, that what I write in my letters I may perform in deed. Forgive my humble and poor style, for I know not any more elegant; but I am sure that you do not care for words, but for the sense that is in the words. I value very highly the cross which you have sent me, and I will always bear it with me. I hope, by the intercession of the Blessed Virgin, who appeared in that tree,176and who confers such benefits on those who are there and those who visit her, that I may be a partaker of those benefits, for though I am absent in the body I am present in spirit.“I humbly commend myself to the Holy Sacrifices of your Reverence.“Your Reverence's unworthy servant in Christ,“[Cross]Ludovicus de Ponte.[Cross]“Valladolid, March 23, 1621.Postscript—“By God's help I have finished a great work. Its title is,Expositio Moralis in Canticum Canticorum, containing exhortations on all the mysteries and virtues of the Christian religion. It is divided into two volumes, and each volume into five books. The arrangement is new and singular, but not without[pg ccviii]foundation in the Sacred Text. The matter is grave in itself, and very copious, taken out of Holy Scripture and the holy Fathers. The style is humble, but clear and chaste, and not out of harmony with matter that is spiritual and sacred, and therefore elevated. It is printed at Paris, and will soon reach Germany and Belgium. Would that it may be to the glory of God, the edification of the Church, and of use to one's neighbour.”The other letter from the same Father was written in reply to one from Father Gerard announcing that he was about to leave Belgium.“I. H. S.“P.C.“May the Almighty and most pitiful Lord accompany you in the journey that you begin, for with such a Guide and Companion you will be everywhere safe and cheerful, and making true progress. Let Him ever dwell in your memory, understanding, and will, for His most sweet providence especially protects those who make their journeys from obedience to Superiors, as Jacob did, who at his father's bidding journeyed through the desert into Mesopotamia, where he heard the voice of the Lord, which said to him,‘I will be thy Keeper whithersoever thou goest.’Trusting to this hope, and protected by this guardianship, you will happily fulfil what you have begun.“I commend myself to your Reverence's Sacrifices and prayers, for my weakness oppresses me much; but may the will of God be done in me and about me in all things and by all things, to Whom concerning all things be glory for ever. Amen.“[Cross]Ludovicus de la Puente.[Cross]“Valladolid, Feb. 2, 1622.”With these saintly words our materials for writing the life of Father John Gerard abruptly fail us. Beyond what has been recorded we only know that he was sent first to Spain, and then to Rome, which he reached Jan. 15, 1623.177He was Confessor to the English College till his death, July 27, 1637, at the ripe age of seventy-three, and upwards.

During his residence at Liége, amongst Father Gerard's correspondents were two venerable servants of God, Robert Cardinal Bellarmine, and Father Luis de la Puente, better known by the Latinized form of his name, de Ponte. As by a man's friends we can obtain an insight into his character, we have thought it desirable to give the few letters from these two holy men to Father Gerard that have come down to us. Cardinal Bellarmine's autograph is preserved at Stonyhurst.169We translate the letter from the original Latin.

“Very Rev. and beloved Father in Christ,—I have received your Reverence's letter dated from Liége the 23rd November, with the little presents inclosed in it, an English knife, a little case (either bone or ivory, I do not know which), and three small toothpicks. I do not know whether these were sent me for use, or as having some special meaning. Whichever it be they were welcome, as a proof of friendship and brotherhood.“The memory of that excellent Mr. Oliver,170whose acquaintance I made very late, has brought me no little sadness, or rather grief, not on his account, who is translated from this world to the joys of Paradise, but for the sake of many whom without doubt he would have converted to a good life if Divine Providence had permitted him to live awhile longer. But the good pleasure of God must ever be fulfilled, and the very same, in order that it may be fulfilled, must ever be pleasing to us under all circumstances.“I was pleased to read what your Reverence relates in your[pg cciv]letter of your journeys; of your office of Master of Novices; of the building which you have bought at Liége; of the visitation of His Serene Highness Ferdinand, the Prince-Bishop of Liége, and of the promise that the Priory, at its next vacancy, shall be applied to the College. If my assistance in carrying this out can be of any use to you with the Pope, it shall not be wanting.“Of Dr. Singleton I have heard much, and have defended him to the best of my power, as long as I could, but the party opposed to him has prevailed. Nor do I see how I can help him at so great a distance, and especially as I should be suspected, because I am a Jesuit. The devil is envious of the harmony between the English at Douay and the Fathers of the Society, for which the good Cardinal Allen cared so much; but all means must be tried to re-establish a true and sincere friendship, and agreement in teaching; otherwise a kingdom divided against itself shall be brought to desolation. For many reasons I say freely that nothing can be done by me in his behalf; first, as I was just saying, because I should be under suspicion, being a Jesuit. Then because I am an old man of seven-and-seventy years of age, and I daily expect the dissolution of my tabernacle. Thirdly, because I cannot think of any manner in which I could help him. The common way of helping men of this sort is to give them ecclesiastical benefices, but here in Rome the multitude of those who aspire to and seek after such benefits is so great that their number is almost infinite. Nor are they only Italians, but Spaniards also, Frenchmen, Germans, who look for nothing but benefices at Rome. I myself, who was thought to have some influence with the Pope, have laboured for more than ten years for a Spaniard, an excellent man and a great friend of mine, to obtain for him a good benefice falling vacant in his own country. I could say the same of Flemish and German friends of mine. What then would be the case with English people, in whose country there are no ecclesiastical benefices for Catholics? But, since these temporal things are nothing when compared to eternal benefices, our friend Dr. Singleton must not be cast down if our Lord treats him now, as of old He treated His Apostles, who He willed should enter into the Kingdom of Heaven through many tribulations. But I must not be too lengthy, for I know[pg ccv]that both he and your Reverence stand in no need of my exhortations. I know that your Reverence will have hard work to read my bad writing, but Father Coffin171would have it that I should write to you with my own hand.“With this I bid your Reverence farewell. Commend me to the prayers of Dr. Singleton, and of all your College; but your Reverence's self especially, for our old friendship and brotherhood, must diligently commend me to the Lord our God.“From Rome, on Christmas Day, December 25, 1618.172“Your Reverence's brother and servant in Christ,“Robert Card. Bellarmine.”“To the Very Rev. Father John Tomson, S.J.,“Rector of the College of the English Novices at Liége.”

“Very Rev. and beloved Father in Christ,—I have received your Reverence's letter dated from Liége the 23rd November, with the little presents inclosed in it, an English knife, a little case (either bone or ivory, I do not know which), and three small toothpicks. I do not know whether these were sent me for use, or as having some special meaning. Whichever it be they were welcome, as a proof of friendship and brotherhood.

“The memory of that excellent Mr. Oliver,170whose acquaintance I made very late, has brought me no little sadness, or rather grief, not on his account, who is translated from this world to the joys of Paradise, but for the sake of many whom without doubt he would have converted to a good life if Divine Providence had permitted him to live awhile longer. But the good pleasure of God must ever be fulfilled, and the very same, in order that it may be fulfilled, must ever be pleasing to us under all circumstances.

“I was pleased to read what your Reverence relates in your[pg cciv]letter of your journeys; of your office of Master of Novices; of the building which you have bought at Liége; of the visitation of His Serene Highness Ferdinand, the Prince-Bishop of Liége, and of the promise that the Priory, at its next vacancy, shall be applied to the College. If my assistance in carrying this out can be of any use to you with the Pope, it shall not be wanting.

“Of Dr. Singleton I have heard much, and have defended him to the best of my power, as long as I could, but the party opposed to him has prevailed. Nor do I see how I can help him at so great a distance, and especially as I should be suspected, because I am a Jesuit. The devil is envious of the harmony between the English at Douay and the Fathers of the Society, for which the good Cardinal Allen cared so much; but all means must be tried to re-establish a true and sincere friendship, and agreement in teaching; otherwise a kingdom divided against itself shall be brought to desolation. For many reasons I say freely that nothing can be done by me in his behalf; first, as I was just saying, because I should be under suspicion, being a Jesuit. Then because I am an old man of seven-and-seventy years of age, and I daily expect the dissolution of my tabernacle. Thirdly, because I cannot think of any manner in which I could help him. The common way of helping men of this sort is to give them ecclesiastical benefices, but here in Rome the multitude of those who aspire to and seek after such benefits is so great that their number is almost infinite. Nor are they only Italians, but Spaniards also, Frenchmen, Germans, who look for nothing but benefices at Rome. I myself, who was thought to have some influence with the Pope, have laboured for more than ten years for a Spaniard, an excellent man and a great friend of mine, to obtain for him a good benefice falling vacant in his own country. I could say the same of Flemish and German friends of mine. What then would be the case with English people, in whose country there are no ecclesiastical benefices for Catholics? But, since these temporal things are nothing when compared to eternal benefices, our friend Dr. Singleton must not be cast down if our Lord treats him now, as of old He treated His Apostles, who He willed should enter into the Kingdom of Heaven through many tribulations. But I must not be too lengthy, for I know[pg ccv]that both he and your Reverence stand in no need of my exhortations. I know that your Reverence will have hard work to read my bad writing, but Father Coffin171would have it that I should write to you with my own hand.

“With this I bid your Reverence farewell. Commend me to the prayers of Dr. Singleton, and of all your College; but your Reverence's self especially, for our old friendship and brotherhood, must diligently commend me to the Lord our God.

“From Rome, on Christmas Day, December 25, 1618.172

“Your Reverence's brother and servant in Christ,

“Robert Card. Bellarmine.”

“To the Very Rev. Father John Tomson, S.J.,“Rector of the College of the English Novices at Liége.”

“To the Very Rev. Father John Tomson, S.J.,

“Rector of the College of the English Novices at Liége.”

The two letters which have come down to us, addressed to Father Gerard by the venerable Father Luis de la Puente, were written just as his residence173at Liége was drawing to a close. We translate from Father Grene's transcript of the originals.174

“I. H. S.“P.C.“When I received your Reverence's letters, I was unable to answer them at once, for I was suffering from extreme weakness, which usually afflicts me every year all through the winter. Blessed be our great God, from Whose providence come health and sickness, life and death, and whatever prosperity and adversity there is in this world. The height of felicity in this life is to be[pg ccvi]superior to all these things, seeking only God's good pleasure in all things, for life in His will, and health, honour, happiness, spiritual progress, and all sanctity consist in the fulfilment of the will of God: and so every day I would that at every breath I could say, May Thy most holy and most sweet will be done in me, concerning me, and by me and about me, in all things and by all things, now and always and for ever. Amen.175God always pours His spirit of prayer into those who so submit their will to His; wherefore the Psalmist says—‘Be subject unto the Lord and pray to Him,’for when any one with prompt obedience and entire resignation humbly submits himself to God, God Himself, Who does the will of those that fear Him, in a certain way is made subject to him, so that He does whatever is asked, God becoming obedient to the voice of a man—not of any man soever, but of the man who obeys God. Oh, wonderful power of prayer and of obedience! Let us pray, my Father, that we may be perfectly obedient, and let us obey, that we may be able to pray, and to speak worthily with God.“It will help wonderfully both one and the other, to meditate profoundly on these two things: to wit, Who God is in Himself, and what He is towards us, and then what we are of ourselves, and what towards God. For whilst I think of God, His Trinity and Unity, most beautiful, most wise, most holy, most full of love for me, immense and everywhere present, the fountain of all good things that are in me and beyond me, from Whom I myself depend, and all that is mine, and everything that I use and enjoy, how can I do otherwise than love Him with all my strength? How shall I not praise Him and thank Him constantly? How shall I not give my whole self to His service? And these affections become the more ardent as I ponder that I have nothing of myself; that I am nothing, and that I and all that is mine would be reduced to nothing unless I were preserved by Him. Now whilst, within this immensity of God, I consider what I have been and what I am towards Him, I am horrified and tremble as I ponder on my malice, my ingratitude, my slothfulness.[pg ccvii]Hence arise feelings of hatred of self, of humiliation and self-denial, and various acts and exercises of penance, which not only nourish humility by which a man, through a truthful knowledge of himself, becomes vile to himself, but they also arouse a most ardent charity by which he loves his Supreme Benefactor, Who has conferred and still confers so many and such great benefits on one who is ungrateful and unworthy. Thus the mind is elevated to perfect contemplation and union with God Himself, and, as it were forgetful of itself, is immersed in Him, or rather God hides it in the concealment of His countenance from all disturbance of men.“Here is a short epitome of my mystical theology, which I have put out at rather greater length in my book; but why should I teach these things to a doctor of others and my own master? Surely I have become foolish, but your letters compelled me. Would that you would help me by your prayers, that what I write in my letters I may perform in deed. Forgive my humble and poor style, for I know not any more elegant; but I am sure that you do not care for words, but for the sense that is in the words. I value very highly the cross which you have sent me, and I will always bear it with me. I hope, by the intercession of the Blessed Virgin, who appeared in that tree,176and who confers such benefits on those who are there and those who visit her, that I may be a partaker of those benefits, for though I am absent in the body I am present in spirit.“I humbly commend myself to the Holy Sacrifices of your Reverence.“Your Reverence's unworthy servant in Christ,“[Cross]Ludovicus de Ponte.[Cross]“Valladolid, March 23, 1621.Postscript—“By God's help I have finished a great work. Its title is,Expositio Moralis in Canticum Canticorum, containing exhortations on all the mysteries and virtues of the Christian religion. It is divided into two volumes, and each volume into five books. The arrangement is new and singular, but not without[pg ccviii]foundation in the Sacred Text. The matter is grave in itself, and very copious, taken out of Holy Scripture and the holy Fathers. The style is humble, but clear and chaste, and not out of harmony with matter that is spiritual and sacred, and therefore elevated. It is printed at Paris, and will soon reach Germany and Belgium. Would that it may be to the glory of God, the edification of the Church, and of use to one's neighbour.”

“I. H. S.

“P.C.

“When I received your Reverence's letters, I was unable to answer them at once, for I was suffering from extreme weakness, which usually afflicts me every year all through the winter. Blessed be our great God, from Whose providence come health and sickness, life and death, and whatever prosperity and adversity there is in this world. The height of felicity in this life is to be[pg ccvi]superior to all these things, seeking only God's good pleasure in all things, for life in His will, and health, honour, happiness, spiritual progress, and all sanctity consist in the fulfilment of the will of God: and so every day I would that at every breath I could say, May Thy most holy and most sweet will be done in me, concerning me, and by me and about me, in all things and by all things, now and always and for ever. Amen.175God always pours His spirit of prayer into those who so submit their will to His; wherefore the Psalmist says—‘Be subject unto the Lord and pray to Him,’for when any one with prompt obedience and entire resignation humbly submits himself to God, God Himself, Who does the will of those that fear Him, in a certain way is made subject to him, so that He does whatever is asked, God becoming obedient to the voice of a man—not of any man soever, but of the man who obeys God. Oh, wonderful power of prayer and of obedience! Let us pray, my Father, that we may be perfectly obedient, and let us obey, that we may be able to pray, and to speak worthily with God.

“It will help wonderfully both one and the other, to meditate profoundly on these two things: to wit, Who God is in Himself, and what He is towards us, and then what we are of ourselves, and what towards God. For whilst I think of God, His Trinity and Unity, most beautiful, most wise, most holy, most full of love for me, immense and everywhere present, the fountain of all good things that are in me and beyond me, from Whom I myself depend, and all that is mine, and everything that I use and enjoy, how can I do otherwise than love Him with all my strength? How shall I not praise Him and thank Him constantly? How shall I not give my whole self to His service? And these affections become the more ardent as I ponder that I have nothing of myself; that I am nothing, and that I and all that is mine would be reduced to nothing unless I were preserved by Him. Now whilst, within this immensity of God, I consider what I have been and what I am towards Him, I am horrified and tremble as I ponder on my malice, my ingratitude, my slothfulness.[pg ccvii]Hence arise feelings of hatred of self, of humiliation and self-denial, and various acts and exercises of penance, which not only nourish humility by which a man, through a truthful knowledge of himself, becomes vile to himself, but they also arouse a most ardent charity by which he loves his Supreme Benefactor, Who has conferred and still confers so many and such great benefits on one who is ungrateful and unworthy. Thus the mind is elevated to perfect contemplation and union with God Himself, and, as it were forgetful of itself, is immersed in Him, or rather God hides it in the concealment of His countenance from all disturbance of men.

“Here is a short epitome of my mystical theology, which I have put out at rather greater length in my book; but why should I teach these things to a doctor of others and my own master? Surely I have become foolish, but your letters compelled me. Would that you would help me by your prayers, that what I write in my letters I may perform in deed. Forgive my humble and poor style, for I know not any more elegant; but I am sure that you do not care for words, but for the sense that is in the words. I value very highly the cross which you have sent me, and I will always bear it with me. I hope, by the intercession of the Blessed Virgin, who appeared in that tree,176and who confers such benefits on those who are there and those who visit her, that I may be a partaker of those benefits, for though I am absent in the body I am present in spirit.

“I humbly commend myself to the Holy Sacrifices of your Reverence.

“Your Reverence's unworthy servant in Christ,

“[Cross]Ludovicus de Ponte.[Cross]

“Valladolid, March 23, 1621.

Postscript—“By God's help I have finished a great work. Its title is,Expositio Moralis in Canticum Canticorum, containing exhortations on all the mysteries and virtues of the Christian religion. It is divided into two volumes, and each volume into five books. The arrangement is new and singular, but not without[pg ccviii]foundation in the Sacred Text. The matter is grave in itself, and very copious, taken out of Holy Scripture and the holy Fathers. The style is humble, but clear and chaste, and not out of harmony with matter that is spiritual and sacred, and therefore elevated. It is printed at Paris, and will soon reach Germany and Belgium. Would that it may be to the glory of God, the edification of the Church, and of use to one's neighbour.”

The other letter from the same Father was written in reply to one from Father Gerard announcing that he was about to leave Belgium.

“I. H. S.“P.C.“May the Almighty and most pitiful Lord accompany you in the journey that you begin, for with such a Guide and Companion you will be everywhere safe and cheerful, and making true progress. Let Him ever dwell in your memory, understanding, and will, for His most sweet providence especially protects those who make their journeys from obedience to Superiors, as Jacob did, who at his father's bidding journeyed through the desert into Mesopotamia, where he heard the voice of the Lord, which said to him,‘I will be thy Keeper whithersoever thou goest.’Trusting to this hope, and protected by this guardianship, you will happily fulfil what you have begun.“I commend myself to your Reverence's Sacrifices and prayers, for my weakness oppresses me much; but may the will of God be done in me and about me in all things and by all things, to Whom concerning all things be glory for ever. Amen.“[Cross]Ludovicus de la Puente.[Cross]“Valladolid, Feb. 2, 1622.”

“I. H. S.

“P.C.

“May the Almighty and most pitiful Lord accompany you in the journey that you begin, for with such a Guide and Companion you will be everywhere safe and cheerful, and making true progress. Let Him ever dwell in your memory, understanding, and will, for His most sweet providence especially protects those who make their journeys from obedience to Superiors, as Jacob did, who at his father's bidding journeyed through the desert into Mesopotamia, where he heard the voice of the Lord, which said to him,‘I will be thy Keeper whithersoever thou goest.’Trusting to this hope, and protected by this guardianship, you will happily fulfil what you have begun.

“I commend myself to your Reverence's Sacrifices and prayers, for my weakness oppresses me much; but may the will of God be done in me and about me in all things and by all things, to Whom concerning all things be glory for ever. Amen.

“[Cross]Ludovicus de la Puente.[Cross]

“Valladolid, Feb. 2, 1622.”

With these saintly words our materials for writing the life of Father John Gerard abruptly fail us. Beyond what has been recorded we only know that he was sent first to Spain, and then to Rome, which he reached Jan. 15, 1623.177He was Confessor to the English College till his death, July 27, 1637, at the ripe age of seventy-three, and upwards.

XXX.In this Autobiography Father Gerard has laid before us his life in all the freedom and unreserve of a confidential communication with his Religious brethren and Superiors. It is not possible, we are convinced, for any impartial person to rise from its perusal without a deep conviction that Father Gerard was a gentleman and a Christian, a man of honour and religious principle; and in many cases this sense of his integrity will be accompanied with some of that personal regard and affection with which he inspired those who lived in intimacy with him. He bore too much for principle, and made too great sacrifices, for us to think that he would deliberately and perseveringly commit sin to free himself from blame. Yet this is the supposition that is involved in an attack upon his veracity in the compilation of his Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot.It is quite true that he, and many others, considered themselves justified, when their own lives or those of innocent persons were at stake, in the use of assertions that were simple falsehoods in the ordinary sense of the terms employed. These they called equivocations; and we find no trace in the period of which we are writing of the modern sense of the word, that is, of a true expression which is really beside the point, though it is so employed that it is very unlikely to be seen to be so by the person to whom it is addressed, who thus is said rather to be suffered to deceive himself than to be deceived. Practically the distinction is hard to draw, and it has the disadvantage of seeming to make the morality of the expression depend on the quickness and readiness of the person in danger, who may be able to think of phrases containing a real ambiguity but which yet would throw the hearers off the right scent.According to modern feeling, Father Gerard would have been quite justified in examining the trees and hedges in search of a falcon178he had not lost, and inquiring of all he met whether they had heard the tinkling of the bird's bells, although it was to make them think that he had lost a falcon, in other words, to deceive[pg ccx]them; but by the same modern feeling he would be held to be guilty of a lie when he said that he was the servant of a lord in a neighbouring county, though he might, without guilt, have worn that lord's livery as a disguise if he could have obtained it, which would have been a more effectual deception than any words.Again, according to modern judgment, John Lilly would be held guilty of a lie when he said179of Gerard's books and manuscripts,“They are mine;”but quite guiltless when, with the same intention of making the magistrates believe him to be a Priest when he was not, he said,“I do not say I am a Priest, that is for you to prove.”Yet the latter expression was far more likely to deceive than the former. It was more like what a Priest, under the circumstances, would have said. Present feeling would condemn him of a lie for saying simply, that the books were his, when it would acquit him if he had thought of using far more deceptive expressions, such as“I am not bound to compromise myself by saying whose they are.”The only difference between modern morality and that on which Father Gerard acted was that now-a-days men say,“Have recourse to evasions.”Then men said,“Say what you like, it is their fault if they think it true.”It is evident that of the two courses of proceeding, the plain-spoken old way is the least open to abuse. No one certainly would have recourse to it excepting from a well-weighed plea of a sorrowful necessity. Whereas, on the other hand, evasions are not startling, and the conscience may lay but little stress on the presence or absence of justifying circumstances. For it is most necessary to bear seriously in mind that all Catholic divines then held, and now hold, that to make use of equivocation excepting under those peculiar circumstances that make it lawful, is in itself a sin, and thus no escape from the sin of lying. So Father Garnett plainly said when on his trial,180“As I say it is never lawful to equivocate in matters of faith, so also in matters of human conversation, it may not be used promiscually or at our pleasure, as in matters of contract, in matters of testimony, or before a competent judge, or[pg ccxi]to the prejudice of any third person: in which cases we judge it altogether unlawful.”It is but fair that, in reading the narrative of times when many lives hung on successful disguise and concealment, we should remember that the modern sense of equivocation was then unknown. Protestant moralists have spoken out their minds plainly enough on this subject.“Great English authors, Jeremy Taylor, Milton, Paley, Johnson, men of very distinct schools of thought, distinctly say that under certain extreme circumstances it is allowable to tell a lie. Taylor says:‘To tell a lie for charity, to save a man's life, the life of a friend, of a husband, of a prince, of a useful and a public person, hath not only been done at all times, but commended by great and wise and good men. Who would not save his father's life, at the charge of a harmless lie, from persecutors or tyrants?’Again, Milton says:‘What man in his senses would deny that there are those whom we have the best ground for considering that we ought to deceive, as boys, madmen, the sick, the intoxicated, enemies, men in error, thieves? I would ask, by which of the Commandments is lying forbidden? You will say, by the ninth. If then my lie does not injure my neighbour, certainly it is not forbidden by this Commandment.’Paley says:‘There are falsehoods which are not lies, that is, which are not criminal.’Johnson:‘The general rule is, that truth should never be violated; there must, however, be some exceptions. If, for instance, a murderer should ask you which way a man is gone.’”181Thislanguagewould not have been used by Catholics. With them the word“lie”signified a simple falsehood; and an“equivocation”was a false expression used under such circumstances that if they to whom it was addressed were deceived by it,[pg ccxii]it was their own fault. They had then no right to the truth, and even in some cases it would have been a sin to tell them the truth.In substance, however, though not in form, the doctrine of Gerard, Southwell, and Garnett, was the same as that of Taylor, Milton, and Johnson. But to confine ourselves to the practice of Father Gerard, this doctrine is not necessary for his defence, and if his conduct be fairly examined, he will be held, even from the modern point of view, to have done no wrong. Protestant moralists, as we have seen, permit men under certain circumstances to tell a lie with intent to deceive. And Catholic moralists permit under such circumstances assertions which would lead the hearers to deceive themselves by neglecting to advert to the limit of the speaker's obligation to tell the truth. But with regard to Father Gerard's legal interrogations, we may waive the question whether they are right or wrong in their morality, for we see clearly that he so expressed himself as to show that his words were not intended to be believed.The real parallel to them, alleged by Gerard himself, as we shall shortly see, is the prisoner's usual plea of“Not guilty.”This is the only form in which thequestionis now put to a person accused. But in those days the question was put over and over again, and in every variety of form. To deny was really to plead“Not guilty,”and if this be lawful once, it was lawful whenever they were forced to repeat it. Not only was it a capital offence to be a Priest within the realm, but it was high treason to be reconciled to the Church, or absolved by a Priest, or to harbour or comfort one. Thus the interrogations addressed to prisoners were always intended to make them criminate themselves or others; that is, in the one case to cause them to plead guilty, so that they might be condemned to death on their own confessions; or, in the other case, to force them to become Queen's evidence, and be accessory to the infliction upon others of the extremest penalties enacted by an unjust law.The first instance that occurs in Father Gerard's Life, is that when, after his apprehension, on being questioned he declared that he was quite unacquainted with the family of the Wisemans, and those who were examining him betrayed their informer[pg ccxiii]by crying out,“What lies you tell! Did you not say so-and-so before such a lady as you read your servant's letter?”Then he adds,“But I still denied it,giving them good reasons however why, even if it had been true, I could and ought to have denied it.”182Another time183he was confronted with three servants of Lord Henry Seymour, who avouched that he had dined with their mistress and her sister, the Lady Mary Percy, that it was in Lent, and they told how their mistress ate meat, while Lady Mary and Father Gerard ate nothing but fish.“Young flung this charge in my teeth with an air of triumph, as though I could not help acknowledging it, and thereby disclosing some of my acquaintances. I answered that I did not know the men whom he had brought up.“‘But we know you,’said they,‘to be the same that was at such a place on such a day.’“‘You wrong your mistress,’said I,‘in saying so. I, however, will not so wrong her.’“‘What a barefaced fellow you are!’exclaimed Young.“‘Doubtless,’I answered,‘were these men's statements true.As for me, I cannot in conscience speak positively in the matter, for reasons that I have often alleged; let them look to the truth and justice of what they say.’”A third instance is the interview184between Father Gerard and the widow Wiseman, in the presence of the Dean of Westminster, Topcliffe, and others.“They wanted to see if she recognized me. So when I came into the room where they brought me, I found her already there. When she saw me coming in with the gaolers, she almost jumped for joy; but she controlled herself, and said to them:‘Is that the person you spoke of? I do not know him; but he looks like a Priest.’“Upon this she made me a very low reverence, and I bowed in return. Then they asked me if I did not recognize her?“I answered:‘I do not recognize her.At the same time, you know this is my usual way of answering, and I will never mention any places, or give the names of any persons that are known to me(which this lady, however, is not);because to do[pg ccxiv]so, as I have told you before, would be contrary both to justice and charity.’”Lastly, when examined185by the Attorney General, after having received a letter from Father Garnett, warning him to prepare himself for death, and after having freely confessed that he was a Priest and a Jesuit, and that he had reconciled others to the Pope, and drawn them away from the faith and religious profession which was approved in England,“answers,”he says himself,“which furnished quite sufficient matter for my condemnation, according to their laws,”and after having denied that he had meddled in political matters; his examination proceeded as follows.“Hereupon Mr. Attorney kept silence for a time, and then he began afresh to ask me what Catholics I knew; did I know such-and-such? I answered,‘I do not know them.’And I added the usual reasons why I should still make the same answer even if I did know them.186Upon this, he digressed to the question of equivocation, and began to inveigh against Father Southwell, because on his trial he denied that he knew the woman who was brought forward to accuse him.187She swore that he had come to her father's house and was received there as a Priest; this he positively denied, though he had been taken in that house and was found in a hiding-place, having been betrayed by this wretched woman. (A dutiful daughter truly, who thus betrayed to death both her spiritual and her natural father! Christ our Lord, however, came not to send peace, but a sword to divide between the good and the bad; and in this case he divided the bad daughter from the good parents.) Good Father Southwell, then, though he marvelled at the impudence of this miserable wench, yet denied what she asserted, andgave good reasons for his denial, well knowing and solidly proving that it was not lawful for him[pg ccxv]to do otherwise, lest he should add to the injury of those who were already suffering for the Faith, and for charity shown to him. Taking this occasion, therefore, he showed very learnedly that it was lawful in some cases, nay, even necessary perhaps, to use equivocation; which doctrine he established and confirmed by strong arguments and copious authorities, drawn as well from Holy Scripture as from the writings of the Doctors of the Church.“The Attorney General inveighed much against this, and tried to make out that this was to foster lying, and so destroy all reliable communications between men, and, therefore, all bonds of society. I, on the other hand, maintained that this was not falsehood, nor supposed an intention of deceiving, which is necessary to constitute a lie, but merely a keeping back of the truth, and that where one is not bound to declare it: consequently there is no deception, because nothing is refused which the other has a right to claim. I showed, moreover, that our doctrine did no way involve a destruction of the bonds of society, because the use of equivocation is never allowed in making contracts, since all are bound to give their neighbour his due, and in making of contracts truth is due to the party contracting. It should be remarked also, I said, that it is not allowed to use equivocation in ordinary conversation to the detriment of plain truth and Christian simplicity, much less in matters properly falling under the cognizance of civil authority,188since it is not lawful to deny even a capital crime if the accused is questioned juridically. He asked me, therefore, what I considered a juridical questioning. I answered that the questioners must be really superiors and judges in the matter under examination; then, the matter itself must be some crime hurtful to the common weal, in order that it may come under their jurisdiction; for sins merely internal were reserved for God's judgment. Again, there must be some trustworthy testimony brought against the accused; thus, it is the custom in England that all who are put[pg ccxvi]on their trial, when first asked by the Judge if they are guilty or not, answer,‘Not guilty,’before any witness is brought against them, or any verdict found by the jury; and though they answer the same way, whether really guilty or not, yet no one accuses them of lying. Therefore I laid down this general principle, that no one is allowed to use equivocation except in the case when something is asked him, either actually or virtually, which the questioner has no right to ask, and the declaration of which will turn to his own hurt, if he answers according to the intention of the questioner. I showed that this had been our Lord's practice, and that of the Saints. I showed that it was the practice of all prudent men, and would certainly be followed by my interrogators themselves in case they were asked about some secret sin, for example, or were asked by robbers where their money was hid.“They asked me, therefore, when our Lord ever made use of equivocations; to which I replied,‘When He told His Apostles that no one knew the Day of Judgment, not even the Son of Man; and again, when He said that He was not going up to the Festival at Jerusalem, and yet He went; yea, and He knew that He should go when He said He would not.’“Wade here interrupted me, saying,‘Christ really did not know the Day of Judgment, as Son of Man.’“‘It cannot be,’said I,‘that the Word of God Incarnate, and with a human nature hypostatically united to God, should be subject to ignorance; nor that He Who was appointed Judge by God the Father should be ignorant of those facts which belonged necessarily to His office; nor that He should be of infinite wisdom, and yet not know what intimately concerned Himself.’In fact, these heretics do not practically admit what the Apostle teaches (though they boast of following his doctrines), namely, that all the fulness of the Divinity resided corporally in Christ, and that in Him were all the treasures of the wisdom and knowledge of God. It did not, however, occur to me at the moment to adduce this passage of St. Paul.”In every one of these instances words are carefully introduced to show that the denials in question were uttered not with the intent of deceiving the hearers (though even that, according to[pg ccxvii]the grave Protestant authorities recently quoted, would have been lawful), nor of allowing them to deceive themselves if they did not choose to advert to the circumstances in which the denials were made (as Catholic divines would have permitted);189but avowedly in order that they might not be available as legal evidence against the speaker or his friends.To Father Gerard's defence of himself it may be as well to add that of Father Southwell,190who was assailed by Sir Edward Coke.“The Father would have spoken further on this point [obedience to the laws] had they not attacked him on another,”[pg ccxviii]objecting to him a statement of Anne Bellamy's, who deposed that Father Robert had instructed her, that if asked by searchers or persecutors if there was a Priest in the house, she could say“No,”though she knew there was one: nay, that if asked on oath, she could swear there was not. No sooner was this brought out than the Judges and officers of the court showed themselves highly scandalized, and were for stopping their ears:191as if, forsooth, the seeking for Catholic Priests to put them to a traitor's death, or force them to apostatize, were a proceeding so clearly and so indubitably just, as to make it as clearly and indubitably unjust to hide them from such an ordeal, or to deny them to their pursuers: nor, indeed, would the harm be confined to the cruel execution of the Priest, but with him the whole of the family in whose house he was found would be liable to the same death of traitors. Coke, therefore, the Attorney General, made the most he could of this matter, insisting that such a pernicious doctrine tended to destroy all truth, and all reliance of men in each other's veracity, and if allowed to prevail, would upset all good government. Topcliffe also inveighed against it so exorbitantly, that Judge Popham silenced him. Father Robert then, as soon as he was allowed to reply, explained briefly what he had said to the witness, whose statement was not altogether exact, and addressing the Judge, said:“‘If you will have the patience to listen to me, I shall be able to prove to you from the Holy Scriptures, from the Fathers, from theologians, and from reason, that in case a demand is made against justice and with the view of doing grievous harm to an innocent person, to give an answer not according to the intent of the questioner is no offence against either the divine law or the natural law. Nay, I will prove that this doctrine in no wise threatens the good government of states and kingdoms: and that, where the other necessary conditions of an oath are present, there is nothing wrong in confirming such an answer in that manner. Now I ask you, Mr. Attorney, Supposing the[pg ccxix]King of France (which God forbid) were to invade this country successfully, and having obtained full possession of this city, were to make search for Her Majesty the Queen, whom you knew to be hidden in a secret apartment of the palace: supposing, moreover, that you were seized in the palace and brought before the King, and that he asked you where the Queen was, and would receive no profession of ignorance from you except on oath: what would you do? To palter or hesitate is to show that she is there: to refuse to swear is equivalent to a betrayal. What would you answer? I suppose, forsooth, you would point out the place! Yet who of all who now hear me would not cry out upon you for a traitor? You would then, if you had any sense, swear at once, either that you knew not where she was, or that you knew she was not in the palace, in order that your knowledge might not become instrumental to her harm. Of this kind, in fact, was the answer of Christ in the Gospel, when He said that concerning the Day of Judgment no one had any knowledge, neither the Angels in Heaven, nor the Son: that is, according to the interpretation of the Fathers, such knowledge that He could communicate to others. Now this is the condition of Catholics in England: they are in peril of their liberty, their fortunes, and their lives, if they should have a Priest in their houses. How can it be forbidden them to escape these evils by an equivocal answer, and to confirm this answer, if necessary, by an oath? For in such a case, three things must be remembered: first, that a wrong is done unless you swear; secondly, that no one is obliged to answer everybody's questions about everything; thirdly, that an oath is always lawful, if made with truth, with judgment, and with justice, all which are found in this case.’192“He went on to exemplify his position by supposed queries of robbers and highwaymen; but he was interrupted by abuse.”[pg ccxx]Father Garnett has defended himself at sufficient length in his speech on his trial;193but as he there refers to his previous answers, we have thought it best to give insertion here to an autograph paper of his preserved in the Public Record Office.194“Concerning equivocation, which I seemed to condemn in moral things, my meaning was in moral and human conversation, in which the virtue of verity is required among friends, for otherwise it were injurious to all humanity. Neither is equivocation at all to be justified, but in case of necessary defence from injustice or wrong, or the obtaining some good of great importance, when there is no danger of harm to others, as in the case of Coventry,195wherein I suppose it is a great advantage to me for to be admitted, and no harm can ensue to the city. For the city seeketh nothing but to be free from the sickness, and if it were possible that the city knew me to be free of certainty, they would admit me presently, which is confirmed by the custom of places beyond [sea], where, though they know a man to come from a place infected, yet after they have kept him in some several place, with convenient diet, for forty days, they admit him.“As for Mr. Tresham's equivocation, I am loath to judge; yet I think ignorance might excuse him, because he might think it lawful in that case to equivocate for the excuse of his friend, yet would I be loath to allow of it or practise it: he being not then urged, but voluntarily offering it himself, contrary to that which he had before set down, and especially being in case of manifest treason, as I will after explain. But in case a man be urged at the hour of his death, it is lawful for to equivocate,with such due circumstances as are required in his life. An example we may bring in another matter. For the divines hold that in some cases a man may be bound to concealsomething in his confession, because of some great harm which may ensue of it. And as he may do so in his life, so may he at his death, if the danger of the harm continue still.“The case being propounded, supposing that I knew Gerard[pg ccxxi]acquainted with this treason, and having been often demanded thereof, I still denying it, by way of equivocation, whether at the hour of my death, either natural or by course of justice, I may by equivocation seek to clear him again.“I answer, that in case I be not urged I may not, but I must leave the matter in case in which it stand; but if I be urged, then I may clear him by equivocation, whereas otherwise my silence would be accounted an accusation. But all this I understand when the case is such that I am bound to conceal Gerard's treason, as if I had heard it in confession. For this is a general rule, that in cases of true and manifest treason,196a man is bound voluntarily in utter and very truth by no way to equivocate, if he know it not by way of confession, in which case also he is bound to seek all lawful ways to discover,salvo sigillo.“Henry Garnett.“29° Martii.“All the Doctors that hold equivocation to be lawful do maintain that it is not lawful when the examinate is bound to tell the simple truth, that is, according to the civil law, when there is a competent judge, and the cause subject to his jurisdiction, and sufficient proofs. But in case of treason a man is bound to confess of another without any witness at all, yea, voluntarily to disclose it; not so of himself.[pg ccxxii]“And how far the common law bindeth in cases that are not treason a man to confess of himself, I know not. In the civil law, it is sufficient to havesemiplenam probationem, that is,unum testem omni exceptione majorem, ormanifesta indicia.“Our law I take to be more mild, and that a man may put all to witnesses without confessing, except in cases of treason. For, according to our law,non pervertitur judicium tacendo vel negando, as in the civil law, where is requiredreus confitens. But generally, when a man is bound to confess, there is no place of equivocation. And when he is not bound to confess according to the laws of each country, then may he equivocate.”In the last paper Father Garnett is not speaking of equivocation used in defence of an innocent person, but of what we may call the persistent plea of“Not guilty,”and he there draws an interesting distinction between the Roman civil law and our own, which he calls“more mild,”in that it professed to regard a prisoner as innocent till he is proved to be guilty. Happily this is our practice now, as well as our profession, and our quotations are needed to enable us to form judgments of conduct in times that have happily passed away.But with regard to the trustworthiness of Father John Gerard's evidence, as we have it before us in his Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot, even if the lawfulness of his proceedings were not admitted, all that we are concerned to show is, that untrue statements, made by a man under circumstances which, rightly or wrongly, he considers to justify him in making them, furnish no presumption whatever that, under other circumstances, affording to his conscience no such justification, his word cannot be trusted. It is an evident instance of the maxim that the exception proves the rule. Restraining himself carefully within the limits of what he held to be lawful under circumstances of extreme difficulty and great personal danger, are we not rather to conclude that, under far less pressure, he will as carefully confine himself to the laws imposed by his conscience? Clearly there is nothing in Father Gerard's practice under examination to cause us to hesitate in placing implicit trust in his word when he speaks as an historian; and, in addition, we are sure that no one will rise[pg ccxxiii]from the perusal of the exculpatory letters which we propose to subjoin, without a full conviction of his innocence and truthfulness.

In this Autobiography Father Gerard has laid before us his life in all the freedom and unreserve of a confidential communication with his Religious brethren and Superiors. It is not possible, we are convinced, for any impartial person to rise from its perusal without a deep conviction that Father Gerard was a gentleman and a Christian, a man of honour and religious principle; and in many cases this sense of his integrity will be accompanied with some of that personal regard and affection with which he inspired those who lived in intimacy with him. He bore too much for principle, and made too great sacrifices, for us to think that he would deliberately and perseveringly commit sin to free himself from blame. Yet this is the supposition that is involved in an attack upon his veracity in the compilation of his Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot.

It is quite true that he, and many others, considered themselves justified, when their own lives or those of innocent persons were at stake, in the use of assertions that were simple falsehoods in the ordinary sense of the terms employed. These they called equivocations; and we find no trace in the period of which we are writing of the modern sense of the word, that is, of a true expression which is really beside the point, though it is so employed that it is very unlikely to be seen to be so by the person to whom it is addressed, who thus is said rather to be suffered to deceive himself than to be deceived. Practically the distinction is hard to draw, and it has the disadvantage of seeming to make the morality of the expression depend on the quickness and readiness of the person in danger, who may be able to think of phrases containing a real ambiguity but which yet would throw the hearers off the right scent.

According to modern feeling, Father Gerard would have been quite justified in examining the trees and hedges in search of a falcon178he had not lost, and inquiring of all he met whether they had heard the tinkling of the bird's bells, although it was to make them think that he had lost a falcon, in other words, to deceive[pg ccx]them; but by the same modern feeling he would be held to be guilty of a lie when he said that he was the servant of a lord in a neighbouring county, though he might, without guilt, have worn that lord's livery as a disguise if he could have obtained it, which would have been a more effectual deception than any words.

Again, according to modern judgment, John Lilly would be held guilty of a lie when he said179of Gerard's books and manuscripts,“They are mine;”but quite guiltless when, with the same intention of making the magistrates believe him to be a Priest when he was not, he said,“I do not say I am a Priest, that is for you to prove.”Yet the latter expression was far more likely to deceive than the former. It was more like what a Priest, under the circumstances, would have said. Present feeling would condemn him of a lie for saying simply, that the books were his, when it would acquit him if he had thought of using far more deceptive expressions, such as“I am not bound to compromise myself by saying whose they are.”

The only difference between modern morality and that on which Father Gerard acted was that now-a-days men say,“Have recourse to evasions.”Then men said,“Say what you like, it is their fault if they think it true.”It is evident that of the two courses of proceeding, the plain-spoken old way is the least open to abuse. No one certainly would have recourse to it excepting from a well-weighed plea of a sorrowful necessity. Whereas, on the other hand, evasions are not startling, and the conscience may lay but little stress on the presence or absence of justifying circumstances. For it is most necessary to bear seriously in mind that all Catholic divines then held, and now hold, that to make use of equivocation excepting under those peculiar circumstances that make it lawful, is in itself a sin, and thus no escape from the sin of lying. So Father Garnett plainly said when on his trial,180“As I say it is never lawful to equivocate in matters of faith, so also in matters of human conversation, it may not be used promiscually or at our pleasure, as in matters of contract, in matters of testimony, or before a competent judge, or[pg ccxi]to the prejudice of any third person: in which cases we judge it altogether unlawful.”

It is but fair that, in reading the narrative of times when many lives hung on successful disguise and concealment, we should remember that the modern sense of equivocation was then unknown. Protestant moralists have spoken out their minds plainly enough on this subject.

“Great English authors, Jeremy Taylor, Milton, Paley, Johnson, men of very distinct schools of thought, distinctly say that under certain extreme circumstances it is allowable to tell a lie. Taylor says:‘To tell a lie for charity, to save a man's life, the life of a friend, of a husband, of a prince, of a useful and a public person, hath not only been done at all times, but commended by great and wise and good men. Who would not save his father's life, at the charge of a harmless lie, from persecutors or tyrants?’Again, Milton says:‘What man in his senses would deny that there are those whom we have the best ground for considering that we ought to deceive, as boys, madmen, the sick, the intoxicated, enemies, men in error, thieves? I would ask, by which of the Commandments is lying forbidden? You will say, by the ninth. If then my lie does not injure my neighbour, certainly it is not forbidden by this Commandment.’Paley says:‘There are falsehoods which are not lies, that is, which are not criminal.’Johnson:‘The general rule is, that truth should never be violated; there must, however, be some exceptions. If, for instance, a murderer should ask you which way a man is gone.’”181

Thislanguagewould not have been used by Catholics. With them the word“lie”signified a simple falsehood; and an“equivocation”was a false expression used under such circumstances that if they to whom it was addressed were deceived by it,[pg ccxii]it was their own fault. They had then no right to the truth, and even in some cases it would have been a sin to tell them the truth.

In substance, however, though not in form, the doctrine of Gerard, Southwell, and Garnett, was the same as that of Taylor, Milton, and Johnson. But to confine ourselves to the practice of Father Gerard, this doctrine is not necessary for his defence, and if his conduct be fairly examined, he will be held, even from the modern point of view, to have done no wrong. Protestant moralists, as we have seen, permit men under certain circumstances to tell a lie with intent to deceive. And Catholic moralists permit under such circumstances assertions which would lead the hearers to deceive themselves by neglecting to advert to the limit of the speaker's obligation to tell the truth. But with regard to Father Gerard's legal interrogations, we may waive the question whether they are right or wrong in their morality, for we see clearly that he so expressed himself as to show that his words were not intended to be believed.

The real parallel to them, alleged by Gerard himself, as we shall shortly see, is the prisoner's usual plea of“Not guilty.”This is the only form in which thequestionis now put to a person accused. But in those days the question was put over and over again, and in every variety of form. To deny was really to plead“Not guilty,”and if this be lawful once, it was lawful whenever they were forced to repeat it. Not only was it a capital offence to be a Priest within the realm, but it was high treason to be reconciled to the Church, or absolved by a Priest, or to harbour or comfort one. Thus the interrogations addressed to prisoners were always intended to make them criminate themselves or others; that is, in the one case to cause them to plead guilty, so that they might be condemned to death on their own confessions; or, in the other case, to force them to become Queen's evidence, and be accessory to the infliction upon others of the extremest penalties enacted by an unjust law.

The first instance that occurs in Father Gerard's Life, is that when, after his apprehension, on being questioned he declared that he was quite unacquainted with the family of the Wisemans, and those who were examining him betrayed their informer[pg ccxiii]by crying out,“What lies you tell! Did you not say so-and-so before such a lady as you read your servant's letter?”Then he adds,“But I still denied it,giving them good reasons however why, even if it had been true, I could and ought to have denied it.”182

Another time183he was confronted with three servants of Lord Henry Seymour, who avouched that he had dined with their mistress and her sister, the Lady Mary Percy, that it was in Lent, and they told how their mistress ate meat, while Lady Mary and Father Gerard ate nothing but fish.“Young flung this charge in my teeth with an air of triumph, as though I could not help acknowledging it, and thereby disclosing some of my acquaintances. I answered that I did not know the men whom he had brought up.

“‘But we know you,’said they,‘to be the same that was at such a place on such a day.’

“‘You wrong your mistress,’said I,‘in saying so. I, however, will not so wrong her.’

“‘What a barefaced fellow you are!’exclaimed Young.

“‘Doubtless,’I answered,‘were these men's statements true.As for me, I cannot in conscience speak positively in the matter, for reasons that I have often alleged; let them look to the truth and justice of what they say.’”

A third instance is the interview184between Father Gerard and the widow Wiseman, in the presence of the Dean of Westminster, Topcliffe, and others.“They wanted to see if she recognized me. So when I came into the room where they brought me, I found her already there. When she saw me coming in with the gaolers, she almost jumped for joy; but she controlled herself, and said to them:‘Is that the person you spoke of? I do not know him; but he looks like a Priest.’

“Upon this she made me a very low reverence, and I bowed in return. Then they asked me if I did not recognize her?

“I answered:‘I do not recognize her.At the same time, you know this is my usual way of answering, and I will never mention any places, or give the names of any persons that are known to me(which this lady, however, is not);because to do[pg ccxiv]so, as I have told you before, would be contrary both to justice and charity.’”

Lastly, when examined185by the Attorney General, after having received a letter from Father Garnett, warning him to prepare himself for death, and after having freely confessed that he was a Priest and a Jesuit, and that he had reconciled others to the Pope, and drawn them away from the faith and religious profession which was approved in England,“answers,”he says himself,“which furnished quite sufficient matter for my condemnation, according to their laws,”and after having denied that he had meddled in political matters; his examination proceeded as follows.

“Hereupon Mr. Attorney kept silence for a time, and then he began afresh to ask me what Catholics I knew; did I know such-and-such? I answered,‘I do not know them.’And I added the usual reasons why I should still make the same answer even if I did know them.186Upon this, he digressed to the question of equivocation, and began to inveigh against Father Southwell, because on his trial he denied that he knew the woman who was brought forward to accuse him.187She swore that he had come to her father's house and was received there as a Priest; this he positively denied, though he had been taken in that house and was found in a hiding-place, having been betrayed by this wretched woman. (A dutiful daughter truly, who thus betrayed to death both her spiritual and her natural father! Christ our Lord, however, came not to send peace, but a sword to divide between the good and the bad; and in this case he divided the bad daughter from the good parents.) Good Father Southwell, then, though he marvelled at the impudence of this miserable wench, yet denied what she asserted, andgave good reasons for his denial, well knowing and solidly proving that it was not lawful for him[pg ccxv]to do otherwise, lest he should add to the injury of those who were already suffering for the Faith, and for charity shown to him. Taking this occasion, therefore, he showed very learnedly that it was lawful in some cases, nay, even necessary perhaps, to use equivocation; which doctrine he established and confirmed by strong arguments and copious authorities, drawn as well from Holy Scripture as from the writings of the Doctors of the Church.

“The Attorney General inveighed much against this, and tried to make out that this was to foster lying, and so destroy all reliable communications between men, and, therefore, all bonds of society. I, on the other hand, maintained that this was not falsehood, nor supposed an intention of deceiving, which is necessary to constitute a lie, but merely a keeping back of the truth, and that where one is not bound to declare it: consequently there is no deception, because nothing is refused which the other has a right to claim. I showed, moreover, that our doctrine did no way involve a destruction of the bonds of society, because the use of equivocation is never allowed in making contracts, since all are bound to give their neighbour his due, and in making of contracts truth is due to the party contracting. It should be remarked also, I said, that it is not allowed to use equivocation in ordinary conversation to the detriment of plain truth and Christian simplicity, much less in matters properly falling under the cognizance of civil authority,188since it is not lawful to deny even a capital crime if the accused is questioned juridically. He asked me, therefore, what I considered a juridical questioning. I answered that the questioners must be really superiors and judges in the matter under examination; then, the matter itself must be some crime hurtful to the common weal, in order that it may come under their jurisdiction; for sins merely internal were reserved for God's judgment. Again, there must be some trustworthy testimony brought against the accused; thus, it is the custom in England that all who are put[pg ccxvi]on their trial, when first asked by the Judge if they are guilty or not, answer,‘Not guilty,’before any witness is brought against them, or any verdict found by the jury; and though they answer the same way, whether really guilty or not, yet no one accuses them of lying. Therefore I laid down this general principle, that no one is allowed to use equivocation except in the case when something is asked him, either actually or virtually, which the questioner has no right to ask, and the declaration of which will turn to his own hurt, if he answers according to the intention of the questioner. I showed that this had been our Lord's practice, and that of the Saints. I showed that it was the practice of all prudent men, and would certainly be followed by my interrogators themselves in case they were asked about some secret sin, for example, or were asked by robbers where their money was hid.

“They asked me, therefore, when our Lord ever made use of equivocations; to which I replied,‘When He told His Apostles that no one knew the Day of Judgment, not even the Son of Man; and again, when He said that He was not going up to the Festival at Jerusalem, and yet He went; yea, and He knew that He should go when He said He would not.’

“Wade here interrupted me, saying,‘Christ really did not know the Day of Judgment, as Son of Man.’

“‘It cannot be,’said I,‘that the Word of God Incarnate, and with a human nature hypostatically united to God, should be subject to ignorance; nor that He Who was appointed Judge by God the Father should be ignorant of those facts which belonged necessarily to His office; nor that He should be of infinite wisdom, and yet not know what intimately concerned Himself.’In fact, these heretics do not practically admit what the Apostle teaches (though they boast of following his doctrines), namely, that all the fulness of the Divinity resided corporally in Christ, and that in Him were all the treasures of the wisdom and knowledge of God. It did not, however, occur to me at the moment to adduce this passage of St. Paul.”

In every one of these instances words are carefully introduced to show that the denials in question were uttered not with the intent of deceiving the hearers (though even that, according to[pg ccxvii]the grave Protestant authorities recently quoted, would have been lawful), nor of allowing them to deceive themselves if they did not choose to advert to the circumstances in which the denials were made (as Catholic divines would have permitted);189but avowedly in order that they might not be available as legal evidence against the speaker or his friends.

To Father Gerard's defence of himself it may be as well to add that of Father Southwell,190who was assailed by Sir Edward Coke.

“The Father would have spoken further on this point [obedience to the laws] had they not attacked him on another,”[pg ccxviii]objecting to him a statement of Anne Bellamy's, who deposed that Father Robert had instructed her, that if asked by searchers or persecutors if there was a Priest in the house, she could say“No,”though she knew there was one: nay, that if asked on oath, she could swear there was not. No sooner was this brought out than the Judges and officers of the court showed themselves highly scandalized, and were for stopping their ears:191as if, forsooth, the seeking for Catholic Priests to put them to a traitor's death, or force them to apostatize, were a proceeding so clearly and so indubitably just, as to make it as clearly and indubitably unjust to hide them from such an ordeal, or to deny them to their pursuers: nor, indeed, would the harm be confined to the cruel execution of the Priest, but with him the whole of the family in whose house he was found would be liable to the same death of traitors. Coke, therefore, the Attorney General, made the most he could of this matter, insisting that such a pernicious doctrine tended to destroy all truth, and all reliance of men in each other's veracity, and if allowed to prevail, would upset all good government. Topcliffe also inveighed against it so exorbitantly, that Judge Popham silenced him. Father Robert then, as soon as he was allowed to reply, explained briefly what he had said to the witness, whose statement was not altogether exact, and addressing the Judge, said:

“‘If you will have the patience to listen to me, I shall be able to prove to you from the Holy Scriptures, from the Fathers, from theologians, and from reason, that in case a demand is made against justice and with the view of doing grievous harm to an innocent person, to give an answer not according to the intent of the questioner is no offence against either the divine law or the natural law. Nay, I will prove that this doctrine in no wise threatens the good government of states and kingdoms: and that, where the other necessary conditions of an oath are present, there is nothing wrong in confirming such an answer in that manner. Now I ask you, Mr. Attorney, Supposing the[pg ccxix]King of France (which God forbid) were to invade this country successfully, and having obtained full possession of this city, were to make search for Her Majesty the Queen, whom you knew to be hidden in a secret apartment of the palace: supposing, moreover, that you were seized in the palace and brought before the King, and that he asked you where the Queen was, and would receive no profession of ignorance from you except on oath: what would you do? To palter or hesitate is to show that she is there: to refuse to swear is equivalent to a betrayal. What would you answer? I suppose, forsooth, you would point out the place! Yet who of all who now hear me would not cry out upon you for a traitor? You would then, if you had any sense, swear at once, either that you knew not where she was, or that you knew she was not in the palace, in order that your knowledge might not become instrumental to her harm. Of this kind, in fact, was the answer of Christ in the Gospel, when He said that concerning the Day of Judgment no one had any knowledge, neither the Angels in Heaven, nor the Son: that is, according to the interpretation of the Fathers, such knowledge that He could communicate to others. Now this is the condition of Catholics in England: they are in peril of their liberty, their fortunes, and their lives, if they should have a Priest in their houses. How can it be forbidden them to escape these evils by an equivocal answer, and to confirm this answer, if necessary, by an oath? For in such a case, three things must be remembered: first, that a wrong is done unless you swear; secondly, that no one is obliged to answer everybody's questions about everything; thirdly, that an oath is always lawful, if made with truth, with judgment, and with justice, all which are found in this case.’192

“He went on to exemplify his position by supposed queries of robbers and highwaymen; but he was interrupted by abuse.”

Father Garnett has defended himself at sufficient length in his speech on his trial;193but as he there refers to his previous answers, we have thought it best to give insertion here to an autograph paper of his preserved in the Public Record Office.194

“Concerning equivocation, which I seemed to condemn in moral things, my meaning was in moral and human conversation, in which the virtue of verity is required among friends, for otherwise it were injurious to all humanity. Neither is equivocation at all to be justified, but in case of necessary defence from injustice or wrong, or the obtaining some good of great importance, when there is no danger of harm to others, as in the case of Coventry,195wherein I suppose it is a great advantage to me for to be admitted, and no harm can ensue to the city. For the city seeketh nothing but to be free from the sickness, and if it were possible that the city knew me to be free of certainty, they would admit me presently, which is confirmed by the custom of places beyond [sea], where, though they know a man to come from a place infected, yet after they have kept him in some several place, with convenient diet, for forty days, they admit him.“As for Mr. Tresham's equivocation, I am loath to judge; yet I think ignorance might excuse him, because he might think it lawful in that case to equivocate for the excuse of his friend, yet would I be loath to allow of it or practise it: he being not then urged, but voluntarily offering it himself, contrary to that which he had before set down, and especially being in case of manifest treason, as I will after explain. But in case a man be urged at the hour of his death, it is lawful for to equivocate,with such due circumstances as are required in his life. An example we may bring in another matter. For the divines hold that in some cases a man may be bound to concealsomething in his confession, because of some great harm which may ensue of it. And as he may do so in his life, so may he at his death, if the danger of the harm continue still.“The case being propounded, supposing that I knew Gerard[pg ccxxi]acquainted with this treason, and having been often demanded thereof, I still denying it, by way of equivocation, whether at the hour of my death, either natural or by course of justice, I may by equivocation seek to clear him again.“I answer, that in case I be not urged I may not, but I must leave the matter in case in which it stand; but if I be urged, then I may clear him by equivocation, whereas otherwise my silence would be accounted an accusation. But all this I understand when the case is such that I am bound to conceal Gerard's treason, as if I had heard it in confession. For this is a general rule, that in cases of true and manifest treason,196a man is bound voluntarily in utter and very truth by no way to equivocate, if he know it not by way of confession, in which case also he is bound to seek all lawful ways to discover,salvo sigillo.“Henry Garnett.“29° Martii.“All the Doctors that hold equivocation to be lawful do maintain that it is not lawful when the examinate is bound to tell the simple truth, that is, according to the civil law, when there is a competent judge, and the cause subject to his jurisdiction, and sufficient proofs. But in case of treason a man is bound to confess of another without any witness at all, yea, voluntarily to disclose it; not so of himself.[pg ccxxii]“And how far the common law bindeth in cases that are not treason a man to confess of himself, I know not. In the civil law, it is sufficient to havesemiplenam probationem, that is,unum testem omni exceptione majorem, ormanifesta indicia.“Our law I take to be more mild, and that a man may put all to witnesses without confessing, except in cases of treason. For, according to our law,non pervertitur judicium tacendo vel negando, as in the civil law, where is requiredreus confitens. But generally, when a man is bound to confess, there is no place of equivocation. And when he is not bound to confess according to the laws of each country, then may he equivocate.”

“Concerning equivocation, which I seemed to condemn in moral things, my meaning was in moral and human conversation, in which the virtue of verity is required among friends, for otherwise it were injurious to all humanity. Neither is equivocation at all to be justified, but in case of necessary defence from injustice or wrong, or the obtaining some good of great importance, when there is no danger of harm to others, as in the case of Coventry,195wherein I suppose it is a great advantage to me for to be admitted, and no harm can ensue to the city. For the city seeketh nothing but to be free from the sickness, and if it were possible that the city knew me to be free of certainty, they would admit me presently, which is confirmed by the custom of places beyond [sea], where, though they know a man to come from a place infected, yet after they have kept him in some several place, with convenient diet, for forty days, they admit him.

“As for Mr. Tresham's equivocation, I am loath to judge; yet I think ignorance might excuse him, because he might think it lawful in that case to equivocate for the excuse of his friend, yet would I be loath to allow of it or practise it: he being not then urged, but voluntarily offering it himself, contrary to that which he had before set down, and especially being in case of manifest treason, as I will after explain. But in case a man be urged at the hour of his death, it is lawful for to equivocate,with such due circumstances as are required in his life. An example we may bring in another matter. For the divines hold that in some cases a man may be bound to concealsomething in his confession, because of some great harm which may ensue of it. And as he may do so in his life, so may he at his death, if the danger of the harm continue still.

“The case being propounded, supposing that I knew Gerard[pg ccxxi]acquainted with this treason, and having been often demanded thereof, I still denying it, by way of equivocation, whether at the hour of my death, either natural or by course of justice, I may by equivocation seek to clear him again.

“I answer, that in case I be not urged I may not, but I must leave the matter in case in which it stand; but if I be urged, then I may clear him by equivocation, whereas otherwise my silence would be accounted an accusation. But all this I understand when the case is such that I am bound to conceal Gerard's treason, as if I had heard it in confession. For this is a general rule, that in cases of true and manifest treason,196a man is bound voluntarily in utter and very truth by no way to equivocate, if he know it not by way of confession, in which case also he is bound to seek all lawful ways to discover,salvo sigillo.

“Henry Garnett.

“29° Martii.

“All the Doctors that hold equivocation to be lawful do maintain that it is not lawful when the examinate is bound to tell the simple truth, that is, according to the civil law, when there is a competent judge, and the cause subject to his jurisdiction, and sufficient proofs. But in case of treason a man is bound to confess of another without any witness at all, yea, voluntarily to disclose it; not so of himself.

“And how far the common law bindeth in cases that are not treason a man to confess of himself, I know not. In the civil law, it is sufficient to havesemiplenam probationem, that is,unum testem omni exceptione majorem, ormanifesta indicia.

“Our law I take to be more mild, and that a man may put all to witnesses without confessing, except in cases of treason. For, according to our law,non pervertitur judicium tacendo vel negando, as in the civil law, where is requiredreus confitens. But generally, when a man is bound to confess, there is no place of equivocation. And when he is not bound to confess according to the laws of each country, then may he equivocate.”

In the last paper Father Garnett is not speaking of equivocation used in defence of an innocent person, but of what we may call the persistent plea of“Not guilty,”and he there draws an interesting distinction between the Roman civil law and our own, which he calls“more mild,”in that it professed to regard a prisoner as innocent till he is proved to be guilty. Happily this is our practice now, as well as our profession, and our quotations are needed to enable us to form judgments of conduct in times that have happily passed away.

But with regard to the trustworthiness of Father John Gerard's evidence, as we have it before us in his Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot, even if the lawfulness of his proceedings were not admitted, all that we are concerned to show is, that untrue statements, made by a man under circumstances which, rightly or wrongly, he considers to justify him in making them, furnish no presumption whatever that, under other circumstances, affording to his conscience no such justification, his word cannot be trusted. It is an evident instance of the maxim that the exception proves the rule. Restraining himself carefully within the limits of what he held to be lawful under circumstances of extreme difficulty and great personal danger, are we not rather to conclude that, under far less pressure, he will as carefully confine himself to the laws imposed by his conscience? Clearly there is nothing in Father Gerard's practice under examination to cause us to hesitate in placing implicit trust in his word when he speaks as an historian; and, in addition, we are sure that no one will rise[pg ccxxiii]from the perusal of the exculpatory letters which we propose to subjoin, without a full conviction of his innocence and truthfulness.

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