p. 269–73.

The Chorus now enters upon an address, first in praise of the equestrian order, and then proceeding to satirize individuals by name. Meanwhile Demus is undergoing a thorough purgation under the hands of the sausage–seller. He reappears “in his former splendour of the days of Miltiades and Aristides,” delivers a recantation of his former principles, and concludes the piece by confirming the appointment of the sausage–seller to Cleon’s place, and investing Cleon solemnly with the tray, and other implements of the sausage–seller.

To those who are disappointed in the specimen here given of the wit and humour of Aristophanes, we have only to suggest in defence of our author, that a large proportion of the most remarkable passages have been omitted, on account of the impossibility of rendering them intelligible, even by a prolix commentary, to those who cannot read the original; and that our description of the ‘Knights’ is but a set of fragments from a translation, which professes its inability to render its original as a whole. And we may quote, as much more applicable to this short attempt than to the work to which it is prefixed, the singularly happy and modest motto of Mr. Mitchell’s translation, applicable as it must be to all translations, but especially to those of Aristophanes.

Among the rest, he culled me out a root;
The leaf was darkish, and had prickles on it;
And in another country, as he said,
Bore a bright golden flower, but not in this soil.

Comus.

In the Parabasis to the Clouds, performed two years after the Knights, the poet refers with pride to his attack on Cleon at his highest; but though he returns to the charge once and again, he makes no mention of any fine imposed upon him; which is in itself almost a sufficient refutation of the story mentioned in a previous note. The play was so relished as to gain the first prize, but there is not a jot of evidence to show that Cleon’s popularity was overclouded by it. Happily his reign only lasted for two years after it. His success at Pylus flattered him into a belief in his talents for war, and he took the command of the army in Thrace, opposed to Brasidas, the best Spartan general of his day. His incapacity lost the Athenians a battle, but the generals on both sides where slain; and the death of their greatest nuisance at home, and their worst enemy abroad, was an ample recompense for the injury incurred by his rashness. “When both Cleon and Brasidas were slain, the which on either side were most opposite to the peace: the one for that he had good success and honour in the war; the other, because in quiet times his evil actions would the more appear, and his calumniations be the less believed,”[115] peace, though of brief duration, was almost immediately concluded.

That Cleon should have succeeded to the influence of Pericles may well surprise the reader. But a very slight inequality will turn the course of a rapid current to the undermining of its own banks; and in like manner, when men’s minds are deeply moved, things in quiet times contemptible may acquire influence and importance commensurate with the force of that which they are enabled, by no intrinsic qualities, to control. By no other considerations can we explain—to justify it is impossible—the extravagance of terror and fury into which England was once goaded by a man, who for knavery and impudence may match the Athenian demagogue, and who, for some time, bore equal sway over the minds of his countrymen, Titus Oates, the discoverer, and probably the inventor of the Popish Plot. Some excuse is to be found in the political circumstances of the times; in the belief that the King adhered secretly to the Romish faith, as the Duke of York openly professed it; and especially in the known fact that the sovereign of Britain was pensioned by France, that he might dispense with parliaments, and the more easily establish himself on an absolute throne. The high character of many who promoted the inquiry is a sufficient warrant that they were actuated by no unworthy motives. But the revolting narrative of murders committed under form of law by perjured witnesses and corrupt judges, will remain for ever a blot in our history; a warning against adding gall to bitterness; against aggravating political dissension by religious discord.

The first information of the plot was given by one Dr. Tongue, in August, 1678; but the King, who was by no means deficient in penetration, pronounced it to be a forgery, and it might have slept for ever, had not the Duke of York, whose confessor was implicated, judged an inquiry necessary to clear himself from all suspicion. Tongue professed to have his information from Oates, and having brought the principal actor on the stage, took no further part in the action of the piece. On Michaelmas–eve Oates was examined before the council, and deposed to the existence of a most extensive conspiracy among the Jesuits to murder the King. He indicated Coleman, formerly secretary to the Duke of York, and at that time to the Duchess, as being acquainted with all the schemes under consideration. The effect of this announcement is thus described by a most amiable and unprejudiced contemporary.

“October 1, 1678. The parliament and the whole nation were alarmed about a conspiracy of some eminent Papists, for the destruction of the King, and introduction of Popery, discovered by one Oates and Dr. Tongue, which last I knew. I went to see and converse with him at Whitehall, with Mr. Oates, one that was lately an apostate to the church of Rome, and now returned again with this discovery. He seemed to be a bold man, and, in my thoughts, furiously indiscreet; but every body believed what he said, and it quite changed the genius and motions of the parliament, growing now corrupt, and interested with long sitting and court practices: but with all this, Popery would not go down. This discovery turned them all as one man against it, and nothing was done but to find out the depth of this. Gates was encouraged, and every thing he affirmed taken for gospel. The truth is, the Roman Catholics were exceedingly bold and busy everywhere, since the Duke forbore to go any longer to the chapel.”[116]

Coleman had notice of his danger, and secreted a part, but not the whole, of his papers. The remainder were seized, and clearly proved that he had maintained a correspondence with the confessor of Louis XIV., the object of which was the reconversion of England. Besides appearing before the council, Gates made oath to the truth of his Narrative, which he published before Sir Edmundbury Godfrey, a zealous Protestant, and active justice of peace, and yet one that lived on good terms both with Non–conformists and Papists. Very shortly afterwards Godfrey was murdered. He was found in a ditch, with his own sword sticking in his body, which had not been plundered; and marks of strangling were thought to be visible about his neck, and some contusions on his breast. It has ever been a mystery by whom this crime was perpetrated; it was of course charged on the Papists, and retorted by them on the contrivers and assertors of the plot. But the support given to Gates’s story by this event, conjointly with Coleman’s papers, threw the whole country into a ferment. Vast crowds flocked to behold the corpse; the funeral excited equal interest, and the wish of its conductors to inflame the people is visible in some extraordinary precautions said to have been taken against a danger which no man could have apprehended seriously. The following account is taken from a contemporary of high tory principles, and animated by a most especial hatred of Gates.

ill151

“The next and last act of this tragedy was the funeral of this poor gentleman; and if it had been possible the rout could have been more formidable than at the exposition of him, it must now have appeared. For as about other party concerns, so here the time and place of the assemblation was generally notified, as also what learned divine was to preach the sermon. The crowd was prodigious, both at the procession and in and about the church; and so heated, that any thing called Papist had gone to pieces in an instant. The Catholics all kept close in their houses and lodgings, thinking it a good composition to be safe there; so far were they from acting violently at that time. But there was all this time upheld among the common people an artificial fright, so as almost every one fancied a Popish knife just at his throat. And at the sermon, besides the preacher, two other thumping divines stood upright in the pulpit, one on each side of him, to guard him from being killed while he was preaching, by the Papists. I did not see this spectacle, but was credibly told by some that affirmed they did see it; and though I have often mentioned it, as now, with precaution, yet I never met with any that contradicted it. A most portentous spectacle sure! Three parsons in one pulpit! Enough of itself, on a less occasion, to strike a terror into the audience.”[117]

This might perhaps be considered as party spleen: but the testimony of Calamy, one of the most learned and amiable dissenting clergymen of his day, and a believer in much, though not in all the details of the plot, to the extravagancies committed, is unexceptionable.

“Though I was at that time but young (he was about nine years of age), yet can I not forget how much I was affected with seeing several that were condemned for this plot, go to be executed at Tyburn, and at the pageantry of the mock processions on the 17th of November.[118] Roger L’Estrange (who used to be called Oliver’s Fiddler), formerly in danger of being hanged for a spy, and about this time the admired buffoon of high–church, called them ‘hobby–horsing processions.’

“In one of them, in the midst of vast crowds of spectators, who made great acclamations and showed abundance of satisfaction, there were carried in pageants upon men’s shoulders through the chief streets of the city, the effigies of the Pope, with the representation of the devil behind him, whispering in his ear, and wonderfully soothing and caressing him (though he afterwards deserted him, and left him to shift for himself, before he was committed to the flames), together with the likeness of the dead body of Sir Edmundbury Godfrey, carried before him by one that rode on horseback, designed to remind the people of his execrable murder. And a great number of dignitaries in their copes, with crosses; monks, friars, and Jesuits; Popish bishops in their mitres, with all their trinkets and appurtenances. Such things as these very discernibly heightened and inflamed the general aversion of the nation from Popery; but it is to be feared, on the other hand, they put some people, by way of revulsion, upon such desperate expedients as brought us even within an ace of ruin.”[119]

A few days after these events the parliament met. “All Oates’s evidence was now so well believed, that it was not safe for any man to seem to doubt of any part of it. He thought he had the nation in his hands, and was swelled up to the highest pitch of vanity and insolence. And now he made a new edition of his discovery before the bar of the House of Commons.”[120] He now said that the Pope, having declared himself entitled to the possession of England, in virtue of the heresy of prince and people, had delegated the supreme power to the order of Jesuits, and that in consequence commissions had been issued by the general of that order, to various noblemen and gentlemen, investing them with all the great offices of the state. He swore that Coleman, and Sir George Wakeman, the Queen’s physician, were in the plot, and that for 15,000l. the latter had engaged to poison the King. Success emboldened him to soar still higher; and after declaring to the House of Lords, that he had named all the persons of rank involved in the plot, he had the effrontery to accuse the Queen of being concerned in it, under circumstances the most improbable: besides that the charge was discountenanced by the whole tenour of her life.

“It was plain, that postnate to the narrative of Oates, there was a design formed for cutting off the Queen by a false accusation, and thereupon this evidence was given, and Bedloe, another evidence for the plot, chimed in. It seems the not venturing so high in Oates’s narrative was thought to be an error to be retrieved by additional swearing. It was not a cabal of ordinary authority could encourage Oates to come to the bar of the House of Commons, and say, ‘Aye, Taitus Oates, accause Catherine Quean of England of haigh traison.’ Upon which the King immediately confined him, and it might have been worse, if some people had not taken his part, who were considerable enough to give umbrage that it would be more prudent to set him at liberty again, which was done accordingly. The King was pleased to say, ‘They think I have a mind to a new wife; but for all that I will not see an innocent woman abused.’ This passage ought to be remembered to the honour of the King’s justice: certainly if his Majesty had given way, the Queen had been very ill used.”[121]

Oates’s exaltation was a tempting bait, and other witnesses of infamous character began to appear. In November Coleman was tried, convicted, and executed on the joint evidence of Oates and Bedloe. There was sufficient disagreement between the statements made by the former upon the trial and before the council, to cause them to be received with much suspicion; but Chief Justice Scroggs, after manifesting throughout a most scandalous bias against the prisoner, charged the jury in a style of which this is a specimen: “The things the prisoner is accused of are of two sorts: the one is to subvert the Protestant religion, and to introduce Popery; the other was to destroy and kill the king. The evidence likewise was of two sorts; the one by letters of his own handwriting, and the other by witnesses viva voce. The former he seems to confess, the other totally to deny.... You are to examine what these letters import in themselves, and what consequences are naturally to be deduced from them. That which is plainly intended is to bring in the Roman Catholic, and subvert the Protestant religion. That which is by consequence intended, is the killing the king, as being the most likely means to introduce that which as it is apparent from his letters, was designed to be brought in.”[122] It would be a waste of words to point out the monstrous wickedness of this inference. The nature of the letters has been already described; that they contained schemes hostile to the constitution there is no doubt, though not, it should seem, such as bore out a charge of treason, least of all against the life of the king. And it is worthy of observation, that after dwelling at length upon the letters, Scroggs says not one word concerning the evidence of the witnesses. Justice Jones worthily seconded his principal: “You must find the prisoner guilty, or bring in two persons perjured.”

The next act of the tragedy was the trial of Ireland, Fenwick, and Whitebread, three Jesuits; and Grove and Pickering, two servants in the queen’s chapel. Oates and Dugdale swore that the priests had conspired the death of the king, and at their instigation the latter had agreed to shoot him, which they attempted three several times; but that on one occasion the flint of their pistol was loose; on another there was no priming; and on the third no powder in the barrel: with other circumstances equally childish and improbable. Scroggs acknowledged that the case had broken down against Whitebread and Fenwick, and in defiance of all principles of justice, remanded them that further evidence might be procured.[123] The other three were condemned and executed. Whitebread, Fenwick, and three other Jesuits, afterwards underwent the same fate.

In July Wakeman and others were tried. “Scroggs summed up very favourably for the prisoners; far contrary to his former practice. The truth is, that this was looked upon as the Queen’s trial, as well as Wakeman’s. The prisoners were acquitted, and now the witnesses saw they were blasted; and they were enraged on it, which they vented with much spite against Scroggs.”[124]

“July 18, 1679. I went early to the Old Bailey sessions–house, to the famous trial of Sir G. Wakeman, one of the Queen’s physicians, and three Benedictine monks: the first (who I take to be a worthy gentleman, abhorring such a fact) for intending to poison the King: the others as accomplices to carry on the plot to subvert the government and introduce Popery. The bench was crowded with the judges, the lord mayor, justices, and innumerable spectators. The chief accusers, Dr. Oates (as he called himself), and one Bedloe, a man of inferior note. Their testimonies were not so pregnant, and I fear, much of it upon hearsay; but swearing positively to some particulars which drew suspicion upon their truth, nor did circumstances so agree as to give either the bench or the jury so entire satisfaction as was expected. After therefore a long and tedious trial of nine hours, the jury brought them in not guilty, to the extraordinary triumph of the Papists, and[125] without sufficient disadvantage and reflections on the witnesses, especially Oates and Bedloe. This was a happy day for the lords in the Tower, who, expecting their trial, had this day gone against the prisoners at the bar, would all have been in the utmost hazard. For my part I look upon Oates as a vain insolent man, puffed up with the favour of the Commons for having discovered something really true, more especially as detecting the dangerous intrigue of Coleman, proved out of his own letters, and of a general design which the Jesuitical party of the Papists ever had, and still have, to ruin the church of England; but that he was trusted with those great secrets he pretended, or had any solid ground for what he accused divers noblemen of, I have many reasons to induce my contrary belief.”

This, the first acquittal, was indeed equivalent to a sentence of perjury against the witnesses; whose credit began to be shaken by the contradictions in their evidence, discoverable by any who would calmly look for them; and by the constancy with which all the condemned met death, disclaiming to the last the justice of their sentence. Several trials followed with various success. Soon after the meeting of the Parliament in 1678, Lord Stafford, with four other Popish lords, had been committed to the Tower upon Oates’s depositions. The parliament was dissolved in January, 1679. Another was called in March, and the question of the Popish lords proceeded in; but this also was dissolved in May, without the accused being brought to trial, and they remained in confinement till a third parliament was called in October, 1680, soon after which it was resolved, “That the House will proceed with the prosecution of the lords in the Tower, and forthwith begin with William, Viscount Stafford.” Oates, Dugdale, and Turbervile, two more witnesses of the same class, gave evidence upon which he was condemned. Stafford was an aged man, and of little estimation; yet he defended himself, prisoners not being then allowed benefit of counsel, with dignity and constancy, through a long trial of six days. He urged with much force the infamy of Oates.

“Dec. 6, 1680. One thing my lord said, as to Oates, which I confess did exceedingly affect me; that a person who during his depositions should so vauntingly brag, that though he went over to the church of Rome, yet he never was a Papist, nor of their religion, all the time that he seemed to apostatize from the Protestant, but only as a spy; though he confessed he took their sacraments, worshipped their images, went through all their oaths, and discipline of their proselytes, swearing secrecy and to be faithful, but with intent to come over again and betray them; that such a hypocrite, that had so deeply prevaricated as even to turn idolater (for so we of the church of England term it), attesting God so solemnly that he was entirely theirs, and devoted to their interests, and consequently (as he pretended) trusted; I say that the witness of such a profligate wretch should be admitted against the life of a peer, this my lord looked upon as a monstrous thing, and such as must needs redound to the dishonour of our religion and nation. And verily I am of his lordship’s opinion: such a man’s testimony should not be taken against the life of a dog. But the merit of something material which he discovered against Coleman, put him in such esteem with the parliament, that now I fancy he stuck at nothing, and thought every body was to take what he said for gospel. The consideration of this in some other circumstances began to stagger me: particularly how it was possible that one who went among the Papists on such a design, and pretended to be intrusted with so many letters and commissions from the Pope and the party, nay and delivered them to so many great persons, should not reserve one of them to show, nor so much as one copy of any commission, which he who had such dexterity in opening letters might certainly have done, to the undeniable conviction of those that he accused: but as I said he gained credit on Coleman; but as to others whom he so madly flew upon, I am little inclined to believe his testimony, he being so slight a person, so passionate, ill–bred, and of such impudent behaviour; nor is it likely that such piercing politicians as the Jesuits should trust him with so high and so dangerous secrets.”[126]

Burnet gives his own words: “I asked him, what were the arguments which prevailed on him to change his religion, and go over to the church of Rome. He upon that stood up, and laid his hands on his breast and said, ‘God and his holy angels knew that he had never changed, but that he had gone among them on purpose to betray them.’ This gave me such a character of him, that I could have no regard to anything he either said or swore after that.”[127]

Stafford died with dignity and calmness, such as to make a deep impression on the spectators. Their behaviour was decent, and even compassionate, and a general belief in his dying protestations of innocence was expressed. He was the last victim, strictly speaking, of this impudent and atrocious forgery, upon which fourteen other men had been previously executed. Many Romish priests also were condemned, and, in part at least, suffered death upon a statute of Elizabeth, making it treason for such to be found within the realm.

It is not from any resemblance in the circumstances of the times, nor from similarity of character, though indeed that is considerable, that Cleon and Oates have been grouped together, so much as to show that cruelty and credulity are equally the growth of ancient and modern times, and that there have always been periods when it has been easy for men, contemptible in rank, talent, and character, so they be possessed of a certain low cunning and a plenitude of impudence, to govern the public mind by availing themselves of its prejudices. Diminish these prejudices in the smallest degree, in the same degree is the liability to this degrading and mischievous bondage reduced. A startling warning may be drawn from the comparison of the two periods. Had England resembled in circumstances, and form of government, the tyrant–democracy of Athens, there is strong reason to thing that the fearful enormities committed by that profligate city against her dependents might have been equalled in the extirmination of the obnoxious sect; as we know that the accusation of non–conformity, and the charge of conspiring to establish a tyranny,[128] formed equally ready handles of insult and oppression. Happily the balanced and complicated form of the constitution, and the impossibility of moving with one accord a great nation, delivered our ancestors from this extremity of guilt. May the hazard which they incurred serve as a beacon, to warn men against suffering themselves to be hoodwinked and goaded by their fears into forgetfulness alike of reason and charity.

It may be some consolation to any whose patriotism is shocked by the ready belief of Oates’s narrative, to know that the proverbial credulity of the English was fully equalled by the gullibility of the acute and polished Athenians.[129] Gross as was the imposture, it was yet not without some foundation in truth; and in the then alarming crisis of public affairs, we may imagine how it was that eager politicians greedily swallowed a story adapted to their prepossessions, although candid and dispassionate observers, like Evelyn, saw immediately how little of it was entitled to credit. Yet even Evelyn was partly a believer, as also Dryden, whose party prejudices certainly did not lead him to side with the whigs.

That plot, the nation’s curse,

Bad in itself, but represented worse;
Raised in extremes, and in extremes decried;
With oaths affirmed, with dying vows denied;
Not weighed and winnowed by the multitude,
But swallowed in the mass, unchewed and crude.
Some truth there was, but dashed and brewed with lies
To please the fools and puzzle all the wise.
Succeeding times did equal folly call,
Believing nothing, or believing all.

Absalom and Achitophel, part I.

The following passages will probably amuse the reader, and convey a good idea of the character of Oates himself:—

“Titus Oates was the son of an anabaptist teacher, who afterwards conformed and got into orders, and took a benefice as this his son did. He was proud and ill–natured, haughty but ignorant. He had been complained of for some very indecent expressions concerning the mysteries of the Christian religion. He was once presented for perjury. But he got to be chaplain in one of the king’s ships, from which he was dismissed upon charges of gross profligacy.... He seemed inclined to be instructed in the Popish religion. One Hutchinson, a Jesuit, had that work put upon him.... He told me that Oates and the Jesuits were always on ill terms. They did not allow Oates above nine–pence a day, of which he complained much; and Hutchinson relieved him often. They wished they could be well rid of him, and sent him beyond sea, being in very ill terms with him. This made Hutchinson conclude that they had not at that time trusted Oates with their secrets; Oates was kept for some time at St. Omers, and was thence sent through France into Spain, and was now returned to England. He had been long acquainted with Tongue, and made his first discovery to him.”[130]

“Oates was a low man, of an ill cut, very short neck, and his visage and features were most particular. His mouth was the centre of his face, and a compass there would sweep his nose, forehead, and chin within the perimeter. In a word, he was a most consummate cheat, blasphemer, vicious, perjured, impudent, and saucy foul–mouthed wretch; and were it not for the truth of history and the great emotions in the public which he was the cause of, not fit (so little deserving) to be remembered.”[131]

“Oates would never say all that he knew, for that was not consistent with the uncertainty of events. For he could not foresee what sort of evidence there might be occasion for, nor whom (it might be thought fit) to accuse. All which matters were kept in reserve to be launched or not, as occasion, like fair weather, invited, or flaws discouraged. And having once said, there was all he knew (if he had been so overseen), it had ended the plot, and then there could have been no further suspense or expectation, as was afterwards continually kept on foot, in hopes that at length the bottom of the plot would come up. In the mean time the faction could calumniate any person, as the Duke, the Queen, and even the good King himself, as being in the plot, much more any one that was loyal in the ministry and magistracy, and so keep all in one. And all the while it went about in whispers, that strange things would appear, if they could but once come to the bottom of the plot, and each one’s evil imagination was to inform what that was, as will fully appear afterwards. When Oates was examined in the House of Commons, and was asked if he knew of any further designs against his Majesty, &c., instead of answering that question, he told a tale of a fox and a goose, that the fox, to see if the ice would bear him and his goose, first carried over a stone as heavy as the goose. And neither then nor ever after, during his whole life, would he be brought to say he had told all that he knew.”[132]

“Oates was now (the author is speaking of a time soon after his first examination before parliament) in his trine exaltation; his plot in full force, efficacy, and virtue: he walked about with his guards (assigned) for fear of the Papists murdering him. He had lodgings in Whitehall, and 1200l. per annum pension. And no wonder, after he had the impudence to cry to the House of Lords in plain terms, that if they would not help him he must help himself. He put on an episcopal garb (except his lawn sleeves), silk gown and cassock, great hat, satin hatband and rose, and was called, or most blasphemously called himself, ‘the Saviour of the nation.’ Whoever he pointed at was taken up and committed, so that many people got out of his way, as from a blast, and glad that they could prove their last two years’ conversation. The very breath of him was pestilential, and if it brought not imprisonment or death over such on whom it fell, it surely poisoned reputation, and left good Protestants arrant Papists; and, something worse than that, in danger of being put in the plot as traitors.”[133]

“He threatened me indeed with a parliament, but that is a course of speech he has got. If the prisoners but ask a new comer for his garnish, the master of the prison shall be told of a parliament. A bishop shall not suspend a minister for refusing to officiate according to the canon, but he is presently threatened with a parliament. If the university shall not think fit to allow Mr. Oates his degree, the lawn sleeves are to be ruffled next parliament. I was walking awhile since only over the outer court at Whitehall innocently about my business, and because I did not cap him over the square, as the boys do fellows at Cambridge, ‘Squire L’Estrange,’ says he, ‘we shall have a parliament,’ twirling his hat about between his finger and thumb, with a look and action not to be expressed.”[134]

The credit of the plot and of its author declined together. In 1681, Oates appeared as a witness in defence of one Colledge, better known as the “Protestant joiner,” a busy man and a zealot against Popery, who was accused of treason upon no better grounds than had served his own party for the destruction of so many Papists. The court was eager for revenge, and by no means scrupulous concerning the means of obtaining it; the witnesses, who had supported the plot, were indifferent which way they perjured themselves, so long as perjury was profitable, and swore against Colledge as readily as against the Jesuits. Oates, therefore, who adhered to his old friends, be this one thing recorded to his credit, was brought into collision with his former associates, and a scene of abuse passed between him and them in open court which is too long for quotation, but will satisfy any person of the infamy of at least one, probably of both parties. (State Trials, vol. viii. p. 628.) Towards the end of Charles’s reign, when the discontinuance of parliaments threw all power into the hands of the court, and the infamous Jefferies was a ready minister of oppression; Oates was prosecuted by the Duke of York for libel, and damages assessed at 100,000l. This was but the beginning of his misfortunes. In 1688, soon after the accession of James, he was convicted of perjury upon two indictments: the one charging him with having sworn that he was at a consultation of Jesuits in London, when he was really at St. Omers; the other, with having deposed to Ireland’s presence in London at a time when he was gone into Staffordshire. The sentence passed upon him was most savage and illegal, and moreover executed with such severity as to produce the belief that he was not meant to survive it. It is in itself a curiosity, and as such, as well as for the instruction of any who do not duly appreciate the blessings of an incorrupt judicature: though long, it shall be given entire.

Justice Wilkins. “I hope I have not been thought a man of ill–nature, and I confess nothing has been so great a regret to me in my place and station as to give judgment and pronounce the sentence of law against my fellow–subjects, my fellow–creatures—but as to you, Mr. Oates, I cannot say my fellow–christian. Yet in this case when I consider your offence, and the dismal effects that have followed upon it, I cannot say I have any remorse in giving judgment upon you. And therefore having told you my thoughts shortly about your crime, and how readily I pronounce your sentence, I shall now declare the judgment of the court upon you: and it is this:—

“First, the court does order for a fine, that you pay 1000 marks upon each indictment.

“Secondly, that you be stripped of all your canonical habits.

“Thirdly, the court doth award, that you do stand upon the pillory, and in the pillory here before Westminster Hall gate, upon Monday next, for an hour’s time, between the hours of ten and twelve, with a paper over your head (which you must first walk with round about to all the courts in Westminster Hall) declaring your crime. And that is upon the first indictment.

“Fourthly (on the second indictment), upon Tuesday you shall stand upon and in the pillory at the Royal Exchange, in London, for the space of an hour, between, the hours of twelve and two, with the same inscription.

“You shall upon the next Wednesday be whipped from Aldgate to Newgate.

“Upon Friday you shall be whipped from Newgate to Tyburn by the hands of the common hangman.

“But Mr. Oates, we cannot but remember there were several particular times you swore false about, and therefore, as annual commemorations, that it may be known, to all people as long as you live, we have taken special care of you for an annual punishment.

“Upon the 24th of April, every year, as long as you live, you are to stand upon the pillory, and in the pillory at Tyburn, just opposite to the gallows, for the space of an hour, between the hours of ten and twelve.

“You are to stand upon and in the pillory here, at Westminster Hall gate, every 9th of August, in every year, so long as you live. And that it may be known what we mean by it, it is to remember what he swore about Mr. Ireland’s being in town between the 8th and 12th of August.

“You are to stand upon and in the pillory at Charing Cross, upon the 10th of August, every year during your life, for an hour, between ten and twelve.

“The like over against the Temple gate upon the 11th.

“And upon the 2nd of September (which is another notorious time, which you cannot but be remembered of) you are to stand upon and in the pillory, for the space of one hour, between twelve and two, at the Royal Exchange; all this you are to do every year during your life, and to be committed close prisoner as long as you live.

“This I pronounce to be the judgment of the court upon you for your offences. And I must tell you plainly that if it had been in my power to have carried it further, I should not have been unwilling to have given sentence of death upon you, for I am sure you deserve it.”[135]

Burnet says, “But now the sitting of the parliament of England came on. And as a preparative to it, Oates was convicted of perjury upon the evidence of the witnesses from St. Omers, who had been brought over before to discredit his testimony. Now juries were so prepared as to believe more easily than formerly. So he was condemned to have his priestly habit taken from him, to be a prisoner for life, to be set in the pillory in all the public places through the city, and ever after that set in the pillory four times a–year, and to be whipped by the common hangman from Aldgate to Newgate one day, and the next from Newgate to Tyburn, which was executed with so much rigour that his back appeared to be all over flead. This was thought too little if he were guilty, and too much if he were innocent; and was illegal in all the parts of it. For as the secular court, could not order the ecclesiastical habit to be taken from him, so to condemn a man to perpetual imprisonment was not in the power of the court. And the extreme rigour of such whipping was without a precedent. Yet he, who was an original in all things, bore this with a constancy that amazed all those who saw it. So that this treatment did rather raise his reputation than sink it.”[136]

So soon as the heat of the plot was over, Charles reduced his pension one–half, and ultimately deprived him of it altogether. After the Revolution he was pardoned, “redintegrated at court, and admitted to a pension of 400l. per annum, at which he was very wroth, for Charles gave him 600l., ‘and sure,’ he said, ‘William will give me more.’ He sought by Act of Parliament to have his judgment for perjury reversed, but he could never obtain a swearing capacity again. The Earl of Danby (then Leeds) knew the danger of that, and would indeed have his sentence reversed, that is, having been whipped from Newgate to Tyburn, would fain have had him whipped back from Tyburn to Newgate. The power of swearing is formidable to great and small, and his lordship was within an ace of being put in the plot for Godfrey’s murder.”[137] Here ends his public life; he died in 1705, having once more changed his religion, and entered into the communion of the Baptists. To the last many persons adhered to him, and considered him a martyr to the Protestant cause. In conclusion, we subjoin his character, as drawn by Calamy, whose temper and opinions alike free his testimony from suspicion.

“Dr. Oates was a man of invincible courage and resolution, and endured what would have killed a great many others. He occasioned a strange turn in the nation, after a general lethargy, that had been of some years’ continuance. By awakening us out of sleep he was an instrument in the hand of God for our preservation. Yet after all, he was but a sorry foul–mouthed wretch, as I can testify from what I once heard from him in company.

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“I have been informed at Westminster that Dr. Oates was a frequent auditor of my predecessor, Mr. Alsop, and moved for leave to come to the Lord’s table with his society, but that an honest man of the congregation upon that occasion spoke freely against him, as one so irregular in his life as to be very unfit for church communion. The doctor afterwards meeting Mr. Alsop, told him that man had sadly abused him, and upon that account he vehemently complained as one that was injuriously dealt with. Mr. Alsop cried out, ‘Prove him a liar, doctor! prove him a liar!’ which it would have been well for him if he could have done. But he really bore an indifferent character at Westminster, and notwithstanding all the service he had done, there were so many things concurring to lessen his credit, as makes it very hard to distinguish between what was true and what was false in his depositions. For which reason I must own that I am the less surprised, that the parliament after the Revolution should leave him under a brand, and incapacitate him for being a witness for the future.”[138]

We may conclude the chapter with a short reference to that most remarkable transaction, the mutilation of the Hermæ, which occurred B.C. 415, just before the Sicilian expedition, and in its consequences bears a striking analogy to the passage in history which we have just related. The Hermæ were square pillars, surmounted by a head of the god, Hermes, or Mercury, which, in compliance with an ancient custom, were placed at the entrances of temples and houses. Most of these throughout Athens were defaced in the course of one night. A great sensation was excited in the city; for the circumstance was held to be of evil omen to the important enterprise just about to be commenced, and moreover to indicate the existence of a plot to overthrow the democracy. Alcibiades was accused among others, but no evidence could be obtained to bring home the offence to any one: the excitement passed off for a time, and he was ordered with the army to Sicily. But men’s minds were unsettled, and agitated by terrors of they knew not what, aggravated by designing persons for party ends. “From the affair of the Mercuries, a plot was inferred for the establishment of oligarchy or tyranny, and the irritation was cherished by continual discourses of what Athens had suffered through the Pisistratidæ. On the slightest suspicion, on the most discreditable evidence, men, the most respected, were imprisoned; alarm increased with the number of accusations, and each found readier credit than the last. At length Andocides, one of the imprisoned, seeing no other hope of escape, and hoping by the sacrifice of a few to save the rest, and to tranquillize the city, confessed the crime, and accused some others, whether truly or falsely is not known. The people received the information with joy; and setting free the informer, and those whom he had cleared, tried and executed the others. The proof was very inadequate, and the condemnation most unjust; but the panic was in great measure abated.”[139]

In this jealous temper, Alcibiades, though not included in the accusation, was summoned home from Sicily. He fled to Sparta, and by his powerful talents contributed very principally to produce those reverses which subsequently overtook the Athenians. The account of this remarkable transaction is given in Thucydides, vi. c. 27, 60, and most completely in the speech of Andocides de Mysteriis, which is contained in Bekker’s collection of the Greek orators.

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