"

the Gospel dispensation, which is Fawkes says was near adjoining signally free from stratagem and to the Parliament House." Winter violence. "We do not," says also states, that after the sacraPaul, war after the flesh; for ment every man disclosed his views, the weapons of our warfare are not and that Mr. Percy was commiscarnal; but mighty through God sioned by the others to take the to the pulling down of strong house, which with some difficulty holds." 2 Cor. x. 3, 4. Nor were he eventually hired, and thus sucthe Israelites themselves indemni-ceeded "one Ferris" as "tenant fied in going beyond their commis- to Whynniard, keeper of the king's sion. So that their infliction of wardrobe." Winter also adds, death without a divine warrant that "Mr. Fawkes underwent the constituted them criminals, and name of Mr. Percy's man, calling subjected them to the sentence, himself Johnson.' "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, But before the conspirators could by man shall his blood be shed," commence the mine beneath the Gen. ix. 6. If, moreover, such Parliament House, they had the murders are prompted by a perse-mortification to learn_that_Parliacuting spirit, the crime becomes ment was adjourned to Feb. 7, still more awful. Thus Paul inti- 1605. On receiving this intellimates, that in persecuting the gence, therefore, says Winter, "Wechurch of God, there was but a all departed several ways into the step between his crime and that country to meet again at the becrime which has no forgiveness, ginning of Michaelmas term." At either in this world or in the world that period, however, Guy Fawkes to come. "I was," says he, "a found on coming to London, (as blasphemer, and a persecutor, and Winter says,) "that the Scottish injurious; but I obtained mercy, Lords were appointed to sit in inasmuch as I did it ignorantly in conference of the union in Mr. unbelief." 1 Tim. i. 13. If then Percy's house." the light within a man be darkness, how great is that darkness! It is great in its danger to society and to the church of God; and it is awfully great to the individual himself, as his blindness does not proceed from the want of means to enlighten him, but it is the prejudiced bias of his own mind that renders him a stranger to the truth 66 as it is in Jesus." To such a man, the oracles of God, if con- "At this time," says Winter, sulted and acted upon, would be" we all five entered with tools fit worth millions of worlds; but if to begin our work, having provided he proceeds through life as the ourselves of baked meats, the less blind captive of Satan, his ultimate to need sending abroad. We enabode will be the blackness of darkness for ever.

To return, however, to the conspirators.-Thomas Winter states, that during his journey to the Continent, Catesby had made inquiries respecting a house which Guy

Thus a further delay was occasioned. "This," says Winter, hindered our beginning until a fortnight before Christmas;" and Guy Fawkes speaking of the aforesaid house says, "There we begun to make our mine about the 11th of December." This, therefore, is another specimen of the agreement between the two distinct testimonies.

tered late in the night, and were never seen, save only Mr. Percy's man," until Christmas eve. In which time we wrought under a

This was Guy Fawkes, who went by the name of " John Johnson."

little entry to the wall of the Parliament House, and underpropped it, as we went, with wood."

cellar in which we resolved to lay the powder, and leave the mine. To the same effect is the testimony of Guy Fawkes. For speaking of his own survey of the cellar, he says, "viewing the commodity thereof for our purpose, Percy went

At this juncture, therefore, they left the mine, and, as Guy Fawkes says, " removed the twenty barrels of powder from the house to the cellar." Winter also says, "Mas

ter Fawkes laid into the cellar a thousand of billets and five hundred of faggots, and with that covered the powder, because we might have the house free, to suffer any one to enter that would." This powder with what was afterwards added made up at last 36 barrels : and yet these stores of death were so covered that the cellar seemed only to contain "a provision of wood and coal" for Mr. Percy's house.

At the close of this fortnight, however, the conspirators found that, instead of blowing up the Parliament House on the 7th of February, they should have to wait and hired the same for yearly till after Michaelmas, as the Par-rent." liament was 66 anew adjourned." They did not fail, however, to enlist new conspirators, and to make every preparation they deemed suitable. Thus, by the beginning of February, Christopher Wright and Robert Winter made the number amount to seven; and the number will be increased to eight when we reckon a man of the name of Keyes, who from about a month before the preceding Michaelmas had been intrusted with the powder and wood at Lambeth. This prepares us for what Guy Fawkes states. "About Candlemas," says he, "we had wrought the wall half through; and whilst they were in working, I stood as sentinel to descry any man that came near, whereof I gave them warning, and so they ceased until I gave notice again to proceed. All we seven lay in the house, and had shot and powder, being resolved to die in that place before we should yield or be taken." Winter says moreover, "About Candlemas we brought over in a boat the powder which we had provided at Lambeth, and laid it in Mr. Percy's house, because we were willing to have all our danger in one place.

Before Easter Sunday, however, which fell on March 31, a new plan of operation presented itself. "Near to Easter," says Winter,

as we wrought the third time, opportunity was given to hire the

"This man," says Winter, "we received into the number, as a trusty honest man!"

Guy Fawkes also proceeds to say, "About Easter, the Parliament being prorogued till October next, we dispersed ourselves, and I retired into the Low Countries by advice and direction of the rest, as well to acquaint Owen with the particulars of the plot, as also lest by my longer stay I might have grown suspicious, and so have come in question." From this journey Guy Fawkes says, "I returned about the beginning of September." As, moreover, the want of money, horses, &c. was contemplated, other conspirators were added at different times. One more hindrance, however, impeded the progress of these infatuated men. Hence Winter says, "Then was the Parliament anew prorogued until the fifth of November, so as we all went down until some ten days before, when Mr. Catesby came up with Mr. Fawkes to an

house by Enfield Chace called God will give you the grace to

White Webbes, whither I came make good use of it; to whose to them." This re-assembling ap- holy protection I commend you." pears to have been on Friday, Oct. The moon having entered her 25, 1605, as Winter calls the fol- last quarter, there was an absence lowing Sunday "two days after." of moonlight when the letter was The next day, Saturday, Octo-delivered. But it is stated that ber the 26th, closed with an event" notwithstanding the lateness and that teemed with destruction to all darkness of the night, Lord Mountthe conspirators and to all their egle repaired to his Majesty's paplans. For, as expressed in the lace at Whitehall, and there deligeneral account of the conspiracy, vered the same to the Earl of The Saturday of the week im- Salisbury his Majesty's principal mediately preceding the king's re- Secretary. On the following Thursturn, being but ten days before the day the king returned "from his Parliament, the Lord Mountegle hunting exercise at Royston ;" and being in his own lodging ready to on Friday afternoon, Nov. 1, the go to supper at seven of the clock Earl of Salisbury availed himself at night, one of his footmen whom of the opportunity of presenting the he had sent of an errand over the letter to his Majesty, who after street was met by an unknown man reading its contents considered it of a reasonable tall personage, who as a warning of impending danger delivered him a letter, charging from gunpowder. "When," said him to put it in my Lord his Mas- the king in his speech, "the letter ter's hands." In the course of the was showed to me by my secresame account, too, this anonymous tary, I did upon the instant interletter is said to have been thus ex-pret and apprehend some dark pressed :

"My Lord,

phrases therein to be meant, by this horrible form, of blowing us up all by powder, and thereupon ordered "Out of the love I beare to some that search to be made, whereby of your friends, I have a care of the matter was discovered and the your preservation. Therefore I man apprehended." Thus we are would advise you, as you tender brought to contemplate the midyour life, to devise some excuse night visit of Sir Thomas Knevet to shift off your attendance at this and his efficient attendants at the Parliament. For God and man commencement of Tuesday, Nov. have concurred to punish the wick-5, 1605.

ednesse of this time. And thinke Such was the dark* and solemn not slightly of this advertisement, hour when "Guy Fawkes was apbut retire yourself into your coun-prehended as he was standing withtrey, where you may expect the out the doors; and on searching event in safetie. For though there him, they found three matches, and be no appearance of any stirre, all other instruments fit for blowyet I say they shall receive a ter- ing up the powder, ready upon rible blow this Parliament, and yet him, which made him instantly they shall not see who hurts them. confess his own guiltiness." On This counsell is not to be contemn-searching the house too they "first ed, because it may doe you good, and can doe you no harme; for the danger is past so soone as you have burnt the letter. And I hope

* The moon being only four days old, lad set some considerable time.

found one of the small barrels of powder, and after all the rest, to the number of thirty-six barrels, great and small.”

As to Guy Fawkes, it is said he was "surely bound, well guarded, and brought into the house, and within a while after the counsell did examine him. Yet was his

At this crisis we may see the cooperation of Providence. For if countenance so far from being deSir Thomas Knevet had been a few seconds sooner, he and his party would have found Guy Fawkes within the house, and in that case Fawkes said, "he would not have failed to have blown him up house and all." On the other hand if Sir Thomas had been a few seconds later, Guy Fawkes would have escaped.

jected, as he often smiled in scornful manner, not only avowing the fact, but repenting only his failing in the execution thereof, whereof he said the devil and not God was the discoverer." Nothing, however, could be extorted from him respecting his accomplices till some days afterwards when he made his confession, and stated that on the The conspirators knew that a plot's succeeding, one of the first letter had been clandestinely sent objects was to secure the Lady to Lord Mountegle; and "on Sa- Elizabeth, the king's eldest daughturday night," Nov. 2, "in Lin-ter, and to proclaim her queen, coln's Inn Walk," Mr. Tresham without any avowal of the invisiinformed Thomas Winter of much ble hand uplifted to destroy her that had passed the preceding day father and relatives, and without between the king and the Earl of proposing an alteration in religion Salisbury. But intoxicated with till they had made their "party the vain hope of success, the con- good;" "and then," says Guy spirators continued in London and Fawkes, "we would have avowed its environs till Monday November both." the fourth. But the dark morning of the fifth of November ushered in a dismal day. Even by five o'clock that morning, says Winter, "the younger Wright came to my chamber" with the intelligence that a nobleman had called up Lord Mountegle, saying, "Arise, and come along to Essex HouseI am going to call up my Lord of Northumberland - the matter is discovered." After this Winter himself went as far as the middle of King's Street where, says he, "I found the guard standing that would not let me pass; and as I returned, I heard one say, there is a treason discovered in which the King and the Lords should have been blown up." "So then," says he, "I was fully satisfied that all was known, and went to the stable where my horse stood, and rode into the country.”

The conspirators that went into the country stole armour and horses and attempted to raise a rebellion. These proceedings, therefore, induced Sir Richard Walsh, sheriff of Worcestershire to trace them to their retreat at Holbeach where on Friday, Nov. 8, about eleven in the forenoon, the conduct of the conspirators made Sir Richard and his attendants proceed to extremities. In this attack, Robert Catesby the originator of the Gunpowder Treason was shot dead, as Winter conjectures, with the same bullet that killed Percy from whom Lord Mountegle supposed the anonymous letter came. By the preceding_shot, says Winter, "Ambrose Rookwood was shot," and by the one before that the younger Wright was killed. The shot before this was the second by wh "the elder Wright was stri

dead;" and the first shot wounded becomes increasingly liable to de

Some of the conspirators, therefore, fell victims on the eighth of November; and within three months IT has been exceedingly gratiThomas Winter and Guy Fawkes, fying to witness the liberality as well as their surviving guilty which has been lately expressed companions, died by the hands of towards the Baptist Missionary the executioner.

are unnecessary. "We brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out." Having food and raiment let us therewith be content, 1 Tim. vi. 8. King James was not insensible of this "But one thing is needful," Luke exposure to danger. For in his speech he x. 42. Riches are unsatisfactory. says, "Kings, as being in the higher places, Wherefore do ye spend money like the high trees, or stayest mountains, for that which is not bread, and your labour for that which satis