knew him or no, but by that name I did not know him, nor at Mrs. Vauxe's, as he said I did, for I never saw a Priest there. Yesterday I was before Mr. Attorney and my Lord Chief Justice, who asked me if I had taken the Sacrament to keep secret the plot as others did. I said that I had not, because I would avoid the question of at whose hands it were. They told me that 5 had taken it of Gerrard, and that he knew of the Plot, which I said was more than I knew.
'Now for my intention let me tell you, that if I had thought there had been the least sin in the Plot, I would not have been in it for all the world: and no other cause drew me to hazard my Fortune, and Life, but Zeal to God's religion. For my keeping it secret, it was caused by certain belief, that those which were best able to judge of the lawfulness of it, had been acquainted with it, and given way unto it. More reasons I had to persuade me to this belief than I dare utter, which I will never, to the suspicion of any, though I should be to the rack for it, and as I did not know it directly that it was approved by such, so did I hold it in my conscience the best not to know any more if I might.
'I have, before all the Lords, cleared all the Priests in it for anything that I know, but now let me tell you, what a grief it hath been to me, to hear that so much condemned which I did believe would have been otherwise thought on by Catholics; there is no other cause but this,
