Page:A history of the gunpowder plot-The conspiracy and its agents (1904).djvu/164

140 'those who were best able to judge,' i.e. the Jesuit Fathers, tacitly approved of it, clearly explain and sum up the whole situation. In the event of the Plot proving a success, the Jesuits would have taken all the credit for themselves at Rome, and would have claimed that it was worked under their direction. In the event of the Plot proving a failure, the Jesuits were prepared to denounce it, and to deny all knowledge of its construction. As for Digby himself, he seems to have been a mere silly puppet in the hands of Fathers John Gerard and Henry Garnet. 'My brother' so constantly referred to by Digby in his correspondence, is, of course, Father Gerard, who (in his autobiography) often refers, in his turn, to 'my brother Digby.' 'He was' says Gerard, 'a most devoted friend to me, just as if he had been my twin-brother. And this name of brother we always used in writing to each other'