The
terror of each man became the source of terror to another. And a
universal panic being diffused, reason and argument, and common sense
and common humanity, lost all influence over them. From this disposition
of men's minds we are to account for the progress of the Popish plot,
and the credit given to it; an event which would otherwise appear
prodigious and altogether inexplicable.
On the twelfth of August, one Kirby, a chemist, accosted the king as he
was walking in the park. "Sir," said he, "keep within the company: your
enemies have a design upon your life; and you may be shot in this very
walk." Being asked the reason of these strange speeches, he said, that
two men, called Grove and Pickering, had engaged to shoot the king,
and Sir George Wakeman, the queen's physician, to poison him. This
intelligence, he added, had been communicated to him by Dr. Tongue,
whom, if permitted, he would introduce to his majesty. Tongue was
a divine of the church of England; a man active, restless, full of
projects, void of understanding. He brought papers to the king, which
contained information of a plot, and were digested into forty-three
articles. The king, not having leisure to peruse them, sent them to
the treasurer, Danby, and ordered the two informers to lay the business
before that minister.
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