secret of the consult of April 24) is a pure hypothesis. It is not
warranted, but refuted, by Godfrey's own words as reported by
Wynell, when, unlike Mr. Pollock, we quote Wynell's whole sentence
on the subject. (see previous exchange between Godfrey and Wynell.)

*Lords' MSS., P. 48.

3.

The theories of Godfrey's death almost defy enumeration. For
suicide, being a man of melancholic temperament, he had reasons as
many and as good as mortal could desire. That he was murdered for
not being active enough in prosecuting the plot, is most improbable.
That he was taken off by Danby's orders, for giving Coleman and the
Duke of York early warning, is an absurd idea, for Danby could have
had him on THAT score by ordinary process of law. That he was slain
by Oates's gang, merely to clinch the fact that a plot there
veritably was, is improbable. At the same time, Godfrey had been
calling Oates a perjurer: he KNEW that Oates was forsworn. This
was an unsafe thing for any man to say, but when the man was the
magistrate who had read Oates's deposition, he invited danger. Such
were the chances that Godfrey risked from the Plot party. The
Catholics, on the other hand, if they were aware that Godfrey
possessed the secret of the Jesuit meeting of April 24, and if they
deemed him too foolish to keep the secret in his own interest, could
not but perceive that to murder him was to play into the hands of
the Whigs by clinching the belief in a Popish plot. Had they been
the murderers, they would probably have taken his money and rings,
to give the idea that he had been attacked and robbed by vulgar
villains. If they 'were not the damnedest fools' (thus freely