In this chapter I purpose to give a short account of those principles, on which the conspirators acted, and which were regarded by them as those of their church. I am ready to allow, that many Roman Catholics deprecated the plot and the course taken by the conspirators; but still it is by no means easy to defend the church of Rome from the guilt of the transaction, since she then entertained principles, which appeared to justify the attempt of the parties who were implicated in the treason. That the jesuits were the life and soul of the conspiracy has already been shown in the narrative. They animated the conspirators when they were dispirited,—warranted the proposed action when they were in doubt,—and absolved them from its guilt after the discovery. Nay, they pronounced the deed to be meritorious. They swore them to secresy, and bound them together to the performance of the treason by means of the sacrament. The great wheels, therefore, by which the whole was set in motion, were the jesuits; but the arch-traitor was the pope himself, who had sent his bulls into England, to endeavour to prevent the accession of King James; for it has been shown that the treason originated in those bulls. I shall _first_ briefly state the principles of the church of Rome, on the question of heresy and heretical sovereigns; and _secondly_, examine their practices prior to, and at the period in question, to show how they corresponded exactly with the principles then publicly avowed and defended. It is an acknowledged principle of the church of Rome, that the decisions of general councils are binding on all. There are disputes amongst her divines respecting some of the councils, whether they were general, or not; but concerning the decisions of those councils which have never been disputed, there is no question with Romanists. Now some of the undisputed councils enforce doctrines at variance with Scripture, and destructive, not merely of the welfare, but of the very existence, of Protestant states and Protestant sovereigns, provided the papal see is sufficiently powerful to carry out her principles into action. No king was completely master in his own dominions, when the papacy was at its height. The first council to which I refer the reader is _The Third Council of Lateran_, convened by Pope Alexander III., A.D. 1179. Its efforts were directed especially against the Albigenses and Waldenses, who were guilty of no crime, except the unpardonable one of opposing the errors of the church of Rome. Twenty-seven canons were framed by this council; all of them on matters of trivial importance with the exception of the last, which is directed against the poor exiles who were bold enough to prefer their own salvation to a blind submission to the church. The _Twenty-seventh_ canon imposes a curse on all those who maintained or favoured the Waldensian opinions. In the event of dying in their alleged errors, they were not even to receive Christian burial[24].