In spite of the singular ability of this manifesto, the art of the writer is undoubtedly somewhat too conspicuous to permit us to accept it as the kind of document which would be produced by one who felt himself confronted by a serious peril. An interesting and most pertinent commentary is supplied by a contemporary Jesuit, Giles Schondonck, Rector of St. Omers College, in a letter to Father Baldwin, the same of whom we have already heard in connection with the Plot.[441] Schondonck has, he says, read and re-read Cecil's book, which Baldwin had lent him. If his opinion be required, he finds in it many flowers of wit and eloquence, and it is a composition well adapted for its object; but the original letter which has evoked this brilliant rejoinder is a manifest fraud, not emanating from any Catholic, but devised by the enemies of the Church for her injury. The writers plainly contradict themselves. They begin by denouncing the Powder Plot as impious and abominable, and they do so most righteously, and they declare its authors to have been turbulent spirits and not religious, in which also they are right. But they go on to approve the design of murdering Cecil. What sense is there in this? If the one design be impious and detestable, with what colour or conscience can the other be approved? There is no difference of principle, though in the one case many were to be murdered, in the other but a single man. No one having in him any spark of religion could defend either project, much less approve it. Moreover, much that is set down is simply ridiculous. Men in the last extremity of sickness, or broken down by sorrow, are not of the stuff whereof those are made by whom desperate deeds are done. From another Jesuit we obtain instructive information which at least serves to show what was the opinion of Catholics as to the way in which things were being managed. This is conveyed in a letter addressed December 1st, 1606, to the famous Father Parsons by Father Richard Blount, Father Garnet's successor as superior of the English mission.[442] It must be remembered that this was not meant for the public eye, and in fact was never published. It cannot have been intended to obtain credence for a particular version of history, and it was written to him who, of all men, was behind the scenes so far as the English Jesuits were concerned. Much of it is in cipher which, fortunately, has been interpreted for us by the recipient.