After which he told me, with much apparent satisfaction, of how well the Jews had done in England.
“Egad, sir,” I said with some exasperation, for then I believed the Jews to have been Christ’s murderers. “You speak of them in such terms that one might think you approved of them.”
“The God we honour and worship is a Hebrew God,” said Newton. “And the Jews are the fathers of our Church. We may learn much from a study of the Jewish religion. Therefore I say to you that not only do I approve of the Jews, I also admire and do honour unto them.
“When you entered my service, my dear Ellis, you asked that I should always correct your ignorance of something and to show you something of the world as I understand it. This hatred people have for the Jews is based on a lie. For it is my opinion that much of modern Christian doctrine is a lie; and that scriptures were corrupted by the opponents of Arius in the Council of Nicea, during the fourth century. It was they who advanced the false doctrine of Athanasius, that the Son is of the same body as the Father, even though that idea is not in scripture. Once this misconception has been disposed of, it may be seen how the Jews are no more to be despised.”
“But, sir,” I breathed, for fear that the coachman might overhear us, “you speak against the Holy Trinity and the divinity of Our Lord Jesus Christ. All this is heresy to our Church.”
“To my mind it is the worship of Christ that is heretical. Jesus was merely the divine mediator between God and man, and to worship him is mere idolatry. Jesus became God’s heir not because of his congenital divinity but because of his death, which earned him the right to be honoured. Just as we honour Moses, Elijah, Solomon, Daniel, and all the other Jewish prophets. Honoured, but nothing more than that.”
Newton had an expert’s knowledge of theology, and I knew he could have disputed doctrine with the Archbishop of Canterbury. And yet I was profoundly shocked to discover just what he believed, or, to put the case more correctly, what he did not believe. The beliefs of Galileo, heretical in the eyes of Rome, were as nothing compared with those of my master, for Newton’s Arianism was, like Roman Catholicism, specifically excluded from the Toleration Act of 1689 that offered religious freedom to all faiths. Even a Jew enjoyed more religious freedom than an Arian.
My astonishment was tempered by the sense of trust that Newton had now put in me. For immediately I saw how Newton’s enemies would have taken delight in the public exposure of his avowed heresy, which would also have destroyed his position in society. I could not imagine how an avowed heretic such as he might have been allowed to remain as the Lucasian Professor at Trinity. At the very least he would have lost his place in the Mint. Possibly he might have suffered an even worse fate. It was only two years since a young man of just eighteen years had been hanged for denying the Holy Trinity in Scotland, despite his having recanted and done penance. Of course the Edinburghclergy, like all the Scots, were the most bigoted opponents of anti-Trinitarianism. But even in England the penalties for dissenting opinions could be severe. Although heresy was not punishable at English Common Law, a man’s blasphemous tongue could be branded with a hot iron, and his person whipped and pilloried. Therefore to be made the trustee of such a grave secret was confirmation indeed of the great faith Newton now placed in me. This pleased me greatly; but I confess I never foresaw how being exposed to Newton’s heretical creed would begin to work upon my own Christian conscience.
From the Strand we returned to the Whit, where Newton explained that it was his intention to press Scotch Robin and John Hunter for information in the matter. When I asked why we did not simply question John Berningham, he explained that he still had hopes that Mrs. Berningham might yet work her uxorious way with her husband. Immediately we arrived at the Whit, Newton had Scotch Robin and John Hunter brought up from the Condemned Hold in the cellars to the Keeper’s Lodge, one after the other. Scotch Robin was a mean, red-haired fellow with a scowling fist of a face and a wen on the side of his scurvy-looking neck as large as a plover’s egg. To me he looked such an obvious jailbird the wonder was that he had ever been permitted to work in the Mint at all.
“Have you considered what I said to you last night?” Newton asked him.
“Aye, I have,” said Scotch Robin, and nonchalantly draped his shackles across his shoulders so that his hands hung about his neck like one almost indifferent to his fate. “But I’ve asked about, and I reckon I’ve got a bit more time than you told me. It seems that Wednesday’s not a hanging match.”
“It’s not a regular hanging day, that’s true,” admitted Newton, colouring a little. “But you would do well to remember that yours could hardly be called a regular hanging. Not with all the attendant barbarities that the law requires the executioner to inflict upon your body. Do not take me lightly, Robin. I am a Justice of the Peace in seven counties of England. I have sworn to uphold the Law, and I will do so in the very teeth of Hell. And I can assure you that it is well within my power to go before a judge this very afternoon and obtain a special warrant for your immediate execution.”
“For the love of Christ,” flinched Robin. “Have you no pity?”
“None for such as you.”
“Then God help me.”
“He will not.”
“Is it you who says so?”
“He came not to Saul, who was a King and the Lord’s anointed. Why should he come to a wretch like you? Come, sir,” insisted Newton, “I grow weary of your prevarications. I did not come here to debate theology with you. You’ll dance for me or in the Sheriff’s picture frame with a rope about your neck.”
Robin hung his head for a moment and at last uttered a name.
Then Newton was Draco himself with John Hunter, who said that he would only co-operate with my master’s investigation on condition of a full pardon for all his past mistakes and the sum of twenty-five guineas to start a new life in the Americas.
“What?” sneered Newton. “Is it true? You still hope to profit from your crimes? Have you no shame? Am I bound to satisfy you, sir? Do you hear him, Mister Ellis? It seems he thinks it is not enough that I save him from a wry neck and wet pair of breeches. The Law trades not with ignorant vulgars such as you, sir. I shall only tell you that if you intend to save your life, you must be quick in informing, for I intend to lose no time. And when I am at last satisfied that you have done this, I shall petition the Lords Justices to deliver you from darkness. But hinder me, sir, and the day after tomorrow I shall deliver you to the hangman myself, my word upon it.”
At which Hunter battered his own forehead with his chain darbies while all the air and bluster now seemed to go out of him. Then he smiled a wry smile and remarked that he had meant no harm.
“I don’t like the black air of the cell,” he said. “Forgive me, sir. I was only trying to find a Jacob, I mean a ladder out of there. Any man would have done the same. But it’s a different kind of ladder I’d be mounting if I thwarted you, sir. I can see that now. And a darker kind of air at the top of it, I’ll warrant. Therefore I’ll peach. I’ll help you nail the man you want. The man what is still in the Mint, who is as ready to steal guinea dies to order as a physician is to let blood.”
Then Hunter named one Daniel Mercer, who was known to both Newton and myself as an engraver whom we thought to be an honest man. This was the same man whom Scotch Robin, who was himself an engraver, had named.
I read over the deposition I had taken and had Hunter sign it, as Scotch Robin had signed his, before having the cull return him to the Condemned Hold, for Newton still thought to extract yet more information from these two at some time in the future.
“Shall we obtain a warrant for Daniel Mercer’s arrest?” I asked, when we were alone.
“By heaven, no,” said Newton, fixing me with that eye of his: an eye that had stared into the eternal and the infinite. “We shall leave him at his liberty in the hope that we may observe this body’s orbit, so to speak. We shall have him watched, by Mister Kennedy, and decide what his motion argues. The matter may receive greater light from hence than from any means that might be available to us while he was in this dark place. He may still draw us to the main intelligence behind this scheme, as salt of tartar draws water out of air.”
We returned to the Tower where we left a note for Mister Kennedy, he that was Newton’s best spy, and briefly walked about the Mint, now operating with more noise than a battlefield. We were not long there before Doctor Newton saw Master Worker Neale coming toward us, and remarked upon it as one who looked upon a Tory arrived in a club for Whigs.
“It is he, I swear. Hang me if it isn’t. What on earth brings him here, I wonder?”
