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LIVES OF THE ENGLISH MARTYRS
DECLARED BLESSED BY POPE LEO XIII. IN 1886 AND 1895
WRITTEN
BY FATHERS OF THE ORATORY, OF THE
SECULAR CLERGY AND OF THE SOCIETY
OF JESUS.
COMPLETED AND EDITED BY
DOM BEDE CAMM, O.S.B.
OF ERDINGTON ABBEY
VOLUME II.
MARTYRS UNDER QUEEN ELIZABETH
IN SERVIS SUJS CONSOLABITUR DEUS
Reissue
LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO.
39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON
NEW YORK, BOMBAY AND CALCUTTA
1914
All rights reserved
fUbtl
FR. JOANNES CHAPMAN, O.S.B.,
CENSOR DEPUTATUS.
Imprimatur :
GULIELMUS PRAEPOSITUS JOHNSON,
VICARIUS GENERALIS
IVestmonasterii, Dit 22 Aprilis,
First published by Messrs. Burns and Oates, 1905. Transferred to Messrs. Longmans, Green and Co., Jan., 1914.
TABLE OF CONTENTS.
INTRODUCTION.
Page § I. Elizabeth's Settlement of Religion . . ix
§ II. Resistance to the Settlement of Religion by the
Crown is considered Treason . . xii
§ III. The Northern Rising . . . . xiv
§ IV. The Excommunication . . . . xv
§ V. The Martyrs of 1570 to 1572 . . . xvii
§ VI. Increase of Missionary Zeal and of Persecution
in 1580 ..... xxii
§ VII. Reasons for the Increase of Persecution . . xxiii
(a) Sir Francis Walsingham .
(b) Errors of Catholic Politicians
(c) The Fictitious Papal League .
(d) Other Reasons ....
§ VIII. Persecution at its height . . . . xxvii
§ IX. The Procedure of Martyrdom . . . xxviii
§ X. Authorities ...... xxxix
§ XI. Writers of the Present Volume . xli
2033039
TABLE OF CONTENTS
LIVES OF THE MARTYRS.
Page I. B. John Felton, Layman.
St. Paul's Churchyard, August 8, 1570 ... i
II. B. John Storey, Layman.
Tyburn, June i, 1571 ... 14
III. BB. Thomas Percy and Thomas Plumtree.
Durham, January 4, 1571, and
York, August 22, 1572 ... in
IV. B. Thomas Woodhouse, Secular Priest.
London, June 13, 1573 ... 186
V. B. Cuthbert Mayne, Proto - Martyr of the Seminary Priests.
Launceston, November 29, 1577 ... 204
VI. B. John Nelson, Jesuit.
Tyburn, February 3, 1577-8 ... 223
VII. B. Thomas Sherwood, Layman.
Tyburn, February 7, 1577-8 ... 234
VIII. B. Everard Hanse, Secular Priest.
Tyburn, July 31, 1581 ... 249
IX. B. Edmund Campion, Jesuit.
Tyburn, December i, 1581 ... 266
X. B. Ralph Sherwin, Secular Priest.
Tyburn, December i, 1581 ... 358
XI. B. Alexander Briant, Jesuit.
Tyburn, December i, 1581 ... 397
XII. B. John Payne, Secular Priest.
Chelmsford, April 2, 1582 ... 424
XIII. B. Thomas Ford, Secular Priest.
Tyburn, May 28, 1582 ... 443
XIV. B. John Shert, Secular Priest.
Tyburn, May 28, 1582 ... 460
XV. B. Robert Johnson, Secular Priest.
Tyburn, May 28, 1582 ... 474
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Page XVI. B. William Filby, Secular Priest.
Tyburn, May 30, 1582 ... 491
XVII. B. Luke Kirby, Secular Priest.
Tyburn, May 30, 1582 ... 500
XVIII. B. Lawrence Richardson (vere Johnson), Secular Priest.
Tyburn, May 30, 1582 ... 523
XIX. B. Thomas Cottam, Jesuit.
Tyburn, May 30, 1582 ... 536
XX. B. William Lacey, Secular Priest.
York, August 22, 1582 ... 564
XXI. B. Richard Kirkman, Secular Priest.
York, August 22, 1582 ... 578
XXII. B. James Thompson (alias Hudson), Secular Priest.
York, November 28, 1582 ... 589
XXIII. B. William Hart, Secular Priest.
York, March 15, 1583 ... 600
XXIV. B. Richard Thirkeld, Secular Priest.
York, May 29, 1583 ... 635
WRITERS IN THIS VOLUME.
ED Dom BedeCamm, O.S.B. Nos. I., II., VII.,
VIII., X., XIII., XXL, XXII.,
XXIII., XXIV.
H. S. B. ... Father Henry Sebastian Bowden, No. IX. Cong. Orat.
E. S. K. ... Father Edward S. Keogh, Cong. Nos. I., IV, V., VI., Orat VIII., X., XL,
XII., XIII., XIV., XV., XVI., XVII.. XVIII., XIX., XX.
G. E. P. ... Father George E. Phillips, of ... No. III. Ushaw College.
J. H. P. ... Father John H. Pollen, SJ Introduction, Nos. IV,
IX., XI., XVII., XIX.
INTRODUCTION.
THOUGH the Lives of the martyrs which will be found in the ensuing pages are told with a fulness not attempted hitherto, none of them illustrate the whole period of the struggle. None of them, therefore, explain with sufficient clearness the origin, nature, and tendency of the quarrel in which the martyrs lost their lives. A few words of introduction will therefore be required to elucidate these points, and others of a like nature. Why. for instance, in a religious persecution were the victims indicted for treason ? Why were such absurd charges preferred against the martyrs, and why were they believed and brought forward again and again ? Before we can appreciate the heroism of the martyrs' deaths, we must find a solution of these problems.
Section I. Elizabeth's Settlement of Religion.
In the previous volume it was shown that the Wars of the Roses and other causes had led to a very great increase in the power of the Crown at the cost of the other estates of the realm. The resolution of
INTRODUCTION
King Henry to marry Anne Boleyn in spite of all obstacles, caused a violent breach with the Church, in consequence of which the country as a whole tamely lapsed into schism. Under King Edward a further step downward was taken. Heresy was introduced into the Court, and took a strong hold on the large towns and the eastern counties. The Puritans, to use a name which came into use later, thus acquired considerable, though not a command- ing power. We shall find them the prime movers of the persecution, influencing the legislature, deter- mining the administration of the law, and clamouring round the gallows for the blood of the martyrs.
Mary's restoration of Catholicism,1 though popular, and carried out with more respect for the Constitution than had been shown by her predecessors, was nevertheless rather her work than her people's. Popular liberty was not known in those days. The actual government was in the hands of a bureaucracy, as it had been under her brother Edward, as it was to be again under her sister. Thus the old religion was restored by the very power that had plucked it down, but was not ensured against a second overthrow similar to the first. Nor was the second fall long in coining.
The Catholic revival lasted for less than four years, from the time when it was fully sanctioned by Parliament. Elizabeth succeeded on the i7th of November, 1558. She at once entrusted her fortunes to a small clique of Protestant advisers, of whom William Cecil was the leader and type, and
1 Pp. 23 — 37, 116 — 118.
INTRODUCTION
by so doing decided, once and for all, the future of her reign, of herself, and of her realm.
Some account of the steps by which England was severed from the unity of the Church, will be found below.1 The great measures were the Supremacy Bill and the Act of Uniformity, which received royal assent on the 28th of May, 1559. These were rein- forced on the 3rd of March, 1563, by the so-called " Act of Assurance." 2 But it must be repeated that the character of the religious policy was decided far more by the personal feelings of the Ministers than by the legislature. Sure of their positions, and with nothing serious to fear, Cecil and his companions had many reasons for tempering tyranny with mercy. When the fanatical party, to whom we have already alluded, raised the cry of "kill the caged wolves ! " (i.e. the imprisoned Bishops), they wisely adopted a milder course, thus advancing their cause and strengthening their mistress's position far more than any violence would have done.
Though much constancy was displayed up and down the country,3 though England would never have changed at all if force had not been applied, still, the resistance was, it must be confessed, small. Unconstitutional pressure brought to bear by the Crown on a people so childlike in the trust they reposed in their rulers, so childish in their incapacity for self-help, had all the evil effect that might have been expected. The practice of the faith was laid aside with lamentable rapidity, considering the tenacity with which it should have been maintained.
1 Pp. 38, 118. * Pp. 126, 127. * Pp. 129, 132, 565.
INTRODUCTION
Section II. Resistance to the Settlement of Religion by the Crown is considered Treason.
This brings us to the solution of one of the problems which was indicated at the commence- ment of this Introduction. Why was it that our martyrs were falsely accused of treason and dis- loyalty ? Why were they not charged with having offended, as they certainly had, against the religion by law established ? The persecutors had no doubt many reasons. Some of the most efficacious were not peculiar to England. It is an ordinary thing for one who has done, or is about to do an injury to another, to overwhelm his victim with reproaches, and ages ago holy Job lamented that the sinner, even " when there is peace, suspecteth treason." Religious persecutors, moreover, even in ages much simpler than the sixteenth century, have generally been ashamed of alleging the real motives of their cruelty, and almost always pretend that those whom they oppress have been guilty of sedition. " We find this man stirring up the people, and refusing tribute to Caesar." The Elizabethan persecutors in particular were especially averse to confessing the truth in this matter, for none had decried the persecutions of Mary, or of Alva, or of Spain, more loudly than they. Their pharasaical minds were therefore wholly bent on proving that they were now, not aggressors, but defenders of the course of justice.
The progress of events, too, naturally led to the
INTRODUCTION
charge of disloyalty being brought against the Catholics. The schism had grown out of the blind devotion to the Crown, then so prevalent. In the case of the greater number at least, fidelity, principle, even conscience, had been at the sovereign's disposal. The sovereign could, and did, alter the objects to which her loyal subjects had previously adhered. But the change could only be made out of deference, not out of loyalty. Those who were truly loyal stood firm to the old objects of allegiance. They refused to be drawn into schismatical and heretical excesses, but remained as conservative and sub- servient as ever. They scorned revolutionary ideas as proper to Zwinglians and new religionists. In the previous volume we heard Blessed Edward Powell in the dialogue defying the heretic Barnes,
What doest thou know
of bate or sedition
of grudge or rebellion
within English region that the old sort did sow ? 1
Similarly in this volume we hear Father Campion cry, " The day shall come, O Queen, the day that shall make it clear as noontide which of the two did love thee best — the Company of Jesus, or the brood of Luther." And Persons was not less emphatic in declaring in a book dedicated to the Queen herself, that "the Catholique faythe teachethe obedience more than other religions." 2
But, alas ! Elizabeth and her Ministers had hardened their hearts. Those only who followed
1 Vol. I. p. 501. « Pp. 339, 343, 344.
her in her revolutionary course were to be styled loyal, whilst those who were loyal in the true and unvarying sense of the word, were branded with the designation of traitors.
Section III. The Northern Rising. We have noted the comparative mildness with which the persecuting laws were administered at the beginning of Elizabeth's reign. This lasted about ten years, until the flight of Mary Queen of Scots into England on the i6th of May, 1568. She was by blood heir to the throne, the " second person in the kingdom,"1 and it is through her, not through Elizabeth, that our present reigning house traces its hereditary right. That Mary's presence in England did something to animate the English Catholics cannot be doubted, even though we know so little about the details. The conservative party among the Protestants, how- ever, headed by the Duke of Norfolk, were now encouraged to attempt the overthrow of Cecil and the advanced reformers, and the Catholics were in sympathy with these plans. But whilst they did nothing, Cecil put the laws in force against the Catholics with greater and greater stringency, until on the i4th of November, 1569, the Northern earls rose in rebellion. Their motives were no doubt many, but religion predominated, and the Spanish Ambassador, than whom no one was at that time more capable of arriving at a broad and true judg- ment on the matter, declared that they rose because 1 P. 134-
INTRODUCTION
of the enforcement of the laws enjoining attendance at the Protestant churches.1 For a week the tide of success flowed with them. Then fortune changed, and three weeks later not one of the Northerners maintained the field.
Section IV. The Excommunication.
Three months after the Rising came the excom- munication of the Queen. Pope Pius V. had not been unaware of the discontent which had been fermenting in England, but, — and this is a point very much to be remembered, — he was far removed from regular and reliable sources of information. Letters from the English Catholics to him, and his answers, might take two, three, or even four months on their way,2 and thus it was very difficult for him to know exactly what to do, still more so to choose the right moment for action. In the year 1568 he had sent Doctor Nicholas Morton, once prebendary of York, to report on the state of affairs in England, and Morton had started back a few months before the actual outbreak, with the news that an insurrec- tion was not impossible. But while he was on his way Sir William Cecil had brought the discontent prematurely to a head, and the Rising was over and crushed, before the Pope had so much as heard of the likelihood of its breaking out.
When he did hear of that probability, he took a
step characteristic of the man and the time. Those
were days in which a wonderful renewal of fervour
was taking place in Rome. The utmost zeal was
1 Spanish Calendar, 1568 — 1579, p. 212. 2 P. 156
INTRODUCTION
being evinced for restoring ancient observance, and the greatest benefits were resulting from the return to pristine severity and mediaeval practices. Hence the idea that the remedy for England was a drastic measure of primitive discipline. The previous Pope, Pius IV., had taken the advice of the Catholic powers as to the excommunication of Elizabeth, and finding them most hostile to any such measure, had decided to proceed no further. But Pius V., far less cautious than Popes usually are, was also, alas ! far too sanguine in trusting the few English exiles who happened to be in Rome. He summoned these men to a court held to inquire into Elizabeth's offences, which were of course as plain and as grave as they could possibly be. He thereupon issued his Bull, Regnans in excelsis, on the 25th of February, 1570, by which he both excommunicated her and deprived her of her realm, believing that the sentence would at once be put into execution. Only after this was done did he hear of the collapse of the Rising. Thus the clauses which concerned the deprivation, resulted in complete failure1 and did actual harm. The excom- munication in itself, however, did no little good to the Church at large, and to the Catholics in this country in particular. For whereas we have seen that the greatest of all snares for the English Catholics had been their blind obedience to their sovereign, even in matters of faith and conscience, the excommunication of that sovereign did much
1 There were indeed complications in England for a couple of years after the excommunication, but they had no influence on the general course of our history. (See The Month, February, 1902.)
INTRODUCTION
to remove the veil from their eyes. It is no mere coincidence then that soon after the excommunica- tion Mayne,1 Campion,2 Ford,3 Robert Johnson,4 and Lawrence Johnson5 — to confine ourselves to those martyrs only of whom we shall treat below — left all that England could offer to hold them in Anglicanism, and went abroad to follow their con- sciences in suffering and poverty.
Section V. The Martyrs of 1570 to 1572.
Coming now to Felton, Storey, Woodhouse, Percy, whose deaths were connected in one way or another with the Rising or the excommunica- tion, we see that their causes involve many more problems than the lives of the other martyrs do. One might, for instance, discuss their patriotism in so far as they championed the old order, which was being subverted by a monstrous exercise of royal tyranny. One might draw out parallels between them and others, such as Hampden, who are commonly belauded as champions of popular resistance to the encroachments of the Crown, and the comparison would be greatly in favour of the Catholics. But here we are only concerned with the precise question of their martyrdom. Were they executed out of the motive of hatred of the Faith ? Were they persecuted for professing the Faith, or for performing some act intimately con- nected with that profession ? On these points, too, this group of martyrs is somewhat exceptional. 1 P. 209. 2 P. 282. 3 P. 444.
« P. 474- 5 P. 524- b
INTRODUCTION
For, whereas all the other martyrs were conspicuous for their inoffensiveness, these four had annoyed the Queen or opposed her titles or temporal claims. If we take a partial view of their cases, and fix our eyes exclusively on their abnormal features, we may feel a doubt about their claim to the honours of martyrdom. But it is needless to say that such a way of looking at them would not only be quite unfair, it would misrepresent the facts. We cannot arrive at the truth without considering the cases in their surroundings ; we must consider these execu- tions as parts of a cruel persecution.
Let us, for instance, first consider the case of the Blessed Thomas Percy, Earl of Northumber- land. He rose in defence of the ancient Faith, but it is not on that account that he has been venerated as a martyr. His claim depends on the courage with which he held to his belief in the hour of weakness and defeat, and on the animus with which his life was taken. When so many other offenders were pardoned on conformity ; when even clerics who recanted were received again into favour,1 when offers of life were made to him, if he too would conform,2 the conclusion becomes ever clearer and clearer that he should be reckoned with the sufferers for religion, of whom there were many at that time.
In Felton's case, if we regard nothing but the fact of his having set up the Bull of Deposition, we might remain uncertain about his claim to martyr- dom. It is not everyone who meets his death while 1 P. 149. a Pp. 172 — 176.
INTRODUCTION xix
executing the sentences of an ecclesiastical court who is a martyr, for such sentences may and do provoke many passions besides hatred of the Faith. Even Catholic princes who would on no account have tampered with the faith or discipline of the Church, have been known to execute Papal mes- sengers who brought them notice of excommunica- tion, and yet no one pretends that such messengers deserve to be canonized as martyrs.
But if we enlarge our view, and regard the whole of the circumstances of Felton's case, we at once see how different his was from that just described. He was not executed by a Catholic unwilling to tamper with the liberties of the Church, but by a persecutor of the Church eager to extinguish every single one of its liberties. Nor did either side regard the exercise of Papal authority in question as an issue unconnected with the continuance of the old Faith in this country. It seemed to be the only remedy in that desperate struggle. Felton took what seemed the last chance " to secure that the Pope's Apostolic voice should be heard, and his Apostolic judgment made known among his English flock. Death endured for that cause was true martyrdom."
Elizabeth's Government took a similar view of the situation. Felton's indictment 2 shows us that
1 P- 13-
2 In the Life of Felton, mention should have been made of the record of his trial, which is preserved. The chief clauses in the indictment are that he conspired on the iyth of May, 1570, with one Cornelius, an Irish cleric, and that on the 24th, "about eleven
xx INTRODUCTION
he was charged with aiding and assisting the Pope " to assume and usurp power and authority within this realm of England." " Assume and usurp," what else do these strong words convey, except that Papal authority was extinct, and that Felton meant to restore it ? If this was the point of view of the Government, they were doing all that was necessary on their part to provide Felton with the martyr's palm.
The case of Woodhouse l is liable to an exception similar to that which was just noticed, though rather more subtle. He accepted and acted rigidly upon the mediaeval theories concerning the deposition of princes by Popes. But, as was said just now, not every one who may be put to death because he accepts and acts upon a sentence of deprivation is necessarily a martyr. Indeed it may be doubted whether Rome, so considerate of the usual prejudices of temporal rulers, ever has declared, or ever would declare such a one to be a martyr upon this ground only, unless there be many other causes making for
o'clock at night, he affixed to the gate of the Bishop of London's Palace a copy, printed on paper, of a Bull of Pius the Fifth, Bishop of Rome, which Bull contained the impious and most wicked decla- ratory sentence, in which he assumes and usurps power and authority within this Kingdom of England, &c., and declares that the Queen has been lawfully deprived," &c. And " further, on the 27th of June, by a writing signed with his own hand, he affirmed all the matters contained in the Bull, &c., and declared the Queen ought not to be Queen of England," &c. " Friday, 4 August, at Guildhall, Felton pleaded Not guilty. Verdict, Guilty. Sentence as usual in cases of High Treason." (Fourth Report of the Deputy Keeper of the Rolls, 1843, p. 265.) 1 Pp. 187 — 203.
INTRODUCTION
martyrdom. In Woodhouse's case there are many additional reasons. The persecutor's animus was shown beforehand by having confined him to prison indefinitely for the exercise of spiritual functions only. Nor could an unprejudiced statesman have taken mortal offence at the very gentle way in which Woodhouse uttered his warnings.1 Moreover, when one reads the whole story, one perceives that it was not so much the lengths to which Woodhouse went, which gave offence, as the constancy with which he " defended the Pope's authority " and maintained that "the Pope hath to do in this realm."2 It was this profession, not the amiable eccentricity with which he urged it, which was the true cause of his death, and death for that cause is surely martyrdom.3
Storey's case is clearer still. It might indeed be alleged that he had irritated the Protestants in Mary's time, and that he was executed because of his personal unpopularity. But this is a very inade- quate account of the matter. His execution of the law in Mary's time was neither unconstitutional4 nor gratuitously cruel, indeed his refutation of the charge of cruelty is a very strong one,5 and in his trial no legal hold could be taken of him in this matter. It does not appear that he ever denied
1 Pp. 191—194.
2 Pp. 194, 195.
3 I have searched the Coram Rege Rolls for the record of Woodhouse's trial, but hitherto in vain. We do not yet seem to know his indictment.
4 P. 33-
5 Pp. 89—91.
INTRODUCTION
the Queen's power,1 or ever positively offended her. But he was a representative of the old order, and a conspicuous man among the Catholic refugees. He was brought home by fraud and violence, and then immolated by exalte fanatics to spread terror among his co-religionists, to show how strong Elizabeth was to punish, how powerless Spain to pro- tect. The moment was one of Protestant triumph, twelve years had passed since the occasion of offence. The charge now alleged was trumpery, even if it had been true. If the rest of the persecution was due to odium fidei, what reason is there for doubting that this act was inspired by the same motive ? 2
Finally, with regard to these four martyrs it is well to remember that, as has been explained in the previous volume,3 the decree, by which their cultus is permitted, is still liable to amendment and is not final, and that Bishop Challoner for prudential reasons omitted them from his lists.
Section VI. Increase of Missionary Zeal and of Persecution in 1580.
The excommunication was one of the chief means of staying the tide of defection in England,
1 Sander, indeed, interpreted his refusal to plead before Elizabeth's judges, as evidence that he rejected the authority of one who was excommunicated. This may be a good inference, or it may not, but at all events it is only an inference. Storey's own explanation (p. 88) is different, and sufficient in itself. This should be borne in mind while reading Sander's resume on p. 82.
2 Besides the copy of Storey's indictment mentioned on p. 77, a reference may be added to the complete record of his trial, on the Coram Rege Roll, 13 Elizabeth, Easter, pt. ii. rot. vii.
3 Vol. I. p. xix.
INTRODUCTION xxiii
but until a new fervour was breathed into the persecuted, terror-stricken Catholics their persever- ance was still insecure. The first step towards a reorganization was the foundation of the English Seminary at Douay in 1568, and the sending of missionaries in I574-1 The next year, 1575, the year of Jubilee, was marked by an awakening of fervour in all classes. The pilgrim spirit becomes wonder- fully strong from this time,2 and also zeal for the missions, which reached its height with the change of the old English hospice in Rome into a Seminary under the direction of the Jesuits, for training priests for England.3 This was accom- plished in 1578. A year later, Dr. Allen obtained the mission of the Jesuits to England, and Fathers Persons and Campion set out for England about the I7th of April, 1580. Their party had increased to thirteen, and included, besides alumni from the English College, Rome, several grey-headed chaplains who had belonged to the former hospice, and even old Bishop Goldwell. At the same time the Douay College (now at Rheims) was sending in missionaries at a rate which under the circum- stances well deserves to be called rapid. Thus we may consider this period as the golden age of missionary effort.
Section VII. Reasons for the Increase of Persecution.
(a) Sir Francis Walsingham. These efforts were met by a notable increase in the persecution. It has been already stated that 1 Pp. 204—207. 2 Pp. 475, 539, 569. 3 Pp. 360—362.
INTRODUCTION
the persecution was decided more by the Ministers than by the laws. The Machiavelli of the period now under discussion was Sir Francis Walsingham. He was not indeed so original nor so powerful a man as Sir William Cecil, but he accepted Cecil's policy, and exceeded him in fanatical earnestness, an earnestness which hardened him against scruple and pity. His object was to keep the Queen and the realm in a state of alarm, until the " bosom serpent," as he called Queen Mary, had been killed and the Catholics were utterly crushed. He, the Earl of Leicester, and others of their party, were labouring for this end during the period covered by our volume, and a year or two later they succeeded in accomplishing their purpose.
(b) Errors of Catholic Politicians. Walsingham's plans were assisted by various errors on the part of the Catholic politicians. The gravest of these was the expedition to Ireland of 1579, in which Pope Gregory himself was compromised. Elizabeth's pirates and her policy in Flanders had enraged public feeling against her on the Continent, and when two adventurers, Thomas Stukely, an Englishman, and James Fitzgerald, an Irishman, asked for a small force of ships and men, with which to vex her in Ireland, they were received with friendly neutrality both in France and Spain, and the good-natured, but impolitic Gregory furnished them with vessels and munitions of war. Stukely perished without achieving anything, but Fitzgerald succeeded in landing in Ireland, where he lit up a
INTRODUCTION
civil war which lasted for some time. He was accompanied by a notable English churchman, Dr. Nicholas Sander, who went, not exactly as a Papal Nuncio, but at least as some sort of Papal representative. This expedition caused Elizabeth much annoyance, and some passing fears, but no serious alarm, and, as we see from the French Ambassador's despatches, she affected to despise the whole enterprise.
The excuse for the Pope's adviser, the Cardinal of Como, who was chiefly responsible for the under- taking, is this — that when it was decided upon, in 1577, there seemed to be no chance of its injuring missionary efforts in England. Nobody then fore- saw the great good that the Seminary priests would soon achieve. On the other hand the expedi- tion was carried out so slowly that, as Father Persons tells us, he and Campion did not hear of Sander's doings in Ireland till they were at Rheims, in June, 1580, and the news caused so much dismay that many persons advised that the Jesuit mission to England should be given up. From all this it follows that Mr. Simpson and other writers who believed that the Papal Government sent warships to Ireland simultaneously with missionaries to England, were under a misapprehension. The warships were sent, because there seemed no opening for messengers of peace. It was a grave mistake, however, even then ; and a worse mistake still not to have recalled them when the spiritual ambassadors were sent forth. The result of per- severing with both enterprises was to give plausibility
INTRODUCTION
to Walsingham's contention that the preaching of the old Faith was a political propaganda.
(c) The Fictitious Papal League. The Irish expedition, however, was at most a very small affair, and did not impress the public very much. Walsingham therefore endeavoured to excite the Queen and the public by more stirring news. There was a great league, he declared, between the Pope, the King of Spain, and the Grand Duke of Florence, for the destruction of English Protestantism.1 Rumours of Papal Leagues had been frequently raised among German Pro- testants, in order to induce the reforming princes to co-operate more closely, but they had been rare in England. Owing to the Irish expedition the Papal League rumour now won some credit, and had its effect in deepening the suspicion against the Catholic priests. The first proclamation against Persons and Campion, that of the I5th of July, 1580, denounced the missioners as engaged in its support. It is also objected against the martyrs as evidence justifying their execution.2
(d) Other Reasons.
The Irish Expedition and the Papal League were, if one may say so, Walsingham's trumps, but he also had in his hand a number of useful small cards of the same suit. He could recall the cruelties of Alva, the Massacre of St. Bartholomew,
1 See The Month, March, 1901, and March, 1902. 2 P. 508.
INTRODUCTION
and the attempts on the life of the Prince of Orange, and he drew the unjustifiable conclusion that Eliza- beth's life was never safe from her faithful and inoffensive Catholic subjects.
After 1581 the young King of Scotland showed signs of restiveness under the galling yoke which Protestantism had placed on his shoulders. Once or twice it really seemed as if he might have drawn the forces of Scotland into opposition to England, and if he had succeeded in this, considerable changes might indeed have followed. But these moments of danger were but few, and they ceased altogether in 1584. The vacillations, however, had only made Walsingham's party more eager than ever to get their work over and settled.
Even Elizabeth's flirtations with the Due d'Alencon were made to assist the projects of the Puritan politicians. The further the marriage negotiations were carried, the more irritated did the fanatics become, and the more ready were Elizabeth's Ministers to sacrifice Catholics in order to propitiate them. The resolution to execute Campion seems to have been finally taken for this reason.
Section VIII. Persecution at its height. Thus from the year 1580, a change is perceptible. Hitherto the persecutors had not done their worst. They had so fashioned their laws, that Catholicism, as they thought, would be sure to be extinguished sooner or later. Now the intention was to crush out the Church at once. The Statute of 23 Elizabeth
INTRODUCTION
imposed on Recusants the ruinous fine of twenty pounds per lunar month ; it made reconciliation with the Church high treason, with grave penalties for all who aided the conversion ; it also put the severest penalties upon keeping Catholic tutors or school- masters. Proclamations were published against the entertainers of Jesuits and Seminarists, and all students in foreign colleges were summoned home. Worst of all was the pest of spies, informers, and pursuivants, who were now turned loose on the unfortunate Catholics, for whom there was nowhere rest, or safety, or escape. Their misfortunes had entered on a new phase. A war of utter extermina- tion had been commenced against them, at the very time they were beginning to hope that they might regain some of the ground they had lost. The increase in cruelty was partly intended as a counter-move to the revival of missionary zeal, and was partly due to political occurrences, which were used or abused in order to represent the missionaries as political traitors. As the persecutors had already perverted the popular conception of loyalty, it was now no longer impossible to take the lives of some of the holiest and noblest of their fellow-countrymen on pretences as absurd as that of the plot of Rome and Rheims.
Section IX. The Procedure of Martyrdom.
The reader will notice that the martyrdoms of the missionary priests, owing to the uniformity of the laws under which they suffered, were in many
INTRODUCTION
things similar one to another. It will be worth while to enumerate these points of likeness, for they will show us how the different lives may be profitably compared and contrasted one with another.
Of the life previous to the arrest we know too often very little beyond the entries in the college registers, which give us the dates of arrival, departure, and the receipt of Holy Orders. The life on the mission was in those days passed in secrecy. It is rare that we know any details what- ever about it. The martyr does not generally come under observation until his arrest. This might take place in a great variety of ways. Frequently, in later times generally, it was the result of a syste- matic search, which might be carried out by a considerable force,1 and might sometimes last for several days.2 Other arrests were due to the merest chance. Hanse was suspected because he was wearing French boots.3 Briant was taken during a search made for Father Persons.4 The identity of Lawrence Richardson was mistaken until his death.5 Others were captured at posts of special danger. Kirby and Cottam (the latter under peculiarly interesting circumstances) at landing ; 6 Sherwin while preaching ; 7 Hanse, Lacey, and Kirkman while visiting prisoners.8 When arrested the victim was searched, often to the very skin,9 robbed of all he possessed,10 and led off to prison
1 Pp. 5, 212. ! P. 338.
3 P. 249. * P. 402. 5 P. 532. 6 Pp. 502, 542. 7 p. 380. 8 Pp. 252, 570, 637.
9 P. 213. " Pp. 242, 436, 638.
INTRODUCTION
with some demonstration of triumph. Campion and his companions had their faces to their horses' tails, and on his hat was the placard, " Campion, the seditious Jesuit." l
After committal the prisoners were fettered, sometimes amongst the felons in the common gaol.2 It is recorded in several instances that the martyrs welcomed these insignia of Christ with notable pride and contentment.3 The chains were sometimes doubled, sometimes fastened down, sometimes so galling that the hand had to be used to relieve the weight, sometimes used as means by which the poor sufferer might be " tugged and lugged " from one place to another.4 Amongst the miseries of prison are mentioned thirst, nakedness, starvation, depriva- tion of beds, confinement in darkness, in underground dungeons, amongst rats, and over stinking drains.5 For " refusing to uncover when heretics said grace at table, Woodhouse was set in the stocks."6 Under Henry VIII. the treatment had been more cruel still. Blessed Edward Powell complained that his keeper " was not content to set me in the chain, but now he hath taken from me my own bed, and hath tied me so that I cannot lie down on the boards, but am hanged in the collar, and do lie in the stocks with gyves on my legs."7
1 Pp- 339. 356- n- 5-
2 PP- 217, 539, 593-
J Pp. 196, 383, 384, 572.
4 Pp. 197, 257, 406, 612.
5 Pp. 240, 242, 243, 403, 404, 406, 409, 483, 531, 587, Gil.
6 P. 190.
7 Vol. I. p. 493. Cases of death while in prison occur pp. 159, 176, 646.
INTRODUCTION
Then came the examinations. Though chiefly directed to the inculpation of others, it was also a primary object to draw from the prisoner evidence tending to his own incrimination. Examinations were generally repeated more than once, and torture was frequently applied to "bolt out"1 evidence, which the victim wished to withhold, or was suspected of withholding. The torture generally consisted of the rack,2 sometimes of Skevington's irons, popularly called "The Scavenger's Daughter."3 The only rack we read of was that in the Tower of London, and it does not seem to have been used without the order of the Privy Council.4 The torture of Briant by needles5 is a solitary case; perhaps the idea was borrowed from the procedure against witches. Blows are not often mentioned.6 Hanse is reported to have been hung up by the feet.
Whilst on this topic it may not be amiss to add that, atrocious as these tortures were, we must not be too superlative in our denunciations of the persecutor for using them. It must be remembered that the manners of the times were very hard and very rough, that torture was in use in most, if not in all other countries, and that it was here employed seldom, except during certain outbursts of savagery. What aggravated the abuse was that the English law clearly forbade it altogether ; and that English- men were even then naturally inclined to humanity, and not liable to fits of violent anger, to scares, to
1 Pp. 6, 404. J Pp. 6, 242, 385, 404, 433, 447, 467, 483.
3 Pp. 385. 386, 507, 550. * Pp. 5, 75, 340, 343, 404, 433, 483.
5 P. 406. 6 Pp. 198, 254, 550.
INTRODUCTION
morbid fanaticism, which have general!)' occasioned the application of torture abroad. Nor had public feeling been brutalized by prolonged war or any pressing danger of it. The tortures were applied calmly by the Privy Council warrant, in order to win evidence that would bolster up the monstrous fiction that the Catholics were traitors by reason of their religion. The worst crime of the Elizabethan persecutors was their hypocrisy.
After the examination by the civil magistrates came the disputations with the Protestant ministers. In the cases here recorded the victory remained with the priests, but the harsh treatment of the martyrs was sometimes aggravated through their successes.1 In one case the meeting leads to an increase of humanity, in another to a conversion.2 From time to time the martyrs were dragged to Protestant sermons, or had to be present at prayers, to which they offered such opposition as they could.3
In ordinary course the trial would then follow. Up to the end of the time covered by this volume there was no statute under which missionaries as such could be executed,4 and in order to put them to death it was necessary to concoct some bogus plot, as for Hanse, Payne, Campion, and his companions, or else to maintain that acceptance of Orders and Jurisdiction from the Pope and still more the reconciling of others to the Church was equivalent to a renunciation of fealty to the Queen, and the seduction of her subjects from their i P. 515. 2 Pp. 341, 612. 3 Pp. 189, 386, 508, 551.
4 Pp. 438, 574, 641.
INTRODUCTION
allegiance.1 The latter point was legalized by the statute of 23 Elizabeth, 1581, but the former did not become the law until 1585.
As to the use of evidence the fuller account we have of Campion's trial is interesting. It seems that more than usual pains were taken in this case to produce proofs of guilt, but the futility of the testimony adduced is remarkable.2
Another noteworthy point is the use of con- fessions or self-accusations. Sherwood, for instance, was questioned by his judges, whether, if the excom- munication of Elizabeth was valid, she was deposed; and — being forced to speak by every means that tyranny could employ, including the rack, — had uttered an affirmative answer, which, however, he immediately begged to retract. It was not pretended that he was in the habit of uttering or disseminating these opinions, but the solitary fact of his having uttered them at that definite time and place before the Commissioners was objected to him as treason, a capital offence, and for it he was executed.3 This case, with that of Nelson and Hanse,* seem to stand by themselves. As a rule the confession was treated not as treason in itself, but as evidence for something else (say for priesthood, or reconciling to the Church), which was accounted a mortal offence.
After condemnation the severities of imprison- ment were often increased,5 and it seems to have been
1 Pp- 254. 574. 585. 592, 616.
2 Pp. 389, 437, 484, 509, and especially the case of Cottarn,
551—554-
3 P. 246, compared with Acts of English Martyrs, pp. 14, 17.
4 Pp. 226, 254, 257. 5 Pp. 419, 454, 493, 510.
C II.
INTRODUCTION
a common thing for the prisoners to be thrown into the low and foul dungeon called " Limbo " before they were executed.1 Catholic friends occasionally managed to send in letters, and even the means to say Mass.2 It was rare that such things were done in the Tower, or even in Newgate, but Elizabeth's officials were almost always open to bribes, and in the smaller and less severe prisons, e.g., the Fleet or the Clink, some alleviation seems to have been generally obtainable. Only in the case of Storey do we read of a priest being admitted to prepare a dying man to meet his doom.3
We now come to a matter somewhat difficult to explain, a method of defaming victims which was afterwards regularly knowTn as that of "the bloody question." To understand it one must bear in mind that, while our martyrs were freely accused of being traitors, when they were tried for such charges, however slight and one-sided the inquiry might be, their innocence of treason was always more manifest than before. An attempt was therefore made to draw from them some expression of opinion which would cause an outcry against them, and under its cover to proceed to their actual execution. They were plied with catch questions, the first of which would be more or less in this form : " Would you not accept freedom for yourself and your Church if you could ? " The examinee was bound to answer this in the affirmative, under pain of condemning himself as irrational. Then came the insidious
1 Pp. 229, 587. A " pit " is described pp. 408, 409, and n. 2 Pp. 415, 422. 3 Pp. 83, 8C.
INTRODUCTION
sequel, " Would you accept it from a Papal force ? "
Then there was no escape from offending the prejudices both of the Queen and of the Puritan mob. It was no use to say that you would fight against the Pope when he was the unjust aggressor, for the Puritans considered him as Antichrist, always to be resisted, and Elizabeth held that neither the Church nor conscience had any liberties which could be justly defended against her.
This insidious test was applied to seven of our martyrs under the form of the six questions.1 The last of these was, " If the Pope, or any other, by his authoritie doe invade this realme, which part ought a good subject of England to take ? " The martyrs answered, that when the circumstances should occur, they would do what should be right, or what other good Catholics did, &c., and their execution was proceeded with. The iniquity lay, not in putting an awkward question to a religious opponent, but in putting it with a murderous intent. That one con- troversialist intent on victory should ask another the most invidious questions he can think of, will cause no one any wonder. But to compel your controversial adversary to give an answer satisfactory to yourself, and to kill him if he fails, this is gross tyranny. The course of the Elizabethan perse- cutors was hardly a whit less iniquitous. They condemned their victims to death without reason, but spared those whose replies on an irrelevant controversial question seemed satisfactory to them-
1 Pp. 449—452.
INTRODUCTION
selves. That such irrelevant matters should have been raised at all, was an obvious violation of the course of justice, and was, as such, eloquently denounced by Campion.1
For, whereas the martyrs were put to death on a definite charge of treason, these questions were intended, not to test their fealty, but to obscure it, and to ensure that the fanatical crowd, who heard the answers read from the gallows, should mis- understand their case and drown the voices of sympathizers by clamours for their blood.2
The martyrs' last chance of life being lost by their answers to "the bloody question," they were in time led out to die. The warrant for those confined in the Tower had to be signed, it is said, by the Queen, and a singular rumour connected with this is recorded at p. 449. They were drawn to the gallows upon a hurdle or a sledge,3 to which they were pinioned, two on one hurdle when there were several to be executed at the same time.4 A prominent feature in the cortege was the Pro- testant parson, whose rude disputativeness was doubtless intended to prevent the dying priests from speaking or praying with peace.5 Friends, however, could also now approach, and during the via dolorosa sometimes tried to speak or make signs to them.6
1 P. 452.
2 For further discussion of these topics, see pp: 342 — 344, 449, 450.
3 Pp. 9 (hurdle or dray), 85 (sledge), 219, 231, 351, 454, 459, 576- 587. 594. 628, 645.
4 Pp. 393- 597-
5 Pp. 8, 471, 590, 614, 630, &c.
6 Pp. 351, 454 (mutual confession), 576.
INTRODUCTION
Arrived at the gallows they were stripped to their shirts, in order that the quartering might be pro- ceeded with more easily afterwards.
They then ascended the cart, when the execu- tions were at the London Tyburn. Here there were not one but three cross-pieces, fastened in a triangle, each angle supported on an upright about twelve feet high. This " pair of gallows made in triangular manner " had been put up new to give solemnity to the execution of Storey.1 Nooses were tied to the cross-beams, and the person to be hanged was driven in the cart under the noose intended for him. When it had been fastened round his throat, the cart was driven away.2 After the Assizes in those brutal times sixteen to twenty corpses were often left hanging on the same day from " Tyburn tree." At the smaller places of execution, away from London, the martyr mounted a ladder, while the rope was being fastened, then the ladder was turned, or he thrown off it.
A good deal of speaking generally took place between the fastening of the rope, and the drive off of the cart. On occasion of the martyrdoms of the 3Oth of May, 1582, Sheriff Martin offered pardon to any who would conform, but this was rarely done in explicit terms. These offers, however, were inspired not by clemency, but by the desire to throw upon the sufferers the responsibility for their own deaths. In the same spirit, they were regularly asked "at least" to beg the Queen's forgiveness. This the martyrs ever refused to do,3 and the refusal
i P. 85. 2 Pp. 93, 472, &c. J Pp. 10, 198, 440, 469, &c.
INTRODUCTION
was held by the worshippers of royalty to be in itself arrant treason, though the dying men, even with their last breath, made striking declarations of their loyalty to the Queen.1 Then the martyr would be expected by the people to make a speech. Some- times he did so, sometimes the officials interfered. At last he was generally left some minutes to pray, but if he used the Latin prayers so familiar to Catholic priests, the ministers and people would cry to him to pray in English.2 The last words used by the martyrs are wonderfully devout and full of significance. In later times, they more frequently murmured the Jesu Psalter, and the custom is obser- vable also in the Lives now under consideration.3 The final butchery was too hideous to describe. In one case the quartering was dispensed with,4 but in others the last tortures even exceeded the severity of the sentence.5
After the martyrdom, the quarters were set on the city gates and the heads on London Bridge, or other conspicuous places. The Catholics generally succeeded in securing some of the precious relics, often at great risk to themselves.
1 Pp. 260, 488, 496, 519, 617, &c.
2 Pp. 198, 352, 441, 457 »., 521. In the (Protestant) account of Storey, he appears to have prayed with Protestants, p. 91. Otherwise the martyrs were careful to pray with Catholics only, pp. 198, 231, 232, 260, 265, 457 »., 560, 631.
3 Pp. 10, 395.
4 P. 597-
5 P. 85.
INTRODUCTION
Section X. Authorities.
Besides the ordinary references to the provenance of quotations, there will be found at the end of each Life a description of the authorities which especially concern it. It will therefore only be necessary to speak here about those general sources, a knowledge of which has been elsewhere presumed.
The most important records for the history of the martyrs were those originally preserved in the Seminaries of Douay and Rome, but which are now in great measure printed, or dispersed, or lost. The archives of the Archbishop of Westminster and those of Stonyhurst College contain most of the manuscripts v/hich survive, but there are others at Oscott, the English College, Rome, and elsewhere.
The above-mentioned records were used by Cardinal Allen when drawing up the first martyr- ology, which was published anonymously, under the title Briefe Historic of twelve Reverend Priests [Rheims, I582].1 This was translated into Latin, somewhat amplified, and continued till 1585, by Father John Bridgwater and his fellow-workers,2 under the title Concertatio Ecclesice Anglicancz, of which there were editions in 1583, 1588, and 1594. This work was translated into Spanish and again amplified and brought up to date by Fray Diego Yepes, Jeronimite, and afterwards Bishop of Tarra- cona, in his Historia Particular de la persecucion de Inglaterra, 1599. 3
1 There is a copy in the British Museum (catalogued under " Catholic Faith "), 4707, aa. 6.
2 P. 634. 3 Cf. p. 597.
xl INTRODUCTION
In the next century we have the catalogues of Dr. Thomas Worthington (1614), and of Richard Smith, Bishop of Chalcedon (still unpublished). Though important for some subsequent martyrs, they add little to our knowledge of the earlier sufferers now under consideration. The most important of all later writers is Bishop Challoner, whose Memoirs of Missionary Priests [1741], is still deservedly popular amongst us. Challoner continued the martyrology to the end of the persecution period, and made use of all the then known material, both printed and manuscript, with singular accuracy and sobriety of judgment.
Since Challoner's time a very important source of information has become available, the Public Record Office, which contains many original pieces referring to our martyrs. These have been " calen- dared," but are not yet published in full. The Calendars for this period (in unfortunate contrast to those for the reign of Henry VIII.) are very meagre, and presume that the reader has access to the original manuscripts.
Coming now to general printed sources, we have Anthony aWood's A thence Oxonienses, not only learned, but also noteworthy as the first attempt of a non- Catholic to write the Lives of the Martyrs without prejudice. Dodd's Church History is rich in material, though its accuracy is not to be implicitly trusted. In modern times we have the works of Mr. Richard Simpson, who was the first to make extensive use of the Record Office papers.1 Mr. Joseph Gillow's
1 P. 354-
INTRODUCTION xli
Dictionary of English Catholics is indispensable to students, and Father Richard Stanton's Menology of England and Wales contains in brief a great deal of information and many useful references. The Dictionary of National Biography, notwithstanding certain defects, is for the history of our martyrs, as for the rest of English History, one of the most important works of the nineteenth century. Brother Henry Foley's voluminous Records of the English Province of the Society of Jesus is valuable for the large number of papers quoted and persons men- tioned. The Records concern not Jesuits only, but Catholics of every class.
Section XI. Writers of the Present Volume.
As the table of contents will show, the majority of these Lives has been written by the late Father Edward S. Keogh. The task of revising and bringing them up to date has, as the reader will see, been most ably discharged by the Editor, Dom Bede Camm. His ill-health somewhat retarded the publi- cation of the volume, and the mere fact of my having written this Introduction in his stead — (I should add that I am also responsible for a share in the correction of the proofs and some other collabora- tion)— is in itself an indication that his unfitness for work was serious and prolonged. Happily a change for the better has at last taken place, and I may now congratulate him on his recovery.
The thoroughness of the work speaks for itself, and will, I trust, enable it to rank as a standard
xlii INTRODUCTION
authority on the Lives of our Martyrs. When we compare this edition of the Lives with the last standard edition of them, that of Dr. Challoner, we find not only that the bulk has increased five-fold, but also that the information contained is multiplied an even greater number of times. Every effort, moreover, has been made to give or to indicate all that is known about each martyr, except in the case of Campion, where omissions were inevitable. This task was the more difficult seeing that so much of the material was still inedited. I will conclude by expressing the hope in the name of all cultores martyrum that our recently formed " Catholic Record Society " will ere long undertake the task of bringing out a complete collection of these valuable but inedited papers, to which might well be added the extremely rare and indispensable printed tracts, such as the often quoted Brief e Historic of twelve Reverend Priests, of which there is perhaps not a single copy in any Catholic library.
The work is concluded by an Index the fulness and lucidity of which will be welcome to all readers, and especially to those who know best what good index-work is. In their names I heartily thank Miss Gunning, who has spent an infinity of labour and skill in its compilation.
J. H. POLLEN, S.J.
I.
THE BLESSED JOHN FELTON.
London, St. Paul's Churchyard, 8 August, 1570.
DURING the latter part of 1569 formal proceedings were carried on at Rome against Elizabeth. She had undoubtedly deserved the censures of the Holy See by her tyranny and persecution, and above all because she had forced her realm into heresy and had refused all communication with the Supreme Pastor. Evidence was given against her by Goldwell, Bishop of St. Asaph, Maurice Clenock, Bishop-Elect of Bangor, Dr. Nicholas Morton, pre- bendary of York, and a number of other ecclesiastics, and at length sentence of excommunication and deposition was pronounced against her by the holy Pontiff St. Pius V., and published in a Bull dated the 25th of February, 1569-70.
Elizabeth and her ministers affected indifference to the Pope's sentence. There is, however, quite sufficient evidence that whatever she may have thought of its spiritual effects, she was by no means indifferent to its political results. In the Europe of the sixteenth century there were still Catholic powers who might be ready to execute the sentence
B II.
BLESSED JOHN FELTON
of deposition which was in those days the corollary of the excommunication, and the insurrection which she had just quenched in blood was proof that a Protestant and persecuting Government did not as yet rest on a secure basis in England.
It is easy then to understand the sensation created in London when, with the morning light of Thursday, May the 25th (the feast of Corpus Christi),1 the Bull of Excommunication was found fastened to the gates of the Bishop of London's palace beside St. Paul's Cathedral. There for several hours it was seen and read and even copied by a great many persons.
Vigorous steps were at once taken to find out the doer of this daring deed. A general search of known Catholic houses in and near London was soon rewarded by the discovery of a copy of the Bull in the chambers of a lawyer in Lincoln's Inn, a well-known Catholic. He was absent at the time, but was soon secured. The methods of Elizabeth's reign were unceremonious. He was racked without any tedious forms of law, and under the agony confessed that he had received the copy from his friend, Mr. Felton.2
1 Dixon points out that "it is curious that three dates have been given for Felton's exploit." Strype gives March 2 ; Stow gives May 25, and Catholic writers give June 2, Corpus Christi day. Dixon adds, " Undoubtedly it was June," and refers to the letter of de Guaras quoted below. (Vol. vi. p. 270.) Lingard gives May 15 as the date. Corpus Christi day in 1570 fell on May 25.
2 A Spanish agent, Don Antonio de Guaras, wrote as follows, June 17, 1570 (Spanish Calendar, 1568 — 1579, p. 251) : "The declaration of the Pope against the Queen has been posted on the Bishop of London's gate, which has caused great sorrow to the bad
BLESSED JOHN F ELTON
The Blessed John Felton was a well-known and wealthy Catholic. He was of a Norfolk family, but he lived at Bermondsey Abbey, near Southwark, a mansion built a generation before on the site and out of the materials of a great Cluniac monastery.1 His wife had been the playmate of the Queen, when they were both children, and afterwards a maid of honour to Queen Mary. He is described as a man of short stature, dark complexion ; and an ardent excitable temperament, — stirred chiefly, as friend and foe alike declare, by whatever touched the interests of religion. His courage and zeal were so well known that when it was thought desirable that the excommunication should be published in England he was asked to undertake the dangerous
people and much delight to the godly, who are convinced that as a consequence of it, a redress for their evils will follow by the arms of Christian Princes, since this declaration can only have been made by the consent of such Princes, and especially of his Majesty. The first results of the declaration had been the persecution and imprisonment of Catholics ; but the Council finding them constant, and that some people of position were passing over to Spain and Flanders to escape the ban of His Holiness, the Queen had ordered that the Catholics should not be persecuted for their religion. This however was only the result of fear, as her heart is much corrupted, and she herself had answered the Pope's declaration in Latin verse, scoffing at the apostolic authority, saying that the boat of St. Peter should never enter a port of hers, and other heresies of a like nature."
1 The monastery was granted by Henry VIII. to Sir Robert Southwell in 1541. He sold it to Sir Thomas Pope, who threw down the church and part of the monastery and built the mansion, and then re-sold it to Sir Robert Southwell in 1555. It does not appear whether it had become Blessed John Felton's property. But later it belonged to the Earl of Sussex, who was living there in 1578 and died there in 1583. (Dugdale's Monasticon, vol. v. p. 93.)
BLESSED JOHN FELTON
task. His daughter, in a MS. relation1 still extant, declares that "the danger of such an employment which he took for an act of virtue, daunted him not a whit. Whereupon promising his best endeavours in that behalf, he had the Bull delivered him at Calais, and after the receipt thereof came presently to London, where being assisted with one Lawrence Webb,2 doctor of the civil and Canon Laws, the five and twentieth day of May, 1570, betwixt two and three of the clock in the morning he set it upon the gate of the Bishop of London his palace." Sander3 tells us that his companion — he does not name him, for he wrote in the following year, and it would not have been prudent — entreated him at once to fly from the country as he was about to do himself; but Felton refused ; the grace of martyrdom was stirring within him, and he declared that by God's grace he was ready for whatever might happen.
The trial of his constancy was not long delayed. At an early hour, on the morning after his friend's racking, the neighbourhood was roused by the clang of arms and the tramp of soldiers. The abbey was
1 This MS. is preserved in the Archives of the see of West- minster, vol. ii. p. 3. It is headed, Ex relatione D. Francisco Salisburiz
filia ipsius Martyris, accepta ab ejus ore per G. Ferrarum, Presb. an. 1627. An English translation of the document has been printed in Pollen's Acts of English Martyrs, pp. 208 — 212.
2 Dr. Webb was ordained priest in Queen Mary's reign. On Elizabeth's accession he went abroad and was one of the most respected of the exiles. He was for many years professor of Moral Theology and Sacred Ceremonies at Douay and Rheims, and after keeping his full jubilee of priesthood, died at Douay, January 14, 1608. (Dodd, ii. p. 382.)
3 De Visibili Monarchia, p. 734. (ist Edition.)
BLESSED JOHN F ELTON
quickly surrounded by five hundred halberdiers, with their officers, headed by the Lord Chief Justice, the Lord Mayor, and the two Sheriffs. The martyr and his wife, drawn to a window by the noise of the armed men, saw them preparing to break in the gate. Mrs. Felton fell down in a swoon, but the brave and courteous gentleman called to them from the window " to have patience, saying he knew they came for him, and he would come down unto them," which he did, himself opening the door, and bidding them welcome. He was immediately arrested, and remained a prisoner nearly three months. Both at his apprehension and at his trial1 he said he would save all further trouble by acknowledging that it was he who had posted up the Bull, and also that as he held the Pope to be the Vicar of Jesus Christ on earth, if it really came from him it ought to be duly venerated. But in spite of his open acknowledg- ment of the act, he was three times racked with the vain hope of extracting from him admissions which might compromise others.
The entry of the Council Order for his torture is as follows : 2
" 25th Jun>s, 1570.
" A letter to Sir Thomas Wroth and others, her Majesty's Commissioners for the examination of the Bull. Where by their letters it appeareth that John Felton being charged by William Mellowes both for the having of the printed Bull and speech 1 Sander, ibid. 2 Dasent, Acts of the Privy Council, vol. vii. p. 373.
BLESSED JOHN FELTON
also with the Spanish Ambassador he utterly denieth it and will in no wise confess the truth. For the boulting out of the truth thereof their Lordships think it convenient that he be delivered to the Lieutenant of the Tower,1 whereby he may be brought to the place of torture and so put in fear thereof. And if they shall perceive him to be obstinate and will in no wise confess that which is to be demanded of him, that then to spare not to lay him upon it, to the end he may feel such smart and pains thereof as to their discretion shall be thought convenient."2
A period of over two months followed, during which every effort was made to " boult out " the truth about his communications with the Spanish Ambassador, Don Guerau de Spes.3
But it is clear that nothing was discovered which would enable Elizabeth's Government to treat our martyr as a merely political offender. We can see this from the pamphlets published under their inspiration, which show that the motives for con-
1 From this it appears that at first he was confined in some other prison, probably Newgate, as it was there he was taken after his trial.
2 Yet Dixon (vol. vi. p. 273) says that the story of his racking "seems improbable. Felton owned the fact, then why should he have been put on the rack to extort a further confession ?" &c. It is strange that the historian should have overlooked this letter.
3 He must not be confounded with the agent Antonio de Guaras. The latter was a banker or merchant living in England, who corresponded with the Duke of Alba, and after the expulsion of the Ambassador in December, 1571, was instructed to look after Spanish interests informally. See Hume's Introduction to Spanish Calendar (1568 — 1579), p. xxxviii.
BLESSED JOHN FELTON
demning him to death were mainly religious. Moreover, we have now access to a considerable number of the Spanish Ambassador's papers, and from these it is clear that Felton had nothing to do with the procuring of the Bull, or with any con- spiracy against the Government.
It is evident too that he was not animated by any personal ill-will to the Queen, but solely with the desire that justice should be done against the fautors of heresy. His motives and his action were in accordance with the ideas that had so long been current in Europe, and which were still held, even in England, by men who did not dare to confess tljeir opinions.
It is pretty certain that Felton received the Bull from Ridolfi. This man was subsequently involved in intrigues of a secret and not very com- mendable character, but it is clear that these intrigues were the result of Elizabeth's cruel perse- cution of the Catholics, and not in any sense the occasion, and still less the justification of her repressive measures. Nor is there the least ground for supposing that Felton was implicated in any blame which Ridolfi may really deserve. The nego- tiations which have brought discredit on the latter took place in Spain, a year after our martyr's death.1
1 See Father Pollen's article in The Month, February, 1902. Dixon says that the Bull was received or brought from abroad by Peter Berga, the chaplain of Don Guerau de Spes, the Spanish Ambassador, who was by birth a Catalan and prebendary of Tarragona. Gabutio (Vita Pii Quinti, p. 104) says that it got into England through Ridolfi, from whom Felton, among others, got a copy, and that many were put to death for making copies of it. (Dixon, vi. pp. 270 and 272, note.)
BLESSED JOHN FELTON
His trial took place on Friday, August the 4th, at the Guildhall. There could be no doubt about the result, for he openly acknowledged the act with which he was charged. But he took advantage of the occasion to make public declaration of his faith in the Supremacy of the Holy See, or in the language of the persecutors, " most traitorously denied the Queen's Supremacy with other heinous and traitorous words against the Queen's Majesty, not worthy to be rehearsed."1
His martyrdom was consummated on the following Tuesday, August the 8th.2 The peace of his last hours was invaded by." two or three godly and learned preachers," who tormented him to the best of their power with "divers good and learned arguments as well out of divers and sundry places of the Scriptures, as also out of the ancient Fathers, the doctors of the Church." Remem- bering his natural character, we can imagine what an ordeal this must have been for his patience. The preachers reported that " he answered arrogantly," and when, no doubt, wearied out, he gave over answering them, they, or the author of the pamphlet from which we are quoting, say that " being over-
1 " The End and Confession of John Felton, the rank traitor, u-ho set up the traitorous Bull on the Bishop of London's gate. Who suffered, before the same gate, for High Treason against the Queen's Majesty, the 8th day of August, 1570. By J. Partridge, Imprinted at London, by Rd. Johnes and Tho. Colwill, 1570." Reprinted in Cobbett's State Trials, vol. i. 1086.
2 " The day and the hour of the execution were unusual ones for fear of the people," wrote Antonio de Guaras. (Spanish Calendar, p. 267.)
BLESSED JOHN FELTON
come, he could say no more." Then they took him to task for his "treasons," and then came another preacher or disputant, who " willed him to remember himself and put his trust in Christ's death, and thereby only hope to be saved." And again he " answered arrogantly that he believed the ancient and Catholic faith, which the Sovereign Pontiff hath ever defended, and that whosoever believed any other faith or held any other opinion it was most wicked and erroneous."
At length the hour appointed for his martyrdom freed him from the persecution of the preachers. As he came down the steps of his prison to the hurdle on which he was to be laid, he found a crowd of people assembled. Imprisonment and racking had not cowed his manly courage, nor cooled his zeal for God's cause, and no one who saw him come out in his satin doublet, and with his bold step, would have imagined he was going to a cruel death. Before lying down upon the hurdle, he took off his doublet, and then, addressing the people, told them " he was going to die for the Catholic faith and because he acknowledged the Primacy of the Sovereign Pontiff and denied the pretended Queen to be the supreme head of the Church." Then he was bound upon the hurdle or dray, on which, with many a rude bump, and covered with the thick dust and mud of the bad roads, he was drawn to the place of execution. On the way he recited aloud the Penitential Psalms. As they turned into St. Paul's Churchyard, they came in view of the scaffold which had been erected for the martyrdom.
BLESSED JOHN FELTON
It was placed facing the Bishop of London's gates, on which Blessed John had posted the Apostolic sentence, not out of party spirit or reckless bravado, but as an act of religious and filial devotion to the Church of Christ and His Vicar, and clearly fore- seeing the peril of the forfeit he was now about to pay. On the scaffold were arrayed all the instru- ments of the butchery that was to be done : the grim gallows, the fire into which his bowels were to be cast before his eyes, the butcher's knife that was to do its cruel work upon his body, the cauldron in which his limbs were to be half-boiled, and the quartering-block.
At the sight of these ghastly preparations there came over the blessed martyr a trial specially humiliating and grievous to a brave man, the unwonted sense of fear and quailing of the heart. Our Blessed Lord was pleased to endure it for the encouragement and consolation of His servants — ccepit pavere et tcedere,1 He began to fear and to be heavy, — and perhaps He allowed Blessed John to experience it in order that his sacrifice might not be lessened by his natural fearlessness. At any rate, he was able quickly to shake it off, and crying to himself, " What is this, — art thou afraid of death ? " he pointed to the Bishop's gate, and said aloud as if contented that his work was done, " The Sovereign Pontiff's letters against the pretended Queen were duly exhibited there, and now I am prepared to die for the Catholic Faith." Some of the bystanders called upon him to ask the Queen's
1 St. Mark xiv. 33.
BLESSED JOHN FELTON
forgiveness. " I have done her no injury," he answered, "but if I have injured any one, I ask for forgiveness of him, and for the matter of that of the whole world." And then to show that no bitterness lurked in his heart against her, he took from his fingers a precious diamond which he was accustomed to wear, valued at £400 of the money of that day, and gave it to the Earl of Sussex, who was present, to be delivered to the Queen from him.
He then knelt and recited the Miserere, and rising, went up the ladder. As he pronounced the words, In manus tiias Domine commendo spiritum meum, he was thrown off. The hangman was inclined to spare him by leaving him hanging till he was dead, but the Sheriff insisted on his being immediately cut down so that he might undergo the rest of the sentence whilst yet alive ; and his daughter relates that while Bull the executioner had his hand on his heart to tear it out he twice called on the holy Name of Jesus.
The martyr's constancy is the prevailing idea in a very hostile ballad published fifteen days after his death, from which we learn a characteristic incident of his trial.
Oh ! traitorous heart, oh martyr vile
Such martyrs nowadays Would fain be made to mortar thin To stop the hollow ways.
He never once relented this
Not once before his death But as malicious traitor he
On gallows gave his breath.
BLESSED JOHN FELTON
Where, as he said in midst Guild Hall
Before the judgment seat That they might well his body take
But more could never get. l
His property, chiefly in plate and jewels, valued at £33,000, was confiscated to the Queen, who however was so far mindful of her old regard for the widow, as graciously to license her by letters patent to have a priest in her house as long as she lived. So writes his daughter Frances, who afterwards married a Mr. Salisbury, in her Relation above referred to. We find mention of one other child, Thomas, who was at the time of his father's death a child of but three years old, and who afterwards became a Friar Minim, and, following his father's footsteps, shed his blood for the Faith.
Bishop Challoner did not number Blessed John Felton amongst the martyrs whose lives he wrote, looking upon the act for which he died as belonging to the political rather than the religious order. The truer judgment of the martyr's own time placed him, under the sanction of Pope Gregory XIII., with the Blessed Fisher and More, Mayne and Campion and their companions, on the walls of St. Thomas de Urbe; and that judgment has been confirmed by the Decree of 1886. It is not necessary to go into the question of the excommunication or the deposi- tion of Elizabeth in order to defend his rights to
1 "A pithy note to Papists all, and some that joy in Felton' s martirdome ; desiring them to read and to judge, and not in spite at simple truth to grudge, &c. Imprinted at London, at the long shop adjoining unto St. Mildred's Church, in the Pultrie, the xxiii of August, by John Allde." See Registers of the Stationers' Company, 1570 — 1587.
BLESSED JOHN F ELTON 13
the martyr's crown. He shed his blood for the prerogatives of Christ's Vicar, and not merely to bear witness to the truth of his supreme authority, but to secure that his Apostolic voice should be heard and his Apostolic judgment made known amongst his English flock. Death endured for that cause was true martyrdom.
E. S. K. and ED.
AUTHORITIES. — The chief sources for the history of Blessed John Felton are the MS. account by his daughter, Mistress Frances Salisbury, and the account by Sander in his work, De Visibili Monarchia Ecclesia, 1571. These have been referred to in the text. The latter has been reprinted by Bridgewater, Concertatio (1589), fol. 41 B — 43 A, and trans- lated into Spanish by Bishop Yepes, Historia particular (1599), pp. 288 — 291.
The Protestant pamphlets also, referred to above, in the main confirm the Catholic accounts of the martyr's firmness and constancy. Felton is of course continually referred to by contemporary writers and controversialists on either side. See also Stow's Chronicle, p. 667. Among modern writers the reader may consult Lingard (v. p. 120), Dixon (vi. p. 270), and Mr. Cooper's account in the Dictionary of National Biography. Few details however will be found that are not included in this life.
II.
THE BLESSED JOHN STOREY.
Tyburn, i June, 1571.
THE BLESSED JOHN STOREY'S life has many points of resemblance with that of Blessed Thomas More. Like More, Storey was a layman and a married man, and yet both were attached by close bonds to an ancient Religious Order ; like More, Storey was an Oxonian, and shed lustre on his University both by his learning and his saintliness ; like More, Storey adopted the legal profession, and rose to great eminence in it, and like More, our martyr had to suffer (though to a still greater degree) from the posthumous attacks of Foxe and other Protestant writers for his alleged cruelty to the heretics.
John Storey was born about the year 1504^ and was the son of Nicholas Storey and Joan his wife. It is almost certain that he was a member of a family settled in Northumberland and Durham,2 and was connected with the Selby family.
Antony a Wood says he became a Franciscan
1 Mr. Pollard in the Dictionary of National Biography gives the date of his birth as 1510 ; but the martyr at his death said he was sixty-seven.
- Surtees, Durham, i. p. 233. Cf. Douay Diaries, p. 73.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 15
lay-brother,1 and this has been repeated in the Dictionary of National Biography, but if it is true, he cannot have remained long with the Grey Friars. We think it is more probable that what is meant is that he became a Tertiary of the Order. At any rate he " was educated in philosophical learning and in the rudiments of the civil law in an ancient hostel for civilians called Hinksey Hall, in St. Aldate's parish in Oxford." He graduated B.C.L. the 8th of May, 1531, and made such progress in his legal studies that he quickly became " the most noted civilian and canonist of his time." When Henry VIII. 's commissioners in 1535 established certain lectures in the University, they appointed John Storey to read that of the civil law, and in 1537 he was elected Principal of Broadgates Hall, now Pembroke College.
On the 2gth of July, 1538, he graduated D.C.L.,2 and in 1539, on resigning his position at Broad- gates Hall, he was admitted advocate of Doctors' Commons.
The state of religion in England at the time was so disturbed, with the King in open rebellion against the spiritual authority of the Holy See, changing the ancient sacred customs, suppressing and destroy- ing the monasteries, pillaging the churches, and slaying those who remained faithful to the cause of God, that Storey, who had desired to be a priest,
1 Athen. Oxon. (Edit. Bliss), i. p. 387. We follow a Wood for the details of Storey's early life. The Franciscan historians are silent as to Storey's connection with the Order.
2 Reg. Univ. Oxon. i. 164.
1 6 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
felt that it would be better and safer for him to serve God as a layman. He therefore, in course of time, married a young lady named Joan Watts, whose fidelity and love were to prove a support and con- solation to him during his troubled life, and to be gratefully and tenderly remembered at the hour of his cruel death.
At present however all smiled on him. Though always an ardent Catholic at heart, he went so far with the times, as to take the Oath of Supremacy exacted by the laws of Henry VIII. This fall of his was bitterly lamented all his life, and as we shall see, he considered that it could never be fully expiated, save by the shedding of his blood.
In 1544 he was summoned to Boulogne, which was being besieged by the English, who in conjunc- tion with the Emperor Charles V. were at war with France. His services were required there however not as a warrior, but as a lawyer. He is said to have performed " such excellent service in the adminis- tration of the civil law under the Lord Marshal there, that the King in consideration thereof did renew his former grant of the said lecture by letters patent for the term of his natural life." In other words, he was confirmed in his office of Regius Professor of Civil Law in the University of Oxford, and he was the first to hold that high position. At the same time an assistant in the work was given him in the person of Mr. Robert Weston, who later on became also his son-in-law.1
As he was not only a distinguished lawyer and
1 Le Neve, iii.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 17
scholar, but also a most eloquent and persuasive speaker, he speedily found his way into the House of Commons, of which he became one of the leading members. So weighty, and at the same time winning, were his speeches in the House, that Sander tells us he was considered by every one facile princeps among the members.1
The time was coming when he would have to stand out from among them as a defender of the Catholic faith.
Storey sat as member for Hindon in Wiltshire in the first Parliament of Edward VI. At first he seems to have remained on good terms with the new Government, for on the igth of November, 1548, the Privy Council gave the Treasurer " warrant to continue payment to John Storey of his annuite for reading of the Cyvile Lecture in Oxenford, and to pay him tharerages [the arrears] of the same."2
But the storm was just about to burst. Only five days later, on November the 24th, Parliament assembled for its second session. Its principal business was to sanction the changes of creed and ceremonial which Cranmer had long been maturing and now at last ventured to bring forward. The old King was gone, and there remained no barrier against the tide of heresy which threatened to over- flow the land. A new English Liturgy was to be
1 Sander, De Visibili Monarchia, lib. 7. This is quoted in full in the Concertatio of Bridgewater, Edit. 1589, fol. 43, &c., and also in Spanish in Bishop Yepes' Historia particular (1599), p. 291, &c. Sander was a friend of Storey.
2 Acts of the Privy Council,- ii. 229.
C II.
i8 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
substituted for the ancient service-books of the Catholic Church, the awful Sacrifice of the Body and Blood of our Lord was to be abolished from the land, and heresy as well as schism were to be forced on a reluctant nation.
It was now that Storey stood forth as the champion of the ancient faith, with a courage and fervour which were but too rare in the times of Tudor tyranny. The Act of Uniformity was not brought forward until the yth of January, 1548-9 ; but the new Prayer Book of which the Act was the sanction must have been laid before the House at the beginning of the Session. It naturally gave rise to heated discussions in both Houses, and in the Lower, our martyr distinguished himself by the learning and constancy with which he opposed its heretical novelties.1
The great point at issue between the Catholic and the Protestant party was of course the doctrine of the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar. " On the passing of the Act in the session of 1547 for com- munion in both kinds, a service had been put out in which the Catholic doctrine was maintained substantially intact ; but heresy and orthodoxy changed places rapidly, and among the reforming clergy Lutheranism was fast disappearing. . . . ' On the I4th of December,' Bartholomew Traheron wrote to Bullinger, ' a disputation was held on the Eucharist in the presence of almost the whole
1 For a learned and exhaustive estimate of this book, its history and origin, see Gasquet and Bishop, The first Prayerbook of Edward VI.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 19.
nobility ; the battle was sharply fought by the bishops ; Canterbury, contrary to expectation, maintained your opinion (the Zwinglian) ; truth never obtained a brighter victory. ..." ' Every day,' wrote Peter Martyr, ' the question is dis- cussed among the Lords, with such disputing of bishops as was never heard ; the Commons throng- ing the Lords' galleries to hear the arguments.' "l Among those who hung upon these debates with the most painful interest was our martyr.
When the Bill was introduced in the House of Commons, he spoke out boldly against it. He revolted against the indecent haste with which Cranmer and his colleagues were destroying the old religion, in the name of an infant Sovereign. " Woe to thee, O land," he cried, in the words of holy writ, " Woe to thee, O land, whose King is a child."2 This speech seems to have been delivered at the time of the third reading of the bill that established the English liturgy, on the 2ist of January, 1548-9. The freedom with which he spoke gave such offence, that the House decreed that he should be committed a prisoner to the custody of the Sergeant.3 The journal of the House repeated the order next day, and on the next, articles of accusation were read against him. It was ordered on the following day that he should be committed a prisoner to the Tower. His wife soon afterwards presented a petition to the House
1 Froude, iv. pp. 385, 386. 2 Eccles. x. 16.
3 Journals of the House of Commons, vol. i. p. 6. Cf. Hallam, i. 365 (1827 Edit.).
BLESSED JOHN STOREY
in his favour, which was referred to the Protector. On February the 2Oth we find that letters from Storey in the Tower were read in the House. These were probably not deemed satisfactory, for it is not till March the 2nd that we find in the journal an entry of a letter from Mr. Storey with his sub- mission. An order immediately follows that "the King's Privy Council in the nether house shall humbly declare unto the lord protector's grace that the resolution of the house is that Mr. Storey shall be enlarged and at liberty, out of prison ; and to require the King's majesty to forgive him his offences in this case towards his majesty and his council."1
The case has attracted attention because it is the first recorded instance of a member's commit- ment by order of the House. "It is also remarkable," says Hallam, " that the Commons by their sole authority should commit their burgess first to their own officer and next to the Tower, and that upon his submission they inform the Protector of their resolution to discharge him out of custody, recom- mending him to forgiveness as to his offence against the council, which, as they must have been aware, the privilege of Parliament as to words spoken within its walls . . . would extend to cover."
The Act of Uniformity of course passed, as Storey, in spite of his brave resistance, must have foreseen that it would. To use Sander's significant words : " There was no other way to the plundering of the chalices, the silver pixes, the crucifixes, the
1 Journals of the House of Commons, vol. i. p. 9.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY
ewers and other sacred vessels, the candlesticks of silver and of brass, the sacred vestments of woven gold, the silk banners, the money given for the pro- vision of wax, oil and everything else used in the worship of God. And lastly, it was the only excuse to give for seizing upon the money and lands given for the maintenance of that worship, and for con- verting them into profane uses of private persons."1
" The magnitude of the innovation," writes Froude, " can now with difficulty be appreciated when the novelty of the sixteenth century has in its turn been consecrated by time. Of the strange features of the change the strangest was perhaps that the official opinion of Convocation was scarcely asked even in form. Parliament now discussed the faith of England, and laymen decided on the doctrine which the clergy were compelled to teach."'2
If we may trust Dodd's account, Storey after purging himself from his contempt on his knees before the House, retired to the country, where " he appeared very forward in opposing all inno- vations, and hindering the people in his neighbour- hood from plundering and making a prey of the goods of the Church ; to which purpose (being a justice of the peace) he made a very warm harangue at one of the quarterly meetings. This behaviour being carried to Court, he was severely threatened, and soon after obliged to withdraw into Flanders, where he remained the rest of King Edward VI. 's
1 Sander, Anglican Schism (Edit. 1877), p. 173. 3 History of England, vol. iv. p. 382.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY
reign."1 Whether this be so or not, certain it is that he soon found that England under the present regime was no place for him, and he retired into exile to a land where the exercise of the Catholic religion was not prohibited, and where he could assist freely at the Adorable Sacrifice of the Mass.
He was warmly welcomed at Louvain, where he took up his abode, and at once became a member of that distinguished University.2 Here he found other English exiles for the Faith, such as the famous Nicholas Harpsfield, William Rastall, nephew of Sir Thomas More, and Antonio Bonvisi, the noble-hearted friend of that blessed martyr, who ministered to him of his substance as he lay in the Tower of London. Storey, like More, became an intimate friend of the old Italian merchant, and when he made his will in 1552 he appointed his "great and special friend, Anthonie Bonvice," to be overseer or executor.
The will is very edifying reading, and we have printed it in full in the Appendix. It seems to have been the martyr's custom to begin whatever he
1 Dodd, part iv. bk. ii. art. vi. p. 165.
- At the ter-centenary of the Bodleian Library in 1902, the University of Louvain sent an address to her elder sister of Oxford, dwelling on the ties that from very early times had united the two seats of learning. In this address occurs the following allusion to Storey : "Then, again, how many of your scholars and professors in the sixteenth century, during the religious dissensions which broke out in England, retired to the Louvain University and adorned it by their writing and teaching, as testified by the annals of the times ? Among these were Thomas Harding, . . . Nicholas Sander, John Storey, . . . and many others whom it would be too long to enumerate here. " (See Dublin Review, April, 1903, p. 287.)
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 23
wrote with the holy name of " Emmanuel," and so this will begins. His prayers for the conversion of England, his contrition for his sin in acknowledging an earthly King as Supreme Head of the Church, his firm faith and deep penitence are very touching. This document portrays to us the man as he really was, and helps us to reckon at their true value the ferocious calumnies circulated against him by his enemies. It will be noted that he desired to be buried in the church of the Franciscans at Louvain, and that he left legacies both to that community and to the Carthusians. He had indeed a great devotion to both these Orders, and the greater part of his time at Louvain was spent in prayer and penitential exercises at the Charterhouse. The other point worthy of notice in the will is the promise which he had exacted of his wife never to return to England until it was restored to the unity of the Church. He was determined that by God's grace neither he nor his should ever again run the risk of making shipwreck of the faith.
After the early death of King Edward VI. and the accession of his Catholic sister, Storey and his family returned to England, about August, 1553.
His patent as Regius Professor was renewed, but he resigned it before the end of the year in order to undertake more important duties ; being appointed Chancellor of the dioceses of London and Oxford, and Dean of the Arches.
These appointments resulted inevitably in his taking a prominent part in the suppression of heresy, which threatened at once the spiritual and
24 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
temporal peace of the nation. As the greater number of the heretics lived in London, they came under the jurisdiction of Bishop Bonner, whose Chancellor Storey had become. It is hardly necessary in these days to undertake the defence of this Bishop from the calumnies heaped upon him by Foxe, since this has been already done in so admirable a manner by such Anglican writers as Dr. Maitland and Dr. Gairdner. When therefore we find Foxe calling Blessed John Storey " a bloody tyrant," "a cruel persecutor of Christ in His members," and "a bloody Nimrod,"1 "even worse than Bonner," we need not be greatly disturbed,, it is only what was to be expected. As to Bishop Bonner, Dr. Maitland has proved conclusively that he has been most grossly calumniated. And what he says about the Bishop we may apply with equal truth to his Chancellor.
" We can scarcely read with attention any one of the cases detailed by those who were no friends of Bonner without seeing in him a judge who (even if we grant that he was dispensing bad laws badly) was obviously desirous to save the prisoner's life." Indeed, Dr. Maitland says that he believes that one of the causes of the bitter hatred with which the Puritans regarded the Bishop, was his remarkable success in inducing them to abjure their errors. " Certainly, while the public sufferings of their steadfast brethren formed in every point of view the best subject for invective against the papists . . .
1 See Foxe, Memorials, viii. pp. 743 — 745. "The cursed and bloody end of Dr. Storey."
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 25
there was among the leaders a great fear of the Bishop's powers of persuasion ; or as Foxe oddly calls them 'subtle snares of that bloody wolf: " *
Yet Foxe, among other lies, dares to write of the Bishop :
This cannibal, in three years space, three hundred martyrs
slew, They were his food ; he loved so blood ; he SPARED NONE he
knew.
" The servant is not above his master," and a subordinate official like Storey could not hope to escape his share of the " rodomontade, decla- mation, and scurrility as odious for its falsehood as for its coarseness"2 with which his chief was so plentifully bespattered. If, then, we find Foxe accusing Storey of an act of gross brutality, of throwing a faggot in the face of a heretic at the stake to make him cease singing psalms, we cannot believe it on his evidence alone. It is true his accusations have been repeated by Strype and other Protestant writers, but as Maitland reminds us, "the coloured and exaggerated accounts" of contemporaries like Foxe, " have been still further coloured and exaggerated — I will add, per- verted and falsified by more modern copyists. . . . These stories have been handed down from one
1 S. R. Maitland, The Reformation. Essay xx. " Bonner's Cruelty," p. 424. The whole essay is well worthy of study. The reader may compare Dr. Gairdner's appreciation, History of the English Church, &c., pp. 341, 342, 353, &c.
2 Ibid. p. 406.
26 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
careless writer to another, containing monstrous falsehoods, even beyond what might be warranted by the statements of the most loose and declamatory writers of the time." l
Now that we have seen the worst accusations of cruelty brought against our martyr, and shown that they are unworthy of credit, there remains nothing for which we can legitimately blame him in the part that he took in the unhappy Marian persecution. As he said while on his defence in Parliament, he did nothing but what was prescribed by the law, whose minister he was, and at his death
1 Dr. Maitland examines two of Foxe's accusations against Storey and shows how baseless they are. Thomas Greene, "who •was scourged and beaten by Dr. Storey for religion," proves to have been a London prentice who had printed a seditious libel called Antichrist, directed against the Queen and the Council, and whose "obstinate perseverance in lying" when brought to account for it, was but paternally punished by a good birching. " It seems to me," writes Maitland, " that he got off rather better than he might have expected." (Reformation, pp. 20 — 27.) Another calumny was that he had caused some of his own kinsfolk to be burnt, " never leaving them until he had brought them to ashes. Such was the rage of that devout Catholic and white child of the mother church, that neither kindred, nor any other consideration, could prevail with him although it did (at his request) with others, who in respect of him were but strangers to them. The Lord, if it be his will, turn his heart, or else rid his poor church from such a hydra, as thanked be the Lord, now he hath." (Foxe, vii. 343.) Will it be believed that although Foxe found out later on that these people were no relation whatever to Dr. Storey, as he admits in another page of a subsequent edition, yet he retains the original calumny in this new edition with the marginal note, " Storey persecuteth his kinsfolk " ? At the same time be it noted that he admits that our martyr at the time of the first apprehension of the woman in question, "was a very earnest suitor for her deliverance" and did in fact obtain it for a time, and that he had also interceded for others who were comparatively strangers to him.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 27
he earnestly deprecated the charge of personal cruelty. We may deeply regret the ill-judged policy which re-enforced the heresy laws, and look with as much horror as any Protestant on the fires of Smithfield, but we cannot justly blame those who administered these laws, so long as they carried them out with equity and justice.
We should not indeed represent the position of Blessed John Storey aright with regard to the laws in question, if we supposed him to have been distinctly averse to them. Indeed, if any of our readers choose to think that he was over-zealous in a matter in which he should (to say the least) have moved with the utmost caution, that is a point on which the evidence does not seem to be sufficient to defend or condemn him. Only this seems certain that he was not broadly speaking behind his age. In the sixteenth century no one doubted the law- fulness or the duty of suppressing heretical opinions, which were a danger both to Church and State. On this point it will be sufficient to quote the words of Blessed Thomas More.1
" The fear of the outrages and mischiefs to follow upon such mischiefs and heresies, with the proof that men have had in some countries thereof, have been the cause that Princes and people have been constrained to punish heretics by terrible death, whereas else more easy ways had been taken with them. And therefore here will I somewhat (said I to your friend) answer the points which ye
1 Dialogue, bk. iv. cap. 13, pp. 275, &c.
28 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
moved at our first meeting, when ye said that many men thought it an hard and uncharitable way taken by the clergy to put men convict of heresy sometime to shame, sometime to death, and that Christ so far abhorred all such violence, as He would not that any of His flock should fight in any wise, neither in the defence of themselves nor any other . . . but that we should all live after Him in sufferance and patience. . . . But as I said before, if the heretics had never begun with violence, though they had used all the ways they could to affect the people by preaching, though they had therewith done as Luther doth now, and as Mahomet did before, bring up opinions pleasant to the people, giving them liberty to lewdness, yet if they had set violence aside, good Christian people had per- adventure yet unto this day used less violence toward them than these do now. And yet were heresy well worthy to be as sore punished as any other fault, since there is no fault that more offendeth God. Howbeit while they forbare violence there was little violence done to them. . . . And yet as for heretics rising among ourselves and springing of ourselves, be in no wise to be suffered, but to be oppressed and overwhelmed in the beginning. For by any covenant with them Christendom can nothing win. For as many as we suffer to fall to them we lese (sic) from Christ. And by all them we cannot win to Christ one the more though we won them all home again for they were our own before. And yet, as I said, for all that in the beginning never were they by any temporal punishment of their
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 29
bodies anything sharply handled, till they began to be violent themselves. We read that in the time- of St. Austin, the great doctor of the Church, the heretics of Afric called the Donatists fell to force and violence, robbing, beating, tormenting, and killing such as they took of the true Christian flock, as the Lutherans have done in Almayne. For avoiding whereof that holy man St. Austin, which long had with great patience borne and suffered their malice, only writing and preaching in the reproof of their errors, and had not only done them no temporal harm but also had letted and resisted others that would have done it, did yet at the last for the peace of good people, both suffer and exhort the Count Boniface and others, to repress them with force and fear them with bodily punishment. Which manner of doing holy St. Hierome and other virtuous fathers have in other places allowed. And since that time hath thereupon necessity per- ceived, by great outrages committed against the peace and quiet of the people in sundry places of Christendom, by heretics rising of a small beginning to an high and unruly multitude, many sore punish- ments been devised for them, and specially by fire, not only in Italy and Almayne, but also in Spain, and in effect in every part of Christendom. Among which in England as a good Catholic realm, it hath been long punished by death in the fire. And specially for as much as in the time of that noble Prince of most famous memory King Henry the fifth, while the Lord Cobham maintained certain heresies and that bv the means thereof the number
30 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
so grew and increased that within a while though himself was fled into Wales, yet they assembled themselves together in a field near unto London, in such wise and such number that the King with his nobles were fain to put harness on their backs for the repression of them, whereupon there were distressed and many put to execution, and after that the Lord Cobham taken in Wales and burned in London ; the King, his nobles and his people there- upon considering the great peril and jeopardy that the realm was like to have fallen into by those heresies, made at a parliament very good and substantial provisions besides all such as were made before, as well for the withstanding as the repress- ing and grievous punishment of any such as should be founden faulty thereof and by the clergy left unto the secular hands.
" For here ye shall understand that it is not the clergy that laboureth to have them punished by death. Well may it be that as we be all men and not angels, some of them may have sometime either over fervent mind or undiscreet zeal, or per- chance an angry and cruel heart, by which they may offend God in the selfsame deed, whereof they should else greatly merit. But surely the order of the spiritual law therein is both good, reasonable, piteous and charitable, and nothing desiring the death of any man therein. For at the first fault he is abjured, forsweareth all heresies, doth such penance for his fault as the Bishop assigneth him. And is in such wise graciously received again into the favour and suffrages of 'Christ's Church. But
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 31
if he betaken eftsoons with the same crime again then is he put out of the Christian flock by excom- munication. And because that being such his conversation were perilous among Christian men, the Church refuseth him, and thereof the clergy giveth knowledge to the temporality, not exhorting the prince or any man else to kill him or punish him, but only in the presence of the temporal officer, the spirituality not delivereth him, but leaveth him to the secular hand and forsaketh him as one excommunicate and removed out of the Christian flock. And although the Church be not light and sudden in receiving him again, yet at the time of his death, upon his request with tokens of repentance he is absolved and received again."
That the opinions of Sir Thomas More were fully shared by Dr. Storey is clear. In a letter of his to Edward Courtenay, Earl of Devon, written in 1555, we find the following passage :
" Albeit, I be ... as it were relegate from the court and tied in the city for the better purging of the same from schism, sedition, and heresy, . . . yet have I thought it my bounden duty to let your honour to understand that the state of the city, being (as you know) the spectacle of this realm, daily drawing, partly for love and partly for fear, to confor- mity, doth not a little amend. Whereof God grant increase and restitution to the old state and dignityr to God's honour and glory. And where of late through too much pity mixed with sinful civility,
32 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
the inferior sort — yea, in times of executions — began to be stout, and seemed to glory in their malignity; now the sharpness of the sword and other correc- tions, hath begun to bring forth that the Word in stony hearts could not do. So that by discreet severity we have good hope of universal unity in religion, and thereby perfect unanimity among the superior sort, unless some lurking darns1 (which as yet in every assembly lacketh not) interturbet omnia. The full cause of all good men is, that by God's gracious assistance and the good counsel of your Lordship and others, the late instruments of God's fury, being now worldlings respecting only the weathercock, shall shortly so be weeded, that they choke not the corn. Which God grant, and to your Lordship your heart's desire. With my most hearty commendation to my fond patron and second Father, good Mr. Bonvise, fautor of all good Catholic men, whom I trust your Lordship hath or will visit. Whereof I know he will be very glad.
" Your L[ordship's] orator,
" (Signed) JO[HN] ST[OREY].
" London, June 17, 1555."
This was in fact the universally accepted teaching of the time, and even Protestants, however they might reject the authority of the Church and claim for themselves liberty of conscience, were the last to give it to others.
1 Darnels, weeds or tares ? 2 Venetian Calendar, vi. n. 137.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 33
" We must remember, too," writes Mr. Simpson,1 " that there was a great difference between upholding the ancient religion by the then established laws of Europe, and establishing a new religion, profes- sing to be built on individual freedom of conscience, by the most ruthless persecution of all consciences that adhered to the old system." It is also well to bear in mind that what More says about the violence and disloyalty of heretics was more than ever exemplified in the reign of Queen Mary. As Mr. Gairdner has admirably put it :
" The experience of twenty years had convinced Mary, and no doubt her subjects generally, that defiance of Papal authority had shaken the founda- tion of all other authority whatsoever. Rebellion and treason had been nourished by heresy — nay, heresy was the very root from which they sprang. And it was really more important in the eyes of Mary to extirpate the root than merely to lop off the branches. She had all possible desire to show indulgence to the misguided, if they could be brought to a better state of mind ; and the bishops might be trusted, especially Bishop Bonner, to do their very utmost to dissuade the obstinate from rushing on their fate. But there was to be no more toleration for incurable perversity."- Again, ''There were heretics whose acts — if the opinions which prompted the acts had not been regarded as the greater evil —
1 Rambler, New Series, vol. vii. (1857), p. 183. We take the opportunity of expressing our indebtedness to this admirable article, from which we have not scrupled to quote freely.
2 Gairdner, English Church in the Sixteenth Century, p. 353.
D II.
34 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
would have deserved very severe punishment indeed, even in days like our own."1
Blessed John Storey then must have felt that the part he had to take in the trial and condemna- tion of heretics was a duty, though a distasteful one. At the same time he undoubtedly felt much com- passion for the poor ignorant people who were often brought before him, and who he saw were obstin- ately clinging to errors which they did not really understand. He more than once, as we have seen even Foxe admit, exerted himself to obtain pardon and liberty for these misguided people. On one occasion he and his intimate friend, the devout and gentle Abbot Feckenham, went to the Queen and begged off the lives of twenty-eight poor wretches condemned to the flames. He felt strongly that it was a great mistake to punish these poor people and let the ringleaders go scot free. And in open con- sistory he once strongly advocated the punishment of seven or eight of the principal of the Zwinglian faction, instead of the dozens of lesser note who suffered death. This it was no doubt that rendered him a peculiar subject of hatred and revenge to Elizabeth, Cecil, the Earl of Bedford, and the rest.2
In 1555 Storey was appointed Queen's proctor for the trial of Archbishop Cranmer.3 It was observed that Cranmer on being brought before
1 Ibid. p. 360.
'2 Simpson, ibid. p. 184. See Persons' Temperate Ward-word to the turbulent and seditious Watch-word of Sir Francis Hastinge, &c. (1599). p. 32, quoted below.
3 Strype's Cranmer, pp. 543 — 545, et seq. See also Foxe, viii. 53.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 35
the court made low obeisance to Dr. Storey and Dr. Martin as the royal commissioners, but refused to bow to the Bishop of Gloucester, who presided as the Pope's delegate. Foxe quotes Storey's speech on this occasion; from which we give an extract :
"Ye say that the King in his realm is supreme head of the Church. Well, sir, you will grant me that there was a perfect Catholic Church before any King was christened. Then if it were a perfect Church, it must needs have a head, which must needs be before any King was member thereof: for you know Constantine was the first christened King that ever was. And although you are bound (as St. Paul saith) to obey your rulers, and Kings have rule of the people, yet doth it not follow that they have cure of souls ; for a fortiori the head may do that the minister cannot do, but the priest may consecrate, and the King cannot, therefore the King is not head."
Cranmer was in a dilemma ; he had justified all his crimes against the Church by pleading the royal authority, now here was the royal authority en- deavouring to restore Papal Supremacy once more — here was the delegate of the " Supreme Head " proclaiming that "to rule the Church was only given to Peter." He refused to plead. " The canons which be received in Christendom," proceeded Storey, " compel you to answer, therefore you are bound to do so. And although this realm of late, through such schismatics as you were, hath exiled and banished the canons, yet that cannot make for
36 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
you ; for you know yourself that nee pars in partem, nee pars in totum aliquid statuere potest. Wherefore this isle, being indeed but a member of the whole, could not determine against the whole."
In February, 1556-7, Storey was put on a commission together with the Bishops of London and Ely, Lord Windsor, Lord North, Sir Francis Englefield, Cole, Dean of St. Paul's, Sir Thomas Pope, Dr. Martin, and several others for them to discover more stringent means of suppressing " heretical and seditious books, concealments, con- tempts, conspiracies, of all false rumours, tales, seditions and clamorous words and sayings," as well as of punishing all enormities and disturbances committed in sacred places, those who refused to hear Mass, &c., and all vagabonds and suspect persons abiding in or near London, &c. This seems to be Foxe's sole ground for asserting that Storey, " thinking their punishment in the fire not cruel enough, went about to invent new torments for the holy martyrs of Christ, such was his hatred to the truth of Christ's Gospel."
Just at this time he wrote another letter to the Earl of Devon, who was in Italy, which is preserved in the Record Office, and is interesting " as showing the good prospects opened to this country, had not Almighty God in His inscrutable providence shortened Queen Mary's days."1
1 Simpson, ibid. p. 185. This and several of the documents quoted below are printed in the Rambler article.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 37
" EMMANUEL.
"Although, my singular good lord, it be long sithence I have visited your honour with this my scraping hand, yet hath not my heart forgotten my bounden duty to pray for the preservation and prosperous estate of your good lordship, whom God hitherto hath proved with manifold travails, to the end that hereafter His mercy may use you to His glory and no small comfort of all Christian religion in this our native country ; wherein although many things concerning spiritual and civil government be yet. to be desired, yet is the same through the virtuous contemplation of the Queen's majesty and of my lord Cardinal his grace so much repaired, and by the prudent activity of my now Lord Chancellor1 in the execution of justice so reduced into order, that if your lordship were present to behold how right ruling doth daily succeed in place of ruffling raging, your honour would conceive no less good hope of the extirpation of vice, and planting again of virtue, than we do here of your lordship to be no small instrument to that purpose, when it shall please God to send you to us again ; whereof I have thought it my duty to certify your honour, although it be notorious, knowing that your honour having ever desired the same, will now the more rejoice you do hear thereof. How other things doth stand, this bearer your diligent servant will declare unto your honour, which God will increase to His glory. From London, this 23rd February [1556].
" Your lordship's most bounden servant,
"JOHN STOREY."2
1 Heath, Archbishop of York. 2 R.O. Domestic, Mary, vii. 9.
38 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
There is little more to tell of our martyr during Queen Mary's reign. We may add however that on the 3ist of January, 1553-4, William Frankelyn, parson of Chalfont St. Giles in Buckinghamshire, gave a lease of all his parsonage to John Storey, LL.D., and Joan his wife and Ellen Storey their daughter, for thirty-one years, at a yearly payment of £26 135 4d.x He therefore probably lived in this quaint old village during the vacations, and Chalfont St. Giles, which boasts of being the home of Milton, may reckon this illustrious martyr among its glories. But he was not to enjoy for long this quiet country home. The death of Queen Mary and of Cardinal Pole upon the same sad day (November 17, 1558) put an end to the hopes of Catholics, and the worst apprehensions of our martyr were speedily realized.
Elizabeth proceeded warily, but her immediate choice of Protestant councillors was an omen of the coming change. The Device for the alteration of Religion,2 which was drawn up by these councillors, sketches out with consummate skill the end to be attained and the means of attaining it. The altera- tion was to be first attempted " at the next Parlia- ment," and Cecil took care that the Lower House should be packed with heretics. The Device had laid down that none were to be admitted, even to lower offices of trust under Government, except those who were "young in years," "were known to be sure at the Queen's devotion." And this was the class of men who filled the benches of the first
1 Wood, Athen. Oxon. Edit. Bliss, 1.389. 2 Burnet, v. p. 327.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 39
Parliament of Queen Elizabeth. It was in fact known as the " Beardless Parliament," so largely did it consist of licentious young men. The Duke of Feria, the Spanish Ambassador, reported that it consisted " of persons chosen throughout the country as being most perverse and heretical," and an English Catholic told the Pope that in a House of about two hundred members only ten were found true to the old creed.1
But among these few was Blessed John Storey. He was returned for Downton, in Wiltshire, on the I7th of January, 1558-9. 2 It must have been with a heavy heart that he assisted at the opening ceremony in Westminster Abbey, on January the 25th. The Mass of the Holy Ghost was not sung as usual, and when Abbot Feckenham in his ponti- fical robes, with his monks in procession bearing lighted candles, received the Queen at the west door, she behaved with extraordinary rudeness, crying, "Away with these lights ; we see very well ! " The Litany was sung in English, and Dr. Cox, a married priest and a most bitter heretic,3 preached the sermon. In this discourse, "after saying many things freely against the monks, proving by his arguments that they ought to be persecuted and punished by her Majesty, ... he then commenced praising her, . . . exhorting her to destroy the
1 See article by Father John Pollen, S.J., Dublin Review, January, 1903, pp. 44—63.
- He had sat successively for East Grinstead (September 25, 1 553)> Bramber (March, 1553-4), and Ludgershall (October 6, 1555).
3 Cox was one of the framers of the Anglican Prayer Book. He became Bishop of Ely.
4o BLESSED JOHN STOREY
images of the saints, the churches and monasteries, and all other things dedicated to divine worship ; proving by his own arguments that it is very great impiety and idolatry to endure them ; and saying many other things against the Christian religion."1
With these auspices did Elizabeth's first Parlia- ment open. Meanwhile things were going from bad to worse outside. Insults and outrages against Catholic priests and Catholic rites passed unpunished, three of the Bishops were imprisoned, while the heretics were set free, and the Court amused itself with buffoonery, plays and lampoons of so abominable and horrible a description that Catholics wondered that their authors did not perish by the act of God. On the feast of the Epiphany Elizabeth had amused herself with a mummery after supper, in which crows appeared clad in Cardinals' robes, asses habited as Bishops, and wolves repre- senting Abbots. Worse than this, the churches were broken into and robbed, the Blessed Sacra- ment trodden underfoot, and the licentious outrages of the mob, excited as they were by the fanatical preachers who hastened over from the Continent, daily grew more violent.
Even the mild and gentle Abbot Feckenham could not contain his indignation at these outrages. He spoke out in the House of Lords:
1 II Schifanoya to the Mantuan Ambassador. (Venetian Calendar, vol. vii. pp. 22, 23.) Schifanoya was an admirable reporter and most trustworthy witness. His accounts of the Coronation and the opening of Parliament, &c., are most minute and graphic. He says that Cox's sermon lasted an hour and a half.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 41
" My good Lords, when in Queen Mary's days, your honours do know right well how the people of this realm did live in an order, and would not run before laws, . . . there was no spoiling of churches, pulling down of altars, and most blas- phemous treading down of the Sacrament under their feet, and hanging up the knave of clubs in the place thereof. There was no skurching nor cutting of the face and legs of the crucifix and image of Christ. There was no open flesh-eating nor shambles keeping in the Lent and days prohibited. The subjects of this realm, and especially the nobility and such as were of the honourable Council, did in Queen Mary's days know the way unto churches and chapels, there to begin their daily work with calling for help and grace by humble prayer and serving of God. But now since the coming and reign of our most sovereign and dear lady Queen Elizabeth, by the only preachers and scaffold-players of this new religion, all things are changed and turned upside down, . . . obedience is gone, humility and meekness clean abolished, virtuous, chaste, and straight living abandoned, and all degrees and kinds desirous of fleshly and carnal liberty."1
Parliament soon settled down to its business, the first point of which had been declared to be Pro Reformanda Religione et tollenda idolatria.
The Supremacy Bill was introduced into the House of Commons at the beginning of February,
1 MS. Cott. Vesp. D. xviii. fol. 86. See, too. Lord Somers' Tracts, vol. i. p. 81.
42 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
read the first time and referred to Committee. During the second reading it was, says D'Ewes, "long argued, as appears plainly from the original journal books of the House of Commons."1 We have few details, however, as to the opposition. The most prominent part in it however, was taken by Blessed John Storey. He spoke often and strenuously on the proposed changes, by which England was once more to be torn away from the unity of the Church. He was taunted by his opponents with his severity against the heretics, and he replied (at least, so it was reported ten years later) that he had nothing to regret save that more had not been done. " I see," he declared boldly, " nothing to be sorry for ; but am rather sorry that I have done no more, and that I had not more earnestly given my advice to spare the little twigs and shoots, but to strike more boldly at the roots and great branches. If this had been done we should not see so many seeds of wickedness taking root everywhere and flourishing so abun- dantly."2
1 Journals of all the Parliaments, Reign Elizabeth (1682), p. 44.
- There is no contemporary report of this speech. It may be found in Holinshed, Edition 1587, vol. ii. p. 1180. Cf. Declaration of the Life and Death of John Storey, . . . by Thomas Caldwell, 1571, printed in the Harleian Miscellany, iii. p. 190 ; in Lord Somers' Tracts, i. p. 480, and in the State Trials, i. p. 1087. Here the version is: 41 I did often-times in Queen Mary's time say to the Bishops that they were too busy with Pecora Campi, chopping at twigs, but I wished to have chopped at the root, which if they had done, this gere had not now come in question."
Father Persons, S.J., in A temperate Ward-word, &c., questions the accuracy of the report. He says (p. 32) : " For the words themselves they had never yet any other proof that they were
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 43
This was indeed a courageous speech to make at such time ; and no wonder that his adversaries, on hearing it, "gnashed at him with their teeth." He was, of course, accused of referring to the Queen herself, though there is a good deal in what Father Persons says to show that in this interpretation of his words there was " more passion than truth, and more rigour than reason." For, as he goes on to argue :
" Why is it necessary we should admit the bloody commentary and heavy exposition only of
spoken, to my knowledge, but only that his enemies affirmed them (to make him thereby more odious) when they had him in their power and desired his destruction. For I never heard that himself confessed them either in liberty, captivity, at the bar, or at his death, and that he should not speak them (though he had thought them) when Queen Elizabeth was now settled in her crown, as this
K affirmeth (he being known to be wise and no fool), all reason
may induce us to think and believe, seeing they could not serve to any purpose but to his own ruin." However, as he goes on to argue as to what Storey meant by the words, if he did say them, it is clear he is not very sure of his ground in denying their authenticity.
I think that Storey certainly must have said something of the kind, because this alone can explain the outcry raised against him and because, as Persons admits, these were certainly his sentiments. But what, to my mind, puts the matter beyond dispute is that Sander, who knew Storey intimately at Louvain, puts this speech into his mouth without hesitation or qualification:
" De crudelitate vero sua id in publicis comitiis Joannes ipse regnante jam Elizabetha, respondit, se nulla in re alia peccasse, nisi quod omissa radice, nescio quos ramusculos pracidisset, cum potius debuisset robus- tissima quceque zizania radicitus evellisse : quod factum si fuisset, jam (in quit) non tot ac tanta videremus impietatis germina ubique stare, atque adeo florere ." (De Visibili Monarchia, Edit. 1571, lib. vii.)
Foxe has embroidered the speech in his usual way, making Storey glory in the barbarities which Foxe, as we have seen, imputes to him out of his own evil imagination. This is indeed incredible. Holinshed and Strype merely reproduce Foxe.
44 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
his enemies, . . . who will needs have him mean by those words the bereaving of our dear Sovereign's life ? Was lad)7 Elizabeth (I pray you) taken to be this root of heresy in Queen Mary's time, being holden by most Catholics to be no Protestant at all, as before I have shewed ? Why might not Dr. Storie meane rather (if he had spoken those words) of some Bacon, some Cecil, some Cook, some Knowles, some Throgmorton, some Russell, and many other like, that were known Protestants in Queen Mary's time, supporters of others, and practitioners against the present state, and yet suffered, yea borne out by known Catholics ; while other poor cobblers, clothiers, carriers, and such like, were punished ? At which manner of dealing I do confess that Dr. Storie being a man of zeal in his religion, misliked exceedingly, and stormed also publicly one day, before the Bishops and Privy Council in a public consistory (for that Councillors also, for honour's sake, and to protect their friends and kindred, would needs be inquisitors in that Govern- ment), complaining grievously of this abuse, . . . whereby also it is much more probable that his complaint of the root of heresy remaining and not touched, was meant rather of the infected nobility and gentry within the land . . . than of lady Elizabeth at that day, for that indeed she was not the root then, nor did the change of religion spring of her principally afterwards, but of those other inferior roots which I have mentioned."1
Whatever the martyr may have said, his 1 A temperate Ward-word, &c.,pp. 32, 33.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 45
enemies were determined to make use of his speech to bring him to destruction.
In defiance of the privileges of Parliament, he was brought up before the Council to answer to the charge of having spoken evil of the affairs of religion. Another Doctor of Laws, a priest, was summoned at the same time. " They bravely and prudently answered the Lords of the Council, and especially the layman, Master Storey, who said : ' You need not interrogate me about these matters, as I know better than any of you both the canon laws and those of this kingdom ; let my accusers appear and prove what I have said, for I certainly said nothing at which you could reasonably take offence; but should her Majesty will otherwise, I do not refuse to die for -the Church.' The other said the like, telling the Lords of the Council besides that her Majesty could not do them a greater favour. So from what I hear, all the clergy are united and confirmed in this holy and good opinion. Some of them will perhaps change their minds, but they will be esteemed for what they are." l
For the moment, Blessed John Storey was dismissed with a caution, but from this time, says Sander, his enemies never ceased collecting new matter of accusation against him. It was not long before he got into trouble again. A Bill had been introduced to deprive the venerable Bishop Whyte of large portions of the lands belonging to his see of Winchester. It had passed the Commons, but nevertheless. Dr. Storey had the boldness to appear
1 II Schifanoya, Venetian Calendar, vii. p. 26.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY
before the Lords as the Bishop's counsel.1 This was reported to the House, on March the 23rd, and Storey, on acknowledging the offence, received a severe reprimand from the Speaker. The Bishop's crime had been the same as his own, and he had already been imprisoned in his own house for daring to teach Catholic truth in his sermons.
Blessed John Storey was soon to taste the vengeance of his enemies. Their fury was so great that he thought it best to hide himself for a time, but he was soon " taken in the West country, riding before a mail in a frieze coat like a serving- man, and was apprehended in the highway by one Mr. Ayleworth, one of the Queen's servants,"'2 and being brought before the Council, was by them committed to the Fleet, on the 2Oth of May, 1560. At the same time, Watson, Bishop of Lincoln ; Feckenham, Abbot of Westminster ; Cole, Dean of St. Paul's ; and Chedsey, Archdeacon of Middlesex, were sent to the Tower.3 The offence with which they were charged was, " having obstinately refused attendance on public worship, and everywhere declaiming and railing against that religion which we now profess."4 In the words of Foxe,
1 These lands had been granted to seculars by letters patent under Edward VI., but taken from them and restored to the see by Mary. They now claimed them back, and the Bishop properly resisted the confiscation. The patentees further ventured to accuse the Bishop of cancelling records, and some articles were devised for his punishment. (Dixon, v. p. 96.)
2 The Declaration, v. supra.
3 Machyn, p. 235.
4 Jewel to Peter Martyr (May 22, 1560), Zurich Letters, First Series, p. 79.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 47
" Elizabeth, staying the bloody sword of persecu- tion from raging any further (!), caused Dr. Storey to be apprehended and committed to ward, with many other, his accomplices, sworn enemies to Christ's glorious Gospel."
In the Fleet prison Blessed Jo"hn Storey found other glorious confessors in chains. Dr. Cuthbert Scott, Bishop of Chester, had been committed prisoner there a week before (May the I3th), and Dr. Nicholas Harpsfield and other dignified eccle- siastics shared with him the miserable accommoda- tion of the prison. In those days prisoners who desired the common decencies of life had to pay heavily for them, and we find, from some constitu- tions drawn up for the government of the Fleet in this very year, that the prisoners who had a bed to themselves, had to pay for board and lodging more than £i a week, a sum we should have to multiply many times to reach its modern value.
We do not know how long Dr. Storey was con- fined in the Fleet at this time. Sander says he spent " some years " in prison. All we know is that by some means or other he escaped for a time, for we find that he was re-taken in April or May, 1562. This we learn from a letter of Parkhurst, Bishop of Norwich, to Bullinger (May 31, 1562) : " Storey, that little man of law and most impudent Papist, has been arrested in the West of England in a courtier's dress."1 He was thrown into the Marshalsea prison, where among his fellow-prisoners
1 Zurich Letters, n. 48. The words are "more aulico," which have been translated " in his barrister's robes " !
48 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
was his old master, the Bishop of London. His enemies meanwhile sought for a legal pretext to put him to death. Nor had they long to wait. Early in the next year Parliament passed a new Act authorizing the Protestant Bishops to require the Oath of Supremacy from any one who had held office in the last three reigns, and made the penalty of the first refusal perpetual imprisonment, and of the second, death.
On the 2gth of April, 1563, Bishop de la Quadra, Spanish Ambassador, wrote to King Philip as follows :x
"This week they begin to demand the oath from the Catholic Bishops, in accordance with the new Act passed in Parliament recently, and the Bishops of London and Lincoln, and Doctors Cole and Storey have been summoned for Monday next. After them will come the rest, and there is no doubt some will die. I am much more afflicted at this misfortune than at all the insults and injuries I have received here, as I see the great danger the Catholic religion will suffer from the death of these men, and still more, if from faint-heartedness any of them were to take the oath."
On May the gth the Ambassador had still more stirring news to report.
"Last week a commission was issued to summon for trial four of the Catholic prisoners, two Bishops — of London and Lincoln — and two doctors — Cole,
1 Spanish Calendar, vol. i. p. 322.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 49
who was commissioner against the Lutherans in the time of our lady, Queen Mary, now in heaven, and Storey. The commission has not yet been signed by the Queen, as when they took it to her, she said she would sign it another day at her convenience. In the meanwhile Dr. Storey was so alarmed at the news that he determined to save himself by flight rather than have to choose between taking the oath or being hanged. He accordingly made the attempt about ten days ago with the assistance of a Flemish gentleman who was con- fined in the same prison for debt. He went into a garden at midnight, and having scaled the wall came to the river, where he took a boat and came to my dwelling. He asked for a chaplain of mine with whom it appears he had had some conversation about his intention, although the chaplain had not approved of it. As he was not in the house, he awaited his arrival, and when he came begged him to help him to escape. The chaplain excused himself as best he could, and even compelled him to leave the house immediately, which he did, and got away safely, at least up to the present they have not been able to find him. By the indications of the boatmen and some of the prison warders the Council has discovered that this man disembarked at my house, and as soon as they learnt it, which was already nearly midnight, they sent the marshal to me to demand the surrender of the man. I, who barely even heard that he had escaped from prison, answered that I knew nothing whatever about him, as I and D'Assonleville had been the whole day in the E II.
50 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
country and we returned home very late, but that if they liked to search the house they were welcome to do so, and I added that if they discovered that any servant of mine had helped him in his flight or hiding, I would have him punished without any respect."
The Bishop then found on inquiry that the chaplain had known of the escape but had not helped it. He reproved him for not informing him of the matter and sent him away to a friend's house, since as he was a man who knew every Catholic in the place, and had absolved and administered the sacraments to many, it would be very dangerous if the Council got hold of him. They did send for him later, but Quadra excused himself, saying he could not dispense with his chaplain. As he tells the King (in cipher) : " I will rather put up with the molestation of these Councillors, than expose so many people to suffering and injury, as would be the case if this chaplain were to be handed over." The Ambassador, however, thought it was safest to get the chaplain out of the way, and sent him secretly over to Flanders.
The King answered on June the I5th : l
" I note what has happened about the flight of Storey, and as your chaplain aided him to escape you have done well in deciding to send him to Flanders, in consequence of the inconveniences that might result from his statements if they were to
1 Spanish Calendar, vol. i. n. 230, p. 333.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 51
take and interrogate him. I do not think he would do anything in this matter to render him deserving of punishment."
Meanwhile Dr. Storey had succeeded in escaping the hands of his enemies. After lying hid for some time in the houses of divers of his friends, he landed in safety in Belgium, and took up his quarters in Louvain.
Here, beside the ordinary trials of exile, he had to bear those of poverty. His family, who came to join him at Louvain, were now increased in number, and he had lost all he possessed in the world. Added to this he had to bear interior trials, for his conscience was continually tormented with the fear that he had done wrong in escaping from death, since thereby he had lost the crown of martyrdom. He spoke of this scruple very often to his wife, and sometimes also to his friends, and on one occasion he confided his trouble to our informant, Sander, asking him whether it would be lawful for him to give himself up once more into the power of the heretics. " But I," says Sander, "did not venture to advise him to return to prison. For it seemed that he had been delivered by the design of God, and that he could not count upon the divine grace, if he placed himself in danger, when God had set him free." He then wished to devote the rest of his life to penance, and he fixed upon the Charterhouse at Louvain as a fitting place of retirement, intending to enter that Order, if his wife also would agree to embrace the religious
52 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
state. But though she refused to do this, Storey nevertheless remained so firm in his resolution to do penance, that he spent more time in prayer with the Carthusians than at home with his family.1 But his poverty was so great that he was forced to look out for means of livelihood, especially when those dependent on him for bread were increased in number by a nephew and niece and their family, who were sent out from England to him. As he had four children of his own it can be imagined that he had difficulty in providing them with the barest necessaries. His married daughter, Mrs. Weston, and her children also, came out to join him, her husband being a prisoner in the Fleet. It is true that he was highly thought of by the Duke of Alva, and that at his intercession the King allowed him a grant of a hundred florins out of the revenues of the Augustinian Abbey of St. Gertrude at Louvain.2
Later on we find a spy writing to Cecil (the yth of April, 1570), " Storey remains at Brussels . . . and has continual access to the Duke of Alva, and was lately rewarded with 250 crowns."3 Again, on April the i6th he writes : " The Duke of Alva has delivered to Storey of the benevolence of the King of Spain a thousand crowns to be distributed among the scholars at Louvain and Douay. The religious men and women in this country, being English, are appointed to receive £10 a piece."4
1 So also Molanus, De Claris Exteris, being part ii. of his Historic Lovaniensum, lib. xii. cap. i.
* Foreign Calendar, 1560 — 1561, n. 846.
3 Foreign Calendar, 1570, n. 803. 4 Ibid. n. 811.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 53
Blessed John Storey thus acted as the King's almoner for his distressed fellow-countrymen. This is no doubt what the spy means by calling him " still a preferrer of all the English traitors' business and causes."
But all the while he was very insufficiently provided for himself, and was quite at a loss what to do to earn his daily bread.
Meanwhile his enemies at home were not idle ; and the martyrdom he so ardently desired, he was by the grace of God at length enabled to attain to. Elizabeth, Leicester, and Cecil laid the following plot to entrap him : The King of Spain and the Duke of Alva had recently appointed an office at Antwerp for the search of all English ships going into or coming out of that port, in order to prevent the traffic in heretical books and other forbidden mer- chandise. The English Government, hearing of this, saw in it a means of wreaking their vengeance upon our martyr. " One William Parker, brother of Elizabeth's new Archbishop,1 a wool-draper, a man well skilled in mercantile affairs, was largely bribed by the Council to go to the Low Countries to the Duke of Alva, and professing himself a
1 We are quoting Mr. Simpson (p. 187). He adds that the relationship of this Parker to the Archbishop is affirmed in a marginal note attached to one of his letters to Cecil, in the Record Office. It is true that Strype does not mention William as one of the Archbishop's brothers, probably because of his being a Popish lost sheep, as he (not knowing the plot) would consider him. Many of the Archbishop's near relations were connected with the wool trade, according to Strype, and his father's name was William; it was therefore a family name and family trade.
54 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
fugitive from England, and a convert to the Catholic faith, to solicit the office in question. The Duke, rejoicing beyond measure in having such a near relation to the chief spiritual heretic in England for a convert and refugee, and withal a man so skilled in mercantile affairs, gladly conferred on him the office he asked for. As soon as he was installed, he named as his assistant Dr. Storey who, as we have seen, was living in great poverty at Louvain. He considered it his duty to his family to accept the office, against the wish of his friends, who told him it was an odious one, and unworthy of a man of his position. Thus the first part of the plot was successful." The second part was soon to follow, and it proved to be a most audacious act of vindictive and illegal treachery.
It seems that a certain John Mershe, one John Lee, and a man named Saltanstall were agents for Cecil in the Low Countries. They were spies in his pay, pretending to be good Catholics in exile for the faith, and reporting to their chief all that they could worm out of the confidence of the Catholic refugees, or that their malignant ingenuity could invent against them. Great numbers of these refugees were now collected in the Low Countries under the protection of their former Sovereign, King Philip. Some of them, like Storey himself, despairing of England after the failure of the Northern Rising, seem to have become naturalized as Spanish subjects. Priests, lawyers, knights, peers, noble ladies, representatives of all sorts and ranks were there, united by a common faith and
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 55
a common suffering. Victims all of them of Elizabeth's tyrannical laws, they preferred to serve God in exile rather than stain their consciences by apostasy from the faith. Among the more prominent of these exiles were the Earl of Westmoreland, the Countess of Northumberland (wife of the Blessed Thomas Percy), the Nortons, and Leonard Dacre, who had been the leaders of the Rising in the North. Who shall blame them if they looked to Spain to help them and their country in its hour of need ? Blessed John Fisher had besought the Emperor through Chapuys, the Imperial Ambassador, to invade England in the time of Henry VIII. , in order to preserve the Catholic faith in the land, and we cannot wonder (especially now that Elizabeth had been excommunicated by St. Pius V.) if English Catholics in their distress looked to that Emperor's son to be the champion of their proscribed religion. There is no proof however (except the mere assertion of his bitter foes) that Blessed John Storey was in any way implicated in any plot against the Queen or her Government. As we shall see, the indictment brought against him at his trial did not venture to charge him with any specific treasonable act, but merely, in the usual vague way, of conspiring the death of the Queen, just as in the case of Blessed Edmund Campion and his companions. The real cause of the hatred against him was his well-known 2eal for the old religion.
Among this company of Catholic exiles moved the spies whom Cecil's gold had bought body and
56 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
soul. Feigning themselves to be devout Catholics, living lives of continual sacrilege and of unspeak- able treachery, they wove their dark plots for the destruction of those who trusted and befriended them.
The plan conceived against Blessed John Storey in Cecil's crafty brain, to be carried out by these agents, was no less a one than to kidnap him while he was discharging the duties of his office and carry him over to England. Mershe and Lee, in con- junction with Parker and a certain Pigotte, arranged that a ship, sufficiently manned and armed for the purpose, should enter the port of Antwerp, and that Dr. Storey should be induced to visit it for pro- hibited goods which were to be placed in her. The plan nearly failed owing to the indiscretion of Pigotte, and the information of one of the sailors, who suspected the plot and ran away, and after- wards told Parker to take care of himself, thinking that he was the victim of, and not a partaker in, the conspiracy.
However, three merchants trading to the Low Countries, viz., Roger Ramsden, Martin Bragge, and Simon Jewkes, allured by the bribes of the Lords of the Council, were found ready to under- take the dangerous enterprise which Pigotte had mismanaged. They arranged with the captain of a smack, by name Cornelius Van Eycke, and settled that this time the point of departure should be Bergen-op-Zoom, opposite Zealand, about thirty- five miles north of Antwerp. The plan was that as soon as Dr. Storey and Parker should go under the
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 57
hatches to search the cargo, the hatches were to be shut down, and the two conveyed to England, all sail being set as quickly as possible ; nobody knowing at the time the complicity of Parker but Mershe and Lee who, under the English Govern- ment, were the chief conspirators. This was accordingly acted upon, and was perfectly success- ful. Dr. Storey was landed at Yarmouth on the evening of the i4th of August, 1570. Cecil had got his enemy into his clutches again, and this time he would take care he did not escape.
Storey wrote to Cecil from Yarmouth the morning after his landing as follows :
"In first proof that I am personally present in this the Queen's Majesty's town of Yarmouth, I am bold to scribble unto your honour these presents. The circumstances of my apprehension on water by Zealand, this bearer and his company, diligent and yet merciful, can better declare than myself, deceived by my simple and yet foxy skipper, can but by conjecture declare. If it shall stand to your pleasure to have me restored to my keeper, from whom like a very wreckling I did escape, then it is my humble suit unto her Majesty and your honour so to temper the yet continued heat of my said keeper, that he content himself with laying on irons on that of my legs which is only able to bear the same, until your leisure may serve to call the corpus before you, or so with charity to dispose the same, now much decaying and decayed, by competent lodging, that it perish not ante tempm a Deo prcefixum*
58 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
If any pre-occupation have been used with your honour of me by Mr. John Mershe, late at Brussels, or Mr. Thomas Palie, now turned a1 Je . . . , it may yet like you andire alteram partem, in which your doing, sicut non pcenitebit ; ita opposite juxta seposita magis elucescent. Decimo quinto Aug. Tni honoris orator.
"JOANNES STOREY."2
This letter was sent up to London by Parker and Simon Jewkes, as we learn from the following items in the bill of expenses3 which was afterwards to form such a bone of contention. (Parker was of course a nominal prisoner and Jewkes his keeper.)
*' Paid at Yarmouth for three horses and a post, sent up with Parker and Simon Jewkes £214
Paid them in their purses, to bear their
charges to London and to the court .300"
Parker however broke down on his journey when he got to St. Alban's, and sent Cecil the following letter from thence :
" Right Honourable, — Not long since your Honour was advertised from Yarmouth of the arrival of Dr. Storey, brought from beyond the seas by me and my supports, or assistants, the I4th of this instant, about eight of the clock in the afternoon ; since which time I have been travelling towards your Honour, with whom my hearty desire
1 Illegible. '2 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, Ixxiii. 18.
3 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, Ixxiii. 64.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 59
is to have conference of those things which in these affairs doth appertain ; but being a man not much used to travel, I have over-travelled myself, so as yet I could not attain to the presence of your Honour, and also not having any determinate time to have any access to your Honour, which I require, if it may stand with your Honour to signify the same by the bearer hereof, and then shall I give my diligent attendance at all times, according to my bounden duty herewith. The Almighty have your Honour in His blessed tuition.
" From St. Alban's, this present night, i8th August, 1570.
" By your honour's obedient during life,
"WILLIAM PARKER.MI
Roger Ramsden and the rest set off with their prisoners after a three days' stay in Yarmouth, having received a strict injunction to let Storey speak to no one. So rigorously was this injunction observed, that one Gosling, a bailiff, got into trouble for supplying the prisoner with kersey to make hose of.'2
The bill here also supplies us with considerable information.
" Paid for 5 more horses when we came up is. and to the post for his pains, and for bringing up our mails and other things £3 10 o
1 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, Ixxiii. 21.
- The martyr was most probably imprisoned in the ancient Toil House, a picturesque mediaeval building which contains several dungeons.
60 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
Paid for our charges at Yarmouth the space of 3 days with the Doctor, Parker and the rest so long as they were in our company, as also that which was spent upon the master and mariners 3 15 o
Paid for all our charges from Yarmouth
to London 5 10 o
Paid for our charges here in London to this 26 of August, 1570, with our horse meat the first night .... o 13 2
Paid for one to help to bring up the hoye from Yarmouth to London because the master came up with us . . .010 2"
Blessed John Storey arrived in London August the 2ist. His capture naturally caused great excite- ment and unbounded joy among the heretics. The Spanish agent, Don Antonio de Guaras, wrote August the 2oth to Zayas as follows :
" I wrote to your Worship on the i6th and the news since then is that they have enticed Dr. Storey, whom you will know, on board a ship in Flanders, and have brought him hither. He was betrayed by a false companion of his, a treacherous Englishman, and an acquaintance of mine met the traitor on the i6th instant coming from Yarmouth whither Storey had been taken.
" My acquaintance seeing the traitor alone was surprised that he should be here ; the latter said : ' I have come hither to do the Queen a great service,
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 61
for I have managed to bring into England a bitter enemy of the Queen and this country.' It is now understood that Dr. Storey will arrive here a prisoner to-night or to-morrow."
In a letter written three days later the Ambas- sador adds : " These people in London are only talking of the martyrs they are going to make."
The jubilation of the Protestants may be judged from the following letter of Bishop Horn, of Win- chester, written to Bullinger a year later (August, I571):
"There was here not long since a doctor of laws, of some learning, such a one as I imagine as those among the Jews who menaced Christ with death. His name is Storey, a man as it were born for cruelty, a most raging persecutor in Marian times to whom it was gain to kill the saints and sport to shed blood.
" This man after the happy day had shone on us . . . was thrown into prison on an evident charge of treason. A short time afterwards ... he escaped to Flanders, . . . where like a fury fresh from hell, or more truly like a wicked Davus, it is wonderful how he made mischief. . . . There comes to him one of his friends, whose fidelity he least suspected, but who had been suborned by the merchants.1 This man whispers in his ear that a ship has just arrived from England with I know
1 Even Horn did not know that Parker had been sent to Flanders for the very purpose of kidnapping the martyr. But it is evident from the whole letter that Horn cared little forgaccuracy.
62 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
not what golden mountains of treasure. Fired with the love of plunder, he straightway sallies forth, promising the money to himself and death to the merchants. After he had entered the ship and was prying about in every corner, and had just gone down into the interior of the vessel, they suddenly closed the hatches, and with their sails set, are carried by a prosperous and safe breeze to England.
"And so at length he was brought to London amidst the great congratulations of the people awaiting him on his return."1
The Lords of the Council ordered Dr. Watts, Archdeacon of London, to take care of Dr. Storey till the Lollards' Tower2 could be got ready for his reception ; for no common prison would do for such a man.
As Lord Cobham wrote to Cecil : " In my poor opinion no common prison is fit for him, for he shall find too many friends." " No," comments Simpson, " the man who might have put Cecil and
1 Zurich Letters, First Series, n. 98.
2 Not the tower at Lambeth Palace, commonly so called, but a tower attached to St. Paul's Cathedral, where heretics who came under the Bishop of London's jurisdiction were confined. "At each corner of this West End [of St. Paul's] was a strong tower of stone, made for Bell-Towers, one of them, viz., that next the Bishop's Palace, was used by the Palace in Stow's time, and the other, toward the South, was called the Lollards' Tower, and used as the Bishop's Prison, for such as were detected for Opinions in Religion contrary to the Faith of the Church." (The History and Survey of the Cities of London and Westminster. By Seymour and Marchant. London, 1754, vol. i. p. 739.)
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 63
Leicester, and Elizabeth herself to death, and had only put them in fear, was not to be allowed the use of friends. He was to have no common prison, the vindictiveness of the Court faction was to ape the vengeance of God, and Dr. Storey was to be punished by that wherein he had sinned. The Lollards' Tower, in which he shut up the heretics whom the ancient laws then punished, was to be new-locked and bolted to shut him up."
On August the 26th, Archdeacon Watts wrote to Cecil that on the Friday evening last Dr. Storey had been brought to his house, "albeit I am very unmeet and unprovided for such a charge." The Lollards' Tower should be made ready for him, the locks and bolts having been broken off its doors at the death of Queen Mary and never repaired since.
" My house is so weak," he plaintively adds, "that I am forced to get men to watch every night, which is a great trouble to me ; and the care that I have of his safe keeping (being a person of whom such an account is made) doth much impair my health. I will commit him to the Lollards' Tower as soon as it is ready, and will appoint a couple of keepers to keep him there."1
He wrote again on September the 4th, that Storey had been in the Lollards' Tower since the Friday before.
" He seemeth to take little thought for any matters, and is as perverse in mind concerning
1 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, Ixxiii. 30.
64 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
religion as heretofore he hath been ; and plainly saith that what he did in Queen Mary's time he did it lawfully, because he was but a minister of the law ; and if the like law were again he might do the like. I have appointed two of my neighbours, being honest men and favourers of the truth, to be his keepers jointly, and have divided the keys of the prison between them, so as the one cannot come at him without the other ; and I have given them strait charge to keep him secret and safe, and not to suffer any to have conference with him."1
Meanwhile the blessed martyr was filled with supernatural joy. Though entirely taken by surprise at his capture, he soon divined what was in prospect for him, and earnestly gave thanks to God, who had brought him back again to the place of suffering, ardently praying that he might obtain the martyr's crown and palm.2 The Catholics were plunged into deep distress, and many prayers went up to Heaven that he might be constant in the hour of trial.
The Spanish Ambassador, Don Guerau de Spes, wrote on September the 3rd :
"Dr. Storey is at present very strictly imprisoned and is being examined. The man who betrayed him is also under arrest, in order to make the people believe that he did not betray him. Many burlesque verses have been printed about the kidnapping of Storey."3
1 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, Ixxxiii. 30. - Concertatio, f. 44.
3 Spanish Calendar, 1570, n. 216.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 65
On the nth he wrote to the King :
" The captain of the smack which brought Dr. Storey is called Cornelius Hadria,1 who I do not think is a Bergen man. He is swaggering about here very impudently. He arranged the matter with Mershe the English commissioner, and others whose names I am ascertaining."
Meanwhile the rogues engaged in this conspiracy were quarrelling over the payment and division of the spoil. William Parker was the luckiest of all; for as Cecil did not desire the share he had in it to be known, and as for appearance sake he was to be kept in prison and tried with Dr. Storey as an accomplice with him, under the pretence that both of them were entrapped and brought over as traitors, it was necessary to pay him very handsomely not to divulge the plot, and to submit quietly to his imprisonment in the Tower, to which both he and Storey were transferred in December. Among the State Papers we find Sir Owen Hopton the Lieutenant's charges for their maintenance there ; each of them being charged 135. 4d. a week for diet, 53. for a keeper, and 45. for fuel and lights.2
John Mershe wrote to Cecil and Leicester on the nth of September, 1570, enclosing the porten- tous bill of charges presented by his accomplices :
" Right Honourable, my duty remembered, I am earnestly pressed by these 3 young men who
1 Ramsden and his companions call him Cornelius Adrianson, but Van Eycke seems to have been his real name. - R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, Ixxiii. 46.
F II.
66 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
brought over Dr. Storey to commend their suit to your Honours, which is that they may be answered such money as they say they have laid out, amount- ing, besides £68 us. 4d., which I have answered to that account, £109 35. 2d., as by an account which they will exhibit may appear. And therefore I am bold to be a humble suitor unto your Honours to be as good to them as may be ; for they have adventured so far as they may no more go into the Low Countries, their names being notoriously known, and yet two of them are married. They trust also that their dangerous services taken in hand with so good a will is taken in so good part that they shall have some further consideration, and although they have kept themselves close in one house which is clear, yet will they spend 5 or 6 days in the country ere they come to the city." *
We much regret that -considerations of space forbid us from printing the bill of charges in its entirety. It is a most interesting document and the effrontery of the ingenuous young men who drew it up is very amusing. It evidently quite took away the breath of the worthies to whom it was addressed.2
It is headed A die 23 Julii anno 1570, and has been annotated by Mershe as we shall see. The whole comes to the respectable total of £177 145. 6d. (which may perhaps be multiplied by at least eight to get the modern value). This bill was of course
1 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, Ixxiii. 62.
2 It is printed in Kervyn de Lettenhove, Relations Politiques des Fays Bas et de I'Angleterre, etc. torn. vi.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 67
for money out of pocket, and did not include the
reward claimed by the merchants. Among the more
interesting items are the following :
" Paid for our charges the space xiii days at the English house in Barrow as well for Parker as for ourselves and two men more for divers which came out of Zealand and from Antwerp, as also expenses upon the master and mariners during our abode there ...'.. £8 4 6 (Margin, Too much.)
Paid more than we were fain to give to be released of a hoye which we had bought at Barrow aforesaid for that she was not so able, nor so fit to serve our turn as we took her
to be 16 13 4
(Margin, / doubt thereof.)
Paid more to be released of x sacks of tow and other things which at the first were determined to be laid upon the said hoye, and afterwards we resolved upon the contrary . 328
Paid more for beer, bread and beef and other victuals for this our last hoye our company being in all x persons 10 o o (Margin, There was V liv. paid.}
Paid to Cornelius Adrianson skipper for his freight, according to our bargain
made with him 50 o o
(Margin, He had but 33 liv. 6s. 8d.)
68 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
Paid unto iii mariners which we hired
for x liv. a man, whereof the one
had but iii liv. vis. viii d. in hand
and afterwards ran away from us,
so that to encourage the rest which
we feared would have done the
like, we granted them the rest of
his hire, so have they in all ... 30 o o
(Margin, He that maketh freight
with the master hireth also the
mariners.)
Paid more unto one Englishman which we took with us for over more strength, if need should have been, as also to be our pilot when occasion
might serve 13 6 8
(Margin,/ think he had xx or xxxfl.) More we have promised unto another Englishman as well for his pains taken on the other side as also for his coming with us for over more aid and strength, whatsoever might have happened by the way 20 o o
(Margin, This was needless, I would they had left him alone.) "
Of the total sum they had already received over £68, which was paid to them at Antwerp by one John Taylor. They still demanded £109 35. 2d. ; but Cecil was not disposed to give a penny more, though Mershe wrote many strenuous letters, urging that it were better to give way, for if the young men
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 69.
were made discontented the affair might acquire an awkward publicity. He hoped, however, that it would not be thought that he " allowed of their account, which I think untrue and unreasonable, as by the 'notes in the margin may appear; but yet I cannot remove them from it ; they doubt by likelihood how they shall be considered [i.e., what reward they will get] and therefore would help themselves this way." He went on to plead for more money for himself.1 We learn from this letter that Ramsden had a wife and children at Antwerp to whom he could not safely return, and that he and Bragge had refused a reward of £40 a piece offered them by Cecil's agent Lee, " saying they would stand to the reward of the Lords of the Council."
Cecil, in one of his last replies (after the affair had gone on sometime and Dr. Storey was executed) jocosely suggested that if the young men were not satisfied, they might have Dr. Storey's carcase among them to sell as relics. They at last invented a new tale, namely, that they had left £2,300 of debt behind them in the Low Countries which the Duke of Alva had confiscated ; for that the seizure of Dr. Storey had very much embittered both the King and himself against Elizabeth and her Government. However, as Simpson says, if there had been any truth in this story, " we doubt whether they would have been a whole twelvemonth in finding it out as an argument for the payment of their bill, and we have still greater
1 Letter of September 14, 1570. R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, Ixxiii. 64.
70 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
doubts whether they would have undertaken the affair with the almost certain prospect of losing everything they had in the Low Countries."
We may end this episode by giving one of their whining letters to Cecil, dated June, 1571, a few days after the martyrdom, because of the great light it throws upon the whole transaction. We do not know if they ever got their money, but probably they did not. As it was, they had already received considerably more than the traditional thirty pieces of silver.
" To the Right Honourable my very good Lord the Lord of Burghley, —
" The cold answer, right honourable, which of late we received of Mr. Mershe to his motion, made as he saith, of our cause unto your lordship, had wholly dismayed us, had not the right honourable Earl of Leicester sundry times declared unto us the contrary ; and you yourself of your great goodness very lately confirmed the same, which yieldeth us indeed great hope that notwithstanding the said Mershe's discouragement, we are shortly to have some good end of that which so long we had sued for, wherein undoubtedly your great bounty shall so much the more appear and shine, as our present necessity doth urgently crave the same ; and our hope is likewise the better assured, in that you have used, as of late we understand, so great liberality towards Parker, whose good hap in that behalf, as we do not in any wise malign, so doubt we not but
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 71
our travail and losses, without whom he had never prevailed, will also be somewhat considered accord- ingly. Yet forasmuch as those, perhaps, to whom we had partly trusted, have not so effectually declared our cause as both by promise and in conscience they are bound to do, and to the intent (whatsoever report be made to the contrary) it may plainly appear to your lordship, that of all prudence touching those affairs, ours hath been and still is the greatest, may it please your lordship to understand the whole order how we came first to deal in this matter. The thing being pretended and planned by others long before, charge was committed unto one Pigotte to furnish a ship with men and mariners sufficient for the purpose. He proceeded therein so far, that the very place, time, and tide were appointed, where the Doctor should be shipped with the whole train almost in all points as we now lastly used, for none other to that end could aptly have served. But in effect those matters were so slenderly handled, that when it came to the very point, all was dashed and like to be discovered. For beside that the men and mariners forsook the enter- prise, and refused to deal any more therein, certain of them letted not to make exclamation at Parker's house, where Storey and all other rebels resorted ; and not knowing that Parker was privy thereunto, warned him, as he said unto us himself, to take heed, for there were that pretended to carry him and another into England. Until the matter was brought into this exigent, we never dealt therein, nor once understood of any such pretence ; and in
72 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
this extremity did one John Lee, gentleman, break the news unto us, declaring how lewdly Pigotte had ordered the matters, greatly complaining the danger he stood in himself, being in fear their enterprise would be bewrayed, that in very deed he once determined with the rest to have fled and absented themselves, for fear of the peril which was like to ensue ; and so far discoursed upon the matter with us, that plainly we perceived him to be the principal dealer therein by order from hence, and the only man that by promises of great rewards and other things had allured Parker to consent thereunto : craving instantly (for so much as he brought the matter so far) our aid and assistance in that distress towards the accomplishing of the rest ; whereunto, although in heart we were very well inclined, yet could we not upon such a sudden be persuaded to hazard all that we had and our lives withal, until such time as, upon sight of certain letters which he showed us from Mr. Saltanstall and Mr. Mershe, wherein your lordship was also mentioned, he showed in the end your lordship's own letter for confirmation of the rest, without which indeed we had not so far endangered ourselves at that sudden. But perceiving thereby that our service should be great and very acceptable to the State, we judged no time to be omitted, nor any danger refused, which might further so good an enterprise. So that it was neither Lee, Saltanstall, or Mershe, but the credit of your lordship's letters, my lord, that moved us, all other things set apart, presently to employ ourselves that way, and without further delibera-
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 73
tion to hazard our lives, and all that we ever had, rather than so good a piece of service should be overthrown. It was a dangerous attempt, and very well handled of Lee, the winning of Parker to consent thereunto ; for without him the Doctor could never have been blinded in such sort as he was. But all the rest was our deed only, and no man's else, as we trust Lee hath long sithence writ unto your lordship ; and we have also his letters to testify the same, if need require, whereby it shall plainly appear, if Mr. Mershe have not likewise reported accordingly, that he hath greatly abused us. As for Parker, be it spoken under correction, my lord, it was the opinion which Storey had of his simplicity, and not his own policy, that so deceived and allured him into those dangers ; which thing Storey by this one point sufficiently declared, in that he thought him not able to deal in any matter touching his office without his presence to guide and direct him ; and sure I am your lordship doth well perceive him to be very incapable of any such affairs as these were. For our parts, more assistance than of a very child or infant we never had of him, and accordingly were forced from time to time to instruct him what he should say or do in every respect ; and for his office, if your lordship make account what he hath lost thereby, surely as it was his only substance, it is well known, although he bore the name, that it was a matter of trust, and that Storey notwith- standing would have reaped the greatest fruit thereof. For our parts, right honourable, besides that we lack a great part of our disbursed money,
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and the great charge which we have been at in following her Majesty's Court these ten months continually, what we have lost and are likely to lose, if we should so amply declare as our cause requireth, your lordship may think it very much ; for over and above the £2,300 heretofore mentioned, our liberty and traffic in those places hath hitherto maintained the estate of mean merchants, whereof we are now wholly destitute. And for mine own part, those hopes which on behalf of my wife I am like to lose, I would not willingly have given for 1,000 marks. Thus humbly beseeching your lord- ship to weigh our cause with compassion, for that Mr. Mershe declaring unto us so heavy a message from you, the same is a double grief that your lordship should wish us Dr. Storey's carcass among us, as Mr. Mershe saith, or otherwise to make some more reasonable suit. Wherein, my good lord, as we have lost all that ever we had in doing this service, so, for that matter what we require tends to the Queen's Majesty's profit, and the Commonweal, and is but a casualty to what it may be worth to counter- vail our damages before mentioned ; yet we humbly content ourselves therewith, desirous no further to enjoy it than as the same be not prejudicial to the intercourse and good policy of the State. And now, if we be driven to change our suit again, as we were once before for the matter of leather, we must be driven withal to beg our bread, and so leave to trouble your lordship any more. But behold your lordship as our good patron, whose goodness it is to consider how extremely we be forced, whilst that we
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 75
must trouble you with so many words. But we beseech you of pardon and some end, whatsoever it be. For* these five months the Earl of Leicester hath promised us good despatch ; and so we be put off to our greater destruction, fed only with hopes, and lastly are further now from any relief at all. Praying God to move his heart, and to preserve your good lordship in all felicity, your honour's orator,
" ROGER RAMSDEN."
But we must return to the Blessed Martyr whom we left in prison in the Tower. On the I3th of December, 1570, Don Guerau wrote to King Philip :
" Dr. Storey has been lodged in the Tower and confronted with the man who brought him. He is accused of having plotted with the Duke of Alva. They are putting him to the torture to-day, and I expect it will go badly with him. God help him. All the Catholics pray for him." l
On the 2nd of March, 1570-1, he wrote again : "Your Majesty will see by the letters from Dr. Storey to me how he is suffering in the Tower.2
Our knowledge of the martyr's doings and sufferings from this point rests wholly on the evidence of extremely hostile writers. It is well to call attention to the fact before proceeding further.
" He bore his fate with considerable stoicism,"
1 Spanish Calendar, p. 288. 2 Ibid. p. 296. These letters are unfortunately not forthcoming.
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writes Froude, " but his firmness failed him in the terrible ordeal which followed. He was examined in his cell under the rack as Felton had been. The Catholics prayed that God would support him under it, but he was seventy years old and feeble for his age, and his dark secrets were wrung from him by his agony."1
We shall hear more of these " dark secrets " later on. As a matter of fact, his long imprisonment and frequent torturings before his trial are to be accounted for by the difficulty which Cecil and Leicester had to trump up some charge of treason against him by which he might legally be put to death, for it was clear that they could not make his having been ecclesiastical commissioner under Queen Mary or his speech in the House of Commons treason, although they were the real cause of his execution. It was not till Easter, 1571, that they concocted an indictment against him. He had been on friendly terms with the Nortons and other refugees, actors in the Northern Rising, who had been indicted for treason. He was therefore indicted for comforting traitors, and one of the particular charges against him was, that " he came one day to Parker's house at Antwerp ; where sitting at dinner, the elder Norton and some other of his company came in from the church, and one said, ' This is Norton ; ' and thereupon Storey rose and gave him place and bid him welcome, and so the elder Norton sat down in Storey's place."
The indictment against him is still extant,2 and
1 History of England, ix. p. 312. '2 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, Ixxvii. 64.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 77
it shows how false were the virulent and spiteful attacks made by the authors of two tracts which were published against him after his death, and to which we shall have to refer later on.
After reciting the indictment against the Nortons and others for their share in the Northern Rising, and that the said Richard Norton and the rest traitorously fled to Antwerp, it goes on to present :
"That John Storey, of London, doctor of laws; William Parker, of London, draper ; and John Prestall, of London, gentleman, feloniously and traitorously conspired, compassed and imagined the death of the Queen, and her deprivation ; and well knowing that Richard Norton and the rest had committed, done, and perpetrated divers treasons and rebellions in England, did feloniously and traitorously, at Antwerp and divers other places, comfort, receive, entertain, and assist the said Richard Norton and the rest against their allegiance, &c., and against the peace, &c., and against the statute in that place made and provided."
" He was brought to Westminster Hall on May the 26th,1 before the judges of the Queen's Bench and arraigned. He refused to plead, saying ' that he was not an English subject, that men were not born slaves but freemen ; that kings were made for the people, and not the people for their kings ; that the doctrine of natural allegiance was tyrannical
1 So Simpson. The Spanish Ambassador, however, says May 27, and Sander May 25. The trial may have lasted more than one day.
78 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
and unjust, for that as men were born free they had a right to choose their own country, and could owe no allegiance before they had sworn allegiance.' He acknowledged however that he was born in England. 'Then,' said they, 'it follows you are a subject to the Queen and laws of the realm.' But he said that he had not been the Queen's subject for the last seven years, having been naturalized a Spaniard, and was the subject of the most Catholic and mighty Prince, Philip of Spain. He added that God commanded Abraham to go forth from the land and country where he was born, from his friends and kinsfolk unto another country ; and so he followed his example, for conscience' sake in religion, did forsake his country and the laws of the realm, and the prince, and had given himself up to the service of another governor. Abraham had been commanded to do this, to escape being involved in the sin of idolatry in which Chaldaea was then plunged, and he to escape the sin of heresy and schism.1 Perceiving that they were about to give judgment against him, he said they had no law to
1 "Quite right too, Dr. Storey," breaks out Mr. Simpson; " you Elizabethan Catholics are much too advanced in your notions of the rights of man, . . . now we have to defend you for the abominable doctrine that a man is not delivered over bound hand and foot, or rather body and soul, into the hands of any ogre who may happen to be sitting on the throne, simply because the poor man was born within the fortunate dominions of the ogre aforesaid. You really do hold that a civilized man who has the misfortune' to be born of civilized parents within the territories of Mumbo-Jumbo or Nangaro, may, if he chooses, migrate to another realm, and transfer his allegiance to a more sympathetic sovereign ! Fatal error," &c., &c.
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do so ; then turning to the people, he said : ' Good people, I trust ye see how violently I am used, and how unjustly and contrary to all justice and equity they use me.' And he added 'that he had good hope that he was not destitute of some friends there who would give notice to the most Catholic Prince, his master, how cruelly they dealt with him. One of them said to him : ' Master Storey, because you think it violence that is shown to you instead of law and justice, you shall know that we do nothing but what we may do by law and equity.' Then one of the judges said, 'This is Scarborough's case.' ' Nay,' answered the martyr, 'my case is not Scarborough's case ; but indeed I had Scarborough's warning1 to come to this arraign, for I knew nothing of it till seven o'clock this morning.' Then there was a book delivered unto him to read wherein he might see what they might do by law ; and after he had read it, the Judge demanded of him ' how he liked it ? ' Storey answered : ' God have mercy upon me.' Then the Lord Chief Justice gave him judgment to be drawn, hanged and quartered; and so he was again sent unto the Tower."
1 " First knocking a man down and then bidding him stand," an old proverb called by the common people in those days "Scarborough's Warning." (Simpson.) The account of the trial as also that of the execution and last speech is taken from one of the tracts already mentioned, which is virulently hostile in tone, The Declaration of the Life and Death of John Storey. The other is entitled, A copy of a Letter lately sent by a Gentleman, Student in the Lawes, to a Friende of his, concernyng D. Storie, a black-letter pamphlet published after the martyr's death and purporting to contain his confessions. Reprinted in Harleian Miscellany, viii. pp. 608 — 613.
8o BLESSED JOHN STOREY
It has been said by the King of Martyrs that *' except a grain of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone, but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." And so it was in the case of Blessed John Storey. There was one present at the trial who was wavering as to whether he should follow the divine call. But the cruelty and injustice there displayed decided him, and Blessed Edmund Campion, for it was no other than he, was convinced by what he saw and heard that England was no place for him. He was "animated to offer himself by this blessed man's example," writes Father Persons,1 " to any danger and peril for the same Faith for which the Doctor died." And so he went abroad, not indeed to escape from like dangers, but to prepare to meet them, and presented himself to Dr. Allen at Douay. Later on, when he returned on that short but triumphal mission of his, he was wont to salute bareheaded the sacred tree of Tyburn consecrated by the old martyr's blood, and fervently to pray beneath it for a like glorious crown.
Having thus been seized in a foreign land by craft and violence, and condemned in a country that he had never meant to enter again, the martyr was taken back to the Tower.
On his way there he was insulted by the rabble who scoffed and jeered at him. " As he went by the way, certain persons in several places met with him, and one said, ' O Storey, Storey ! thou art a strange story ! remember Master Bradford that godly man ; his blood asketh vengeance on thee,
1 Life of Campion, p. 7.
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Storey; repent in time.' . . . Another cried unto him and said, ' Blessed be God, Storey, who hath made thee partaker of such bread as thou wast wont to deal to the innocent members of Jesus Christ.' Another also cried out on him and said, ' Storey, Storey, the abominable cup of fornication and filthiness, that thou hast given others to drink be heaped up topful, that thy plagues may be greater at the terrible day of God's wrath and vengeance, unless thou ask mercy for thy filthy, corrupt, and stinking life.' And yet another cried out unto him and said : ' I pray God that thy heart be not hardened as was Pharaoh's, and made harder than the adamant stone or the steel ; that when he would he could not repent and call for grace.' And among the rest, one came to him at London-stone and saluted him with this metre, saying :
Master doctor Story
For you they are quite sorry,
The Court of Lovaine and Rome :
Your holy father the pope
Cannot save you from rope,
The hangman must have your gown.
And to all these outrages ' he answered never a word.' "*
The martyr was confined in the Beauchamp Tower,2 in the large room on the first floor, on the walls of which he has left a precious relic of his imprisonment. The inscription
I57O : IHON • STORE • DOCTOR.
1 The Declaration. - We presume that the inscription retains its original site.
G II.
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no doubt cut with his own hand, can still be seen on the left hand of the chimney.
While in the Tower he was several times offered the Oath of Supremacy, which he steadily refused to take.1
Two days after his condemnation he wrote a letter to his wife at Louvain. He complained of the injustice of his condemnation. It would have been easy for him, he wrote, to have refuted the charge of treason, if the case had been tried before other judges. And he cited as witnesses of his innocence those very men with whom he was said to have conspired at Antwerp. But his conscience would not allow him to act otherwise than he had done. He could not plead as if he acknowledged an excommunicated Queen, and especially could not, according to his conscience, acknowledge the jurisdiction of any judge appointed by one so excommunicated, for fear of himself being involved in the same condemnation. In order, therefore, to save his own conscience, and that he might die in the communion of Holy Church, he did not hesitate to shed his blood. He therefore not only returned thanks to God that he was thought worthy to die for so good a cause, but believed that his wife and all his friends would congratulate him, if they really knew with what eagerness he prepared himself for that death, by which in so short a time he would expiate the faults of a life of nearly seventy years.2
1 Wood, A then. Oxon. i. 388.
2 Sander, Concertatio, ff. 448, 45 A. We have only Sander's resume of this letter.
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The fanatical preachers who had hitherto annoyed him with their importunities now left him, and on the evening before his execution the Lieutenant of the Tower asked him if he would like any minister of God to attend him. He said he would be most grateful for the assistance of a Catholic priest, but he would have nothing to do with any heretic or schismatic. The Lieutenant, upon this, gave leave that his old friend, the learned and saintly Dr. Feckenham, Abbot of Westminster, himself a con- fessor in chains for the Catholic faith, should attend him. This was almost the last time that such a favour was granted. The Abbot remained with him all night, and we know from the martyr's Own testimony, how great was the spiritual comfort which he derived from the good old man. The fear of death was taken away and his soul was flooded with supernatural joy.
Meanwhile, it will be asked, what were his powerful friends doing ? What efforts were being made to save him by the great King whose liege subject he had claimed to be ? If Blessed John Storey had ever been tempted to put his trust in princes, he knew now how true was the Psalmist's warning that there was " no help in them."
It is true that some feeble efforts had been made by the Spanish Ambassador and the Duke of Alva on his behalf, but Philip II. could not afford just then to quarrel with Elizabeth, and so to throw her into the arms of France, even to save Dr. Storey from his cruel fate.
" If Alva and Philip endured this, the Catholics
BLESSED JOHN STOREY
in England might well despair of help from them, and Elizabeth might lay aside her fears. Here was a man living under the King of Spain's protection, in the employ of the Government, and seized and carried off, as it were, under Alva's eyes. Yet Alva contented himself with a mild remonstrance to the English Minister. ' The proceeding appeared strange to him,' he said, ' the Queen of England should remember that it would discontent her to have the like done in her countries ; it was the King's pleasure, however, to bear with her in a matter which he would not have suffered at another prince's hand.' The English Catholics little expected such an answer."1
Nor indeed did the Spanish Ambassador. On the 27th of May, 1571, he wrote to the King : " Your Majesty will have learned that I addressed this Council from the Duke of Alva, in order to attempt to procure the release of Dr. Storey.2 I now hear that they took him to-day to be tried at Westminster, and that they have condemned him to death in the usual way. I will say no more about it, as I have no fresh instructions to do so." . . . He adds, in a postscript : " I had written thus far when I decided to convey to the Council the enclosed remonstrance. Cecil replied that an answer should be sent after the Queen and Council had been
1 Froude, History of England, ix. p. 313.
- This was on April 16. The Ambassador, through his secretary, John Cipres, required the punishment of Storey's abductors, and complained of the encouragement given to the rebels and pirates of the Low Countries in England. (Foreign Calendar, 1569— 1571- n-
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consulted, as had been done previously, but he was much surprised that the Duke and I should intercede for an Englishman."1 The Ambassador had demanded that Storey should be returned to Flanders. When the answer came it was character- istically insolent. Elizabeth sent a message that she would keep the body of the condemned man, but would be quite willing to send his head to the King of Spain.2
We now approach the final tragedy. The execu- tion took place on the ist of June, 1571. It was carried out, says Pollard, "with horrible cruelty." a Some of the details of the martyr's sufferings are indeed too abominable to describe in these days, they will be found in Antony a Wood and other writers. It had evidently been determined by the old martyr's relentless foes that he should be spared no detail of extremest ignominy" and horror. We give the account furnished us by the contemporary pamphleteer,4 who was evidently present at the martyrdom. Though so bitterly hostile a witness, his account seems trustworthy, and indeed his bias against the victim makes his testimony doubly precious.
" The first day of June, the said Mr. Storey was drawn upon a hurdle from the Tower of London unto Tyburn ; where was prepared for him a new pair of gallows, made in triangular manner. And by the way, as he went, many people spoke unto
1 Spanish Calendar, 1571, p. 313. * Relations Politiques, vi. p. ii. 3 Dictionary of National Biography. * The Declaration.
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him, and called unto him to repent of his tyranny and wickedness ; and willed him to call upon God for mercy ; but he lay as though he had been asleep, and would not speak to any person. And when he was taken from the hurdle, and set in a cart, he made there a solemn protestation and said :
" I am come hither to die, and truly if this death were ten times more fierce and sharp than it is, I have deserved it. I have lived the space of three score and seven years, and now my body must abide this temporal pain and punishment, provided for me here in this life, by means whereof my days shall be cut off. But, where at the first I stood in fear of death, I thank God, this night past I have been so comforted with God and godly men, that the fear of death is taken from my sight. And now I appeal to God the Father, trusting in the Passion of His Son Jesus Christ, and hoping by the shedding of His Blood only to be saved. And although a long time I could not apply the virtue of His Passion and Death to the use and benefit of my soul, because of my long hovering in fear ; yet now, I thank God, I know how to apply this medicine ; as for example, an apothecary may have a medicine in his shop seven years, that may help a sick or diseased man, by the counsel of a physician, but if this medicine be not applied to the patient but still remaineth in the apothecary's shop, it profiteth nothing — no more could the benefit of Christ's death help me, because, although I knew the medicine good, I did not apply it unto my soul's health : but now it hath pleased Almighty God to call me to account of my
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 87
sixty-seven years, which now must have an end, and this corrupt body must feel a temporal punishment, for my sins have deserved it (as I said before). I am now come to a proof of this medicine. David, when he had committed adultery with Bathsheba, the wife of Uriah (whose husband also he caused to be put into the front of the battle, and so was murdered) ; he for that trespass felt a temporal punishment, by the loss of his son, whom he loved tenderly. Also, when he numbered his people, he greatly displeased God ; and for his offence and transgression he felt a temporal pain ; and choice was given unto him from above, to choose one of these three temporal and bodily punishments ; that is to say : three days' pestilence ; the sword, that is to say : bloody battle seven years ; or famine seven years. And he thought to choose the least, and he chose three days' pestilence ; but this scourge took away an infinite number of his subjects. So now as my sins deserve a temporal pain, which here have an end, even in this flesh ; I am of the same mind that the prophet David was : and with him I agree saying, Invoco te, Domine, &c. ' Lord, I call upon Thee in this day of my trouble. Hear me, O Lord, out of Thy dwelling-place,' &c.
" But now to speak a little of my arraignment : when I was at Westminster, I alleged in my plea that I was no subject of this realm ; as I did like- wise before the Queen's commissioners, Sir Thomas Wrath, Mr. Thomas Wilbraham, late Recorder of the City of London, Mr. Peter Osborne, Mr. Marshe, and
88 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
Mr. Dr. Watts; where the Recorder of London made a like demand as was demanded of me at West- minster ; and that was, whether I was born in England or no ? Whereunto I answered, ' I was.' ' Then,' said he, ' it followeth that you are and ought to continue the Queen's faithful subject.' Where- unto I replied then, as I do now, saying: 'I am sworn to the noble King, defender of the ancient Catholic Faith, King Philip of Spain, and he is sworn again by a solemn and corporal oath, to maintain and defend the University of Louvain, whereof I am a member ; and therefore no subject of this realm, nor yet subject to any laws thereof. For it is well known that I departed this realm being freely licensed thereunto by the Queen, who accounted me an abject and castaway ; and I came not hither again of my own accord, but I was betrayed.
" And although I had an inkling given me before of such a thing pretended towards me, yet I could not shun or escape it : for sure it was God who made dim my understanding and blinded mine eyes, so that I could not perceive it. But Holy Writ commandeth me to love my enemies, and here I forgive them freely with all my heart ; beseeching God that they take no harm for me in another country. I would be right sorry they should, although they betrayed me. I travelled with them from ship to ship, by the space of eight days, and mistrusted no peril to be at hand, until I was clapped fast under the hatches. But sure, sure it was God that wrought it ; yea, and although I
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 89
was accounted a poller of the Englishmen of your country, I stand now here before God, and by the death I shall die, I had never out of any ship more than two pieces of gold, and forty dollars that were laid in my hand.
" But once again to my arraignment. Where there were certain letters laid to my charge, wherein I should go about to provoke the Mortons, the Nevilles, and others to rebel ; I never meant it ; yet will I discharge my conscience freely and frankly, and tell you truth. There was a com- mission for a like matter sent into Scotland, which I wrote with mine own hand : but it contained a proviso, wherein the Queen of England and her dominions were excepted.
" There are yet two things that I purpose to talk of; namely, for that there are here present a great number of youth ; and I would to God I might say or speak that which might bring all men to the unity of the Church ; for there is but one Church, one Flock, and one Shepherd ; if I could this do I would think myself to have wrought a good work.
" The first point toucheth my cruelty, wherewith I am sore burdened, and the second concerneth my religion. As touching the first ; there were three in commission of the which I was one who might do least, for I was the last of the three. And though I might, by persuasion, essay to cause them to revoke the Articles, which they had maintained, and to confess the presence wherein I stand ; ye know that he who chideth is not worthy to be condemned for fighting ; no more am I worthy to
90 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
be counted cruel for chiding. It was the Bishop that pronounced the sentence (Excommunicainns) and against that I could not do, for I was one of the laity. Yet often -times the Bishop, to whom I was a servant, was bold with me, when he had so many prisoners that he could not well bestow them. For at one time the Lord Riche sent him out of Essex 28, and at another time 16 and 14, and some of them were sent to me, whom I kept in my house with such fare as I had provided for myself and my family at my own cost and charge. And to prove that I was not so cruel as I am reported to be, let this one tale suffice : there were at one time 28 condemned to the fire, and I moved the dean of Paul's to tender their estate, who after was Abbot of Westminster, a very pitiful- minded man. I think the most part of you know him, it is Mr. Fecknam, and we went up and persuaded with them, and we found them very tractable ; and Mr. Fecknam and I laboured to the Lord Cardinal Poole, showing they were nescientes quid fecerunt. The Cardinal and we did sue together to the Queen, and laid both the swords together, and so we obtained pardon for them all, saving an old woman that dwelt about Paul's Churchyard ; she would not convert and therefore she was burned. The rest of them received absolution and that with all reverence. Search the Register and you shall find it. Yea, and it was my procurement that there should be no more burnt in London ; for I saw well that it would not prevail, and therefore we sent them into odd corners, into the country.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 91
"Wherefore, I pray you, name me not cruel; I would be loth to have any such slander to run on me ; but sith I die in charity, I pray you all of charity to pray for me, that God may strengthen me with patience to suffer my death, to the which I yield most willingly.
"And here I make a petition to you my friends, who would have bestowed anything on me ; I beseech you, for charity sake, bestow it yearly on my wife, who hath four small children, and God hath now taken me away that was her staff and stay ; and now my daughter Weston and her three children are gone over unto her, and I know not how they shall do for food, unless they go a begging from door to door for it; although, indeed, no English persons do beg but of English, being helped by the Lady Dormer and Sir Francis (Englefield).
" I have good hope that you will be good unto her, for she is the faithfullest wife, the lovingest and constantest that ever man had ; and twice we have lost all that ever we had, and now she hath lost me to her great grief, I know.
" The second point that I thought to speak of is concerning my religion, for that I know many are desirous to know what faith I will die in ; the which I will briefly touch. I say with St. Jerome, that ancient father and pillar of the old ancient, Catholic and Apostolic Church, grounded upon the Patriarchs, Prophets, and Apostles, that in the same faith that I was born in, I purpose to die in. And as the ark that Noe and his family did possess, figured the ship of Christ's Church, out of which
92 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
ship whosoever is, cannot be saved, in that ship am I. ... A ship that is tossed on the floods is often in danger of loss on the sands, and sometimes on the rocks ; but when the men who are in the ship espy present peril at hand, there is a cockboat at the tail of the ship, whereunto they fly for succour; so likewise I, being in the ship of Christ, once fell out of the same ship, and was in present peril and great danger : but then I, following the example of a good mariner, took the cockboat, thinking to drive to land ; and at the last, being in the boat, I espied three oars, that is, to wit, contri- tion, confession, and absolution ; and I held all these fast, and ever since then I have continued in the ship of Christ, of which the Apostle Peter is the guide and principal, and in the faith Catholic of my King I die.
" Then said the Earl of Bedford : ' Are you not the Queen's subject ? ' '" No,' said Storey, ' and yet I do not exclude the Queen, but I pray for her, her Council, and the nobility of this realm long to continue.' Then said the Lord Hunsdon : ' Are you not the Queen's subject ? You were born in England ? ' Then said Storey : ' Every man is freeborn, and he hath the whole face of the earth before him to dwell and abide in, where he liketh best ; and if he cannot live here, he may go elsewhere.' Then was there (as I think) one of the ministers hearing him to make so light of our noble Queen and country, demanded of him whether she were not next and immediately under God Supreme Head of the Churches of England and Ireland ?
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 93
Whereunto he answered, ' I come not hither to dispute, but if she be, she is. My nay will not prevail to prove it otherwise.' And then they cried, ' Away with the cart ! ' And so he was hanged according to his judgment."
The Elizabethan libeller prudently stops here. The horrible scene that followed was little calcu- lated to display to advantage his ''noble Queen and country."
" The execution," says Simpson, " was con- ducted with more atrocious cruelty than was usual even in those most barbarous times. Lords Burleigh and Hunsdon, the Earl of Bedford, and another earl, whom we may not uncharitably suppose to have been Leicester, came to gloat over the dying moments of the man they both hated and feared in Queen Mary's days and detested still. Dr. Fulke, a celebrated Protestant controversialist, and many others of the leading Puritans, were present. He was cut down the instant he was hanged, in order that he might have all his senses about him. He was then stripped, and as soon as the executioner began his obscene and disgusting function, the modest martyr rose and gave him a box on the ear. He was however held down by three or four men while the rest of the cruel butchery was performed."
The malice of his enemies did not cease with his death ; most violent attacks were made on his memory.1 Everything which he did (or was said
1 Especially in the two tracts already mentioned. Strype, Holinshed, and Burnet are very foul-mouthed against him. They do but re-echo Foxe, for the most part.
94 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
to have done) as a young man, which could in any way tell invidiously was brought up against him to blacken his character — nay, the very cries he uttered at the time of his martyrdom, wrung from him by their own barbarity, were brought against him by way of reproach.
The notorious Dr. Fulke, the antagonist of Blessed Edmund Campion, thus wrote against him :l
" Such as were manifestly void of patience can be no true martyrs, as were most of those rebels and traitors ; and Storey, by name, who for all his glorious tale, in the time of his deserved execution by quartering was so impatient, that he did not only cry and roar like a hell-hound, but also struck the executioner doing his office, and resisted as long as strength did serve him, being kept down by three or four men till he was dead ; and he used no voice of prayer in all that time of his crying, as I heard of the very executioner himself, besides them that stood by, but only roared and cried, as one overcome with the sharpness of the pain ; as no martyr, as the Papists did mightily boast of him."
This passage, though quoted with relish by both Strype and Bishop Kennet, will disgust most readers, who will probably agree with Mr. Simpson, that " the term hell-hound is rather applicable to those who could complacently write such atrocious language, and to those who could come and gloat
1 Strype, Annals, ii. 84, anno 1571.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 95
their vengeance over the sufferings of a poor dying man — to Elizabeth and her infamous ministers, and to the Protestant Bishops and clergy, who were con- tinually urging them on to still further atrocities."
Strype also finds pleasure in quoting some doggerel written by Lawrence Ramsey, a poet near about this time, in a book entitled The Practice of the Devil, wherein the devil is brought in, speaking thus :
" Stand to it Stapleton, Dorman and Harding, And Rastal, that rakehell, to maintain my order: Bonner and Gardiner are worth the regarding, For keeping articles so long in this border. O Storey, Storey, thou art worth recording : Thou stood'st to it stoutly against God and King, And at Tyburn desperately gav'st me an offering."1
i A modern accuser, Mr. Froude, brings a serious accusation against our martyr which needs fuller consideration. He writes thus of Storey : " Besides the ordinary plots for invading England, it seems that he had a scheme on foot in connection with one of the Hamiltons for a feat which would have eclipsed the murder at Linlithgow. It was nothing less than making away with the little King of Scots, in the belief that with his life would be removed the principal obstacle to his mother's marriage with some Catholic prince." In a note he adds : "This preposterous piece of wickedness would have been incredible had it not been confessed by Storey himself. The account of it was transmitted by the Spanish Ambas- sador to Philip. Don Guerau's words are these." He then quotes a passage in Spanish of which we give the translation. " Storey said that Hamilton told him that Prestal had written to him, that as to the business which Storey and Hamilton had mentioned to him, it could be done with [the] Englishman] who was then in Ireland ; it could not be accomplished without great supply of money. And that secret was about slaughtering the King of Scotland ; for this Prestal had said to Hamilton that with difficulty could the Scots be reduced to the obedience of the Queen, while she was without a husband, and that no principal person \vould seek her as wife while that boy lived. But that if [he] slaughtered him that
96 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
The savage execution of the aged martyr caused a great sensation among Catholics both in England and on the Continent, where he was everywhere venerated as a saint.
On the 5th of August, 1571, King Philip wrote to Don Guerau de Spes : "The death, or rather martyrdom, of Dr. Storey was, I see by the state- ment you send, so firm and faithful in the Catholic religion that it is a subject of gratitude to God that He has still preserved such men as this in England, since by means of them hopes may be entertained
he hoped that the brother of the Emperor \vould marry her." (History of England, ix. 310, 311.)
Now at first sight this does look very black against Storey, especially to the reader who does not know Spanish, and therefore assumes that Froude's quotation confirms his statement. Besides, it rests on the authority of the Spanish Ambassador, who would of course have no reason whatever for misrepresenting Storey to his Sovereign.
But when the matter is examined the whole structure collapses. This statement does not rest on the authority of the Spanish Ambas- sador at all ! It is taken from a mere translation into Spanish of one of the scurrilous pamphlets written against the martyr, to which we have already referred, that namely by the Gentleman Student in the Lawes of the Realm, which is full of the most virulent abuse of the martyr. This student maintains that though Storey was not charged at his trial with his various horrible treasons, he might and would have been had he been only content to plead. He then goes on to give what he asserts to be a series of Extracts out of DY. Storey's Confessions, ix December, 1570.
This letter was translated into Spanish, and found its way eventually to the State Archives of Simancas. Part of it is printed in Spanish by Baron Kervyn de Lettenhove, Relations Politiques, Ac. vi. p. 141. The reference is Archives de Simancas, Estado, Leg. 826, fol. 63, and is entitled Copia de carta escripta por un cavallero que estudia leyes de Inglaterra a cierto amigo suyo sobre el Doctor Estory. Among the stories it contains, is one that the martyr was ever in the habit of cursing the Queen as a form of grace after meals. It
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 97
that the true religion may yet be restored there. Having respect to the need and trouble in which I was informed Storey's wife was at Louvain, where she lives, I have ordered the Duke to make the necessary provision for the maintenance of her and her children."
The martyr's life and death is said by a Protestant informer, to have become one of the regular themes at the English College at Rome.1 When the time came to paint the famous frescoes on the walls of the church, Dr. Storey was
is full of quite unsupported charges against the martyr, none of which were brought forward at the trial. Froude's transcripts from Simancas are now in the British Museum (Add. 26,056 b, 158), and there it can be seen how he has made his extracts from this pre- posterous pamphlet, which then he has the audacity to give as the testimony of the Spanish Ambassador. His methods of dealing with history are however too notorious to allow even such an instance as this to cause much surprise. Besides this, when the so-called Confessions are attentively read, it will be seen that they come to little or nothing. Storey was certainly in communication with Prestal and Hamilton, and we have seen that he acknowledged at his martyrdom that he was doing his best to aid the cause of the imprisoned Queen of Scots, and to restore her to her own kingdom. But all the " confession " shows is that Storey had been told by Prestal that a mysterious Englishman had a scheme for killing the King of Scots, and that this Englishman wanted money. Later on we find him saying " that Prestal told him he could do much with that Englishman in Ireland, therein this examinate discouraged him."
This Prestal seems to have been in reality a traitor in the pay of the English Government, trying to involve other men in pre- tended plots. At any rate, Lee, Cecil's agent, who had so much to do with Storey's capture, constantly reports long conversations with him to his master, and says that he is very well disposed. He pretended to be a necromancer, and boasted he could predict the day and the hour of the Queen of England's death. Camden calls him " a magical impostor against the Queen's life."
1 Anthony Munday, English Romaine Life, p. 25.
H II.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY
represented there among the other martyrs of England, and so it is that he now receives the honours due to a Beatified Servant of God. But nowhere did he receive more veneration than at his old University of Louvain, and among the Carthusians and the Grey Friars to whom he had been so devoted. They honoured him as a saint, and his relics and picture were placed over the altars in certain of their churches. And indeed he deserved their homage, for few more illustrious martyrs have suffered in England for the defence of the Supremacy of the Holy See, than this old man, this Regius Professor of the Civil Law, who died amidst such excruciating agonies at Tyburn. Even the posthumous attacks of his enemies, as Sander reminds us, only serve to add to his glory ; " for in trying to cast the note of infamy on the memory of a venerable and aged man and a most holy martyr, they only prove how great were his merits, since even after his death their hatred and envy against him have no rest. Frustra enim post Dei opera, hominum attexuntur verba"
A word must be added as to those who betrayed our martyr to his death. The arch-villain Parker, received a handsome pension from the Government. He became one of Cecil's regular spies. The true history of his treachery was kept carefully concealed. Strype himself gives two accounts of it ; that in his Life of Archbishop Parker,1 being the more trust- worthy. " Parker was procured by certain persons,
1 ii. p. 366.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 99
to which they say Cecil was privy, to go to Antwerp and decoy Storey," but then he adds that "the Roman Catholics did not forget Parker; for this year, for some pretence, he was cast into prison by the craft and malice of Storey's private friends as a pirate." The truth was of course that Parker was conveyed to England with Storey apparently against his will, imprisoned and arraigned with him, in order that his complicity with Cecil might not leak out ; and Parker was well paid for submitting to it with a good grace. Strype gives us another version in his Life of Sir J. Cheke, asserting that Parker was a merchant trading to Antwerp, and that when Storey came to search his vessel unnecessarily, he was so angry that he carried him off to England on his own responsibility. This is no doubt the version that the Government wished to be accepted.1
We do not know if Ramsden and his worthy comrades ever obtained the price of blood for which they so greatly hungered. Lee, who lived at Antwerp, where he was married to an Irishwoman, did not altogether escape the punishment he so richly merited. He contrived to get Parker's wife and family conveyed safely over to England, and intrigued
1 There is a long story in Froude (ix. 460, &c.) in which Parker and Cecil reappear in peculiarly disgraceful parts. According to this, Parker personated Storey in the Tower in order to elicit a confession from a prisoner named Baily, and to corrupt his fidelity to the Catholic party. This, though recounted in great detail by Froude, rests upon authority which is by no means convincing. However this may be, Cecil and Parker were no doubt quite capable of the treachery ascribed to them.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY
with Prestal in order to get evidence against our martyr. But having at last (through information furnished by Don Guerau) been detected as one of the principal agents in the whole disgraceful business, he was thrown into prison by the Duke of Alva. From his cell he wrote piteous letters to Cecil and Leicester, who eventually thought it worth their while to intercede for his release. Probably they recognized that he could yet do them useful service (for even in prison he kept up the farce of being a devout Catholic exiled for the faith), and very likely they feared that he would betray their secrets if pushed to desperation. Strange to say, the Duke of Alva granted the petition and let the traitor go free.
The wife and family of the martyr continued to inhabit the Low Countries, though we learn from an entry in the Acts of the Privy Council that they paid a visit to England in 1577.
The martyr's son John became a church student at Rheims, and eventually a priest.1 His mother, who was still at Louvain in 1557, came to Rheims in order to be near her son, where we find her in 1582. 2 Dr. Allen, it would appear, found she had a sharp tongue, and did not much relish her living so near him. Perhaps the poor woman's temper had been soured by her troubles.
The life of Blessed John Storey seems to show how a man who was naturally of a choleric tempera- ment can be purified by suffering, if he has a firm
1 Knox, Douay Diaries, p. 300. - Knox, Letters and Memorials of Cardinal Allen, p. 168.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY
grasp of the truths of our holy religion. Much as we dislike the Marian persecution in which he took a prominent part, it must be conceded that he was ever moved by a passionate love for the Catholic Faith, and an intense desire to see his fellow-country- men united once more in religious truth. His ardent desire for the crown of martyrdom, his passionate sorrow when, yielding to the frailty of the flesh, he lost, as he thought for ever, the opportunity of gaining the palm, his deep and life-long penitence for his early fall into schism, his joy when he found once more within his grasp the crown which he so greatly coveted, have all deep lessons for us, who in these soft days of religious peace are in danger of losing the keenness of our faith, of sinking into a false and specious toleration of error which is but another name for indifferentism. It is well if in these milder times we have learnt to shrink from all that approaches to religious persecution, but it would not be well if we were tempted to minimize or conceal the fundamental distinctions between truth and error, or allow our compassion for the heretic to lead us to think lightly of the evil of heresy. Rather, do we need more than ever in these days the lessons of such a life as that of Blessed John Storey.
ED.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY
APPENDIX.
Dr. Storey's Last Will and Testament made at Louvain Anno 1552. 1
EMMANUEL.
In the name of God, Amen. In the year of our Lord God, a thousand five hundred fifty and two, and in the last day of May, I, John Storey Doctor, lauded be Almighty God, being whole of mind and body, do to God and the world declare my last will and testament in manner and form following. First and before all things transitory, as I do most humbly render thanks, laud and praising to my Lord God, for my creation and redemption, so do I also most humbly acknow- ledge His great mercies by leading me a wretched sinner out of my native country ; the which (being swerved out of the sure ship of our salvation), I beseech Almighty God of His infinite mercy to restore again to the unity of the same vessel, being our mother the holy catholic church, for His holy name's sake. And having full trust and affiance that I am one, and within the number of the said
1 The original MS. (undoubtedly a holograph by Blessed John Storey) from which this has been printed is among the Petyt MSS. in the Inner Temple Library. (No. 538, vol. 47, fol. 66, seq.) The will is printed by Strype, Annals, vol. ii. Part 2, Appendix x. p. 450, but with omissions, which are here supplied. The MS. is endorsed, " A coppye of a will made by John Story doctor in law." The water- mark of the paper of the MS. is a unicorn.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 103
catholic visible church (the which doth, and here in earth shall contain both good and bad, until the same by wilful leaping out, or lawful separation be excluded), I do confess to God and before the world, that I in this perilous time of trial of the corn from the moveable chaff, do believe, and have full trust and affiance in all and every article, clause or sentence, that our said mother the holy church, con- tinued from the time of the apostles, hath and shall decree, set forth and deliver to be kept and observed by us her children. And for my breaking of any commandment of God set forth by the authority of the same church, and for my non-observance of any decree, ordinance or counsel of the same, and specially for mine offence in forsaking the unity of it, by the acknowledging of any other supreme head than our Saviour Jesu Christ did depute here in earth to remain (which was St. Peter and his successors, bishops of the see of Rome) — I do most humbly and penitently cry God mercy, desir- ing of Him pardon ; as I do also ask forgiveness of all such as, by my said offence and evil example, I have by any means slandered or offended in this world : desiring all Christian people remaining within the unity of our said mother the catholic church to pray for me, being a simple and a wretched member of the same.
And as concerning such my temporal goods, as by the sufferance of Almighty God, I have been steward of here in this vale of misery, my mind is that all my debts be truly contented and paid by mine executor hereunder named to all such persons
io4 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
as by any lawful means can show any bill or other sufficient title to any part thereof. Also I do give and bequeath to Ellen Storey my daughter the sum of six hundred and iii score florins, to be paid and delivered to her at the day of her marriage. So, and under this condition, that she do take to husband and marry such one as her mother then living, or mine overseers hereunder named, or any one of them do first consent and give licence to my said daughter to marry or take to husband. And if my said daughter following her own sensuality do chance to marry with any man without, or against the good will, pleasure and consent of her foresaid friends, or of one of them, then my mind is that she shall have only iii score florins towards her raiment and no more. And if my said daughter, Ellen, by God's good motion, do enter into religion: then do I give and bequeath to the house and company where she shall chance to be professed, one hundred and xx florins, desiring them to be good instructors of my said daughter, and of their charity to pray for the souls of my father and mother, Nicholas and Joan, for my soul and all Christian souls.
Also, I do bequeath my soul to Almighty God, of whom this my mortal flesh hath received the same : and my body to be buried within the grey friars in Louvain, if I do depart in Louvain, as near unto the burial of Mr. Thomas Tybald as may be permitted. For the which my burial, exequies, and other divine services, then by that convent to be done and solemnized for the wealth of my soul,
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 105
I do bequeath to that same convent twenty florins. Also I give and bequeath unto the said convent forty florins more, desiring them of their charity, in their daily celebrations of Mass, that they will pray for the souls of Nicholas and Joan my parents, for my soul and of all Christian souls ; and to limit and appoint one devout person of their company by the space of ii years next after my burial, daily to make a special memory to God for my soul and of all Christian souls. And my mind is that the same convent, the next day after my month's mind by them to be kept for my soul, do receive of mine executor the said whole sum of money, viz., iii score florins. For the which I beseech them that I may have my year's mind kept with Mass and Dirige by the space of iii years.
Also, I do give and bequeath to the house and company of the charter house in Louvain the sum of xx florins ; requiring them of their charity in their celebrations to pray by special memory for the soul of my said parents and for my soul, so long as by their charity they shall be moved thereunto. Also I give and bequeath to the great hospital, which lodgeth and keepeth sick persons, the sum of ten florins, desiring them of their charity to pray for my soul and all Christian souls.1
1 The original ending of the will here follows in the MS. It was afterwards cancelled by the martyr, and the conclusion printed above substituted for it. In the margin the martyr has written, " Cancellatio hec facta est per me Jhoannem Story." It runs as follows : " The residue of all my goods, wheresoever and in whose hands soever they be, I do give and bequeath to Joan Storey my wife, whom I do make mine executrice so and under the condition that she do not
io6 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
The residue of all my goods and specialties, in whose hands soever they be, upon full trust and confidence that I have in the promise of my well- beloved wife, Joan Storey hereafter mentioned, I do give and bequeath unto her ; whom I do make my whole and sole executrice, to perform this my last will. Provided always, and it is my full mind and deliberate will, that my said executrice shall not take nor demand my whole money out of my great and especial friend Mr. Bonvice's hand, by the space of iii years next after my decease ; but shall
return and by the space of one month abide in England, neither send her daughter and mine thither or carry her, until the same land or state thereof be converted and returned to the unity of our mother the holy catholic church, out of the which the same land by schism is swerved. And if my said wife, following her sensuality and neglecting her soul, shall chance to return into England, as God forbid, and make her abode there above the space of one month, without lawful impediment of her return, or do at any time before religion be there reformed, carry or send her daughter and mine into that land or any part thereof, then and in such case my mind is that my especial good friend Mr. Anthony Bonvice, upon suit made to him by my said wife, do deliver to her of such money as remaineth of mine in his hands twenty pounds Flemish or of English money at her choice, and to keep the rest of my money remaining in his hand for the payment of my legacies abovesaid, and for the use of my daughter for her best profit, to be delivered to her at the day of her marriage ; so that she do not marry but with the consent of my said especial good friend Mr. Bonvice then living. And in case that my said daughter do rather choose to enter and continue in religion than to marry, then my will is that, after one hundred and xx florins by Mr. Bonvice paid to the cloister where she will be professed, and after all other my legacies performed, that the rest of my money with him remaining shall still remain in his hands and with the profits thereof to find my nephew John Storey to school in Louvain by the space of iii years; and after that time to distribute all such money as then shall remain in his hands, the one moiety thereof to poor scholars and priests being English- men here tarrying in these parts and the other moiety to my said
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 107
receive only such money of him, as will pay my legacies to be prayed for, (the which several sums my mind is shall be paid although I do depart this life out of Louvain) and such other money as my said worshipful friend of his charitable benevolence will give to her for occupying such her stock as he hath of mine in his hands. And my mind is that this clause shall take place only in the life of my said worshipful friend Mr. Bonvice, or else my said wife to take up the whole at her pleasure.
Item, I do desire my said good friend, Mr. Anthony Bonvice,1 to be overseer of this my
wife, daughter, nephew, and servant called Bess, after such sort and rate, as to his wisdom shall seem to be most requisite and expedient according to their necessity and following of this my last will. And I shall most entirely desire my said worshipful and charitable friend Mr. Bonvice to be overseer of this my last will, and in my wife's refusal by her departing into England, to execute this my last will as well concerning my burial and legacies, as in causing a piece of brass to set upon my grave declaring my name and day of my departing, if I chance to die in Louvain ; provided alway that if my said wife do continue still in Louvain and do marry or not marry, and do take upon her to be mine executor or not take upon her, my full mind and special request is, that my said worship- ful friend Mr. Bonvice do not deliver to her above the sum of thirty pounds by the year. And after she hath tarried here at Louvain iii full years after my decease, my mind is that my said worshipful friend, upon her bond that she will not return into England until it be reformed, do deliver to my said wife (if they both shall think it best) the whole sum remaining for the behoof of her and my daughter.
In witness whereof I have written these presents, the year and day abovesaid.
Per me,
Jo: STORYE."
1 Antonio Bonvisi, our martyr's dear and faithful friend, was a wealthy wool merchant, sprung from an ancient and noble family of Lucca, but probably born in England. He was a fervent
io8 BLESSED JOHN STOREY
last will and testament, most heartily desiring him to be good instructor of my wife, to keep and perform her promise made to God and me. Whereupon I have altered the last end of my will above written. Which promise is that she at no time, until the land of England be restored to the unity of Christ's
Catholic, a kindly patron of learned men, and the devoted friend of Blessed Thomas More, Blessed John Fisher, and Cardinal Pole. He ministered to Fisher and More in prison, stood by Friar Peto when he had to fly to the Low Countries after his courageous sermon against Henry VIII. 's first divorce, and was eulogized by Pole, who calls him " a special benefactor of all Catholic and good persons, . . . worthy is he of name, and I doubt not but his name is in the book of life." He resided at Crosby Hall, Bishopsgate Street, which he at first leased from the nuns of St. Helen's, and after the dissolution of the priory, bought (in 1552) from the King. . At the beginning of the reign of Edward VI. he went into voluntary exile for the Faith, his property in England was confiscated, and in the general pardon which concluded the Acts of the Parliament of 1553, he was specially excepted, together with his friends Pole and Storey. He recovered his English property in the reign of Queen Mary, and died at Louvain at a very advanced age, December 7, 1558. His nephew, Benedict, inherited his English property.
Two Inquisitiones post mortem relating to him are to be found in vol. xv. of the publications of the British Record Society, the first taken at the confiscation of his property (p. 113), the second at his death (p. 182). From the former we learn that before he, " without licence from the King, craftily and rebelliously took flight with all his family and went to parts beyond the seas, to wit, to Antwerp," he had conveyed Crosby Hall (or Crosbies Place as it was then called), and other property, to William Roper and William Rastell (both near connections of Blessed Thomas More), for the term of 99 years.
We may add that More says, in a letter written from the Tower, that he had been for nearly 40 years " not a guest, but a continual nursling of the house of Bonvisi," and calls Antonio the most faithful of his friends. For other details see Dictionary of National Biography, vol. v. p. 335 (by C. Trice Martin).
BLESSED JOHN STOREY 109
church, will return thither, or carry her daughter and mine into that land, except it be for the only intent to procure her mother to come thence. And in such case not to tarry there above the space of iii months, unless she by compulsion be enforced thereunto.
In witness whereof I have written these presents and subscribed my name.
Per me JOHANNEM STORYE.
AUTHORITIES. — The principal Catholic authority is, of course, Sander, who was a friend of the martyr. His account of him in the De Visibili Monarchia (1570) is perhaps most accessible in the Concertatio (Treves, 1589), fol. 43 A — 45 B. It has been translated into Spanish by Bishop Yepes, Historia Particular (Madrid, 1599), pp. 43, 44. Sander also speaks of the martyr in his History of the Anglican Schism (Edit. Lewis, 1877), pp. 200, &c.
The principal general sources are, the Calendars of State Papers, especially the Spanish and Foreign, passim.
Acts of the Privy Council (Edit. Dasent).
Journals of the House of Commons, vol. i. pp 6, 8, and 9.
Camden's Annals, for 1569 and 1571.
Strype's Life of Archbishop Cranmer, and Life of Archbishop Parker, also Memorials and Annals of the Reformation, passim.
Burnet, History of the Reformation (Edit. Pocock).
Wood, A thence Oxon., Edit. Bliss, i. 386 — 90.
Macleane, History of Pembroke College (Oxford Hist. Soc., 1897).
Foster, Alumni Oxonienses (1500 — 1714).
Wright, Elizabeth, i. 373, 374, 378.
Maitland's Essays on the Reformation.
Foxe's Acts and Monuments (Edit. Townsend), very bitter and unscrupulous.
BLESSED JOHN STOREY
Dictionary of National Biography (by A. F. Pollard, vol. 54, p. 427).
There are also the pamphlets issued by various Protestant writers in 1571, to which we have referred in the text, and the letters printed in various volumes of the Parker Society (see Cough's Index), all of which are exceedingly hostile. The reader will find Froude not less bitter. He may also refer to Dixon, History of the Church of England, vols. iv. and v., and the Cambridge Modern History, vol. ii. pp. 474 and 585.
The other authorities, including R. Simpson's admirable article in the Rambler, are fully referred to in the text.
III.
THE BLESSED THOMAS PERCY, York, 22 August, 1572;
THE BLESSED THOMAS PLUMTREE,
Durham, 4 January, 1572.
FEW writers, even among Catholics, appear to have given quite the attention it deserves to the magni- ficent confession of the Faith, made both during life and still more at his death, by the martyred nobleman who forms the subject of this memoir. He was born in 1528, and was the eldest son of Sir Thomas Percy, brother and heir-presumptive to Henry Algernon, sixth Earl of Northumberland, who was childless. His mother, the Lady Eleanor, was daughter to Sir Guiscard Harbottal, who had fallen at Flodden Field in 1513, slain by the hand of the Scottish King himself.1
Sir Thomas and his lady seem after their marriage to have resided partly at Newburn, partly at Prudhoe Castle, on the Tyne, one of the many fortresses belonging to the Earl ; and there most probably were spent the early years of the future martyr's life. It was a time when there was rarely 1 History of Northumberland. By Cadwallader J. Bates, p. 209.
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peace for long together upon the Scottish border, and when, even whilst a truce existed between the English and the Scotch, the tranquillity of the country was too often disturbed by petty feuds between the gentry of Northumberland themselves. The din of arms must thus have been familiar to the little Thomas Percy, even from his earliest years.
When he was but little more than eight years old, there broke out, in the October of 1536, the movement known as the Pilgrimage of Grace, which stirred the whole North of England, from the Scottish borders to the H umber. Gathering together under banners bearing the representation of our Lord upon the Cross, and the Chalice with the Host, the good simple people of the northern counties marched in thousands into Yorkshire, crying out for the re-establishment of the monas- teries, the repeal of the laws by which the Pope's authority had been abolished, and the restoration of the ancient Faith in its entirety. At first King Henry quailed before the Pilgrims, and found it necessary to dissemble his resentment until, by deceitful promises of redress of their grievances, he had cajoled them into dispersing and returning to their homes. But, in the next spring, on their reassembling, having meantime despatched more numerous forces to the Duke of Norfolk, his lieu- tenant, he succeeded in securing the persons of their leaders ; and these were forthwith sent up to London to be tried and executed, while their more humble followers were hanged in scores at York, Hull, and Carlisle.
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In the Pilgrimage of Grace no one, after Robert Aske, its leader, seems to have figured more con- spicuously than Sir Thomas Percy, our martyr's father. He led the vanguard of the pilgrim army, composed of six thousand men, marching under the banner of St. Cuthbert. After their dispersion, he returned to Prudhoe Castle ; but, on being sum- moned to Doncaster by the Duke of Norfolk, he surrendered of his own accord, and being taken up to London, was thrown into the Tower. Thence, after the formality of a trial at Westminster, he was drawn to Tyburn on the 2nd of June, 1537, and there hanged, in company with other supposed leaders of the movement, amongst whom were the Abbot of Jervaulx and a Dominican friar named John Pickering. The official report of the trials, now published amongst the State Papers,1 shows that the charge, on which these sufferers were condemned, was that they " did, as false traitors, conspire and imagine to deprive the King of his royal dignity, viz., of being on earth Supreme Head of the Church of England." We may therefore be allowed to hope that, in the sight of God, they died true martyrs for the Catholic Faith.
The knowledge, if not the actual recollection (for he was nine years old when it occurred), of the circumstances which led to his brave father's death, in defence of the very cause for which he was himself to die so gloriously, cannot have failed to influence the character of our martyr, especially considering
1 Given in De Fonblanque's Annals of the House of Percy, vol. i. PP- 570. 571-
I II.
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the sufferings which Sir Thomas Percy's execution brought upon his family. As a consequence of his attainder, his children were excluded from succeed- ing either to the earldom of Northumberland, or to the estates which, on the demise of the Earl, their uncle, a few weeks later, would naturally have fallen to them; and for a time they had to depend entirely upon the charity of strangers. The Lady Eleanor Percy, their poor widowed mother, seems to have been considered too much implicated in the so-called treason of her husband to be allowed to retain them in her charge ; and for a while, at all events, the little Thomas and his still younger brother Henry were placed under the keeping of Sir Thomas Tempest — one of the Commissioners appointed for the trials of the Pilgrims — who lived at Holmside, near to Durham.
The cost of their maintenance there — to his honour be it said — was defrayed by none other than the Duke of Norfolk,1 who, in spite of the relentless manner with which he had executed the King's vengeance on the defeated pilgrims, pitied the forlorn condition of these homeless children of their leader. The position of Holmside exposed it, however, to the attacks of Scotch marauders, who might be tempted, it was feared, to carry off the little Percys in hopes of obtaining the payment of a ransom. Some months later, therefore, at the request of Sir Thomas Tempest, Bishop Tunstall wrote to Cromwell, begging that some place might be provided for them " more within the country.
1 De Fonblanque, ii. p. 4.
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The children be young, and must be among women." ' We are not told what followed from the Bishop's application, nor how long the poor children were kept separated from their mother ; 2 and but little more is known with reference to the early life of our martyr. He and his brother are said, however, to have received some part of their education at Liver- pool, which must then have greatly differed from the present crowded city.3
Meanwhile Henry VIII. passed to his account, and was succeeded by his son, Edward VI. Under the boy-king, in the February of 1549, an Act of Parliament was passed "for the restitution in blood of Mr. Thomas Percy,"4 who in that year attained the age of manhood. By this Act the young Percy was so far rehabilitated, as heir to his father, as to be entitled to inherit any property which might come to him from collateral branches of his family ; and he was enabled also to receive the benefit of an annuity which his uncle, the late Earl, had left him. About this same time, moreover, he was knighted. It was not till three years later that restoration was made to him of any part of the North-
1 R.O. Henry VIII. Domestic, vol. v. p. 118.
2 In the year following her husband's execution, Lady Percy is mentioned as being at Preston Tower, a residence some ten miles south of Berwick, which she had inherited from her father's family, with a portion of the Ellingham estate. (Bateson's History of Northumberland, ii. p. 106.)
3 See Collins's Peerage of England, 1779, vol. ii. p. 386, where bills, &c., relating to the board and education of the two young Percys are referred to as amongst the papers of the Duke of Northumberland.
4 Lords' Journals, 2. Edward VI.
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umberland estates, but he was then allowed to take possession of Langley, Ellingham, and certain other manors. Meantime the entire barony of Alnwick was bestowed by the young King on the adventurous and unprincipled Dudley, Earl of Warwick, with the then unprecedented title of Duke (not Earl) of Northumberland.
The downfall of this nobleman, consequent on his attempt in 1553 to exclude Queen Mary from the throne, removed the chief obstacle to Sir Thomas Percy's reinstatement in the ancient honours and possessions of his family ; and we may be sure that from the first he must have had the sympathy of the good Queen, whose own fidelity to the Faith had been the occasion of so many sufferings. Soon after her accession, Sir Thomas Percy was named Governor of Prudhoe Castle, and throughout her reign he showed himself a faithful and active supporter of her interests. In the April of 1557, he earned particular distinction by capturing, after a two days' siege, the Castle of Scarborough from Sir Thomas Stafford, who had seized upon it whilst in conspiracy with the French King against Queen Mary. The restoration of Sir Thomas Percy to the earldom quickly followed, and on May the ist of the same year he was created Earl of Northumberland, with remainder to his brother Henry: the subordinate titles of Baron Percy, Baron Poynings, Lucy, Bryan, and Fitzpane, having been conferred upon him on the previous day.
The patent of his creation set forth that "the same was done in consideration of his noble descent,
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constancy of virtues, valour in deeds of arms, and other shining qualifications." Of the ceremony of his installation at Whitehall, Hutchinson writes : " It was attended with great pomp. The procession was preceded by eight heralds and twelve trumpeters. He was accompanied by the Earls of Pembroke, Arundel, and Rutland, and the Lord Montague — walking in the middle in robes of crimson velvet, and a coronet of gold." l
Queen Mary gave him a fresh proof of her con- fidence by appointing him at the same time Warden General of the Marches, in conjunction with Lord Wharton. He was soon called upon in this capacity to show his prowess in the field. A fresh outbreak of hostilities with the Scotch occurred in the July °f I557j when the latter crossed the Border. The new Earl of Northumberland led an expedition to the Cheviots, where he not only gained a victory, but succeeded in taking prisoner Sir Andrew Ker, the Scotch leader.
In the following January the Queen commissioned him to treat with Scotland for a truce between the two kingdoms, and wrote at the same time to the venerable Bishop of Durham, Cuthbert Tunstall, requesting him to assist the Earl with his counsel in this important matter.2 The truce, however, proved but of short duration ; and in the summer of the same year we again find the Earl and his brother, Sir Henry Percy, occupied, not always with complete success, in repelling the inroads of the Scotch, now led by French officers.
1 View of Northumberland, ii. 238. - Scottish Calendar, January 21 and 23, 1558.
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Meanwhile, we must not forget to mention the Earl's marriage, in the same year, 1558, with Anne Somerset, daughter of the Earl of Worcester, a courageous lady, who, by her patient endurance throughout the long period of her widowhood and exile, proved herself no unfitting consort for the destined martyr. His mother, the Lady Eleanor, seems to have continued living on her Ellingham estate, which she had made over to him, but had to receive back for her lifetime ; and we find her com- plained of to Cecil, in 1563, as having had Mass said in her house. About four years after her husband's death, the Lady Eleanor had married Sir Richard Holland, of Denton, in Lancashire, who died in 1548 ; from which time, until her own death in 1567, she remained a widow.1
In the November of 1558, Queen Mary died ; and the accession of her half-sister, Elizabeth, was the signal for England's being plunged again, more hopelessly than ever, into heresy and schism.
The new Queen soon made it clear that her first object was to sever all connection between England and Rome ; and, following the bad example of her father, to leave no stone unturned to wrest to herself the authority which God has given to the Roman Pontiff.
Elizabeth's first Parliament assembled on the 25th of January, 1559, and was dissolved on May the 8th following. In this, in opposition to the votes of all the Bishops, and to counter-resolu-
1 Collins, ii. p. 386.
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tions of both Houses of Convocation, were passed the two Acts of Supremacy and of Uniformity, the effect of which was to depose the Catholic religion from its place as the religion of the country (the observance of it being thenceforth made into a legal crime), and to set up in its stead the institu- tion still styled in law the Established Church of England, to which all the old Catholic churches and cathedrals were from that time made over.
By the first of these two Acts the spiritual authority of every foreign prelate was declared within the realm to be abolished, the jurisdiction exercised till then by the Pope being made over to the Crown. Assertors of the Pope's authority were to be punished, for a first offence by forfeiture of property, fora second by perpetual imprisonment; whilst a third transgression was to be visited with the penalty of death, inflicted as in cases of high treason. By the Act of Uniformity the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass was prohibited, and it was required that in all churches the ministers should use the Protestant Book of Common Prayer alone, under like penalties of forfeiture, deprivation, and death.1
It was thus that the so-called Church of England came into existence ; the faithful Bishops, who had all, save one, refused to take the oath of the Queen's Supremacy, being at the same time deposed from their sees by the civil power, and condemned to end their days in prison or in voluntary exile ; whilst into their bishoprics, thus forcibly vacated, they
1 Hallam, Constitutional History of England, i. 152 ; Lingard, vi. P- *3-
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had to witness the intrusion of ministers of the new State-made religion.
Most justly, therefore, did our martyr Earl exclaim later, as he stood upon the scaffold : " As to this new Church of England, I do not acknow- ledge it ! " How, indeed, could he acknowledge it as the Church of Jesus Christ when he had seen it thus brought into existence, and knew whose handiwork it was ?
The Earl was not himself present at the passing of these Acts, having been specially instructed by the Council to remain in the North (where he was much occupied as Warden of the Marches), and not to come up to attend the Parliament.1 It may be true enough that the disturbed condition of the Borders at the moment supplied the Council with some pretext for this action ; but there can be little doubt that the real reason of his being thus kept at a distance at so critical a juncture, was his well- known attachment to the ancient Faith, which would have ensured his opposition to the evil measures then in contemplation.
Being thus debarred from attending Parliament in person, the Earl of Northumberland named as his proxy in the House of Lords, with power to vote
1 Foreign Calendar, January n, 1559. Privy Council to Earl of Northumberland. "He is to stay in the North, and not come to Parliament." In the first issue of this memoir (by the C.T.S.), the Earl of Northumberland was wrongly said to have been present at some of the Sessions of this Parliament ; the writer having been misled by the lists of Peers in the Lords' Journals, in which the Earl's name is found with those of the others, but without a p (meaning przsens) added to it.
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in his name, the Earl of Arundel, who was then regarded as a zealous Catholic. Unfortunately, however, this nobleman proved himself in the event unworthy of the trust reposed in him ; having been " won over [if Rishton is correct] by the expectation of marrying the Queen held out to him by Elizabeth herself."1 After absenting himself from Parliament for a great part of the Session " from indisposition " (as the Mantuan Envoy wrote), " feigned, as some think, to avoid consulting about such ruin of this realm;"2 Arundel is said, in the end, to have actually voted for the Bill conferring religious Supremacy upon the Queen. Of this, however, grace was given him to repent before he died ; nor can Northumberland be held in any way responsible for the weakness of his proxy.
On May the loth, two days after the Parliament had closed, the Queen despatched to the Earl of Northumberland, in conjunction with the Bishop of Durham, Cuthbert Tunstall, and Sir Joseph Croft, a commission to conclude a fresh treaty with the Queen Dowager of Scotland. This treaty was signed by the representatives of the two nations, at Upsatlington, on the 3ist of May, 1559. 3
The venerable Bishop, with whom Northumber- land was associated in this commission, had also been dispensed by the Queen from attending Parlia- ment ; the Acts passed by which had rilled him with
1 Rise and Growth of the Anglican Schism, Sander and Rishton. (Edit. Lewis, p. 255.)
2 Venetian Calendar, March 21, 1559.
3 Scottish Calendar, May 10 and 31, 1559.
4 Domestic Calendar, December 19, 1558.
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sorrow and dismay. As soon as the business con- nected with the treaty was concluded, the aged prelate wrote from his residence at Auckland both to Cecil and the Queen herself, expressing his great " wish to do his duty to his Sovereign once in his days," l and announced his coming up to London, with some faint hope perhaps of being able even yet to do something to avert the change. Causing himself therefore to be conveyed thither with such haste as his great age would permit, he reached London on July the 2Oth. It is needless to say that the remonstrances of the good Bishop were altogether ineffectual ; and after making a noble protest against the introduction of any change into the diocese of which he was the Bishop, and on refusing to take the new Oath of Supremacy he was declared to be deprived of his see (as already had been most of his brother Bishops), and was placed in strict confinement in the house of Matthew Parker, whom Elizabeth had appointed to the archbishopric of Canterbury. There did Bishop Tunstall die. a prisoner for the Faith, on November the i8th following.
Meantime, on August the 6th of the same eventful year, 1559, the Queen had addressed to the Earl of Northumberland, whom she still detained in his own county, a fresh commission " for the reforma- tion of the disorders committed by the Scots upon the frontier." With him, however, were joined in the commission Sir Ralph Sadler and Sir James Croft, and the instructions secretly issued to the 1 Foreign Calendar, June 30, 1559.
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first of these a few days later,1 prove that the Earl's name was placed at the head of the commission merely to deceive the public ; the real purpose of Elizabeth and Cecil being to give all the secret encouragement they could to the Scottish insur- gents, whom the fanatical John Knox was heading, in the hope of bringing about the overthrow of the existing Government.2 The Earl's connection with the commission, which was from the first, as I have said, but nominal, soon came to an end entirely; and that he was no party to the transac- tions carried on is shown by a letter of Sadler's, written from Berwick a few days after he had entered on his mission, in which he tells Sir William Cecil that " he intends to take the assistance of Sir James Croft in preference to that of Sir Henry Percy, or the Earl of Northumberland : that he thinks the former not in any wise comparable to Croft, and the latter very unmeet for the charge committed to him." 3
To have been thought " unmeet " by an un- scrupulous agent of Elizabeth's, need certainly be taken as no blame in our eyes ; and it is worth remarking that, at the time referred to, Sir Henry Percy, whom Sadler seems to have considered less " unmeet " than his brother, the Earl, had already so far abandoned his religion as to let himself be used
1 On August 8, the Queen despatched to Sadler £3,000 in gold, whh which secretly " he may reward any manner of person in Scotland with such sums of money as he shall think meet." (Foreign Calendar, August 6 and 8, 1559.)
- Lingard, vi. 34.
3 Scottish Calendar, August 29, 1559.
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by Cecil as a medium of communication with John Knox. The understanding which already existed between Sir Henry and the Scotch heresiarch, is shown by a letter of the latter, written on July the ist, in which he requires such friendship from Sir Henry "that there may be conference and knowledge from time to time between the faithful (i.e., the Protestants) of both realms." l
His brother's apostasy must have been one of the sorest trials of the Earl ; and it was not till several years later, that Sir Henry was brought back to the Faith, when he atoned for his past infidelity by the patient endurance of much persecution.
It was not long before Northumberland was driven by the mistrust of the Government and the opposition of his own colleagues in the office to resign the Wardenship of the Marches. He then retired to the south, and during the next few years lived much at his Sussex residence at Petworth. Though he still enjoyed, at all events externally, the favour of the Queen, who in 1563 bestowed on him the Order of the Garter, indications are not wanting that in consequence of his well-known attachment to the ancient Faith, he was at this time kept more or less under surveillance, and perhaps occasionally restricted in his movements. Thus in the May of 1565, Elizabeth's agent in Scotland wrote to Lord Leicester, praying that " the Earl of Northumber- land be stayed in London. From all I hear it is very necessary. The Papists in these parts do stir themselves." 2
1 Scottish Calendar, July i and August 4, 1559. '2 Ibid. May n, 1565.
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In like manner the Spanish Ambassador in London is found writing to his Sovereign in April, 1566 (namely, three years and a half before the rising): " The Earl of Northumberland has come. . . . He is considered very Catholic." l
Facts such as these, joined to the martyr's own dying declaration that he had held the Catholic Faith " from his earliest years " even to that day, are inconsistent with any idea of his having ever really fallen away from his religion ; and yet it would seem, from an expression used by him during his imprisonment, that he must at one time have failed in some way in a right profession of it.
One of the questions put to him when examined, was : " Were you reconciled to the Church of Rome before you did enter into the rebellion ? and by whom ? " To this the Earl replied : " I was reconciled by one Master Copley two years or more before our stir : " adding, in answer to a further question, that the said Master Copley "hath no certain abiding, but was sometimes in Lancashire and sometimes elsewhere." '
If " reconciliation " is to be understood here in its usual sense, something more would seem to be implied than an ordinary sacramental absolution ; and in those times of special trial, without re- nouncing their religion, Catholics were sometimes led through ignorance or weakness into unlawful
1 Spanish Calendar, April 29, 1566. Guzman de Silva to King Philip II.
- Sir Cuthbert Sharpe, Memorials of the Rebellion of 1369, pp. 204 — 213.
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acts, which afterwards gave just trouble to their con- sciences. We know for instance how many in the first years of Elizabeth endeavoured to escape the penalties of non-attendance at the Protestant service by consenting to be present at it, though in a merely external manner ; and it may be that to some such weakness Northumberland had at one time yielded. If so, however, we have no other proof of it than his reply, as above given, the exact sense of which is not altogether clear. On the other hand, his public acts, as far as they are recorded, display no sign of weakness ; and in each of the two Parliaments which he was able to attend we find him making a courageous opposition to the persecuting measures which they passed.
The second Parliament of Queen Elizabeth met in 1563, and sat from January the nth to April the loth ; the Earl of Northumberland being present at most of the sittings of the House of Lords. By the Act of 1559, the obligation of taking the Oath of the Queen's Supremacy had been imposed only on certain classes of her subjects ; but in the Parliament of 1563 a further Act was passed requiring it of all, who should either have said, or heard Mass; thus extending it, says Lingard, "to the whole Catholic population of the realm.'' To all such, moreover, the oath, if at first refused, was to be tendered again a second time ; the penalty of a second refusal being death as in cases of high treason. Against the passing of this cruel measure our good Earl spoke boldly in the House of Lords. He said (wrote the Spanish Ambassador on January
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the 27th of the same year) " that the heretics should be satisfied to enjoy the bishoprics and benefits of the others without wishing to cut off their heads as well. He said when they had beheaded the clergy they would claim to do the same by the lay nobles, and he was moved by his conscience to say that he was of opinion that so rigorous an Act should not be passed."1 In spite of this, however, and of a vigorous speech in the same sense by Lord Montague, the Bill was passed on March the 3rd.
Parliament did not again assemble until the autumn of 1566 ; in the November of which year — in spite of the counter-votes of Northumberland and ten other peers — the Lords passed an Act to remedy the defective consecration of the first Protestant Bishops, declaring it to have been "good, lawful, and perfect." It ought, however, especially to be observed that, though the Catholic opponents of this measure could not hinder it from passing, they did nevertheless get a proviso added to it refusing confirmation to any of the new-made Bishops' acts affecting either life or property. In this way they saved the life of the brave Bishop Bonner, to whom in prison the Protestant Bishop Horn of Winchester had tried to administer the Oath of Supremacy, in order thereby to get him condemned to death. It was, in fact, principally in order to obtain " good Bishop Bonner's " con- demnation (wrote the Spanish Ambassador) that
i Spanish Calendar. Bishop Quadra to King Philip II., January
27. 1563-
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the Protestant prelates had asked for a confirmation of their acts.1
When Parliament next met in 1571 the Earl of Northumberland was a prisoner in Scotland, having fled thither on the failure of the Northern Rising, of which we must now try to trace the origin.
The troubles of the unhappy Mary Queen of Scots — whose subjects, incited by the continual intrigues of Elizabeth and Cecil, had openly rebelled against her — were naturally viewed with the liveliest sympathy by the Catholics of England, for they placed in Queen Mary, as heiress to the English throne, their own hopes of relief from persecution in the future. Northumberland, in particular, made no secret of his sympathy, and when, in the May of 1568, the Scottish Queen was forced to flee from her own kingdom and seek refuge at Carlisle, the Earl set out from Topcliffe, in Yorkshire, where he was staying at the time, to do what he could for her safe and honourable entertainment. His views, however, with reference to the Royal fugitive, were very different from those of Elizabeth and her minions ; and his demand to be allowed to take charge of Mary met with a rude refusal from the Deputy Warden of the Marches; nor were either he or his Countess permitted to have speech with the captive Queen, excepting once in presence of some others. The Earl found means, however, of occasion- ally communicating with her during her confinement in the course of the next year at Bolton and at
1 Spanish Calendar. Guzman de Silva to Philip II., November n, 1566.
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Tutbury; and he himself, in his answers when examined, tells how he had written " praying her especially to regard the advancement of the Catholic religion." This, in fact, more than any mere com- passion for her sufferings, was, he makes quite plain, the one real cause of his supporting her; and he adds that, when the idea of marrying her to the Duke of Norfolk had been mooted, he " sent her word how her marriage with the Duke was misliked, he being counted a Protestant. If she ever looked to recover her estate, it must be by the advancing and maintaining of the Catholic faith ; for there ought to be no halting in those matters."1
Meanwhile, the exercise of the Catholic religion had been becoming day by day more difficult and dangerous, and the only wonder is that the ancient Faith contrived, as it did, still to keep its hold upon the people, and that it continued for so long a period, and particularly in the northern counties, to be yet in reality the religion of the land. In virtue of the sacrilegious and unjust Act of Uniformity, all the grand old churches and cathedrals with which, throughout its length and breadth, the soil of England had been covered by our Catholic ancestors, had been diverted from the sacred purpose to which they had been originally consecrated, and had been given over during the last eleven years to the ministers of the new State-made religion, whose pretended mission was derived, not from the Vicar of our Blessed Lord, but only from the Queen. The crucifixes and the images of our Blessed Lady and 1 Sharpe, p. 192.
J n.
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the Saints had been everywhere torn down and broken, on the senseless plea that they were incen- tives to idolatry ; and the innumerable altars, on which the Holy Sacrifice had been daily offered up for centuries, had been overturned and desecrated ; whilst the Holy Mass itself might now no more be heard, or offered up, unless in the safe concealment of some vault or secret chamber. The priests too, who, remaining faithful to their trust, had refused to take the oath affirming the Royal Supremacy in matters of religion — an oath which, of course, no Catholic could take without apostasy — had been ruthlessly ejected from their cures, turned adrift to live how and where they could, and liable, if found to be still exercising their priestly office, to immediate seizure and imprisonment ; or, if the offence were often repeated, to the punishment of death. Nor were the lay people free to refuse the ministra- tions of the new-fangled clergy, but were made liable to a fine each time they were absent from their services on a Sunday.
Nevertheless, although the ministers of the new religion were thus supported by the whole power of the law, their own admissions supply us with the clearest evidence of the extreme difficulty which they experienced in thrusting the new doctrines on the people. Indeed, if the whole subject were not so supremely sad, the story of the difficulties encoun- tered by these so-called Bishops (on whom Elizabeth had astutely conferred the titles of the ancient sees), in their attempts to execute their office, would be highly entertaining. Thus, to take a few examples
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out of many: in the August of 1561, the State Papers show us Scory, the new Bishop of Hereford, indignantly complaining to Cecil, that " a number of Popish priests, who had been driven out of Exeter and elsewhere, had been received and feasted in the streets, with torch-lights ! '51
In the same year, the newly-made Bishop of Carlisle, in reporting the state of his diocese to the same official, writes : " The priests are wicked imps of Antichrist, for the most part ignorant and stubborn, and past measure false and subtle ; " 2 and in the following January, the same prelate is found again complaining of the "great prevalence of Popery in his diocese," and announcing in dismay that "Articles of Religion in French are being circulated among the disaffected Papists of the North." 3 As to Durham, Dr. Pilkington could find no other way of describing his experiences than by saying that, " Like St. Paul, he has to fight with beasts at Ephesus; "4 and even as late as 1576, Dr. Barnes, his successor, in writing of his difficulties with "the reconciling priests and massers " of Northumberland, " whereof there was store," actually goes on to call Durham an "Augice stabulum, whose stink is grievous in the nose of God and men, and which to purge far passeth Hercules' labours."5
Lastly, to pass to Yorkshire (for our present interest is with the northern counties), the words of Sir Ralph Sadler have repeatedly been quoted, in which, when the Rising we are now to speak of had
1 Domestic Calendar, 1547 — 1580, p. 183.
2 Ibid. p. 180. 3 Ibid. p. 192. 4 Ibid. p. 187.
5 Surtees Society, 1850. Proceedings of Bishop Barnes, Preface
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begun, he writes to Sir William Cecil: "There are not ten gentlemen in all this country that favour her (the Queen's) proceedings in religion. The common people are ignorant, superstitious, and altogether blinded with the old Popish doctrine, and therefore so favour the cause which the rebels make the colour of their rebellion. . . . No doubt all this country had wholly rebelled, if at the beginning my Lord Lieu- tenant had not wisely and stoutly handled the matter."1 It is hardly necessary to explain that, in the mouths of men such as Sadler and the Protestant Bishops, the terms " ignorance " and " superstition " were but synonyms for adherence to the ancient Catholic belief.
There would be no difficulty in multiplying such quotations, but the above seem sufficient to prove the tenacity with which, in spite of every obstacle, the good people of the North retained their affection for the ancient Faith ; and this fact explains the readiness with which — like their fathers in the Pilgrimage of Grace — many of them flocked to join the banners of the Earls of Northumberland and Westmoreland, when, in 1569, in the beginning of Elizabeth's twelfth year, a brave, though in reality ill-judged, attempt was led by these two noblemen, to obtain the restoration of the Catholic religion.
Unwise as the Rising of the North was, and
difficult to defend when measured by its prospects
of success, no one can set himself to an impartial
study of its history without feeling that the movement
1 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, December 6, 1569.
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originated solely and entirely from the desire of the actors to bring about the restoration of the Catholic religion, the practice of which had become impos- sible under the persecuting policy of Elizabeth and of her Chief Secretary, Sir William Cecil. This is proved conclusively, not only by the proclamations of its leaders and by the whole conduct of those that took part in the movement, but even still more clearly by the admissions of their adversaries themselves.
In the spring of the year 1569, Dr. Nicholas Morton, a former Prebendary of York Minster, had been sent by the Pope as Apostolic Penitentiary to the northern counties, for the purpose of imparting to the persecuted priests the faculties which they required, the surviving Bishops being all imprisoned. He was related to two of the Yorkshire families afterwards most prominent in the Rising, the Mortons and the Markenfields, whose 'estates lay near to Ripon ; and was declared by Francis Norton to have been "the most earnest mover of the rebellion." The Earl of Northumberland, who was then residing at his Yorkshire seat of Topcliffe, was amongst those whom Dr. Morton visited ; and in a letter written afterwards to Lord Burghleigh the same Francis Norton tells how the Earl had sent for his father, old Mr. Richard Norton, and declared to him "the great grief he had for that they all lived out of the laws of the Catholic Church, for the restitution whereof he would willingly spend his life."1 Sander, moreover, 1 Sharpe, p. 281.
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in speaking of the conferences held between the leaders before the actual outbreak, relates that when certain persons urged the policy of putting forward some other pretext for the Rising rather than the Catholic faith, the Earl of Northumberland exclaimed : " I neither know of nor acknowledge any other, for we are seeking, I imagine, the glory not of men but God."1
If the liberation of Mary Queen of Scots from her unjust captivity entered into the designs of the leaders of the Rising, it was because they con- sidered the freedom of the Catholic heiress to the English throne an indispensable condition for securing their religious liberty. " In the having of her," says the Earl in his answers to the Privy Council, " we hoped thereby to have some reforma- tion in religion, or at the least, some sufferance for men to use their conscience as they were disposed ; and also the freedom of her whom we accounted the second person and right heir apparent."5
If we turn, moreover, to the letters of the Earl of Sussex, Lord President of the Council of the North, written from York to Sir William Cecil and to the Queen herself at the first beginning of the outbreak, we find him again and again asserting religion as its cause. " These Earls and their con- federates will do what they can for the cause of religion, and therefore this matter should not be dallied with." "They have been . . . drawn on ... to what was intended by those wicked coun- sellors at the beginning. ... I mean the cause
1 Bridgewater's Concertatio, fol. 46. * Sharpe, p. 193.
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of religion." And a few days later, " The people like so well their cause of religion that they flock to them in all places where they come."1
Other similar expressions from the despatches of Government and other officials, and even from a letter of Elizabeth herself, will be quoted later ; but the above appear sufficiently to show how clearly it was understood on all sides that the desire to restore the Catholic religion was the actuating motive of the Rising.
The early autumn was spent by the northern Catholic gentry in holding frequent consultations. Northumberland's reluctance to take action was due, as he says in his answers, partly to his " finding the matter apparently without all likeli- hood of success," and therefore "likely to breed bloodshed " to no purpose ; and partly to his strong sense of his obligation to remain submissive to his Sovereign, so long as the fact of her excom- munication should remain uncertain. His doubts on these two points caused him much painful hesitation, and made him the last of all the leaders to give his sanction to the enterprise ; and even then he only yielded under pressure which was little short of violence, and whilst still maintaining his loyalty to the person of the Queen herself.2
To solve their doubts as to the lawfulness of their contemplated Rising, the two Earls, on the jth
1 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, 1566 — 1579, pp. 103, 108, 112.
'2 The loyalty of the Earl's sentiments towards the Queen is shown by a letter which he wrote to her on the day before the outbreak. (Sharpe, p. 320.)
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of November, 1569, addressed a joint letter to Pope St. Pius V., asking for advice and help. It is true that they were driven into taking action long before the Holy Father's answer could arrive ; and that, when it was given, the movement already had been crushed. Still the Pope's letter has a very special interest, since apparently it justifies completely the enterprise looked at in itself. It is given in full by the continuator of Baronius, and it should be noticed that it was dated the 22nd of February, 1570, that is, three days before the famous Bull by which Elizabeth was excommunicated. Clearly Dr. Morton had not been wrong in representing her as con- sidered by the Pope to be already practically excommunicated, and deprived of her right of sovereignty.1
In replying to the letter of the Earls, dated November the 7th (which he had received, he says, on February the i6th), the Pontiff wrote as follows :
" Our Lord Jesus Christ . . . has inspired you with this resolution (which is worthy of your zeal for the Catholic faith), to endeavour, by delivering yourselves and your kingdom from a woman's passion, to restore it to its ancient obedience to this holy Roman See . . . and if, in maintaining the Catholic faith and the authority of this Holy- See, even death should be encountered by you and your blood should be shed, it is far better for the confession of God's truth to pass quickly to eternal
1 " Master Copley and another priest consulted by the leaders, thought that the formal excommunication ought to be waited for before rising." (Sharpe, p. 204. Answers of the Earl.)
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life by the short road of a glorious death, than to live on in shame and ignominy, to the loss of your souls, in bondage to a feeble woman's passion. For think not, beloved sons in Christ, that those Bishops, or other leading Catholics (principibus Catholicis) of your country whom you mention, have made an unhappy end ; who, for their refusal to give up their confession of the Catholic faith, have been either cast into prisons, or unjustly visited with other penalties. For their constancy, which has been encouraged by the example (still, as we believe, effective) of the blessed Thomas Archbishop of Canterbury, can be praised by none as much as it deserves. Imitating this same constancy your- selves, be brave and firm in your resolve ! and abandon not your undertaking through fear or threat of any dangers."1
A few days after the two Earls had despatched their letter to the Pope, they were startled by a sudden summons to present- themselves before the Queen, who had received information of their move- ment. On this they held a last consultation with their chief supporters at Brancepeth Castle, the residence of Lord Westmoreland, where, though almost wrung from him by force, Northumberland's agreement to the Rising was at last obtained.2 Accordingly, setting out from Brancepeth with
1 Laderchi, Baronii Aniiales,ad. an. 1570, §384.
a The following is Northumberland's own account of this Council, held at Brancepeth, as abridged from his answers on examination: "My Lord (of Westmoreland), his uncles, old Norton, and Markenfield were earnest to proceed. Francis Norton, John
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such forces as could hastily be gathered, the two Earls made a public entry into Durham on the afternoon of November the I4th, amidst the accla- mations of the people. Their first care on entering was to proceed to the Cathedral and give directions for its immediate restoration to Catholic worship, the communion - table and Protestant books of service being carried out and publicly destroyed ; and this was the signal for St. Cuthbert's city once more to assume its old appearance, and openly show itself the Catholic town it had always remained at heart. During the short month the Rising lasted we read of altars rebuilt in nearly all the churches there, and of Masses heard by crowded congre- gations; of holy water carried to the people's houses, and of processions headed by the cross ; and, best
Swinburne, myself, and others thought it impossible ; so we broke up and departed, every man to provide for himself. Lady West- moreland, hearing this, cried out, weeping bitterly, that we and our country were shamed for ever, and that we must seek holes to creep into. Some departed, and I wished to go, but my Lord's uncles and others were so importunate that I and my Lord should not sunder, or we should cast ourselves away, that I remained a day or two. If any of us had provided a ship, we should have been glad ; but when I found I could not get away I agreed to rise with them, and promised to go and raise my force in Northumberland, to join Lord Westmoreland upon the Tyne. They misliked my departing, but I told them I must go, unless I went under my Lord's standard without force of my own. I had got away an arrow-shot, when the Nortons and others came to persuade me to return. Being desperately urged, I returned, and met my Lord riding homeward. I thought, but he passed towards Durham. When I understood they would begin the matter there, I would no further, and willed my Lord to return home and take better advice. I walked up and down till sunset, and then they forced me to go." (Domestic Calendar, Addenda, June 13, 1572.)
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of all, of thousands kneeling at the feet of priests commissioned by Christ's Vicar, to receive absolution from censure and from sin.
On this first day of the Rising the Earls stayed no longer in Durham than was needed for the pro- clamation of their enterprise ; and returning to Brancepeth for the night, they set out next day with their army southwards. But this public restoration of the Catholic religion in a city such as Durham, in the beginning of Elizabeth's twelfth year, is an event so striking as to deserve more attention than it has usually received. Let us then interrupt the narrative to supply some details regarding it not noticed by most writers.
The following account of the proceedings in Durham on November the I4th, is contained in a letter to the Earl of Sussex from Sir George Bowes, then in command of Barnard Castle, and is inter- esting from the fact of its having been written on the following day : " The doings of the Earls of Westmoreland and Northumberland. Yesterday, at four of the clock in the afternoon, the said Earls, accompanied with Richard Norton, Francis, his son, with divers other of his said sons ; Christopher Nevill, Cuthbert Nevill, uncles of the said Earl of Westmoreland ; and Thomas Markenfield, with others to the number of three [score] horsemen armed in corselets and coats of plates, with spears, arquebuses, and daggers, entered the Minster there, and there took all the books but one, and them and the communion-table defaced, rent, and broke in pieces. And after made a proclamation in the
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Queen's name that no man, before their pleasure known, should use any service ; and calling the citizens before them, told them how they had done nothing but that they would avow, and was after the Queen's proceedings. And so tarrying about the space of one hour they departed, putting a watch of twenty-four townsmen to the town, which took a servant of mine, which I sent thither, and him carried to his lodging, and there he was kept till this morning, and so came away. In haste at Barnard Castle, November the I5th, at twelve of the clock, 1569."
The fact of a watch of twenty-four of their own fellow-townsmen being thought by the Earls a suffi- cient force to guard the city, shows clearly how entirely they had the sympathy of the citizens of Durham in their proceedings at the Minster; and, in fact, we have the express declaration of the Earl of Sussex, made in answer to questions from the Queen as to the " Earls' outrageous doings at Durham," that " there was no resistance made, nor any mislike of their doings." He says too in another letter : " They pay for all they take, and suffer no spoil. At Durham a man of the Earls' took a horse of the Dean's out of his stable, but the horse was restored and the taker punished."1 Indeed, the whole conduct of the people at this time showed that they were no mere passive spectators of the attempt to give back to them the means of practising again their ancient Faith, but were actual and glad co- operators in it : and yet it must not be forgotten 1 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, pp. 119, 120.
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that for the eleven years preceding they had been entirely debarred from attending (unless occasionally by stealth) either Mass or Sacraments ; and that every church and chapel in the country had been for the same space of time in the hands of ministers, who, whether priests or not by ordination, had all conformed to the new heresy, and who were for the most part animated by a virulent hatred of everything that savoured of the old religion, attend- ance at their own services being, moreover, enforced by rigorous penalties. Of these, James Pilkington ("the late supposed Bishop," as one of the Earls' proclamations described him1) had openly praised God for having kept him from the " filthiness " of the religion and orders of his predecessor, Cuthbert Tunstall ; 2 whilst the fanatical Dean Whittingham (who then presided over the Cathedral, and who owed his only orders to the Calvinist ministers of Geneva3) displayed his love of Catholicity by sacri- legiously rifling the tomb of Venerable Bede, whose relics, some say, he scattered to the winds,4 and by burning the corporal cloth of St. Cuthbert, which had been upheld by the monks as a banner at the victory of Nevill's Cross.
As to the eleven Canons who then occupied the places of the monks, two brothers of the Bishop — John and Leonard Pilkington — may be supposed to have shared his sentiments ; as also Swift, his Vicar-
1 Sharpe, p. 98. 2 Bridget! and Knox, Elizabeth and the Catholic Hierarchy, p. 48.
3 Estcourt, Question of Anglican Ordinations, p. 149. 4 Acta Sanctorum, Mali 27 (Ada S.Bedz), Edit. Bollandists.
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General, who afterwards presided at the trials for ecclesiastical offences which followed the suppres- sion of the Rising ; whilst of the rest it is enough to say that all of them had been appointed, or at least confirmed in office, by Elizabeth ; l and that (sad to tell) no less than three amongst them — Stephen Marley (last Subprior), Thomas Spark, and George Cliff — were apostate monks, who, following no principle except the securing of their worldly interests, had accepted each successive change that had followed the suppression of their monastery in 1541, renouncing their Faith again finally on the accession of Elizabeth.
The first two of these ex-monks were probably in 1569 the only members of the Chapter who had been validly ordained, George Cliff having appar- ently received no more than acolyte's orders from Bishop Tunstall.2 Nearly all of these worthies seem to have fled from Durham on its occupation by the Earls, since a memorial of Cecil's is found to contain the following item under the heading of " Proceedings for the suppression of the Rising : " " The Bishop and Dean of Durham and all ecclesi- astical persons (to be) commanded to return to their charges."3 Most, however, of the more subordinate
1 One — John Rudd — had been dispossessed by Mary. See Le Neve's Fasti. Hardy's Edition.
2 Surtees Society, 1845. Depositions and Ecclesiastical Proceedings from the Courts of Durham, p. 137. Cliff was made a Canon by Elizabeth.
3 Most of the details which follow are gathered from the Reports of the trials held after the Rising, published by the Surtees Society, Depositions, &c., pp. 127, seq.
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officials appear without reluctance to have lent their services to the faithful priests, who, as long as the Rising lasted, were allowed to take undisturbed possession both of the Cathedral and the other churches. Of these priests a word must now be said.
In virtue of special faculties received from Rome, the chief conduct of religious matters was under- taken by a zealous and courageous priest named William Holmes, whose memory deserves to be rescued from the oblivion into which it has been allowed to fall. So conspicuous, indeed, was the part played by this man at the time we speak of, that it won for him from his enemies the name of the " Pope's Patriarch ; " and we find him so described by them in their despatches. Thus, after the suppression of the Rising, the Attorney-General writes to Cecil : " One Holmes, thought to be the Patriarch, is indicted here (Durham), but he is fled."1
Mr. Holmes was assisted in his difficult and dangerous undertaking by three other priests, named Robert and John Peirson and John Robson. The first of these is spoken of by one of the witnesses at the trials held after the Rising as " the priest of Brancepeth," and he appears to have been private chaplain to the Earl of Westmoreland. John Peirson (perhaps brother to the former) was one of the Minor Canons of the Cathedral, and had probably made his submission to the Church some time before. Whatever may have been his history, there was evidently no question raised about his Orders,
1 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, April i, 1570.
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and he was now fully reinstated in his ministry, for which he afterwards suffered deprivation of his benefice.1 It was in his chambers on the Palace Green that Mr. Holmes appears to have found a lodging, and there that he received some of the conforming clergy, who came to him for absolution from their censures. As to Mr. Robson, no particu- lars seem discoverable, beyond the frequent mention of him in the trials as having said Mass in the Cathedral.
The burning of the Protestant service-books at the Cathedral had been the signal for similar pro- ceedings at the other churches; those, for instance, of St. Oswald's — consisting of " a Bible, the Book of Comon Praier, the Apologe, and the Homilies " — having been brought down, as was afterwards deposed, and " byrnt at the brig ende." • The next step was to rebuild a certain number of the ruined altars, on which the Holy Sacrifice might again be offered up, and to replace the holy-water stoups at the church doors ; and the laborious way in which this work was set about shows how permanent it was meant to be by its directors — Mr. Holmes and Mr. Robert Peirson — to whom Lord Westmoreland's uncle, Mr. Cuthbert Nevill, lent his powerful support. Orders are said to have been given by them for the rebuilding of no less than five of the Cathedral altars, although only two seem to have been actually erected. These were the high altar in the choir and that of our Blessed Lady in the south transept, called the Lady 1 Sharpe, pp. 231, 260. 2 Probably Elvet Bridge.
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Bolton altar, from the tithes of Bolton chapelry with which it had been anciently endowed. For the re- erection of these altars two of the old altar-stones, which lay buried under rubbish (one at the back of the house of Dr. Swift, Pilkington's Vicar-General, and the other " in the cemetery garth "), were with considerable trouble got back into the Cathedral, three days being spent in the work of their erection by some dozen workmen, some of whom afterwards, when put on their trial, had the weakness to profess themselves sorry for their " fault." In at least four also of the other churches — those, namely, of St. Giles, St. Margaret, St. Nicholas, and St. Oswald — the altars and the holy-water fonts were restored in the same way, and in these and the Cathedral as many Masses as the small number of priests avail- able would permit began now to be celebrated, to the indescribable delight and comfort of the crowds that flocked to hear them.
It is hard, indeed, to realize what must have been the joy of these long persecuted Catholics, to hear their well-loved churches once more echoing with the old familiar Latin chants of Mass and Vespers ; to receive again in the old way holy water1 and blessed bread ; to be suffered freely (as they quaintly expressed it) to " occupy their gaudes " [i.e., to use their rosaries, then commonly called gaudies], as the widow, Alice Wilkinson, declared upon her trial " many thowsand dyd ; " to be able
i Holy water was also taken to the people in their houses. The parish clerk of St. Nicholas' owned to having " willed two boys to go about the parish with holy water."
K II.
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once more to confess their sins to a true priest, who had power from Christ's Vicar to forgive them ; and, above all, to feel that our Blessed Lord Himself was once more present on the altar, and could be received as their food in Holy Communion.1 How sad to think that all this was but to last so short a time !
The first High Mass, of which we find mention, was sung in the Cathedral on St. Andrew's Day (Wednesday, November the 3Oth), by Mr. Robert Peirson, the choir consisting of the official singing- men of the Cathedral, who (whatever their weakness afterwards at the trials) seem at the time, at all events, to have been troubled by no other scruple than that they had not yet been " reconciled " to the Church ; on which point, however, they were reassured by the good priest, who told them "that
1 The following "Libel against hearers of Mass," Depositions and Ecclesiastical Proceedings, &c. (p. 131), from the private book of Swift, the Vicar-General, is instructive as showing the charges on which those tried before that worthy in the ensuing April were indicted : " That the said A.B., about St. Andrew last past, or before fourteen day of December, 1569, by the instigation of the divell . . . did unlawfullye erecte ... or cause to be erected . . . one alter and holie-water stone, . . . and also in the same monthes and yere came to Masse, Matens, Evensonge, procession, and like idolatrous service, thereat knelling, bowing, knocking, and shewing such like reverent gesture, used praying on beades, confession or shriving to a prest, toke holy water and holye breade ; and did also then and ther heare false and erroniouse doctrine against God and the Churche of England preached by one W. Holmes in the pulpit, and, subjecting himselve to the same doctryne and to the Pope, did, among other like wicked people knowen to him, knell down and receive absolution under Pope Pius name [St. Pius V.], in Latin, false-terming this godly estate of England to be a schisme or heresy."
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all that were reconciled in heart " might take part in the singing.1 The " throng of people " on this occasion is declared by one witness to have been " so much that she could not see the Mass, and so sat down in the low end of the same church and said her prayers."
The crown was put to the work of Durham's reconciliation to the Church by the public absolution of the people from their censures, pronounced by Mr. Holmes on December the 4th, which happened that year to be the Second Sunday of Advent. On that day Mr. Holmes mounted the Cathedral pulpit, and after preaching on the state of heresy and schism which the new religion had established in the country, exhorted all his hearers to submit once more to the Catholic Church, and to kneel down whilst he gave them absolution; "affirming," as a witness at the trials said, " that he had authority to reconcile men to the Church of Rome : " and " thereupon he openly reconciled and absolved in the Pope's name all the hearers there." Then,, making his way through the still kneeling crowd to the high altar in the choir, he offered up the Holy Sacrifice, with what feelings of joyful gratitude we can well imagine. The day concluded with " Even- songe in Latten," and the singing of the anthem, Gaude Virgo Christipara, in honour of our Blessed Lady.
On this self-same Sunday, at Bishop Auckland (Pilkington's own place of residence), a similar con- soling scene was enacted in St. Helen's Church by 1 Declaration of Thomas Wark. (Ibid. p. 153.)
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a priest named George Whyte, who, " coming into the church (at whose procurement the deponent cannot say), went into the pulpit, where, when he had preached against the state of religion established in this realm, he willed them to revert to the Church of Rome ; and thereupon read absolution in the Pope's name to all the people, . . . and afterwards . . . said Mass there."1
How general the Catholic revival was throughout the county would best be shown by a list of the various places which figure in the depositions ; but of these it seems enough to mention Sedgefield, Long Newton, Lanchester, Chester-le-Street, Stockton, and Monkwearmouth. How many souls were strengthened by it to bear steadfastly the fearful troubles which were so soon to come upon them, can be known to God alone ; but that its effects did not soon pass away is proved by the angry words, already quoted, of Bishop Barnes — Pilkington's successor — who (in writing to Lord Burghley six years after its occurrence), says of the Church of Durham that its " stinke is grievous in the nose of God and men, and which to purge far passeth Hercules' labours."
During the week which followed the public *' reconciliation " of the people of Durham, Mr. Holmes seems to have had the happiness of receiv- ing back into the Church most of the Protestant ministers yet remaining in the town. Amongst these were no less than five of the Minor Canons of the Cathedral, who, fortified with a commen-
1 Ibid. p. 181.
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datory letter from Mr. John Peirson, their former comrade, on Friday, December the gth, went out all together to see Mr. Holmes at Staindrop — " who,, besides the letter of Sir John Pierson's, was heartily moved upon their submission to reconcile them from the schism ; every man acknowledging his state of life for eleven years last past privately and secretly, did promise that they would now turn off the same." It would seem, however, that Mr. Holmes was not satisfied with regard to their Orders, at all events as far as the priesthood was concerned ; for he "was content to admit them as deacons to minister in the church, but not to celebrate."1
Unhappily, most of these somewhat hastily converted ministers seemed to have lacked either the sincerity or the courage to stand the test of persecution, and returned again to their old ways, Still a brave profession of his Faith was made by one of them, John Browne by name, who, in addition to his minor canonry, held also the curacy of Witton Gilbert. No less than three witnesses made depositions afterwards that, in the chapel of Witton Gilbert, on a Sunday or holiday in December last, they " heard Sir John Browne, curate there, say openly to his parishioners after this sort : ' I have these eleven years taught you the wrong way in such learning as is against my soul and yours both, and I am sorry and ask God mercy therefor, and you my parishioners; and do here renounce my
1 Depositions of William Smyth and William Blenkinsopp, Minor Canons, who both, unfortunately, afterwards retracted. (Ibid. pp. 138, 144.)
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living before you all ; and wheresoever you meet me, in town or field, take me as a stranger and none of your curate.' "J
For a few days after his reception back again into the one true fold, this brave man had the consolation of ministering at the services in the Cathedral, where he is once mentioned as serving Mr. Holmes' Mass ; but his name was naturally struck off from the list of the Cathedral clergy on the suppression of the Rising, and most probably he had to flee the country.
It is time for us to return to the Earl of Northumberland and the Earl of Westmoreland, his fellow-leader in the Rising. Unfortunately for the ultimate success of their attempt, they had been hurried into taking action without sufficient time for preparation. They were, moreover, disappointed both as to the co-operation of many of the gentry from whom help had been expected, and also as to assistance which had been looked for from abroad. Thus, although they were enabled to carry all before them for a little while, nevertheless the movement could not sustain itself, and was soon forced to collapse. Meanwhile, however, the Earl of Sussex, the Queen's representative in the North, was so doubtful of the fidelity of his own troops, of whose Catholic sympathies he was well aware, that he dared not stir from York against the insurgents till reinforcements should reach him from the South ; and his letters to Cecil betray his great anxiety.
1 Ibid. p. 174.
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The uncompromising manner in which the religious purpose of the Rising was put forward by the two Earls, is well shown by the following procla- mation which they issued a day or two after their entry into Durham : " Thomas, Earl of Northumber- land, and Charles, Earl of Westmoreland, the Queen's true and faithful subjects, to all the same of the old and Catholic Faith, — . . . As divers ill-disposed persons about her Majesty have by their crafty dealing overthrown in this realm the true and Catholic religion towards God, abused the Queen, dishonoured the realm, and now seek to procure the destruction of the nobility ; we have gathered ourselves together to resist force by force, . . . and to redress those things amiss, with the restoring of all ancient customs and liberties to God and this noble realm."
It is true that in a later manifesto, put forth when they were beginning to retreat, the Earls sought to disarm hostility and win fresh adherents by speaking only of the need of fixing the succession to the throne, without making any open reference to religion. But the successor, whose claim they wished to get acknowledged, was none other than Mary Queen of Scots, through whom they hoped eventually to obtain the restoration of the Catholic religion. The idea, however, of placing her upon the throne at once was not even mooted — as we know from the declaration of Northumberland himself. He was guilty, therefore, of no hypocrisy in calling himself in the above proclamation " a true and faithful subject of Elizabeth."
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On the day following their entry into Durham, the Earls moved southwards, with the intention of liberating, if possible, the Scottish Queen, who was then confined at Tutbury, in Staffordshire. Nothing, it would seem, could well exceed the enthusiasm with which "the sturdy men of the North " flocked to join them.
" No sooner," writes M. de Fonblanque, " had they set up their standards in Durham, than men of all classes, from nobles and knights, accompanied by their tenants mounted and equipped for war, down to unarmed labourers bringing only their stout hearts and good-will, rallied round their natural chiefs." They went on, continues the same writer, " steadily increasing their numbers, till, . . . on the 23rd of November, the force amounted to 6,000 men."1
"All their force both of horse and foot," writes Sir F. Leek to the Council, " wear red crosses, as well the priests as others."5 Their standard, representing our Blessed Lord with Blood streaming from His Wounds, was borne by old Mr. Richard Norton, High Sheriff of Yorkshire in the previous year, whose long grey hair and venerable bearing excited the enthusiasm of the beholders.
The chief chaplain of their army appears to have been none other than the Blessed Thomas Plumtree, illustrious for his martyrdom at Durham after the suppression of the Rising. In an old ballad of the time he is called " the preacher of the Rebels ; " and
1 Annals of the House of Percy, ii. pp. 51, 57. z Domestic Calendar, Addenda, December 3, 1569.
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the same title is given him in Lord Scroop's list of the prisoners whom he sent to Durham : " Thomas Plomtree, a priest and their preacher; 5>1 and as, in the report of the trials held at Durham, he is only mentioned once as having there said Mass, it seems probable that he accompanied the two Earls on their march southwards, and only returned to Durham with them. As to this holy man's earlier life, we unfortunately know little. He seems to have been a native of the diocese of Lincoln, and to have been a scholar of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, in 1543. He took the degree of B.A. in 1546, and in the same year was made Rector of Stubton, in Lincolnshire. He resigned this benefice at the change of religion under Elizabeth, and became master of a school at Lincoln, which position he also had to give up later on account of his religion.2 A despatch of Fenelon, the French Ambas- sador, described Blessed Thomas Plumtree, a few days after his martyrdom, as estime home fort sqavant et de bonne me?
Staindrop and Darlington seem to have been the Earls' first stopping-places after leaving Brancepeth, and at each, as at Durham, they proclaimed the
1 Among manye newes reported of late,
As touching the Rebelles their wicked estate, Yet Syr Thomas Plomtrie, their preacher they saie, Hath made the north countrie to crie well a daye, Well a daye, well a daye, well a daye, woe is mee, Syr Thomas Plomtrie is hanged on a tree.
(Sharpe, pp. 123, 383.) In a summary of those executed (p. 140), Sharpe, by an evident mistake, calls him William Plumtree. 2 Bridgewater's Concertatio, fol. 405. See Foster, Alumni Oxonienses. 3 January 21, 1570. Quoted by Sharpe, p. 188.
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re-establishment of Catholic worship. Leaving Darlington on November the 17th, after assisting publicly at the Holy Sacrifice, offered up most probably by Blessed Thomas Plumtree, they passed into Yorkshire, continually receiving fresh adherents and nowhere meeting an opponent, and proceeded through Richmond and Northallerton to Ripon, where the Holy Mass was once more celebrated in St. Wilfrid's stately Minster. Thence advancing still further south, they encamped on November the 23rd on Clifford Moor, near Wetherby. So far everything had gone favourably. " They had suc- ceeded in dispersing the levies in course of forma- tion for the Queen's service, had captured a body of 300 horse at Tadcaster, and cut off communication with York, where Sussex lay with a garrison not exceeding 2,000 men, ' whereof not past 300 horsemen.' A vigorous assault would have placed him and the city at their mercy."1
At this point however, the unfortunate failure of supplies and money, as also differences of opinion amongst the leaders, put a stop to further progress, and necessitated their return into the bishopric of Durham. Marching, therefore, again northwards, they succeeded in capturing, first the port of Hartlepool, through which they hoped to receive succour from abroad, and a little later Barnard Castle, where seems to have occurred almost the only righting, and to which they laid a formal siege. The sympathy felt by a large portion of the garrison for the undertaking of the Earls, was shown by some hundreds of them
1 De Fonblanque, ii. p. 58.
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leaping from the walls to join them ; and, at the end of ten days, Sir George Bowes, the royalist com- mander of the castle, found it necessary to capitulate, and was allowed to march out with such troops as remained faithful to him, and proceed to York.
Whilst the siege was still continuing, the Earl of Northumberland, in consequence of the rumoured approach of hostile troops from Berwick, had returned with five hundred horse to Durham ; it was thus he was present in the Cathedral on December the 4th, when Mr. Holmes publicly absolved the people.1 Also along with him and as chaplain to his soldiers, the Blessed Thomas Plumtree seems to have returned, for he appears to have been the celebrant of the Mass said on that memorable day immediately before Mr. Holmes' sermon. Amongst the citizens of Durham tried afterwards for having been present at the services held in the Cathedral, one, Ralph Stevenson, admitted that "he was at Plomtre's Masse in the Collidge Church and was at Holmes' preichinge. ... He toke absolucion of the said preicher, emongst the resydew of the people."2
Meanwhile, the approach of his long expected reinforcements had set Sussex free to commence a movement northwards, other troops to join him having been gathered at Newcastle. The hope- lessness of any ultimate success to be obtained by
1 Depositions and Ecclesiastical Proceedings, &c.
2 Ibid. p. 181. The Close, occupied by the Prebendaries' houses on the south side of the Cathedral, is still called " the College." Probably the Cathedral came to be spoken of as the "College Church," from the erection in it of a College of Canons in place of the former monks.
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the insurgents was thus made daily more apparent. They held their last council of war at Durham on December the i6th, when Lord Westmoreland seems to have been in favour of still standing out, but the gentle and more timorous Northumberland, afraid of causing useless bloodshed, and anxious still, as far as might be possible, to avoid resistance to his Sovereign, was desirous that they should cease hostilities.1 Opinions being thus divided, no course but flight was open to them. On the same night, accordingly, dismissing their poorer followers to their own homes, the two Earls, with the chief part of the gentry that had joined them, rode off to Hexham. A few days later they made their way across the Scottish frontier, trusting to find safety for a while amongst the half independent clans dwelling on the borders ; and thence, not long afterwards, Lord Westmoreland and many others succeeded in escaping to the Continent.
The whole North was now at the mercy of the Earl of Sussex, whom the Queen had especially charged to execute on the offenders the full severity of martial law. " The most repulsive feature," writes the author of the Percy Annals, "in the retaliatory measures now adopted by Elizabeth and her agents, is the cold-blooded, calculating spirit in which whole-
1 Reports (perhaps exaggerated) of the Earl's hesitation had already reached his enemies. On the previous November 24, Lord Hunsdon wrote from York to Cecil : " The other [Northum- berland] is very timorous, and has meant twice or thrice to submit ; but his wife encourages him to persevere, and rides up and down with their army, so that the grey mare is the better horse." (Domestic Calendar, Addenda (1566—1579), p. 124.)
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sale executions were inflicted upon the ' meaner sort,' while those were spared who were able to ransom their lives. The gentlemen and substantial yeomen who fell into the hands of the authorities were allowed to escape the penalty of their offences by a money payment ; while the poor peasants . . . were consigned to the gallows by hundreds. ... A report, drawn up in October, 1573, by Lord Huntingdon, put the number of rebels actually executed at ' seven hundred and odd, . . . wholly of the meanest of the people, except the aldermen of Durham, Plomtree, their preacher, the constables, and fifty serving- men.'"1 "In the county of Durham alone," says Lingard, "more than three hundred individuals suffered death ; nor was there between Newcastle and Wetherby, a district of sixty miles in length and forty in breadth, a town or village in which some of the inhabitants did not expire on the gibbet."2
Blessed Thomas Plumtree was taken in his flight together with some three hundred others, and con- ducted to Carlisle. Thence, a few days later, he was sent back by Lord Scroop to Durham along with some thirty landed gentlemen, whose estates were marked for confiscation, and committed to the custody of Sir George Bowes, the late opponent of the Earls at Barnard Castle, who was now installed in Durham Castle as Marshal for the keeping of the "prisoners rebels." In pursuance, probably, of the following suggestions, found in a memorial of Cecil's
1 De Fonblanque, ii. pp. 76 and 80.
2 History of England, vol. vi. p. 217.
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— " For some terror . . . particular examples are to be made at Durham, where the Bibles and Common Prayers were misused. . . . Some notable example is to be made of the priests that have offended in this rebellion"1 — Thomas Plumtree was singled out amongst the very first for special punishment, in hatred of his priestly character.
The Earl of Sussex came himself to Durham to preside in person at the executions, which began on January the 4th. On that day the blessed martyr was led out from the Castle, in full sight of the old Cathedral in which he had so lately offered up the Holy Sacrifice, and conducted down the winding street which leads to the market-place, where his gibbet was erected. Dr. Nicholas Sander, writing within a year and a half of the occurrence, relates that, " on his arriving at the place of execu- tion (Jam ad mortem ducto), his life was offered to him, if he would but renounce the Catholic Faith and embrace the heresy ; " to which the martyr nobly answered, "that he had no desire so to continue living in the world, as meantime to die to God. Wherefore, having fearlessly confessed his Faith, by God's grace he suffered death in this world, that he might merit to receive from Christ eternal life." 2
Surtees3 quotes the register of St. Nicholas' (the church in the market-place where the martyr suffered) as recording, on January the i4th, the
1 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, p. 172.
2 De Visibili Monarchia Ecclesia, Louvain, 1571, p. 732.
3 History of Durham, iv. p. 51.
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burial of " Maistre Plumbetre." In the English College pictures Blessed Thomas Plumtrce is repre- sented as being cut in pieces, after hanging, as were most of the other martyrs ; and from his burial having taken place ten days after his martyrdom, it seems that his quarters must have been left hanging on the gibbet, " for some terror," for the space of ten whole days. The ancient cemetery, in which he seems to have been laid, is now covered by the pavement of the market-place.
The remainder of the priests who had worked so zealously at Durham, during the brief restoration of the Catholic religion, seem to have succeeded in escaping ; although of few of them, except William Holmes, " the Patriarch," is it possible to find further actual mention. There seems, however, to be good reason for identifying the John Peirson, spoken of amongst them, with " a venerable old priest " named John Pearson, who "was imprisoned" .(says Father Christopher Grene, SJ.) " for many years at Durham, for refusing to attend heretical services;" and who — from the order in which Father Grene makes mention of him — appears to have died not later than the year 1585, "from his cruel treatment in a dungeon into which he was thrust, when in a burning fever, among a set of thieves." ] Against Mr. Holmes, who had escaped to Scotland, a special indictment had been made out at Durham, and more than one allusion to him is found in the State Papers of the time. Thus, on the I5th of February, 1570, Lord Hunsdon writes from Berwick 1 Father Morris, Troubles, Hi. p. 315.
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to the Privy Council, that " Lord Home is the principal receiver of the Queen's rebels, and has Mass in his house ; for the Patriarch, who was at Durham with the Earls, is now at Fast Castle," near Dunbar. A little later (March the lyth), he writes again to say that he has received information that " the Patriarch and other rebels have prepared a ship to pass into Flanders," and that he hopes to intercept them, as " Mr. Randolph [then Eliza- beth's Postmaster General] has practised with the master of the ship." Lord Hunsdon's hopes in this respect were, however, doomed to disappoint- ment ; and on the following April the ist he was obliged to inform Cecil that, by the contrivance of Lord Home, who had received warning of his plot, Mr. Holmes and his companions had been sent to Orkney, to be conveyed by that circuitous route to Flanders.1 There, amongst the English exiles for the Faith, "William Holmes, priest," is named in Sander's De Visibili Monarchia.
This section may be concluded with the following beautiful letter, written by Mr. Holmes from Louvain, in the September of 1571, to one of his fellow- fugitives of the Rising — George Smythe, of Esh Hall, Durham — who had not yet succeeded in escaping to the Continent, being kept a prisoner by Lord Lindsay :
" I am sorry to seem to neglect you in not writing ; but I have to write when I should sleep. I have prayed for your spiritual comfort, and am
1 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, and Sharpe, p. 72.
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glad to hear of your courage in God's cause. You may rejoice that you are thought worthy to suffer for His sake. Walking on the seas tried Peter's love, but he was not suffered to drown. Drink the cup of persecution willingly, though bitter in taste, and your reward shall be everlasting life."1
This letter, intercepted by the spies of Cecil, can never have been seen by him for whose encourage- ment it was written.
None of God's saints have won the crowns they now wear in Heaven, without going through much suffering here on earth. It seems indeed a necessary condition for the acquiring of sanctity in any high degree to have first passed through the school of suffering, since there is no way of becoming like to our Blessed Lord without taking up the Cross.
It could not be otherwise with Blessed Thomas Percy ; and we have now reached a period in his life at which began for him a long course of tribu- lations, destined in God's providence to fit him for his final triumph.
The brave Countess of Northumberland had clung faithfully to her husband throughout the campaign, riding everywhere with him and his army. On passing into Scotland after the flight from Durham, they both took refuge for a little while in the cottage of a Liddesdale outlaw, known upon the Borders as John of the Side. It was only for a few days, however, that the Earl's enemies allowed him to enjoy even the poor shelter
1 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, Sept. 3 (or 13), 1571. L II.
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which Sussex, in writing to the Queen, described as "not to be compared to any dog-kennel in England."
Acting in agreement with the Ministers of Eliza- beth, the Scotch Regent, Murray, had already made a proclamation, in which he warned his subjects that "the rebellious people of England intend to enter Scotland in a warlike manner, and set up again the Papistical idolatry and abominable Mass; " and, on hearing of the arrival of the fugitives amongst the Border clans, he succeeded, by the free use of threats and promises to the men of Liddesdale, in procuring their expulsion.1 On being driven thence, Northumberland, thinking that his late rough hosts would at least respect his wife, and not wishing to expose her to further unknown perils, left her amongst them, and set out to seek protection from the neighbouring clan of Armstrongs. No sooner had he gone, however, than the poor Countess found herself robbed of all her personal effects, including her money and her jewels, whilst her horse and those of her attendants were seized by the outlaws for their own use. Happily she was not left very long in this miserable state, but was rescued by the friendly Laird of Fernihurst, who conducted her a few days later to Fast Castle, on the sea-coast, where, with many of the other fugitives, she was protected by Lord Home.
Meanwhile the Earl himself had been betrayed
into a snare laid for him by the Regent, through
the treachery of a certain Hector Armstrong, whom,
when a fugitive in England, he had himself formerly
1 Foreign Calendar, December 18 and 22, 1569.
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protected. By this man he was entrapped into a conference with an envoy from the Regent ; and whilst talking with the latter was suddenly sur- rounded by a troop of horsemen. These succeeded in conveying him to Hawick, in spite of the brave resistance of his followers, who gave pursuit and contrived to kill the leader of the capturing party.1
The betrayal of the Earl to the Regent, in the manner just related, took place on the Christmas Eve of 1569, but eight days after his flight from Durham.2 Torn away, as he was, thus suddenly from all his friends and followers, and committed to the mercy of a declared and faithless enemy, it is not easy to imagine a much more forlorn condition : and his " great distress and misery, clean without apparel or money ; " and still more his anxiety of mind as to the condition of " his friends, his men, and those that were with him," and, above all, of " his children " — four little girls (of whom the eldest was no more than ten), now bereft of both their parents, and left behind in England — is feelingly described in a letter, which was addressed on the Earl's behalf a few days later to his brother, Sir Henry Percy,3 who, throughout the Rising, had taken open part against him, but who now began to show some willingness to help him.
The news of Northumberland's capture by the Scottish Regent was communicated to the Queen on the day after its occurrence by Lord Sussex, who had at once received information of it. Nothing
1 De Fonblanque, ii. p. 68.
2 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, December 25, 1569. 3 De Fonblanque, ii. p. 71.
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else, however, would content Elizabeth but that the Earl should be handed over to herself; and she, with this object, immediately commenced negotiating in spite of the warning sent to her by Lord Hunsdon, that he found "the nobility and the commonalty of Scotland bent wholly to the contrary," and that " if his spies did not much fail, most of the nobility thought it a great reproach to the country to deliver any banished man to the slaughter." l
The only effect this message had upon Elizabeth is shown by a letter, in which she seeks to rouse the bigotry of the Scottish Regent, telling him that " as the rebels, besides their treason against her, have purposed the alteration of the common religion, she cannot think that any godly wise councillor will either maintain them or impeach their delivery."2 This acknowledgment of the religious purpose of the Rising, made by Elizabeth herself, is worth noting.
In the end, rinding it impossible otherwise to obtain possession of her victim, Elizabeth was not ashamed to bargain with the successor of Murray as to the price of the Earl's surrender ; and at last, in spite of her known avarice, agreed to pay for him £2,000 — possibly worth £16,000 to £20,000 in the present value of money. Thus the Blessed Thomas Percy had, like our Lord, the glory of being sold for money to his enemies ; and what added to the infamy of the transaction was the fact that the Scots were at the same time treating for his ransom with
1 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, January 13, 1570. 2 Foreign Calendar, January 24, 1570.
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the Countess, whose offer they would have accepted had not Elizabeth outbidden her. Meanwhile, the Earl himself had been placed by the Regent in strict confinement at Lochleven, in the castle famous for having been a short time previously the prison of Queen Mary. There he was left to languish for two years and a half.
We are indebted for a reliable account of the captivity and martyrdom of Blessed Thomas Percy (from which I shall not scruple to quote freely) to the pen of Dr. Nicholas Sander,1 the much calum- niated historian of the Anglican schism, who was for some time in Flanders with the Countess of Northumberland, besides being in actual correspond- ence with the Earl.
After speaking of the wonderful gentleness and patience with which the saintly man bore his captivity at Lochleven, and of the continual fasts and watchings and pious meditations, by means of which he strove to win that " crown of glory, which the just judge now has rendered to him," this writer goes on to relate that, although the Calvinist Laird of Lochleven, who had the Earl in keeping, " often brought thither a number of persons of his
1 Martyrium sanctissimi viri Thames Percei, Comitis N orthumbria . It was published, after Sander's death, in Bridgewater's Concertatio, Treves, 1589. So far as I know, it has not yet been translated. Unfortunately I have not been able to consult the MS. at Florence which Mr. Turnbull found among the Medici Archives there. He says it contains an account of the execution sent to the Grand Duke of Tuscany by one of his residents in England, and that it records "the speech and even the prayers uttered by the Earl at the solemn moment." (W. Turnbull, Letters of Mary Stuart, p. 67, note.)
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sect, who tried to draw the Earl away from the Catholic faith into their new errors ; these men, nevertheless, were never able, either by cunning arguments and speeches, or by any kind of threats or promises, to prevail on him to depart even in the smallest matter from the communion of the Catholic Church ; and yet, if he would have but yielded somewhat to their heresy, there were not wanting persons quite prepared to promise to him, not merely his release from prison, but also his old rank and honours. If, as often happened, meat was brought to him on days on which Catholics observe a fast, he contented himself with bread alone ; and by his example he moved some of those attending on him to repent of their apostasy. Sometimes he spent whole days upon his knees, . . . and prayer, to which he had been devoted all his life, was now more than ever his delight." " I myself," continues Sander, " have seen a fair sized book, elegantly written and illuminated by his own hand, into which he had brought together a quantity of prayers gathered out of various works."
The above account of the promises made to the Earl at this time, if he would but renounce his Faith, is confirmed by the following passage taken from an intercepted letter, which was addressed, in the May of 1570, to the Duchess of Feria in Spain, by Sir Francis Englefield, then living in exile for the Faith at Antwerp. After mentioning the Earl's imprisonment at Lochleven, the writer of this letter says : " Hunsdon has offered Northumberland con- ditions of pardon ; but he has refused them without
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liberty (be given) to the Catholics to live as such." 1
The unselfishness with which, at the cost of all manner of sacrifices to herself, Lady Northumberland laboured for her husband's liberation could not be surpassed ; and at one time it really seemed as if her efforts were about to be successful. With the Earl's keeper, William Douglas, of Lochleven, she contrived to come to an agreement as to the sum which would be accepted, and the raising of the money seemed to be the only further thing required. For this purpose, seeing no hope of obtaining it as long as she remained where she was, and afraid lest her own liberty should sooner or later be interfered with, about the June of 1570 she moved northwards to Aberdeen, with the view of making her way thence to the Continent. In this she received much help from Lord Seton, who, after entertaining her for some time "in old Aberdeen in the Chancellor's house " — where " it is said," wrote Randolph, " she hears Mass daily " — himself set sail with her for the Low Countries in the following August.2
In Flanders, the Countess received a kind welcome from the Duke of Alva, who undertook to interest the King of Spain on her behalf; and from that monarch (though only after several months' delay) she received a promise of 6,000 crowns, which fell far short of the sum demanded by Lochleven. Nothing, however, could daunt her zeal, and at last, in the January of 1572, she was able to send word to her husband that, thanks to 1 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, May 7, 1570. 2 Sharpe, p. 346.
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a further promise of 4,000 crowns from Pope St. Pius V., the sum required for his ransom was obtained ; and that nothing was now left but to take the necessary measures for securing his safe passage to the Continent.1
How high the hopes of the Earl's many friends abroad had risen, may be gathered from the following letter written from Louvain, in the month just mentioned, to the prisoner of Lochleven by none other than the Dr. Sander I have quoted. It was intercepted by the agents of Elizabeth, and so was never suffered to convey the consolation intended by its writer. We see from it that Dr. Sander was then on the point of setting out for Rome, whither St. Pius V. had summoned him ; and it contains a very pleasing reference to that Pope's affection for the imprisoned nobleman.
" Amongst my other fortunes, I account it not the best that I am forced to leave this country, when you, as we hear, are drawing near to it ; for
1 The Countess' long and touching letter conveying the above intelligence is given in the Annals of the House of Percy , ii.pp.g6 — 101. In speaking of persons likely to be able to assist her husband, she describes Dr. Allen (afterwards Cardinal) as "the most singular man in my opinion, next to Mr. Sanders, on this side the seas. If he might be had (to help you), I think you could not have the choice of the like, whensoever God should send you hither." The following shows the anxiety both of the Earl and herself for their children, who had been separated from them, and were apparently in the hands of Protestants. " For your children, the best means that I can imagine to have them transmitted hither were a suit to be made to have them licensed to come to see you. . . . The eldest of all I wish the rather, because her age is fittest to receive instruction, and most ready to take knowledge now of the virtuous examples, which here she could see and learn, and there doth want altogether."
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now I depart to Italy, being called for to Rome ; and yet amongst my adversities, I accept it the least that I go not hence before I see you in some towardness to come hither. What travail my Lady has taken for your deliver}', not only do I know who was a part of it, but all men see ; because she was no longer able to work by private means, but was forced to follow the Court, and to press upon the Duke's grace even against his will. God saw her tears and heard her prayers. But what say I, hers ? He saw and heard yours, which were so earnest that they also appeared in her. I shall long to hear from you, being at Rome ; and, much more, to hear of your delivery, and to deliver your letter of thanks to him that there loves you ; and truly if he loves you, as he has given good evidence, then God loves you. For these three hundred years there was no such man in that See, albeit many excellent men have sat there. But you have a more proper token of God's love — your imprisonment, affliction, trouble, and tedious oppression. That do you embrace, and you have conquered the world. As you have borne yourself well in adversity, so take care not to forget the goodness of God if He send you prosperity, as I beseech Him to do."1
The activity of the spies employed by Cecil (now Lord Burghley) on the Continent, is proved by the quantity of letters such as the above, which they found means of intercepting, and which are now calendared in the volumes published by the Master 1 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, January 8, 1572.
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of the Rolls, together with the letters of the spies that sent them. It was through the agency of one of these spies — a man named John Lee, who, by his pretended zeal for the Catholic Faith, and his feigned ardour in the cause of Mary Queen of Scots, had contrived to worm himself into the confidence of the poor Countess and the other exiles (we hear more of this rascal in the life of Blessed John Storey) — that the Ministers of Elizabeth received prompt and full information of each step taken by the unfortunate lady for her husband's liberation.
On learning, therefore, that a final agreement was on the point of being come to between the Countess and Douglas of Lochleven, Elizabeth determined at once to push on her negotiations with the Scottish Regent to the conclusion on which she had set her mind. The shameful bargain for the Earl's surrender was accordingly arranged on the i6th of April, 1572, as is shown by a letter from the Queen herself to Lord Hunsdon, the Governor of Berwick, in which she signifies her willingness to pay the £2,000 demanded. Its actual payment seems, however, only to have been extorted from her by the repeated assurances of Lord Hunsdon, that the Scots " would not deliver up the Earl without the money."1
It is true that the Scottish Regent strove to veil the infamy of his own part in the proceeding by accompanying his surrender of the Earl with a hypocritical request that his life might be spared ; but it seems impossible that he should have had
1 State Papers, Scotland, April 16, May i, 2, and 7, 1572.
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any doubt as to Elizabeth's intention in demanding him. The delivery of the Earl to Lord Hunsdon took place at Eyemouth, near to Coldingham, on May the 2gth, and thence on the same day he was conveyed to Berwick. Sander relates that his heartless keeper at Lochleven, in placing him upon the vessel which was to carry him to Coldingham, had treacherously endeavoured to persuade him that he was about to be set free, and conveyed across the sea to Flanders ; and that the meek confessor of Christ, although suspecting some deceit, had bestowed a parting kiss on his betrayer, in imitation of his Master.
Hunsdon, who had probably expected to find his prisoner either querulous or sullen, and who was hardly likely to understand aright the calmness, even in the midst of danger and of sorrow, of one who had given up all earthly things for God, remarks with something of a sneer, in announcing the Earl's surrender to Lord Burghley, that "he is readier to talk of hawks and hounds than anything else, though very sorrowful and fearing for his life."1 He did not see that he had no right to expect a prisoner to discuss with his captor the things which really lay deepest in his heart. Still, that Lord Hunsdon was not without some sense of the disgraceful nature of the transaction to which he was a party, appears from -the remark, which Sander says he made on paying down the price of the Earl's blood to the Scotch lord who surrendered him : " You have got your money, but you have sold your faith and honour! "
1 State Papers, Scotland, May 29, 1572.
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As soon as Elizabeth heard that the Earl had been actually surrendered, she wrote herself to Hunsdon, giving instructions with reference to his confinement, and enclosing a long list of questions, drawn up by Burghley, to which a written answer was to be re- quired from him. " You may use speeches," wrote the Queen, "to terrify him with the extremity of punishment if he shall conceal anything. As you see cause, you may also comfort him with hope, so as it be not in our name, if he will utter the truth of every person. . . . We like not any chargeable entertainment of him in his diet, considering him as a person attainted."1
Reference has been already several times made to the Earl's full and careful answers to these questions, which have been published, with all their quaintness both of phrase and spelling, by Sir Cuthbert Sharpe.2 Surely it is impossible to read them without being struck by the singleness of purpose and scrupulous regard to conscience which characterized his whole conduct with reference to the Rising.
" Entertainment," such as accorded with the instructions of the Queen, seems to have been found for him in the house of Sir Valentine Browne, the Treasurer of Berwick, whose report of him to Lord Burghley, as " nothing altered from his old mummish opinions, which he would persuade to be taken as the cause of the rebellion,"3 is a fresh
1 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, June 5, 1572.
2 Memorials of the Rebellion, pp. 189, seq. 3 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, June 8, 1572.
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testimony, if one were wanted, to the confessor's fidelity to his religion. In the same letter, dated June the 8th, his keeper speaks of him as " standing in great hope of Her Majesty's mercy," which seems to show that Hunsdon had acted on Elizabeth's insidious permission to " comfort him with hope " intended by her never to receive fulfilment.
News of the Queen's orders did not reach Berwick till July the nth, on which day Lord Hunsdon received instructions to convey the Earl to York for execution. A further delay of some six weeks, however, followed, occasioned partly by the real or pretended hesitation of the Queen, partly by Hunsdon's blunt refusal to undertake the charge of being the Earl's " carrier . . to execution into a place where he had nothing to do," though at the same time he declared himself quite willing to " deliver him at Alnwick, but no further."1
It seems to have been during this latter portion of his stay at Berwick that Blessed Thomas had a violent and dangerous attack of fever, in which his one anxiety, as Sander tells us, was his fear that it might rob him of the martyr's crown.
The disagreeable task of conducting him to the place where he was to be martyred was entrusted, at the suggestion of Lord Hunsdon, to Sir John Forster, on whom the revenues of a large part of the attainted nobleman's estates had been bestowed, together with the use of Alnwick Castle. It was an undertaking not altogether free from risk, and it is evident that those that had to carry it out were not
1 Ibid. July u.
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without anxiety. Not only did the route from Berwick lead necessarily through Northumberland, the actual earldom of their victim — where, as Hunsdon himself had previously written to the Privy Council, people " knew no other prince but a Percy," and loved in particular the good and virtuous Earl Thomas "better than they did the Queen"1 — but Durham and a great part of Yorkshire, the chief scene of the recent Rising, had also to be traversed. Accordingly, with the duplicity which from the first had characterized the proceedings of the Earl's enemies, they diligently spread the report that he was about to be reinstated in his former honours ; and even he himself seems to have been kept in ignorance of the orders which the Queen had given, though he can hardly have been really doubtful as to the ultimate result.
Arrived at Alnwick, his own feudal castle, he was handed over to Sir John Forster on August the 1 8th, and there the following night was spent. The journey thence to York was broken both at New- castle and Darlington, and thus occupied three days; and in consequence, as it would seem, of the weakness left by his late illness, the Earl was conveyed in a carriage surrounded by a strong guard of horsemen.2 Friends came in numbers to greet him as he passed, and his cheerful and intrepid expression rilled them with admiration. When they
1 Foreign Calendar, December 31, 1569; and Domestic Calendar, Addenda, January 13, 1570.
2 The strength of the force employed is shown by Forster's charge of £154 us. 4d. for his journey from Alnwick to York and back. (Sharpe, pp. 333, 334.)
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offered him good wishes for his life and honour, Sander says that he replied : " That life would be more pleasing to my flesh than death — not so much on account of myself, as of my wife, my children, and my friends — I neither can nor will deny, provided that my conscience be not injured. For, rather than that should suffer, let death come and life depart."
York was reached on the afternoon of August the 2ist, a mid-day halt having been made at Topcliffe, which had been the Earl's last place of residence before the Rising. Here it seems possible he may still have found his children, and have been allowed to say farewell to them. We are not told where he was lodged on the one night he spent in York, but we may presume he would be taken to the Castle. This presumption falls in with what Sander tells us of his farewell interview with Sir Thomas Metham, a venerable sufferer for the Faith, who, together with his lady, had been several years detained as prisoners in York Castle, on account of their refusal to attend service, or receive Communion in the Protestant Church.1 " He had formerly," says Sander, " been united in close intimacy and friend- ship with the Earl, and was desirous to see him enduring imprisonment for our Lord, in order that his own constancy in his holy resolution might be
1 A letter addressed to Cecil (Domestic Calendar, Addenda), dated York, February 6, 1570, describes Sir Thomas Metham as a " most wilful Papist. ... He does much hurt here, and is reverenced by Papists as a pillar of their faith. . . . I caused him to be committed to the Castle, where he remains and does harm, yet would have done more if he had remained at large."
1 76 BE. THOMAS PERCY AND THOMAS PLUMTREE
strengthened by the spectacle." Having obtained the permission of his keeper, " he saw him and held converse with him, and bade him a last adieu. Then returning to his own place of confinement, he gave up his soul to God a few days afterwards, so that having loved each other in life, in death they were not divided."
At York a last attempt was made to draw the prisoner, if possible, from the Catholic Faith ; and his life (whether with the Queen's authority or not) was offered him if he would but abandon his religion. Of this fact, Sander says,1 he had received most certain information ; and the self-same thing is affirmed by Cardinal Allen.2
It is hardly necessary to say that Blessed Thomas refused to listen to an offer of his life made dependent on such a condition ; and at last, about nine o'clock on the same evening (August the 2ist), Sir John Forster, seeing that he could not induce him to alter his determination, announced to him that he was to prepare to suffer execution about two o'clock on the afternoon of the next day.
The Earl received the announcement with a joy
1 It seems necessary to caution readers against a most strange mistake made by Tierney (in a note to Dodd's History, iii. 13) with reference to this offer of life made to the Earl. Through want of attention to the text of the passage from which he is quoting, he makes Sander " mention it only as auditum quendam incertum et praterea nihil." Due care in reading Sander would have shown him that the words, " auditum quendam," &c., refer, not to the offer of life made to the Earl, if he would apostatize (which fact Sander says he has ab auctoribus certissima fdei), but solely to a ridiculous report that the Earl had been called on to adore an image of Elizabeth.
2 Responsio ad Persecutores. Published by Bridgewater, fol. 316.
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which impressed even his enemies, and then set himself, as was his wont, to prayer. It was not long, however, before he was interrupted by the return of Forster, in company with the Protestant Dean of York, and a minister named Palmer, who had come to argue with him. His success in repel- ling their attacks extorted even Forster's admiration, who was heard to exclaim next day: "I have known the Earl of Northumberland for many years, but never have I seen in him such wisdom, eloquence, and modest firmness as he displayed last night." Finding themselves overcome in argument, the two ministers requested that he would at least join with them in prayer ; but this too he refused, saying that "he knew they were not members of the true Church of God."
On their departure he again applied himself with great joy to prayer, and, though urged by his faithful attendant, named John Clerk, to take some rest, he replied : " If Christ chid His disciples for not watching one hour with Him, do you wish me, who have so little of life left, to sleep for an hour ? " and thus he continued in this holy exercise all through the night, except for some portion of an hour, when through simple weariness he fell asleep : nor would he allow himself to break his fast, except by tasting a few plums. When the hour appointed for his death drew near, making the sign of the Cross upon his forehead as he came forth bareheaded from his cell, he surrendered himself with a calm and steady countenance into the hands of those who were to conduct him to the broad open place in York, known M ii.
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as the Pavement, where the scaffold had been set up for his execution, and where an immense crowd had gathered.
I must tell the story of his martyrdom in the words of Sander, merely omitting things which seem unnecessary. " On arriving at the place of execution the Earl took off his cloak, and again making the sign of the Cross, not only on his forehead, but also on the steps, he mounted cheerfully to the platform, where Palmer, the same Protestant minister who had visited him the night before, began to urge him to acknowledge his crime against the Queen in the presence of the assembled crowd.
" On this the Earl, turning towards the people, said : ' I should have been content to meet my death in silence, were it not that I see it is the custom for those who undergo this kind of punish- ment to address some words to the bystanders as to the cause of their being put to death. Know, there- for^, that, from my earliest years down to this present day, I have held the Faith of that Church which, throughout the whole Christian world, is knit and bound together ; and that in this same Faith I am about to end this unhappy life. But, as for this new Church of England, I do not acknow- ledge it.'
" Here Palmer, interrupting him, cried out in a loud voice : ' I see that you are dying an obstinate Papist ; a member, not of the Catholic, but of the Roman Church.'
" To this the Earl replied : 'That which you call
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the Roman Church is the Catholic Church, which has been founded on the teaching of the Apostles, Jesus Christ Himself being its corner-stone, strength- ened by the blood of Martyrs, honoured by the recognition of the holy Fathers; and it continues always the same, being the Church against which, as Christ our Saviour said, the gates of Hell shall not prevail.'
" When Palmer tried a second time to interrupt him, the Earl said : ' Cease, pray, to further trouble me, for of this truth my mind and conscience are most thoroughly convinced.' And when Palmer still would not be silent, the Earl, turning to the people, said : ' Beware, beloved brothers, of these ravening wolves, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, whilst, meantime, they are the men that devour your souls.' At this, rushing straight down from the platform, as though he had received a blow, Palmer left the Earl free to finish his address^
" ' To me it has been a grievous sorrow,' he continued, ' that, in consequence of an occasion furnished in a manner by myself, so many of the common people have been put to a violent death for the zeal with which they strove to further God's religion, and clung also personally to myself. Would that by my own death I might have saved their lives ! and yet I have no fear but that their souls have obtained the glory of Heaven.'
" 'As to other matters brought against me, they are already fully explained in my answers to the questions set me by the Privy Council ; but I know that in them there is no room for mercy, and
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therefore from them I expect none : but from Him alone, whom I know to be the author of all mercy, who will, as I truly believe, grant mercy to me.'
" After commending to his brother's care his children, his servants, and some small debts,1 he begged all present to forgive him, declaring that he on his part forgave all from his heart. Then kneeling down he finished his prayers.
" Then, after kissing a cross, which he traced upon the ladder of the scaffold, with his arms so folded on his breast as to form a cross, he stretched himself upon the block ; and as soon as he had said, * Lord, receive my soul ! ' the executioner struck off his head. At that same instant, a great groan, which sounded like a roll of thunder, burst from the weeping spectators, as with one voice they called on God to receive his soul into eternal rest.
" It was thought very wonderful that, from the moment of his laying himself upon the block, he gave not even the smallest sign of fear, and made no movement whatsoever, either of head or body.
" The people gathered up the martyr's blood so diligently with handkerchiefs and linen cloths, that not even a straw stained with it was suffered to remain without their carrying it home to be treasured
1 His brother, Sir Henry Percy, who succeeded him in the earldom, was at this time a prisoner in the Tower, on a charge of conspiracy to free the Queen of Scots. His return to the Faith seems to have dated from about this time, and he incurred in conse- quence the severe displeasure of Elizabeth. After being long restricted as to his place of residence, and continually watched by spies, he was again thrown into the Tower, on no definite accusa- tion ; and at length was murdered there, in 1585 — on account, as Catholics believed, of his religion.
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as a sacred relic. For throughout his life," Sander concludes, " he was beyond measure dear to the whole people."
Thus, at the comparatively early age of forty- four, did Blessed Thomas Percy win his crown in the year 1572, on August the 22nd, the octave-day of the Assumption of our Lady, and, as it happened, on a Friday. A despatch, sent a few days later to Lord Burghley,1 informs us that the actual hour of his death was three o'clock* He thus had the privilege of expiring at the same hour as our Blessed Lord, for whom he laid down his life.
Drake's History of York 2 supplies the following particulars with reference to his burial : " His head was set up on a high pole on Micklegate Bar, where it continued for two years, but was afterwards stolen from thence. The body was buried in Crux Church by two of his servants, where it now lies without any memorial."
Since Drake wrote, the Church of Holy Crux, which stood at one end of the Pavement, has been pulled down, and the site built over.3 All exact traces of the tomb of Blessed Thomas Percy seem thus unfortunately to be lost at present. At Stony- hurst College there is preserved one of the Thorns from the Crown of our Blessed Lord, which had been given to the martyred Earl by Mary Queen of
1 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, September 2.
z Tom. i. p. 143. Edition of 1788.
3 This was done in 1887, through the influence of Archbishop Thompson, and in spite of the protests of Earl Percy (now Duke of Northumberland) and of archaeologists in general.
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Scots, as a proof of her grateful appreciation of his services. "The Earl," writes M. de Fonblanque, " had worn it, mounted in a golden cross, around his neck to the day of his death, when he bequeathed it to his eldest daughter, Elizabeth ; " who " in her turn gave, or bequeathed it, to the Jesuit Father Gerard." The golden casket, in which it is now enclosed, bears, says the same writer, the following inscription : " Hasc spina de Corona Domini sancta fuit primo Mariae Reginae Scotiae, Martyris, et ab ea data Comiti Northumbriae, Martyri, qui in morte misit illam filiae suae, Elizabethan, quae dedit Societati."1 The Countess of Northumberland sur- vived her husband's martyrdom for more than twenty years. She bore with edifying patience the sufferings and privations of her exile till her death, which took place at Namur in 1596. Her youngest daughter, the Lady Mary Percy, who seems to have been born during the Earl's imprisonment at Lochleven,2 became the foundress in 1598 of a community of Benedictine Nuns at Brussels, since removed to the Abbey of St. Mary at East Bergholt, where it still flourishes. Amongst these good Religious, who playfully speak of the martyred father of their foundress as their "grandfather," the memory of the Blessed Thomas Percy has been ever held in special veneration.
1 Annals of the House of Percy, ii. 121, 122.
2 A MS., quoted in the Catholic Magazine of August, 1838, gives June ii, 1570, as the date of Lady Mary Percy's birth, which would thus seem to have occurred during her mother's residence at Old Aberdeen.
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APPENDIX.
Mention has been made in the foregoing pages of a book of prayers, which Sander tells us the martyred Earl wrote with his own hand, partly during his earlier years, partly during his imprison- ment at Lochleven. The following are Sander's words, in speaking of the latter period.
" Sometimes he spent whole days till even late at night upon his knees. And in this holy exercise so great was his delight, not only in his previous life, but more than ever then ; that when, through bodily weakness, he could neither go on kneeling, nor recite prayers walking up and down, he would betake himself to writing, and yet wrote nothing else but holy prayers. I myself have seen a fair sized book, elegantly written and illuminated by his own hand, into which he had brought together a quantity of prayers gathered out of various works. Of which labour this seemed to me the most abundant fruit, that when he himself could pray no longer, his handwriting still continued ever pleading for him." l
Happily the book itself, thus spoken of by Sander, is still in existence; and, thanks to the kindness of its present owner, Mr. George Browne, of Trout- beck, Kendal, in entrusting it for a brief space to the Bishop of Hexham and Newcastle, I am able here to give some account of it. That the existing volume was once at least the property of Blessed
1 Martyrium, &c., Bridgewater, fol. 46.
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Thomas Percy is shown by internal evidence which will not admit of question. In several of the prayers his name is introduced : " Me, thy unworthy servant Thomas Percy," and the first five pages display coats of arms belonging to his family. The first three quarters of the book are elaborately written and decorated, and contain the date (fol. 15) 1555. One of the prayers is a "General Confession" in English, and is especially noteworthy because the Blessed Martyr (who seems to have taken it from some primer published during the schism) has carefully corrected some erroneous or ill- sounding expressions which occur in it. Thus the prayer runs : " Graunt nowe that . . . we may be faithfull true and obedient unto the quene our soveraigne ladie and supreme hed /\ immediatly under Christe." After the word " hed " the Blessed Martyr has inserted in the margin " in temporall matters" It is thus a witness to his fervent orthodoxy.
The second part of the book differs greatly in its style of execution from the first, and was evidently written at a late period of his life. At the head of the first page stands his name " Northumberland." The writing seems to be that of a man made pre- maturely old by suffering, and no longer thoughtful of appearances. This part of the book apparently contains the prayers which the Earl wrote, as Sander tells us, during his confinement in Lochleven Castle, 1570 — 1572. Among the more striking of these prayers are those to his Guardian Angel, St. George, and All Saints. They occur in Latin
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in the primer of 1517, and were evidently favourites with our forefathers. They take the form of a " Memorial " or " Commemoration," i.e., they consist of antiphon, versicle and response, and collect.
In the spirit of humble penitence which is so remarkable throughout, the book concludes with prayers for Confession, and a long and minute form of examination of conscience.
G. E. P.
AUTHORITIES. — The fullest accounts yet published of Blessed Thomas Percy, the yth Earl of Northumberland, seem to be those given in De Fonblanque's Annals of the House of Percy, 1887, vol. ii. pp. 3 — 125 ; and in Collins's Peerage of England, 1779, vol. ii. p. 386, in an article on the Dukes of Northumberland by Thomas Percy, Protestant Bishop of Dromore.
For the Rising of the North the authorities chiefly followed have been the various Calendars of State Papers of the period, particularly Domestic, Addenda, 1566 — 1579; Sir Cuthbert Sharpe's Memorials of the Rebellion of 1569, 1840, in which a number of the Bowes Papers are published ; and Lingard's History of England.
The account of what was done in Durham, during the brief restoration of the Catholic religion, is taken from the volume of the Surtees Society for 1845, — Depositions and Ecclesiastical Proceedings from the Courts of Durham.
The account of the Earl's martyrdom is from Sander's Martyrium sanctissimi viri Thames Percei, Comitis Northumbrice, published after its author's death, in Bridgewater's Concertatio, 1589.
W. Turnbull, in his Letters of Mary Queen of Scots (p. 67), says that he found among the Medici archives at Florence a letter written to the Grand Duke of Tuscany by his Resident in England, giving a minute description of the martyrdom. A careful search at Florence has failed to bring to light any such document, and it seems clear that Turnbull confused the Earl with Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, of
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whose execution in the reign of Queen Mary there is an account among these papers.
PORTRAITS of B. Thomas Percy are published by De Fon- blanque, from a painting at Alnwick Castle ; and by Sir C. Sharpe, from a painting at Petworth made in 1566, when the Earl was in his thirty-eighth year.
What is known of B. Thomas Plumtree is gathered from the same sources, and from a brief notice of his martyrdom in Sander's De Visibili Monarchia, 1571.
IV. THE BLESSED THOMAS WOODHOUSE.
London, 13 June, 1573.
IN the spring of 1561 a new phase of the religious persecution began. Up to that time there had been but little violence shown, for little had been needed. The Catholic Church had not fallen without some struggle. So long as they remained free, the churchmen had most unequivocally pro- claimed their faith in the ancient Church, and Elizabeth did not at first dare to show that she meant to lead the realm into heresy. She gave herself out as a Catholic, though leaving herself free to make reforms. Then she prohibited preach- ing, pretending that it would lead to disturbances. By imprisoning a few Bishops she enabled her party to obtain the votes in Parliament necessary to give her Supremacy Bill the semblance of legality, and after that, by depriving the more courageous of the clergy, she forced her new liturgy upon the country. Unfortunately the amount of violence necessary was but small, for the subservience of England to the tyranny of the Tudors was lament- able. But this country was not then as insular as it was soon to become, and the Catholics
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still hoped that the influence of the Pope and of their co-religionists on the Continent might win them relief. On his side the Pope twice tried to send envoys to Elizabeth, but in vain. Excuses were made for refusing them admission into England, and on the second occasion Sir William Cecil frightened the Queen by affecting to have discovered a plot against her amongst the Catholics, though when the charges were formulated the real offence was found to be that they had celebrated or attended Mass.1 Amongst those apprehended was Blessed Thomas Woodhouse, who was com- mitted on the i4th of May, 1561, to the Fleet Prison, where he was admitted as a " pore priest " who could not pay for his keep, but lived on precarious charity.2
For the chief facts which we are able to relate of this noble servant of Christ we are indebted to a narrative written and forwarded to Rome by Father Henry Garnet, S.J., and first printed in the second volume of the Catholic Spectator, in the year
Sir Thomas Woodhouse, as he was styled
1 A short account of the missions of Parpaglia and Martinengo will be found in The Month for January, 1902.
2 Richard Simpson in the Rambler, vol. x. p. 20.
3 Brother Foley, S.J., who re-edits Father Garnet's Relation, in the seventh volume of his Records of the English Province of the Society of Jesus, from the Stonyhurst MSS. vol. i. n. 3. does not seem to be aware that it had been published sixty years earlier. The late Mr. Simpson was certainly unaware of its existence when he wrote the article in the Rambler to which we have referred. An earlier but shorter narrative, dated 1574, exists in the Archives of the Society, of which Foley gives an abstract in Records, vii. p. 1257.
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according to the ancient usage, had been ordained priest towards the end of Queen Mary's reign. He was made Rector of a Lincolnshire parish, but had held it less than a year when the persecuting laws of Elizabeth obliged him to leave the place. He took refuge, in 1560, in the house of a gentleman in Wales, and taught his sons, but was unable to remain there long. It was the next year that while at the altar, in the act of saying Mass, he was seized and thrown into prison.
He was a prisoner for our Lord during twelve years, and all this time gave the example of a very holy life. The details that have come down to us show in him a strong individuality of character, in which great simplicity, boldness, and a gentle zeal were the chief features.
During the plague which raged in London in 1563, Tyrrel, the warder of Fleet Prison, was allowed to remove all prisoners for the Faith to his own house in Cambridgeshire. Here Blessed Thomas, knowing him to be a Catholic at heart, publicly reproved him for eating meat in Lent, and declared if he continued to do so he would not stay in the house. The warder laughed good-humouredly, think- ing his prisoner could not get away if he would. But the martyr was as good as his word, and one day he was missing. Tyrrel sent in alarm to have search made for him in London, when it was found that he had gone quietly back to his old prison in the Fleet. He was equally sturdy in refusing to uncover when heretics said grace at table. On one occasion where this was complained of, he was
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set in the stocks. But for all his uncompromising ways he won general confidence and affection, and was allowed a good deal of liberty. He had the freedom of the prison, and was even able to make secret excursions to his friends in the day.
He was fearless in all that concerned God's service. He not only recited his Office regularly, but said Mass daily in his room in the prison, and was unmoved by the more timid or prudent counsels given him by fellow-prisoners. Once, when some of the heretics, who had got scent of what was going on, hammered at the door with repeated blows, he turned to those who were with him, just before the Consecration, and promised them they should not be taken ; and so it was, for the intruders went away. In the same undaunted spirit he made use of every opportunity to make converts, entirely disregarding the peril. Having received a Mr. Gascoigne, a prisoner for debt, the fact was reported by some of the Protestants. Gascoigne asked him what he should answer if he was questioned as to who had received him, "for I," he said, "will never deny that I am reconciled." Blessed Thomas in reply urged him to say without hesitation that he had reconciled him, for he was ready to avouch it with his blood.
His perfect freedom from fear was not ordinary courage ; it came from a veritable longing for martyrdom. One day people came to tell the Catholic prisoners that a new Act had been passed by Parliament the day before, which would bring all Catholics to the gallows ; upon which he knelt
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down, and with bared head prayed to God that he might be the first. When Blessed John Storey was sentenced to death, Woodhouse conceived the simple idea that he might by some means or other make interest with the Council to let him take his place and suffer death for him, and "with many fair words, some gift in hand and large promises," tried to get his keeper to enter into his scheme and help him to carry it out.
It was with the same mingled simplicity, zeal, and fearlessness that in the twelfth year of his captivity he wrote to Lord Treasurer Burghley a letter which led to his martyrdom.1 It bears date the igth of November, 1572, and runs thus :
"JESUS.
" Your lordship will peradventure marvel at my boldness that dare presume to interpell your wisdom, being occupied about so great and weighty affairs touching the state of the whole realm. Howbeit I have conceived that opinion of your Lordship's humanity, that ye will not condemn any man's good-will, how simple or mean soever he be ; which maketh me bold at this present to communicate my poor advice, what is very requisite and best for your Lordship to do in so great and ponderous affairs.
1 Father Garnet and the author of the Relation of 1574, knew something of this letter, perhaps from a draft or duplicate preserved by the martyr. Mr. Simpson had the good fortune to find the original amongst the Burghley Papers in the British Museum, " classed with a series of madmen's letters, such as we suppose all public men are used to receive now and then." Mr. Simpson pub- lished it in the Rambler article already referred to.
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Forasmuch therefore as our Lord and God, Jesus Christ, hath given supreme authority unto His blessed Apostle St. Peter, and in him to his suc- cessors the Bishops of Rome, to feed, rule and govern His sheep, that is to say all Christians, at such time as He said unto the same His Apostle thrice, * Feed My lambs, feed My sheep,' — my poor advice is that ye humbly and unfeignedly even from the very bottom of your heart, acknowledge and confess your great iniquity and offence against Almighty God, especially in disobeying that supreme authority and power of the See Apostolic, so ordained and established by the King of kings and Lord of lords, Jesus Christ ; and that in all dutiful manner and apparent fruits of penance ye seek to be reconciled unto that your supreme prince and pastor here in earth, appointed and assigned unto you by your Lord God and Redeemer, Jesus Christ. Likewise that ye earnestly persuade the Lady Elizabeth, who for her own great disobedience is most justly deposed, to submit. herself unto her spiritual prince and father, the Pope's Holiness, and with all humility to reconcile herself unto him, that she may be the child of salvation. Now your Lordship hath heard my poor advice, which if your wisdom shall not disdain to follow, I hope it shall turn through the mercy of God to the preservation of our dear country, and to a most flourishing and happy state in the Christian Commonwealth, and shall also redound unto your eternal salvation, honour and glory. But if, which God forbid, ye shall contemn or neglect the same, I fear it will be
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to the great desolation and ruin of our beloved country and people, and to the utter subversion and perishing of you and yours for ever in hell ; where is the gnawing worm, where is the unquenchable fire, where is weeping and gnashing of teeth. Dixi. " My lord, for this my poor advice I require no other thing of your Lordship but that ye will not molest by any means this bearer, who is wholly ignorant of the contents and a hot Protestant ; nor yet the guardian, nor yet the gaolers, who are likewise ignorant of my doings ; for they lock me up more closely than I think your honour would they should, and suppose I have neither pen, nor ink, nor messenger.
" Your honour's humble and daily beadsman, "THOMAS WOODDUS."
The third or fourth day after the despatch of this characteristic letter,1 the holy priest was
1 Apparently the washerwoman of the Fleet was the bearer; one day after Mass the martyr gave her the letter to deliver to one of Lord Burghley's servants, which done, she was to return without having said a word. The last lines of an imperfect Latin account of the martyr in flowing hexameters will serve as a specimen of the whole :
Cum sic intrantem Christi fortissimus heros Lotricem alloquitur, sacris de more peractis, " I mea, dixit, anus, Burlceo hac scripta Baroni, Aut uni e famuli s Domino tradenda relinque. Nee tibi languenti pvce liming crede morandum, Nee verbis opus esse puta, sese indice prodent Scripta suo, tu lenta retro vestigia torque.'1 Excipit ilia sinu venturi ignara tabellas. Nee mora, linteolis, et rebus onusta lavandis Custodem, tortis scripto latitante capillis Decipit, atque audax ad nota palatia tendit.
N II.
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summoned to the Lord Treasurer's presence. He went in his "priest's gown and cornered cap." The interview must be related verbatim from Father Garnet's account.
Mr. Treasurer " seeing him such a silly [simple] little body as he was, seemed to despise him, saying, ' Sirrah, was it you that wrote me a letter the other day ? ' ' Yes, sir,' saith Mr. Woodhouse, approach- ing as near his nose as he could, and casting up his head to look him in the face. ' That it was, even I, if your name be Cecil ; ' whereat the Treasurer staying awhile, said more coldly than before, ' Why, sir, will ye acknowledge me none other name nor title than Mr. Cecil?' 'No, sir,' saith Mr. Woodhouse. 'And why so ? ' saith the Treasurer. 'Because,' saith Woodhouse, 'she that gave you those names and titles had no authority so to do.' * And why so?' saith the Treasurer. 'Because,' saith Woodhouse, ' our holy Father the Pope hath deposed her.' ' Thou art a traitor,' saith the Treasurer. ' Non est discipulus super Magistnun,' saith Mr. Woodhouse. Then the Treasurer paused awhile, and after, said unto him, ' In the super- scription of thy letter thou callest me Lord Burghley, High Treasurer of England.' ' I did so,' saith Woodhouse, ' for that otherwise I knew my letter would not come to your hands.' Then the Treasurer began to dispute with him against the Pope's authority, and the other did defend it and heated the Treasurer a little. At last he grew cold again and asked Mr. Woodhouse if he would be his chaplain, and he said, ' Yea.' ' And wilt thou say
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Mass in my house?' 'Yea, that I will,' saith Mr. Woodhouse. ' And shall I come to it ? ' saith the Treasurer. 'No,' saith Woodhouse, 'that ye shall not, unless ye will be reconciled to the Catholic Church.' And so he was sent back again to the Fleet, where he was separate from his companions and put in a chamber by himself."
But his zeal still found means to communicate with the outer world. Father Garnet in a report to the Father General says he " wrote divers papers, persuading men to the true faith and obedience, which he signed with his name, tied to stones, and threw them out of the prison window into the street."1
Within a week all England was talking of Mr. Woodhouse's bearding of the great Lord Treasurer. The Protestants said he was mad, many Catholics reproached him with rashness. Those who knew his holy life would not join in such judgments. The Council would have been glad to favour the idea of his being mad, and sum- moned him before them with this view. He " made a short courtesy, as he would have done to so many gentlemen of worship." They told him to kneel, but he refused and " stood still upright." " Oh, poor fool," said one of the Council, "the Pope hath nothing to do in this realm." He answered, " Christ said unto Peter, Pasce oves meas, pasce agnos meos, and I say that if Christ have in England either sheep or lambs, the Pope who is Peter's successor, hath to
1 Foley, Records of the English Province of the Society of Jesus* vol. vii. p. 967.
i g6 BLESSED THOMAS WOODHOUSE
do in this realm." Another said, "This is thy dream." " No," he answered, " it is not my invention but the opinion of St. Augustine and other Doctors of the Church." And the attempt to make him out mad was given up as hopeless.
He was repeatedly examined both publicly and privately. Once when he had denied the Queen's title before the Recorder of London and other com- missioners, some one said, " If you saw her Majesty, you would not say so, for her Majesty is great." " But the majesty of God is greater," he answered.
At length in April, 1573, he was arraigned at the Guildhall. He denied the authority of the judges, saying " they were not his judges, nor for his judges would he ever take them, being heretics and pre- tending authority from her that could not give it them." He also protested against the competency of secular judges to try priests and spiritual causes, as the earlier Relation tells us, and was treated with the greatest indignity and contumely and held for a fool. He was found guilty of high treason and sentenced accordingly, but two months elapsed before his execution.
Before as after his condemnation he ever kept up the same bright, sweet demeanour, the same intrepidity, the same eager desire to suffer for his Master. When first a smith came to rivet irons on him he rewarded him with two shillings. When the same man afterwards came, on some occasion, to take them off, he stood waiting, cap in hand, after his work, hoping for a present, and at last said, " Sir, this day seven-night when I burdened you
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with irons, you rewarded me with two shillings : now that I have taken them away, for your more ease, I trust your worship will reward me much better." "No," said the martyr, "then I gave thee wages for laying irons on me, because I was sure to have my wages for bearing them ; now, thou must have patience if thou lose thy wages, since thou hast with taking away mine irons taken also away those wages I have for carrying them. But come when you will to load me with irons, and if I have money thou shalt not go home with an empty purse."
When some one told him he was to be removed to the Tower to be racked, " No," said he, " I cannot believe that; but notwithstanding bring me true news here that it is so and thou shalt have a crown of gold for thy pains." From this answer it may be gathered that he had light from God about what was to happen to him : and so, again, the next day a servant brought him word it was reported through all London he should be put to death the next week, " No," he answered, " I shall not die these two months and more." And so it happened.
After his sentence he was not taken back to his old prison, but was committed to Newgate. On his way to the prison he was much ill-treated, " being tugged and lugged hither and thither, weak and sore laden with irons ; insomuch as going up the stairs at Newgate, he fell down divers times on the stairs ; and to one that seemed by his words to pity him, he answered with a smiling countenance that these troubles were sweet to him." Some one in the crowd gave him a blow on the face. " Would God,"
ig8 BLESSED THOMAS WOODHOUSE
he said turning to him, " I might suffer ten times as much that thou might go free for the blow thou hast given me. I forgive thee and pray to God to forgive thee even as I would be forgiven."
At Newgate he was put into the place conse- crated by the martyrdom of the Blessed Carthusian Fathers who had been starved to death five-and- thirty years before. The author of the " Relation of 1574" says it was the part of the prison appropriated to robbers, and a most dismal place. But after a time he was removed to another chamber, where a number of ministers were allowed access to him and disputed with him. Some of them he confuted, surprising those present by his learning ; but when the Dean of St. Paul's came he severely rebuked him, and ended with the words, " Begone, Satan."
His martyrdom was consummated on Friday, the I3th of June, 1573. He was drawn in the usual way to the place of execution. Hearing him pray in Latin, some of the crowd wanted him to pray in English so that all might join with him. He answered that with the Catholics he would willingly, but as for the others he would neither pray with them nor have them pray with him or for him ; though he would willingly pray for them. The Sheriff was impatient at what he called his obsti- nacy, and cried out, " Away with him, executioner, strip him of his garments, put the rope about his neck and do it quickly." Then he called to the martyr to ask pardon of God, the Queen, and the country, but Blessed Thomas answered, " Nay, I on the part of God, demand of you and of the
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Queen, that ye ask pardon of God and of holy Mother Church, because contrary to the truth ye have resisted Christ the Lord, and the Pope, His Vicar upon earth." These bold words drew shouts from the ever-fickle crowd of " Hang him, hang him, this man is worse than Storey." He was cut down alive, so that "he went between two from the gallows to the fire, near which he was spoiled, and came perfectly to himself before the hangman began to bowel him ; inasmuch as some have said he spoke when the hangman had his hand in his body seeking for his heart to pull it .out."
He is described as of middle stature, " with rosy and fair face," the " latter part of his chin adorned by a blackish beard," full eyes, a joyful expression which he retained to the last, and a robust body.
A few words must be added on the admission of the Blessed Martyr into the Society of Jesus while he was still in prison. As might be expected, the writers who describe his death briefly, do not mention this at all, and it is very probable that they did not know anything about it. Even Father Henry More, S.J., though he was aware of the fact from Father Thomas Stephenson's Life of Thomas Pound, seems to have been unable to find further evidence, and gave up the inquiry as " somewhat obscure and uncertain." 1 Of late years, however, a good deal more information has been discovered.
i. In the " Relation of 1574," to which reference has already been made, the following passage occurs. " He was inflamed with so great a love for the
1 H. More, Historia Provincice Anglicans, p. 33.
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Society of Jesus and desire of entering it, that he wrote to the Superior in Paris, earnestly entreating him to deign to admit him, unable indeed to be present in person, though he was so in heart ; and begging that he might be honoured by at least the name of the Society, and that he might be admitted to participate in its merits and indulgences, as far as the Constitutions of the Society permitted it." Towards the end of the same Relation, this sentence occurs. " He was so studious of humility, that when he had obtained from the Fathers of the Society of Jesus the favour that he had asked for, he would not tell it to his friends but only to his confessor." l
2. Brother Foley in his Records, has printed a translation of a letter from Father Henry Garnet, then Superior in England, to the Father General, dated London, the nth of March, 1601, in which the following passage occurs. " In the year 1572 or 1573, a priest was martyred, who was the proto- martyr of all the priests, and the first of all in the time of this Queen, except Felton and Storey, who were laymen. His history has come to my hands, which I will immediately send to Father Robert [Persons].2 He was called Thomas Woodhouse. I write this now because I happened to be in London3 at the time of his martyrdom, and I have heard it said by Catholics elsewhere, that when in
1 Foley, Records S.J. vii. p. 1267. His summary, however, is far from complete.
2 This is presumably the long Relation in Foley, vii. 967.
3 He was then a young layman. He entered the Jesuit Novitiate at the age of twenty, in 1575.
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prison he was received into the Society by the Provincial of Paris, and it will be well to make inquiry into the matter, because it will afford no little consolation to all our members. He died directly through the confession of a private indi- vidual, and a little while after the appearance of the Bull of Pius V. He was so animated by the news of his reception to the Society, as the Catholics said at the time, that he sat down and wrote to Cecil exhorting him to persuade the Queen to submit herself to the Pope. Your Paternity shall see this letter."1
The letter just mentioned has been already quoted from the original, which is preserved among the Burghley Papers. Father Garnet must have had access to some draft or duplicate preserved by the martyr's friends. The next document may be connected with the Father General's answer to Garnet's letter.
3. In the same volume which contains the " Relation of 1574," and just before it, there is bound up a single leaf of paper on which have been jotted down some notes in an early seventeenth century hand, presumably by some librarian or secretary, from documents then in the Archives of the Society, but which are no longer forthcoming. They begin,
" I573- Gulielmus (sic) Wuddus, in carcere Londinensi detentus, potest admitti in Societatem. " Carmina ab eodem scripta in carcere."
1 Foley, Records S.J. vol. vii. p. 967.
BLESSED THOMAS WOODHOUSE
After this page is bound the Latin life of the martyr, which has been called the " Relation of 1574," written in a hand of that date, and then come some three hundred lines of Latin heroics by the same writer dating from London. Of these a few have been quoted already. Perhaps the rough note "Verses by, &c.," should read "Verses about the Martyr."
One is tempted to conjecture that the above note was made with a view to answer some such inquirer as Father Garnet. It runs in the form one would expect to find in an official register, and its evidence appears to bring us very near to the original record of our martyr's admission to the Society.
Such are the facts on this subject as at present known. It will be noted that several of them were not published before the drawing up of the Decree of 1886, and this accounts for the Decree itself describing the martyr as a Secular Priest, and it is in any case clear that the honour of having formed and trained this hero of Christ belongs to the Secular Clergy. Later on, when the time came for drawing up Offices and Masses, the Postulators of the Society of Jesus asked to have Blessed Thomas's name, with that of Blessed John Nelson, inserted among the titulars of their special feast (December the ist), with a special eulogium in their Martyrology, and commemorations in their Lessons, and this petition was at once granted by the Sacred Congre- gation of Rites.
E. S. K. J. H. P.
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P.S. Since the above was in print I have noticed the following reference to our martyr in Dr. Sander's Report to Cardinal Moroni (Catholic Record Society, 1904), written in May, 1562. " Thomas Woddus, Reginae Marias capellanus, in ipso actu privationis populum obtestatus est ut ab haeresi et schismate caveret." Whether this deprivation refers to his chaplaincy, or to the rectorate in Lincoln, does not appear. Elizabeth's visitors were ejecting Catholics in the autumn of 1559, but Mr. Gee's Elizabethan Clergy, pp. 98, 129, 266, 269, 279, makes no mention of Thomas Woodhouse. In any case we have here another instance of the martyr's unusual courage and vigour in resisting the encroachments of heresy.
J.H.P.
AUTHORITIES. — The original texts of all the Latin papers quoted in the text from the Stonyhurst Papers, and from the volume in the Archives of the Society of Jesus, which is entitled Anglia, Necrologia, are still unpublished, but Foley's Records (vol. vii. 967 and 1267) contain copious extracts in English. The translations from the Stonyhurst Papers in the Catholic Spectator, vol. ii. 1824, are presumably from the pen of Dr. George Oliver. Mr. Richard Simpson's article in the Rambler (vol. x.) contains the State Papers from the British Museum and Record Office printed in full.
V. THE BLESSED CUTHBERT MAYNE,
PROTO-MARTYR OF THE SEMINARY PRIESTS. Launceston, 29 November, 1577.
FOUR years passed after the martyrdom of Blessed Thomas Woodhouse before another martyr shed his blood. But the pressure of the persecution went on increasing. The statutes of 1559 and 1563 were found insufficient. Elizabeth and her Ministers had hoped, perhaps, that a few years of such repression would extinguish the Faith in England, as it had been extinguished in Sweden, Denmark, and Norway. There were no bishops, except in prison ; there were no churches ; there were no monasteries ; there were no Catholic institutions of charity or education. Catholic worship, the preach- ing of the word of God, existed no longer save in holes and corners ; and heavy fines and weary imprisonment must by degrees crush out the constancy of many and terrify the rest of the afflicted Catholics. And yet the Government made little way, and on the contrary from about 1561 a considerable reaction had set in, many who had fallen were reconciled, many gave up the too common temporizing attendance at the heretical worship. Two causes, in this state of things,
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incited the Government to fresh severities. The one was the Bull of Excommunication and Deposition in February, 1570. The other was the foundation of the Seminary at Douay.
There were still, scattered up and down the country, some good and zealous priests who in danger and difficulty ministered as they might to the needs of the faithful. As late as 1596 no fewer than forty or fifty of these ancient priests are said to have been labouring in England.1 But in the absence of any means of recruitment their numbers must yearly diminish, and they were doomed within a few years to inevitable extinction. Divine Providence, however, provided a remedy. Dr. William Allen had been successively Fellow of Oriel College, Oxford, Principal of St. Mary's Hall, Proctor of the University, Canon of York, when in 1561 he was obliged to leave the country. He returned to labour for three years with immense fruit in England, finally left the country in 1565, and on Michaelmas day, 1568, laid the foundations of his great work, the Seminary of Douay for the training of priests who should perpetuate the Faith in England. A select band of able men soon gathered round him to aid in the work, Marshall, Bristow, Stapleton, Dorman, Gregory Martin, and others. Students then began to join the College. The first ordi- nations took place in the year of Blessed Thomas Woodhouse's martyrdom. The next year, 1574, the first three missionary priests left the College gates for England. In the course of another six years it
1 Knox, Douay Diaries, Historical Introduction, p. Ixii.
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sent a hundred such labourers into the English vineyard. The tide was stemmed ; it was soon turned in the other direction. A continuous stream of youths for education, converts to be instructed and received, candidates for the priesthood to be prepared and ordained, set in to Douay ; the stream was fed by a ceaseless drain of members from the Universities. By 1578 the Seminary had instructed more than five hundred men in the knowledge of religion. Ten or eleven would sometimes arrive in a single day from England. The studies were of a high order, piety and union reigned, the young missionaries were filled with zeal, and even longed for martyrdom. Cecil and Elizabeth herself were far too clear-sighted not to understand how vast a change the establishment of the College wrought in the situation. Every effort was made to bring about its destruction, and failing that, to harass and impede its work.
A new penal statute, added to the code of persecution in 1571, made it high treason to obtain, publish, or put in use any Bull, writing, or instrument from the Pope, whatever it might contain, or in virtue of any such instrument to absolve or reconcile any person, or to be absolved or reconciled. The same statute enacted the penalties of pramunire, imprisonment and forfeiture for bringing into the country, giving to any one to use, or receiving for use or wear, any object, Agnus Dei, beads, crosses or pictures, which had been blessed either by the Pope or in virtue of faculties from him.
Still God's work went on. The new missionaries
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were themselves amazed at their success. Henry Shaw, one of the first three sent, wrote after a year's work to Allen, "The number of Catholics increases so abundantly on all sides that he, who almost alone holds the rudder of the State, has privately admitted to one of his friends, that for one staunch Catholic at the beginning of the reign there were now, he knew for certain, ten."1 In 1577, Allen wrote that "the number of those who were daily restored to the Catholic Church almost surpassed belief," and that " one of the younger priests lately sent on the mission had reconciled no fewer than eighty persons in one day." 2
The blood of martyrs was not long wanting to water this new harvest. It was the fifteenth of the missionaries sent from Douay who was chosen by God to be the first martyr of the Seminary. Cuthbert Mayne3 was himself a convert. He was born in 1544, at Youlston, an estate in the parish of Sherwell,4 near Barnstaple, in Devonshire, and
1 Douay Diaries, p. 98. z Ibid. Ixiii.
3 The account of the Blessed Cuthbert Mayne, which follows, is chiefly taken from an ancient MS. in the Archives of the see of Westminster (vol. ii. 49), which is by far the fullest in detail of the early relations, and appears to have been very carefully drawn up. It is a quarto MS. of fourteen pages, very closely and neatly written in an Elizabethan or Jacobean hand. Tierney-Dodd and Challoner have used it for their histories of the martyr. It differs from Champney and the Briefe historic of the glorious martyrdom of xii. Reverend Priests (1582), p. 145, as to the date of his trial, which it places at the June Assizes, whilst they defer it to Michaelmas.
4 He was baptized in the old square Norman font in SherwelT Church, March 20, 1544. His baptismal register is still extant there. It runs : " Cuthbert Mayne the sonne of William Maine, was baptised the xx daie of March, ano p'dto." The day of his baptism being St. Cuthbert's feast, will account for his Christian, name, which is unusual in the south of England.
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brought up as a Protestant by an old uncle, a priest who had joined the heretical religion and had a good benefice, which he wanted his nephew to hold after him. When Cuthbert came to the age of eighteen or nineteen his uncle got him ordained a minister. He used afterwards to speak of this with great sorrow, and declared that at the time "he knew neither what ministry nor religion meant." He had been educated at Barnstaple Grammar School, and now went to Oxford, where, after studying for his Bachelor's degree at St. Alban's Hall, he became chaplain at the newly-established College of St. John,1 and there became the friend and companion of Gregory Martin and of Blessed Edmund Campion, the latter, like himself, at that time a Protestant. His lovable character quickly endeared him both to heretics and Catholics. Some of the latter becoming intimate with him, the result was that before long he confessed himself convinced of the truth of the Catholic faith.2 But he dreaded the poverty he would have to face if he threw up his appointment
1 Maine or Mayn Cuthbert, sup. for B.A., March 26, 1566 ; adm. April 6 ; det. 1567 ; sup. for M.A., 10 February, 1569-70 ; He. April 8, 1570, inc. July 10. (Fasti, p. 185; Boase, Register of the University of Oxford, i. 260, and Courtenay's Bibliotheca Cornubiensis, PP- 343- 757. 778. 1278.) One Jasper Mayne, D.D. (1604—1672). is mentioned by Prince, Worthies of Devon (pp. 461-3), who says that the martyr was in all probability near akin to him. The family still exists in Devonshire. There is a good Mayne monument, with coats of arms, in the Church of St. Petrock, Exeter.
2 He only administered the Lord's Supper on one occasion while at the College, but "every Sunday gave them a dry Com- munion." (Briefe Historic.)
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as chaplain to the College, and shrank from the loss of his friends ; and so he remained as he was, all the while grieving for the error in which he had lived, groaning at the " profane " office he still filled, and yearning to enter the bosom of Holy Church. Meantime, Gregory Martin and Blessed Edmund Campion had given up friends, country, and worldly prospects, and were studying at Douay, whence they wrote entreaties to their old com- panion to break away courageously and follow them. One of these letters fell into the hands of the Bishop of London, and was at length the means of bursting asunder Blessed Cuthbert's bonds. The Bishop, on making his discovery of the state of mind of the chaplain of St. John's and others named in the letter, sent to have them all arrested. The others were seized and thrown into prison. Cuthbert was fortunately absent, and was at once warned of his danger by a friend at Oxford, Thomas Ford, a fellow of Trinity College, and afterwards also a martyr. This cannot have been later than 1570, 1 for in that year Blessed Thomas Ford was admitted into the Seminary at Douay. Whether Blessed Cuthbert found difficulty in leaving the country or remained uncertain as to his future course, does not appear ; but after an interval of two or three years, he made his way at last from the Cornish coast to the Continent, and in 1573 his arrival at Douay is registered in the College Diaries. He was at once admitted into the Seminary, and
1 Nor earlier, for on July 10, 1570, Cuthbert Mayne took his Master's degree at Oxford, as we have seen.
O II.
BLESSED CUTHBERT MAYNE
there applied his whole energy to the double task of the study of theology and of holiness. In the course of 1575 he was considered to have made such strides in both that Dr. Allen had him ordained. He was especially admired for his diligence and his humility. Short as the time of his preparation had been, his friend and biographer says it seemed long to him from the greatness of his desire to labour for souls in England and to atone for his old infame ministerium by the exercise of the holy priesthood. On April the 24th of next year (1576) he started, with the blessing of his Superior and the prayers of his companions, for England, together with the Blessed John Payne. At the coast they were delayed by stormy weather and reports of danger at the English ports ; but at length they got safely into the country, and then taking an affec- tionate farewell, went their several ways, to meet again only when they had won the martyr's palm. A few weeks1 after their departure from Douay a letter came from Henry Shaw, one of the first three missioners, entreating that Blessed Cuthbert might be sent to England without delay. He must have learned to appreciate the future martyr while they were together at the Seminary. Two items of news about them reached the Seminary a little later — on June the 28th. One was that a spirit of great exas- peration had been excited among the heretics by the numerous conversions, and that all kinds of tortures were threatened, in particular, against Henry Shaw, Blessed Cuthbert, and Blessed John 1 May 2, 1576. (Knox, Douay Diaries, p. 104.)
BLESSED CUTHBERT MAYNE
Payne, whenever they should be caught; the other was that the carefully collected theological notes of the last two, with their store of books, pictures, rosaries, Agnus Dei, and other pious objects, had all been seized, but had been cleverly recovered again by a Mr. Richard Evingham, a pious young Catholic who had been at Douay, and whose father had paid the forfeit of his son's devotion, being thrown into prison, while the son himself was eagerly sought for by the persecutors.1 After many adventures and escapes, young Evingham succeeded in reaching Douay on the 5th of October, 1576.
After a short visit to his native Devonshire, Blessed Cuthbert went to live in the house of Mr. Francis Tregian, at Golden, about five miles from Truro, in Cornwall.2 Mr. Tregian was a man of large fortune, exceedingly hospitable and a fervent Catholic. The missionaries usually sought shelter for a longer or shorter period, first in one, then in another such influential family, amongst whose large household they could live unnoticed, whilst they were enabled to say Mass, preach, and administer the Sacraments to the neighbouring Catholics, and also find many opportunities of meeting Protestants whose conversion was thought hopeful. No details of Blessed Cuthbert's ministry
1 Douay Diaries, p. 106.
• The name Tregian should be pronounced Trudgeon. In this form it is still not uncommon in Cornwall. The estate in St. Ewe, from which the family took its name, is so called from the British words Tre and Udgian (oxen town). The priest's hiding-place (where Blessed Cuthbert may sometimes have been concealed) still exists at Golden ; which is in the parish of St. Probus.
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are recorded, except that he passed as Mr. Tregian's steward, and that it was noted afterwards that not one of those whom he gained to God ever fell away. Conceal himself as carefully as he might, however, vague rumours gradually spread about, and before a year had passed, the storm, which was unusually violent at the time in many parts of the country, broke over Mr. Tregian's house.
The Bishop of Exeter was making a visitation at Truro — the Protestant Bishops were usually the hottest persecutors — and it was determined between him and the High Sheriff, Richard Grenville l of Stowe, to search the house at Golden. The High Sheriff presented himself on the 8th of June, 1577, with the Bishop's Chancellor, and nine or ten Justices of the Peace, accompanied by their servants, a party of about a hundred men. Mr. Tregian met them at the threshold. " We are come," said the High Sheriff, " to search your house for a certain Bourne who has committed an offence in London and fled to this neighbourhood, and indeed is said to have taken refuge here." Tregian declared no such person was in his house, nor had he any idea where he might be, and protested against the indignity of searching a gentleman's house without any warrant
1 In the Briefe Historic it is given as Greenfield, but see J. Morris, Troubles, i. p. 65. He was at this time simply Mr. Sheriff Grenville, being knighted later as a reward for his share in Blessed Cuthbert's martyrdom. This is the hero so glorified in Kingsley's Westward Ho! though even Kingsley is forced to admit that Sir Richard " was subject at moments to such fearful fits of rage that he had been seen to snatch the glasses from the table, grind them to pieces with his teeth, and swallow them."
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from the Queen. But resistance to such a force was impossible, and the Sheriff with drawn dagger and threats of violence forced his way into the house with his followers.
The blessed martyr was completely unaware of what was going on, and coming into his room by the garden entrance and hearing the battering at his other door, which was locked, opened it, and found himself face to face with the High Sheriff. " What art thou ? " said the latter. " I am a man," answered the martyr — but as the High Sheriff put his question he grasped the Blessed Cuthbert by the bosom and in doing so his hand struck against metal, so, asking if he wore a coat of mail, he tore open his clothes and made the discovery of an Agnus Dei, which the holy priest wore suspended from his neck in a case of silver and crystal. This was enough to make him a criminal by the Act of 1571, and calling him every opprobrious name, they at once carried him off, with his books and papers, to the Bishop at Truro. Tregian, who was also arrested, was liberated for a time on bail, but the martyr, after a long examination of himself and his papers, was committed to the custody of the Sheriff, who carried him from one gentleman's house to another, with every kind of ignominious treatment, until they came to Launceston. Here he was very cruelly used, confined to a filthy and dark under- ground prison, loaded with heavy irons, chained to his bedposts, allowed no books or writing materials, — indeed there was no light to use them — and not permitted to see any one except in presence of a
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gaoler. The capture was regarded as so important a service to the Crown that the Sheriff was knighted for it.1
Eight days later, on June the i6th,2 the Assizes commenced at Launceston, the Earl of Bedford among others being present, and Blessed Cuthbert was brought to trial, together with several gentle- men and servants,3 who were accused of aiding and abetting his offence.
In order to throw the more contempt on them, they were stripped of their upper garments, and made to appear at the bar in their doublets and hose.
An elaborate indictment had been prepared against the martyr, containing the following heads of accusation.
" i. That he had on a stated day traitorously obtained from the Roman See a printed faculty containing matter of absolution of sundry subjects of the kingdom.
" 2. That on a day named he had traitorously published the said document at Golden.
" 3. That on another day he had at Launceston maliciously and with evil intent taught and defended
1 The examination of Blessed Cuthbert, " first taken not long before his execution at Launceston," will be found in the Record Office, Domestic, Elizabeth, cxviii. 46.
2 Tregian's Life says September the i6th.
3 Mr. Richard Tremayne, Mr. John Kempe, Mr. Richard Hore, Mr. Thomas Harris, Mr. John Williams, M.A., and three servants. Mr. Tregian himself was brought to London to be dealt with by the Council.
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in express words, the ecclesiastical power of a foreign Bishop, to wit, the Bishop of Rome, heretofore usurped in this kingdom.
" 4. That on a certain day he had brought into this kingdom a vain and superstitious thing, com- monly called an Agnus Dei, blessed, as they say, by the said Bishop of Rome, and had delivered the same to Mr. Francis Tregian.
" 5. That on a day named he had publicly said Mass and administered the Lord's Supper according to the Popish rite, and all these things contrary to statutes made in the ist and I3th years of our sovereign lady Queen Elizabeth and against her peace, crown, and dignity." l
Very full details of the trial are recorded in the manuscript from which these particulars are taken. It is difficult at the present day to realize that such a perversion of the forms and authority of law can ever have been possible in England. The most elementary principles of evidence, of argument, of justice were violated. The martyr urged that the " Bull " did not come from Rome, that it was a printed copy — printed at Douay, where he had bought it — of the announcement of the Jubilee of 1575, having no force or application of any kind after that year, and that of course he had never published it at Golden or anywhere else,2 that no
1 J. Morris, Troubles, i. pp. 71 — 77.
2 Mr. Froude (History of England, vol. xi. p. 54) says that Mayne "was discovered in Cornwall in November, 1578, having about him copies of the Bull of Pope Pius," meaning, of course, the Bull of Excommunication. " This and similar executions are now
2i6 BLESSED CUTHBERT MAYNE
evidence had been offered of the alleged publication, or that the Agnus Dei had been brought from Rome, or that he had brought it into England or delivered it to Mr. Tregian. The finding of a missal, chalice and vestments in his room, to which the High Sheriff testified, was also far from proving that he had said Mass. And in answer to three illiterate witnesses who said that in a secret conversation with them in prison he had denied the Queen to be supreme head of the Church, he declared he had not made to them any positive assertion or denial. One of the judges, Judge Manwood, instructed the jury that where plain proofs were wanting, strong presumptions ought to be considered suffi- cient, and directed them to convict the prisoner accordingly. The jury, after deliberating some time, were still undecided, in spite of the strongly prejudiced charge, when the High Sheriff in the sight of the court went amongst them and held a long consultation with them, an act as illegal and scandalous then as it would be now ; after which being called on for their verdict they pro- nounced the blessed martyr guilty of high treason and the others of felony. The next day they were all brought up for judgment. The sentence of death was pronounced on Blessed Cuthbert and
held to have been needless cruelties." Here Mr. Froude seems to have thought he had made too great an admission and he is not ashamed to add, " But were a Brahmin to be found in the quarters of a Sepoy Regiment, scattering incendiary addresses from Nana Sahib, he would be hanged also " ! " He was tried for treason and hanged at Launceston, without any charge against him except his religion," says Hallam. (Constitutional History, vol. i. p. 145.)
BLESSED CUTHBERT MAYNE 217
that of perpetual imprisonment and forfeiture on the rest. On hearing the sentence the martyr raised his eyes and hands to heaven, and with a calm voice and joyful face cried aloud, Deo gratias. He was taken back to his wretched prison, handcuffed, and loaded with fetters. Here he remained over five months amongst criminals of the lowest class.
The delay was due to the fact that the two Judges of Assize had differed. Judge Jeffries had allowed himself to be overborne at the moment by Manwood, but subsequently forwarded to the Council a report of the trial and his reasons for not concurring in the sentence. By order of the Council the case was discussed by all the judges together, but they were as little agreed as the first two, though the older judges and those of greater authority took the side of Jeffries. The Government, however, well aware of the stream of missionaries pouring into the country, and stung by the abundant fruits of their apostolate, were unwilling to forego the opportunity of making an example, and an order was sent to the High Sheriff, signed by eight or nine of the Privy Council, to proceed with the execution.
When a servant told the holy priest to be pre- pared, for he was to die in three days, he heartily thanked him and said he would most gladly have rewarded him, had he anything to give, since he had been the first to bring him such joyful news ; and from that moment he gave himself up to more intimate prayer and preparation for his passion. During the second night of this preparation, the chamber was filled with a bright supernatural light,
218 BLESSED CUTHBERT MAYNE
and the other prisoners in amazement called to him to know what it was. He answered that it was nothing in which they were concerned, and begged them to be silent.
The day before his martyrdom he was brought out of his prison to a conference with a number of justices and other gentlemen who had come with two ministers to see him. From eight o'clock in the morning till nightfall, ironed as he was, and weakened with ill-treatment, he kept the field, meeting all they had to say with complete success, as some who were present had the honesty to confess, though the ministers and their patrons spread the report that he had been unable to answer them. But what was much more than success in argument was the victory of his faith and constancy; for the justices present assured him they could answer for his life and liberty if he would affirm on oath that the Queen was the supreme head of the Church of England. The martyr asked for a Bible, and perhaps for an instant they thought that terror of death and desire for life had prevailed, but in another moment he had taken the Holy Scriptures into his hand, made the sign of the Cross, and kissed the sacred volume, and the words came clear and firm, " The Queen never was, nor is, nor ever shall be, the head of the Church of England."
The next day was the eve of St. Andrew, an auspicious day for a martyr's death. The place was not less so, for its ancient name was Fanum Sancti Stephani — " the Church of St. Stephen." With such happy auguries Blessed Cuthbert set out for
BLESSED CUTHBERT MAYNE 219
the market-place, where the execution was to take place. When he was laid on the sledge some of the justices wanted him to be placed so that his head should hang over the framework, and thus be more cruelly bruised by the stones ; he made no objection himself, but the deputy of the High Sheriff was humane enough to forbid it.1 At the place of execution, after kneeling in prayer for some time, he went up the ladder, and began to explain to the people the cause of his death and to make an exhortation to them, but he was soon stopped, and one of the justices told the hangman to attach the rope, adding as the ladder was going to be turned, " Now let him preach if he will." At the same moment another called out, " Now, villain and traitor, you are at the moment of death ; tell us then truly whether Mr. Tregian and Sir John Arundell2 knew of the things you are going to die for." " I know nothing about them," answered the martyr, " except that they are good and pious men ; and as to the things laid to my charge, no one but myself has any knowledge." Then he was thrown off so suddenly that he had not time to finish the verse In manus tuas, which, striking his breast, he had begun. He was almost instantly cut down,3 but
1 The contemporary author of the Imprisonment of Francis Tregian, says " he was uneasily laid on a hurdle, and so spitefully drawn, receiving some knocks on his face and his fingers with a girdle, unto the market-place," &c. (See J. Morris, Troubles, i. p. 98.)
2 Mr. Tregian's brother-in-law.
3 The Briefe Historic, however, says: "Some of the gentlemen would have had him cut down straightway that they might have had him quartered alive, but the Sheriff's deputy would not, but let him hang until he was dead."
BLESSED CUTHBERT MAYNE
the malice of the persecutors was baulked of part of its satisfaction, for as he fell from the gibbet, which was unusually high, his head struck with great force against an angle of the scaffold. One of his eyes was put out by the blow, and so he was nearly insensible while the usual butchery was gone through.
When the quarters of the holy martyr were distributed, his head was stuck upon a pole at Wadebridge.1 In some way it came into the reverent hands of Catholics and is now preserved as a most precious relic of the first martyr of the seminaries, at the Carmelite Convent, Lanherne.
The words of a saint about a saint are ever of special interest. Blessed Edmund Campion heard of his old friend's happy end for the first time more than a year afterwards, when he learned the par- ticulars from Gregory Martin. In his answer, dated August, 1579, from Prague, he says, " We all thank you much for your account of Cuthbert's martyrdom. It gave many of us a real religious joy. Wretch that I am, how has that novice distanced me ! May he be favourable to his old friend and tutor ! I shall now boast of these titles more than ever."
Mr. Francis Tregian, after various imprisonments and sufferings, in which his mother, his wife and children were involved, was condemned to the penalties of prcemunire. His property, forfeited to the Crown, was given by Elizabeth to Sir George
1 The quarters were distributed as follows: One to Bodmin, another to Barnstaple (near the martyr's birthplace), a third to Tregony (about a mile from Mr. Tregian's house), and the fourth to Launceston. In the Briefe Historie St. Probus is given for Tregony.
BLESSED CUT H BERT MAYNE
Carey, created by her Lord Hunsdon in 1559. He himself remained a prisoner for thirty years, chiefly in the Fleet Prison, but was at length set at liberty and died at an advanced age on the 25th of September, 1608. His body was found absolutely incorrupt seventeen years after his death, and his son-in-law, Francis Plunket, in his Life of him, relates several miracles wrought by his relics.1
E. S. K.
AUTHORITIES. — These are already sufficiently referred to in the notes. We may add, however, the following. Estcourt, Question of Anglican Ordinations, p. 138, App. p. Ixii. ; Simpson's Campion (1867), pp. 49, 73, 93 ; Frere, A History of the English Church in the reigns of Elizabeth and James I. pp. 210 — 213 ; Morris, Troubles of our Catholic Forefathers, Series I. pp. 65 — 140, for the life and sufferings of Mr.Tregian; and W. Meyer Griffith, Blessed Cttthbert Mayne, Proto-Martyr of the Seminaries (London, 1903), a tiny booklet which has the merit of being the first to clear up the question as to the martyr's birthplace. It contains a sketch of the font at Sherwell Church, and a facsimile of the martyr's baptismal register. Prince, Danmonii Orientates Illustres, or, The Worthies of Devon (1701), gives (p. 461) the Mayne family arms, gules, a fess argent between four hands or.
PORTRAIT. — A rude sketch of the martyr's features exists. It was possibly the work of his gaoler, or of some visitor to
1 J. Morris, Troubles, i. p. 62. If Mr. Tregian would have gone to the Protestant service he might not only have secured full immunity for himself and his servants, but also the life of Blessed Cuthbert. " But no persuasions or offers whatsoever could once induce him to agree thereto, always preferring Christianity before his own immunity or his servants' liberty. And concerning the life of Cuthbert Mayne, always alleging that he would not hazard his own soul unto Hell to withhold his man's from Heaven." (Ibid. P- 97-)
222 BLESSED CUT H BERT MAYNE
his prison. A copy will be found in Portraits of the English Martyrs (Art and Book Co., 1895).
RELICS. — The skull of Blessed Cuthbert is, as we saidr reverently preserved at the Carmelite Convent, Lanherne, Cornwall. The hole through the top shows the shape of the spike on which it was exposed. There are projections on the sides of the hole, showing that there must have been a raised edge on the spike. The following memorandum is preserved in the Convent. " Richard Raine, Esq., made a present to our Community, in the year 1807, of the skull of Mr. Cuthbert Mayne, who was put to death for his faith, in Cornwall, in the year 1577." Many fragments have been detached from this relic (which is the upper part only of the skull), and the nuns have been only too generous in distri- buting particles. It is now, however, sealed up in a beautiful reliquary, presented by the late Mr. Charles Weld of Chideock.
A portion of the relic is at the Catholic Church, Laun- ceston, others are at Bruges, Erdington, Durham, Harrow (Visitation Convent), Parkminster, Roehampton, Ushaw, and elsewhere.
In the splendid old mansion of Sutton Place, Guildford,. the seat of the Westons, and afterwards of the Salvins, there was found, some years ago, in a cupboard in an old lumber- room, together with other relics, enclosed in a magnificent Gothic reliquary of the fourteenth century, a large part of the skull of Blessed Cuthbert Mayne, being the part under the right ear. (This seems never to have been at Lanherne.) It is not known how these relics came into the possession of the family.
VI. THE BLESSED JOHN NELSON,
JESUIT.
Tyburn, 3 February, 1577-8.
Two days after the martyrdom of Blessed Cuthbert Mayne, another capture was made, this time in London ; that of the Blessed John Nelson.
John Nelson was born of an honourable York- shire family, at "Skelton, within two miles of York, being the ancient house of the Nelsons, being knights of good worth." l His life had been exactly coextensive with the duration of the schism, for he was born in the fatal year 1534. He was from his earliest years a man of great faith and a loving zeal for God's cause, and Dr. Bridgwater says he had a vehement detestation for the error of many Catholics who in the early years of Elizabeth's reign thought it lawful to go to the Protestant worship. He used to declare it a great grace of God to him, that he had been able to withdraw a good many from this error, and had the consola- tion of seeing them imitate the courage and con- stancy of the Catholic Bishops and other holy
1 An old MS. in the Archives of the see of Westminster, vol. ii. p. 65.
224 BLESSED JOHN NELSON
confessors who were suffering the loss of goods and liberty in Elizabeth's prisons for this cause. His intimate friends related after his death how he had long been accustomed to say that the Catholic religion would never be restored in England until many should shed their blood for confession and testimony of the same ; and whatever hopes people might found on other means, he never wavered in this opinion.1 Moreover, both when at Douay and for years before, he was firmly persuaded that he himself would shed his blood for the Faith. To such a man Douay offered an irresistible attraction ; and in 1573, at the mature age of forty, he left England and betook himself to the Seminary. Of his four brothers two followed his example. Martin, the next in age to himself, arrived in 1574, and was ordained and sent on the mission the same year ; Thomas followed in 1575, and was ordained and sent to England in I577-2
It is difficult in middle age to fall into a life of regular discipline ; but John was remarked as being always most prompt in his obedience to every order of his Superiors. His great longing for the holy priesthood is also spoken of. His desire was accomplished on the nth of June, 1576, when he was ordained at Bynche, by the Archbishop of
1 F. Watford's Relation of Martyrs. (Stonyhurst MS. Collectanea M. fol. 131 — 143. Printed in Pollen's Acts of English Martyrs, p. 250.)
2 Both brothers lived till the year 1625, Martin dying at Sutton, in Herefordshire, on December 4, and Thomas at Antwerp, in June. Christopher was the owner of Skelton. The fifth brother apostatized from the Faith and became a minister.
BLESSED JOHN NELSON 225
Cambrai. He left Douay for England on November the yth of the same year, with four companions who had been ordained with him, and a young relation of his own name, whom he was afraid to leave in the troubled state of the country, from which many of the English were flying.
His ministry lasted but one year. The Douay Diary l says he " had laboured much," but no par- ticulars have been preserved of his work unless an act related in the Diaries be rightly attributed to him. A certain woman in London led the life of an anchoress, enclosed in some open space, where she passed several years without ever leaving it, to the general wonder. But, as is thought, from an ignorance which heresy had made very common, she never had a thought of reconciliation to the Church or of the holy sacraments. This poor woman was at the point of death and was sur- rounded by a great number of the neighbours, when "one of ours," says the diarist, "rather than allow a soul so religious in life to pass away without the sacraments, disguised himself so that he might not be at once seized as a priest, and then boldly entering the place, bade the bystanders to withdraw a little, and, as if he were engaged in some other business with her, reconciled her to the Church, and that done she expired." In the margin of this entry a contemporary hand had written " Nels.," and it is highly probable that the priest was no other than the blessed martyr.2
1 Knox, Douay Diaries (Diarium Secundum), February 15, 1578, p. 133.
2 Ibid. June i, 1577, P- I22- P II.
226 BLESSED JOHN NELSON
It was just a year after his arrival in England that he was called upon to exorcise a possessed person. The evil spirit was forced to leave his victim, but before doing so threatened the holy priest that he would have him taken up in a week, and that it should cost him his life.1 And, in fact, on Sunday, December the ist, late in the evening, as he was saying the Matins of the next day's Office, he was seized and at once committed to Newgate Prison on suspicion of " Papistry."
A few days elapsed and then he was summoned for examination before the Queen's High Com- missioners. There was no accusation against him, but the Commissioners began by tendering the Oath of Supremacy, which of course he refused to take. The simple refusal did not of itself bring him within any of the penal statutes, inasmuch as he was not known or proved to be included in any of the classes of persons who could be obliged to take it ; on the other hand, to maintain expressly the authority of the Pope was highly penal for any one, and the second offence incurred the punishment of high treason. According to the just and humane practice of our day, the worst criminal is carefully warned against incriminating himself; but it was far otherwise in Elizabeth's time, and the Com- missioners at once went on to draw from the martyr matter for his condemnation. " Why would he not take the oath?" he was asked. "Because I never heard or read," he answered, " that any lay prince could have that pre-eminence." "Who, then, 1 Yepes, Historia particular (1599), lib. ii. c. 13, p. 97.
BLESSED JOHN NELSON 227
according to your opinion, is the head of the Church?" He answered boldly, "The Roman Pontiff, as being Christ's vicar and the lawful successor of St. Peter." They next asked him what he thought of the religion now practised in England, to which he replied that it was schismatical and heretical. Required to define schism, he said it was a voluntary departure from the unity of the Catholic Roman faith. Upon this they asked whether the Queen, then, was a schismatic. To answer this question in the affirmative was, by the Act of 1571, at once high treason, so the martyr tried to evade it. He answered that he could not tell, because he did not know her mind and intention as to the promulgation and support of Protestantism. But the Commissioners would not let him escape. They answered that the Queen unquestionably did pro- mulgate and support it, and pressed him to declare whether that being the case, she was a schismatic or a heretic. The martyr paused. He knew life was at stake. Was it possible to escape offending against the cruel law of his earthly sovereign without offending against God and his own conscience ? Then, seeing that there was no escape, " If she be," quoth he, " the setter forth and defender of this religion now practised in England, then is she a schismatic and a heretic." Having thus got from him matter for a capital charge, they ordered him back to prison.
For nearly seven weeks he remained in peace. Towards the end of this time a special providence secured to him the grace of saying Mass and
228 BLESSED JOHN NELSON
nourishing himself with the Bread of the Strong. A priest and some other friends, who came to see him and knew his desire to say Mass, were very anxious to assist at the Sacrifice and receive Holy Com- munion from his hands. They proposed the feast of the Purification, but on consultation they all agreed that it would be a dangerous day, as such a festival would be likely to excite suspicion. They then proposed the day after, but whether warned by a Divine light or guided by Providence, Blessed John preferred the Thursday before. Had the other day been chosen he would have had to go through his martyrdom without the Holy Viaticum, for on the very next day after his Mass he was told he was to be brought to trial on the morrow, which would be the eve of the Purification. He was warned at the same time that his condemnation was certain unless he retracted the answers he had given at his first examination.
Accordingly on Saturday, the ist of February, 1577-8, he was tried on the charge, as Stow testifies, of " denying the Queen's Supremacy and such other traitorous words against her Majesty." The evidence of his previous examination was clear, and confirmed by his answers in court, so that the verdict was a matter of course, and sentence was passed accordingly, at which it was remarked that he did not the least change countenance, or betray any sign of emotion.
For the next two days — his martyrdom was fixed for the third — he was confined, his biographer says, ""in a most filthy underground dungeon." It was no
BLESSED JOHN NELSON 229^
doubt the same afterwards described by Father Henry Garnet : " We have here a Limbo," he says, " the place where they ordinarily confine all those who have been already condemned to death ; and all Catholics under sentence of death have to go to that prison before execution, unless exempted by a particular favour. ... It is a place underground, full of horrors, without light, and swarming with vermin and creeping things. It is impossible to see there without candles continually burning, and there is neither bed nor chair, unless the persons provide for themselves. One of our holy martyrs, a priest (Father Southwell), was there some years ago after being sentenced to death, and whilst sleeping some poisonous insect entered his body causing intense suffering, until he was transferred to the repose of the saints and just ones of God."1
From the moment of his condemnation the servant of God gave himself up entirely to prepara- tion for his martyrdom. He would take no other food than bread and a little weak beer. The gaoler's wife when he came back from the court, offered him some wine out of compassion, thinking he must be dejected by his sentence. But he refused it. He said he would prefer water, or rather vinegar and gall, so that he might more closely follow his Lord, and wished to give no indulgence to his body which was so soon to die. He spent the time chiefly in prayer, and when he had occasion to speak, his words were almost exclusively of eternal
1 Foley, Records of the English Province of the Society of Jesus, vol. vii. p. 1361.
230 BLESSED JOHN NELSON
things. A friend who came to see him advised him to fortify his courage by reading the Acts of the Martyrs. He answered "that he had enough to occupy his mind withal, and to meditate upon full well." His friend went on to remind him of all the torments the martyrs had borne, and of the heroic constancy with which they had been able to endure them. "Yes," he answered, "these thoughts have long been familiar to my mind and have filled me with such sweetness that I doubt nothing but that I shall find and feel the grace of God's conso- lation in the midst of my agony."
Early on the day of his martyrdom, Monday, February the 3rd, he was transferred to a better part of the prison, where two of his near relations came to take leave of him. Very likely they may have been his brothers. Dodd says of Thomas Nelson, then a priest, that he had the satisfaction of visiting his brother before his death. They found him absorbed in prayer, his hands joined and lifted up. They were overcome with tears, but the martyr, unmoved, said they ought to console him and not need his consolation ; and that they would do better to shed their tears over their sins than over him ; for whom all things, by God's goodness, were falling out according to his desire. They were going to bid him good-bye, when they were over- powered with a fresh burst of grief; on which the servant of God, feeling that he was beginning to be overcome, and fearing the weakness of nature, very lovingly sent them away. Hardly were they gone when " two proud ministers of Satan " burst in and
BLESSED JOHN NELSON 231
began to torment his last moments with controversy, but he would not so much as enter into conversation with them, and finding him obstinately silent they at last gave up the attempt.
When he was brought out of the prison and laid on the hurdle, some of the officers called on him to beg pardon of the Queen for his great offences against her. " I will ask no pardon of her," he answered, "for I have never offended her." The hostile crowd broke into cries of "Traitor," and threats. " Well," said he, " God's will be done, I perceive I must die, and surely I am ready to die with a good will ; for better it is to abide all punish- ment here, be it never so grievous, than to suffer the eternal torments of hell fire."
He said, In manus tuas Domine, as he was lifted from the sledge at Tyburn, and begged all Catholics who were present to say with him a Pater, Ave, and Credo, which he recited aloud in Latin, and after which he added the Confiteor, Miserere, and De proftmdis. He then addressed all present, saying, " I beg you to bear me witness that I die in the unity of the Catholic Church, and for that unity do now most willingly suffer my blood to be shed ; and I earnestly beseech of God, through His infinite mercy, to make you all true Catholic men, and both to live and die in the unity of the Roman and Catholic Faith." From the crowd there were cries of "Away with thee and thy Catholic Romish Faith," but the martyr was not to be cowed, and repeated his prayer again. He went on to ask pardon of all whom he had ever offended and to declare his
232 BLESSED JOHN NELSON
forgiveness of his enemies and persecutors, and to pray for God's forgiveness for them. Being urged again to ask the Queen's forgiveness, he repeated that he could not do so, never having offended her. But after a pause he added that he would ask pardon of her also and of all the world for any offence he had ever given, as on his part he forgave all.
The hangman being told to hasten, the martyr once more recommended himself to the prayers of the Catholics, that Christ our Lord by the merits of His bitter Passion would receive his soul into eternal joys, and as they drove away the cart and left him hanging, many voices were heard to cry out, " Lord, receive his soul." He was cut down immediately, and was fully conscious while the usual cruelties were inflicted ; and when the executioner had his hand on his heart, he raised himself a little and, like another St. Stephen, in the very agony of death said, " I forgive the Queen and all the authors of my death."1
A friend who was present, as he rode away immediately to the north of England, said to his companion, " It is now come to pass that John Nelson foretold me seven years since, that he should die for the Catholic Faith.'' The Briefe Historic before referred to, and published but four years later, records that there was then a credible fame of miraculous cures wrought by the martyr's relics.
i The author of the Briefe Historie says, " Some that stood near report this, . . . but I, though I saw his lips move, yet heard not so much." He adds, "The hangman had three or four blows at his head before he could strike it off."
BLESSED JOHN NELSON 233
Blessed John Nelson, like Thomas Woodhouse, Thomas Pound, Thomas Metham and others, was an admirer of the Society of Jesus before its missioners had appeared in England, and like them he applied abroad for leave to be admitted in this country, which under the circumstances he could never expect to quit, and his" prayer like theirs was granted. Though we do not know to which Provincial he addressed himself, nor what was the date of his application, Father Stephenson has recorded the fact of his admission,1 and the Fathers of the Society keep his feast with that of their other Martyrs in England.
" God be blessed for him, and blessed be the memory of this his martyrdom amongst men in all our posterity. Amen."
E.S. K.
AUTHORITIES. — The earliest printed biography seems to be that included in A brief e Historic of the Glorious Martyrdom of xii Reverend Priests [? Rheims], 1582, unpaged. See also Concertatio, fol. 49 A — 50 B, Yepes, pp. 304 — 307. Champney's Annals, p. 793. Challoner, i. pp. 20 — 23.
1 H. More, Historia Provincice Anglicans, 1660, p. 35.
VII. THE BLESSED THOMAS SHERWOOD,
LAYMAN. Tyburn, 7 February, 1577-8.
ONLY four days after Blessed John Nelson's martyr- dom, Tyburn was the scene of another like tragedy and another like triumph.
Some three months earlier, in the first half of November, 1577, a noble-looking youth was walking in the streets of London, when a cry was heard, " Stop the traitor, stop the traitor ! " on which the young man was seized by the passers-by and carried off to the nearest justice of the peace. The prisoner's name was Thomas Sherwood, his age twenty-seven years.
Blessed Thomas Sherwood was the son of pious Catholic parents. We have a beautiful account both of him and his family written by one of his brothers, which has been preserved among the Stonyhurst manuscripts.1 From this we learn that his father, Henry Sherwood, was born in Not- tingham, and was brought up as a singing-boy in the chapel of the Earl of Northumberland. He was 1 Printed in Pollen's Acts of English Martyrs, pp. 2 — 8.
BLESSED THOMAS SHERWOOD 235
afterwards sent to Oxford by the Earl, in the reign of Henry VIII., where he continued six or seven years, but was unable to take his degree, as that involved subscribing to the Oath of Supremacy. On leaving the University he entered the employ- ment of a Watling Street merchant tailor, and acted for some time as his factor in Spain. On his return he adopted the trade of a woollen draper, and married a virtuous maid called Elizabeth Tregian,1 by whom he had fourteen children, most of whom lived to man's estate, and were all brought up in the Catholic religion.
When Elizabeth came to the throne, Henry Sherwood retired for a time to Belgium and lived for a year at Mechlin, where the nuns of Syon had also found a refuge. Shortly after his return to England he and his wife were taken at Mass in London, and were brought before the High Com- missioners. His wife made a very brave confession, and put Dr. Cox, the Bishop of Ely, to shame by her trenchant replies to his calumnies against Catholics.
Her husband was committed to prison, where he remained six months, being released at last through the intercession of the Spanish Ambassador. He then went with his wife and younger children to live at Nottingham, where after some years, being called in question for not coming to church, they went to stay with one of their sons, who was married, in Dorsetshire. That son being molested for the
1 Sister to Mr. Francis Tregian, the noble confessor, in whose house Blessed Cuthbert Mayne was taken.
236 BLESSED THOMAS SHERWOOD
same cause, they all went to London, where the old man lived a life of strict retirement, attending only to his devotions and never leaving his lodging. It was shortly after their coming to London that Thomas was apprehended.
The Blessed Thomas had been born in London and had been brought up for some years at school. But at the age of fifteen he was taken from school to serve his father in the trade of a draper, which he did for several years.
" Afterwards," writes his brother, " being more devoted to a religious course of life than to a worldly, he obtained from his parents leave to pass the seas and come to Douay, where, having con- ferred with certain venerable Fathers, by them he was encouraged to fall again to study ; and deter- mining upon that course, it was thought fit he should first return into England, as well to adjustate his accounts with his father, having the best part of his substance in his hands and charge, as also to procure some competent means to maintain him for some time at his study.
" Upon which occasion he returned back, and whiles he travailed in the despatch of his business he was met one morning in Chancery Lane by one George Martin,1 son to the Lady Tregonwell, in Dorsetshire, which George had seen him divers times at his mother's house in the company of one Mr. Stampe, a priest ; and so meeting him and calling for the constable, caused him to be appre- hended."
1 " Martine Tregonian." (Briefe Historic.)
BLESSED THOMAS SHERWOOD 237
Father Persons,1 in his De Persecutione Anglicana, calls the Lady " Tregony," and Challoner says the martyr was wont to frequent her house in London. She was a good and virtuous Catholic, but her son was widely different from his mother both in faith and morals.2 " This young spark suspected that Mass was sometimes privately said in his mother's house ; and this, as he imagined, by the means of Mr. Sherwood, which was the occasion of his conceiving an implacable hatred against him."3
1 In Bridgwater's Concertatio, fol. 283.
2 The Tregonwells lived at Milton Abbas, near Blandford, Dorset. The Sherwoods probably made the lady's acquaintance when they were living in Dorsetshire. She was no doubt the widow of Sir John Tregonwell, and had been his second wife. She was by birth a New. Sir John Tregonwell had been one of the Royal Commissioners for the dissolution of the monasteries under Henry VIII. and had obtained Milton Abbey as his share of the spoil. His tomb is still to be seen in the desecrated church, with his effigy in brass. He is kneeling, clad in armour, with surcoat bearing the Tregonwell arms, and the inscription runs : " Here lyeth buried Sir John Tregonwell, Knyght, doctor of the cyvill lawes, and one of the maisters of the Chauncerye, who dyed the xiiith day of January, in the yere of our lorde 1565, of whose soul God have mercy."
It should be added, that Bishop Challoner was mistaken when he writes of our martyr, " He went over to the English College of Douay, in Flanders, where I find him, in the diary of the house, a student, in 1576." The only Sherwood who appears in the Diary at that date is a priest. (Douay Diaries, pp. 102, 259.) Father Persons, however, is also mistaken when he asserts (Philopater, 1593, p. 186) that Sherwood had never been out of England. In a list of martyrs of the Seminaries of Douay and Rome, drawn up by Dr. Barrett, in 1593, Sherwood's name appears as a student of Douay College, and the statement has been copied by later writers. Though he never actually studied there, it will be seen from the text, that there was some justification for this claim.
3 Challoner, i. p. 23.
238 BLESSED THOMAS SHERWOOD
The result was the cruel and cowardly denunciation of his mother's friend to the persecuting instincts of the London crowd.
When however they arrived before the Justice, who was none other than Mr. Recorder Fleetwood, one of the bitterest enemies of Catholics, the young man had no charge to bring against Blessed Thomas. All he could say was that he suspected him to be a Papist, that he was much in the company of priests, and had been across the seas and had no doubt conferred with traitors there. But he had rightly gauged the present administration of law and justice. In default of an offence the magistrate set to work to create one, as the High Commissioners did shortly after with the Blessed John Nelson. He put a string of questions about the Queen and the Pope's Supremacy, the heretical or schismatical character of the new religion, and whether the Queen were a heretic or not. It required but little skill to entrap the ingenuous youth, who made no attempt to evade the questions, but answered plainly according to his conscience. He preserved none the less a modest and respectful manner, " being of his nature," says his brother, " very meek and gentle." He was pressed by the Justice as to what he thought of the Bull of Pius V., and whether, if the Pope had excommunicated Queen Elizabeth, she were then lawful Queen or no. He answered that he knew nothing of the Bull, but if the Pope had indeed excommunicated the Queen, he thought she could not be lawful Queen.
This was of course quite sufficient for the
BLESSED THOMAS SHERWOOD 239
purpose of his enemies, and the martyr was at once committed to the Gatehouse at Westminster, while Fleetwood made haste to acquaint her Majesty's Council of his important capture. The Attorney- General, Gilbert Gerard, was thereupon ordered to go to the prison and receive his examination. He did so on November the 2oth, and there obtained again from the martyr the statement as to the excommunication of the Queen, which Fleetwood had already got from him. According to the iniquity of the times the utterance so obtained was treated as an act of high treason, and for it he finally suffered. As, however, he would not confess the names of any other Catholics, he was sent to the Tower, where his examination was continued under torture.1
The Council Book contains two entries on the iyth of November, 1577, which shall be here inserted.
" Windsor, I7th November, 1577. " A letter to Mr. Attorney-General, signifying unto him that he shall receive the examination of one Thomas Sherwood, lately committed by the High Commissioners, for hearing of a Mass, and since examined by Mr. Recorder of London : which exami- nation containing matter of high treason against her Majesty's person, their Lordships have thought good to send unto him and require him, after he shall have substantially considered thereof, to acquaint the Lord Chief Justice therewith, and
1 " Being the first that was racked for mere matter of faith in our memories." (Brief e Historic.)
240
BLESSED THOMAS SHERWOOD
presently to give order that the said Sherwood be this term arraigned and proceeded against according to the laws of this realm in that behalf provided ; but before they proceed to his arraignment, to take some pains further to examine him both upon the points of his confession, and also to see if he can discover any others of his knowledge to be of his opinion ; and where, and of whom, he hath gathered the substance of his arguments gained in his said confession, wherein perchance he may bolt out some other matters or persons worthy to be known."
At the same time they sent
" A letter to the Lieutenant of the Tower requir- ing him to receive into his hands, of Mr. Recorder of London, the person of Thomas Sherwood, and to retain him close prisoner, and from conference with any person, until such time as he shall receive order from Mr. Attorney-General, who is appointed to examine him upon such matters as he is to be charged withal : and showing this their Lordships' letter to Mr. Recorder, which shall be his sufficient warrant for the delivery of him.
" He is required in a postscript that if the said Sherwood shall not willingly confess such things as shall be demanded of him, he is then required to commit him to the dungeon amongst the rats."1
1 A Reading on the Use of Torture in the Criminal Law of England, by David Jardine, Appendix, p. 79. The substance of the letters is printed by Father Pollen (Acts of English Martyrs, pp. n and 12), and the full text in Dasent's Acts of the Privy Council.
BLESSED THOMAS SHERWOOD 241
This last direction would have seemed incredible were it not found in the Council books themselves. According to Mr. Jardine, this dungeon " is described as a cell below high water mark and totally dark. As the tide flowed, innumerable rats, which infest the muddy banks of the Thames, were driven through the orifices of the walls into the dungeon. The alarm excited by the irruption of these loathsome creatures in the dark was the least part of the torture which the unfortunate captives had to undergo ; instances are related, which humanity would gladly believe to be the exaggera- tions of Catholic partisans, where the flesh has been torn from the arms and legs of prisoners during sleep by the well-known voracity of these animals." :
Here then our brave young martyr was thrown, and here he lay for well-nigh three winter months, only leaving the horrible place for the still more terrible torture-chamber hard by. He suffered from "cold, stench, and hunger," and it was evidently intended by the rigour of his suffering to force him to give information as to where he had heard Mass and what priests had said it. It was no doubt because they failed in the attempt that recourse was had to still more cruel means. Three times the martyr was most sorely racked in the vaulted chamber near which he had been confined. This torture he bore with a supernatural fortitude not unequal to that of the early martyrs, and strengthened by God he persisted in refusing any 1 Op. cit. p. 26.
Q II.
242 BLESSED THOMAS SHERWOOD
information which could have betrayed others or brought them into danger. And here again, the Council Book corroborates the Martyr's Acts. "Sherwood's courage and constancy," says Mr. Jardine, " overcame the horrors of this dungeon ; and continuing his resolution, a warrant was issued from the Board, on the 4th of December, 1577, authorizing the Lieutenant, the Attorney — and Solicitor-General, and the Recorder ' to assay him at the rack.' This also appears to have failed, for he made no discoveries of importance."1 The warrant is printed in Mr. Jardine's Appendix, and directs that the commissioners are to " assay him at the rack upon such articles as they shall think meet to minister unto him for the discovering either of the persons or of further matter."
We may now continue our narrative from a contemporary document by an anonymous writer, which though undated must have been written before 1582, as it is quoted by Father Persons in his De Persecutions Anglicana, which was printed in that year.
" The brave youth was sent to the Tower, . . . and meantime the chamber he had in the city was ransacked (according to the custom of those harpies) and all his goods removed, together with about ninety pieces of gold belonging to other persons, which were owing to his needy and afflicted father,
1 Jardine, p. 27.
2 Ibid. p. 8r. It is also given in Pollen's Acts of English Martyrs, pp. 13, 14.
243
as if the pieces themselves were guilty of high treason and denial of the Supremacy. In the prison Sherwood suffered very grievous things with a constancy worthy of all praise. . . . To begin with, the holy youth was harassed by repeated torturings, in order that overcome with pain, he might confess where he had heard Mass, to the intent that any he might name, might be punished with like plunder of goods and bodily injury. But he was brave beyond his years, no racking, no cross- examination could make him name any one. Thus baulked, his barbarous torturers changed their proceedings and cast the martyr, who had now lost the use of his limbs, into a very dark and fetid dungeon. Here he was left without necessary clothing, in order that the terrors of darkness, the stench, and most of all, the shameful nakedness, might break his resolution, which no torture could move. As to food, it is easy to conjecture of what sort it was, seeing that he was not allowed to buy anything to sustain life — nay, more, what calls for the utmost commiseration is that when a certain good man,1 touched by the report of the extreme hunger which the blessed youth was suffering, sent him some money, and by means of a prisoner con- veyed it to Sherwood's own keeper (this everyone in the Tower has), the keeper returned it next day, because the Lieutenant would not allow him to have
1 Father Persons has added in a note: " Mr. Roper, son-in-law to Thomas More." William Roper died January 4, 1577-8, not in 1573, as Cresacre More, Life of Sir Thomas More, p. 119, Edition of 1725, erroneously says.
244 BLESSED THOMAS SHERWOOD
the benefit of any alms. The martyr's friend asked whether the keeper himself would not expend it for his benefit, but he was told it was impossible. All that the most earnest prayers could effect was to induce him to take sixpence to buy straw for the youth to lie on, so great was the inhumanity of the Lieutenant towards his starving prisoner."
Blessed Thomas's brother gives us some more precious details.
" He was of small learning, scarcely understand- ing the Latin tongue, but had much read books of controversies and devotion, and had used much to converse among Catholic priests, and by reason thereof, having a good wit and judgment, and withal being very devout and religious, he was able to give good counsel, as he did to many of the more ignorant sort, being much esteemed for his virtuous life and humble and modest behaviour : besides God did give a special grace in his [con- versation] , whereby together with his good example of life, he much moved and edified others. He was a man of little stature of body, yet of a healthful and good constitution, and very temperate in his diet.
" After his first racking in the Tower (which was said to be rigorous), being visited by a Catholic gentlewoman, he showed himself of that joyful and comfortable spirit as she was astonished thereat. As also his keeper with compassion giving him warning that he was to be racked again, he was
BLESSED THOMAS SHERWOOD 245
so little moved therewith, as merrily and with a cheerful countenance he said these words : ' I am very little, and you are very tall ; you may hide me in your great hose and so they shall not find me ; ' which the keeper did afterwards report to divers, much marvelling at his great fortitude and courage. He was about the age of twenty-seven years when he was martyred."1
Our martyr was brought to trial on Saturday, the ist of February, 1577-8. The official record of his trial still exists.2 It took place in the Court of the Queen's Bench at Westminster. The martyr
1 Hallam states that the Blessed Thomas was only fourteen years of age, and the mistake has been repeated by more than one recent writer. Hallam makes the statement on the authority of Ribadeneyra (Continuatio Sanderi et Rishtoni, chap, xxvi.), writing many years later. The brother's witness conclusively shows that Ribadeneyra was mistaken. The following conjecture is offered to the reader as a possible explanation of the error. The Philopater of Father Persons appeared at Lyons in 1592 ; Ribadeneyra's Appendix, or Continuation of Sander and Rishton, which refers to the former work, was published probably with an edition of the History of the English Schism in 1594 (Dodd says 1595). Whoever will compare the passage of Ribadeneyra about Blessed Thomas Sherwood (chap, xxvi.) with that of Persons (sect. iv. 266) will see that the former is taken almost textually from the latter. Now Persons begins his passage with the words, Quid . . . causes fuit cur annis abliinc quatuordecim,juvenempr<zclarum, &c. Ribadeneyra (in the Latin translation of 1610), Adolescens, imo puer quatuordecim annorum, liberalis admodum forma, &c. Is it fanciful to suppose that from an imperfect recollection of Persons' book, or badly written notes, he mistook the passage from Philopater for annos natum quatuor- decim ? It may be added that he probably was boyish-looking and young for his age as well as small of stature, as all the authorities dwell so much on his youth.
'^ Coram Rege Roll. (20 Elizabeth, rot. 3.)
246 BLESSED THOMAS SHERWOOD
was accused in the indictment of having on November the 2Oth last " diabolically, maliciously, and traitorously ... of his own perverse and treacherous mind and imagination, ... in the presence and hearing of divers faithful subjects of the said Lady our Queen " uttered, answered, published, and said "these false traitorous English words following, . . . falsely, maliciously, advisedly, directly, and treacherously — to wit, ' that for so much as our Queen Elizabeth . . . doth expressly disassent in Religion from the Catholic faith, of which Catholic faith, he sayeth that the Pope Gregory the thirteenth that now is, is conserver, because he is God's General Vicar in earth : and therefore he affirmeth by express words that our said Queen Elizabeth . . . is a schismatic and an heretic:' to the very great scandal and deroga- tion of the person of our said Lady the Queen, and the subversion of the state of this realm of England," &c.
The other words of which he was accused (for we may spare the reader any more of the redundant adjectives and adverbs which besprinkle the report so lavishly), were those which we have already quoted as having been extorted from him by Fleetwood, and again by the Attorney-General, as to the excommunication of the Queen.
The martyr having pleaded not guilty, the trial was fixed for the following Monday, "the morrow of the Purification of Blessed Mary the Virgin," on which day he was speedily found guilty and condemned to death in the usual form, i.e., " that the aforesaid Thomas Sherwood be led by the aforesaid Lieutenant
BLESSED THOMAS SHERWOOD 247
unto the Tower of London, and thence be dragged through the midst of the city of London, directly unto the gallows of Tyburn, and upon the gallows there be hanged, and thrown living to the earth, and that his bowels be taken from his belly, and whilst he is alive be burnt, and that his head be cut off, and that his body be divided into four parts, and that his head and quarters be placed where our Lady the Queen shall please to assign them."
There is no account preserved of the martyrdom. It took place on Friday, February the 7th, at Tyburn ; l and the Acts expressly mention that after the hanging, the other barbarous details of the execution were inflicted on him while still alive and conscious.
Three weeks later one who arrived at Douay from England brought the news that " for the profession of the Catholic faith a certain youth named Thomas Sherwood had endured not prisons only but even death : and that in all his torments his cry had been, ' Lord Jesus, I am not worthy to suffer these things for Thee, much less to receive those rewards which Thou hast promised to such as confess Thee.' "
Can we conclude this sketch of the life and sufferings of this bright and heroic soul better than
1 The writs to the Lieutenant of the Tower to deliver up Sherwood to the Sheriffs, and that to the Sheriffs of London to conduct him to execution, are in the Controlment Roll (20 Elizabeth, rot. 29). See Pollen, Acts of English Martyrs, p. 19. Stow records the execution in his Chronicle.
248 BLESSED THOMAS SHERWOOD
in the words of his ancient biographer ? — " Farewell, most holy martyr, and help with your patronage me, a most unworthy sinner, who am labouring to increase your honour here on earth. Amen."
ED.
AUTHORITIES. — Briefe Historic, p. 158. Concertatio (1589), if. 79 B — 80 A. Yepes, pp. 360, 361. Raissius, Catalogus Sacerdotum Anglo- Duacenorum. Champney's Annals (in West- minster Archives), p. 740. Challoner (1874), i. pp. 23, 24. Pollen, Acts of English Martyrs, pp. i — 20. Dasent, Acts of the Privy Council.
VIII. THE BLESSED EVERARD HANSE,
SECULAR PRIEST. Tyburn, 31 July, 1581.
Two opposite currents were becoming stronger day by day in England. On the one hand, the labours of the new missionaries, in spite of the heat of persecution, brought a great many into the Church. But on the other hand, among large numbers, there was a cruel and growing eagerness, fostered and rewarded by the Government, and stimulated by every art of calumny and misrepresentation, to track down the devoted priests and hunt them to death as if they were a natural prey. It was thus that the Blessed Everard Hanse obtained the crown of martyrdom. He was visiting some prisoners for the Faith in the Marshalsea Prison, an every-day event in the prison discipline of the day, when the gaoler noticed the foreign make of his boots. This was enough to awaken suspicion in the excitement of the time, roused, as it was, to the highest pitch by the search for Father Campion, and his capture which had just been effected. Hanse was at once brought before a magistrate and required to give
250 BLESSED EVERARD HANSE
an account of himself. He made no attempt to evade the inquiry, but with fearless openness declared that he was a priest, and was immediately com- mitted to Newgate, and as if he were a most dangerous and degraded criminal, heavily ironed and placed amongst the felons there.
He was born in Northamptonshire. His father and mother were both followers of the new religion, and Everard was sent to Cambridge. His abilities attracted attention, and having received heretical Orders he was presented to a rich living. His MS. Acts1 speak of him as surrounded by an admiring crowd when he preached, and as much carried away by his success. Meantime his elder brother, William, had obeyed the call of divine grace and left England to prepare himself for the priesthood. The Seminary had been shortly before obliged to leave Douay, largely owing to the intrigues of Elizabeth against it, and in March, 1578, had found a refuge at Rheims under the protection of the Cardinal Archbishop, Louis of Guise. William Hanse arrived there on November the nth following the transfer, and in the course of the next spring was ordained, said his first Mass on April the 28th, and was sent on the perilous English Mission on the 23rd of May, 1579.
The two brothers had many discussions about religion, but Everard remained unmoved. God's mercy, however, had singled him out not only for the grace of conversion, but for the glory of martyr- dom. In the midst of his prosperity he was struck down by a dangerous illness. As he lay long in
1 Westminster Archives, vol. ii. p. 175.
BLESSED EVERARD HANSE 251
extreme suffering, hovering between life and death, things began to appear to him in a new aspect, and God completed His work by some supernatural light, the nature of which his Acts do not specify. He did not delay. His brother was summoned to his sick-bed, and had the consolation of instructing him in the Faith, and receiving him into the unity of the Church.
Everard did not give himself to God by halves. As soon as he was recovered and had resigned his living, he set out for Rheims, with the desire of becoming a teacher of the truth amongst his countrymen to whom he had been a preacher of error. He was admitted to the Seminary on the nth of June, 1580, just four days after the Blessed Edmund Campion and Father Persons had left for England.
At this time the College was more than ever like a busy hive, priests or students were con- tinually arriving from or setting out for England, Rome and Paris; the lectures in Theology, Philo- sophy, Scripture, the Classics, and Hebrew, were in full activity ; the version of the New Testament was nearing completion, and controversial works succeeded each other rapidly. So far from the migration to Rheims having injured its work, there were this year no fewer than one hundred and twelve members in residence, besides others living in the town, and joining in the studies. Such was the life in which the new convert found himself. He lost no time in applying himself with his whole energy to theology, especially moral theology, and the
252 BLESSED EVERARD HANSE
practical duties of a missionary priest, and rapidly acquired a sufficient knowledge to warrant his Superiors in presenting him for ordination. The English fields were ripe for the harvest, labourers were urgently needed, and no time was to be lost. Besides all this, our martyr, we are told, was filled with an " unspeakable desire to gain others, but especially some of his dearest friends into the unity of the Church." On the 2ist of the February following his arrival, he was ordained subdeacon, and on Holy Saturday, which in 1581 was March the 25th, he was raised to the priesthood in the Church of our Blessed Lady at Rheims, by the Bishop of Chalons, being one of thirteen, of whom four besides himself were afterwards martyrs. He said his first Mass on April the 4th, and on the 24th set out for England, with three other priests.
During the latter months of his residence at Rheims, the College diaries record again and again harrowing accounts of the seizures, imprisonments, and torturings of the missionaries of which the news reached the Seminary from England.1
But so far from being terrified by these horrors or hesitating in their purpose, the students were only more eager for the combat. Two years later (the i4th of April, 1583), Dr. Barrett wrote2 from Rheims to Father Agazzari :
" There is among all a great fervour of charity, and an exceeding desire to aid our country. They
1 Knox, Douay Diaries (Diarium Secundum), September 18, October 9, December 22, 1580; January 25, January 31, 1581.
2 Ibid. Introduction, p. Ixxxii.
BLESSED EVERARD HANSE 253
seem to me like men striving with all their might to put out a conflagration. They cannot in any way be kept back from England."
Allen wrote of the very period under discussion : l
"These late terrors (thanks be to God) trouble them so little, that divers straight upon the arrival here in Rheims of the late proclamation of January (1581), came to their Superiors to desire leave to go in ; and being answered that the times were not seasonable, they said it was no God-a- mercy for a priest to enter in at other times, but that they were brought up and made specially for such days, and nineteen persons the same week following took Holy Orders."
That ordination would seem by the Diary2 to have been the very one in which Blessed Everard Hanse was made subdeacon. We may well suppose that he returned to England, anticipating, even by the light of common sense, but a short apostolate. He took the precaution of adopting a feigned name, and passed as Evans Duckett. From this time the practice was usually adopted by the missionaries. It was unfortunately only a slight protection against the ubiquitous spies of Cecil
1 Allen, Apology for the English Seminaries (Mounts in Renault, 1581), f. 85 v.
2 Knox, Douay Diaries (Diarium Secundum), February 21, 1581. This entry follows immediately that of February 12, which records the news of the January Proclamation
254 BLESSED EVERARD HANSE
and Walsingham, who penetrated even into the seminaries and supplied their employers with minute particulars of the names, appearance, and movements of the priests and students.
And in fact Blessed Everard had laboured but three months in the vineyard when he was seized, as we have seen. He had gone to give alms and con- solation to the prisoners for Jesus Christ ; and he received at once the recompense of being made a prisoner for Jesus Christ himself.
From a paper in the Ambrosian library at Milan, consisting of extracts from the correspondence of Allen and others in the following month, we learn that various efforts were made to prevail on him to acknowledge the Royal Supremacy, and also that he was beaten, and for a long time hung up by his feet. This must have been immediately after his committal ; for the Newgate gaol delivery took place a few days after the holy priest's committal, and he was accordingly brought to trial on Friday, July the 28th, at the Old Bailey, before the Recorder of London, Fleetwood, a bitter enemy of Catholics. As in the case of the Blessed John Nelson and the Blessed Thomas Sherwood, there was literally no offence to charge him with, for though he had declared himself a priest, the famous statute by which it was made high treason for a priest ordained abroad to be in England was not as yet passed. The judge had therefore first to make his victim commit a capital offence before he could charge him. This did not, however, require much skill, for the martyr answered all his questions with
BLESSED EVERARD HANSE 255
as much readiness and frankness as if they were on indifferent topics instead of involving his life.
The Recorder first asked him where he was ordained and for what purpose he had come into England. He answered that he was ordained at Rheims and that he had come back in order to gain erring souls to the unity of the Christian Church.
Recorder. — "Then you are subject to the Pope?"
Blessed Everard. — " So I am, Sir."
Recorder. — "Then the Pope has some authority over you ? "
Blessed Everard. — " The most just authority."
Recorder. — " What ! now in England ? "
Blessed Everard. — " Most assuredly. He hath as much authority and right in spiritual government in this realm as ever he had, and as much as he hath in any other country, or in Rome itself."
The judge now proceeded to extract from him matter against another statute. He was asked whether he thought the Pope could err. He answered as any Catholic would answer now, that in his own life and conduct he was liable to error, or even in his writings as a private doctor, but not in his "judicial definitions of controverted questions."
They were warily bringing him nearer to the snare, — a most needless ingenuity — and asked whether Pius V. had not acted judicially in the Bull of Excommunication against the Queen, and then reading out the part in which she is declared to be a heretic and a supporter of heretics, and therefore deprived of her royal crown and dignity,
256 BLESSED EVERARD HANSE
required the prisoner to say if the Pope had not erred in this. He answered, " I hope not," using this expression because the act of the Pope was not a doctrinal definition but a question of fact and of discipline.
This answer served to bring him within the reach of the statute of 1571, which made it high treason to declare the Queen a heretic or schismatic. But Fleetwood seems to have had an artistic sense of completeness in judicial persecution, and went on to secure against his prisoner an accusation under a new statute passed this very year, 1581, which extended the ever-widening embrace of high treason to the act (among many others) of persuading any subject of the Queen to leave the established religion for that of the Catholic Church. So as a final question he asked, " Have you given the answers we have heard with a design to persuade those who are present to embrace the same opinions ? "
"I know not," said the open-hearted priest, "what you mean by the word persuade, but I would fain that all believed the Catholic Faith from their hearts as I do."
The offence had now been obtained, and a lawyer in the court was directed then and there to draw up the indictment, the charge being to this effect : that Everard Hanse, a scholar of the Pope, and made priest beyond the seas, had come back into England to withdraw the Queen's subjects from their obedience ; that he had asserted that the Pope was his Superior, and had in England the same authority as heretofore ; and likewise that he had
BLESSED EVERARD HANSE 257
declared that he hoped Pius V. had not erred in pronouncing the Queen a heretic and depriving her of her kingdom, and that he had said these things to persuade others to follow his opinions.
The indictment having been read out, the martyr was ordered to hold up his hand, as is usual when pleading, on which the judge took the opportunity to browbeat him, because his right hand being occupied in holding up his heavy chains, he had held up the left. When asked if he was guilty of what was charged against him, he answered with his usual frankness that though the indictment was not «xact in every particular, yet he quite acknowledged its substantial truth. And upon this, sentence of death was pronounced as in cases of high treason. Such was the degradation of English justice under Elizabeth, at least where Catholics were concerned. Such a sentence would have been iniquitous and illegal, even apart from the cruelty and injustice of the statutes it professed to apply.
The account of the martyr's trial which has been given from his Acts is briefly confirmed by the honest Stow. " Everard Hanse," he writes, "a seminary priest, was in the Sessions Hall in the Old Bailey, arraigned ; where he affirmed that he was subject to the Pope in ecclesiastical causes, and that the Pope had now the same authority here in England that he had a hundred years past ; with other traitorous speeches ; for which he was condemned and executed."1
1 Stow's Chronicle (1581). The heretics declared he was as foolish as he was false ; and that it was impossible he could have R II.
258 BLESSED EVERARD HANSE
Blessed Everard's martyrdom was consummated three days after his sentence, on the 3ist of July, 1581, at Tyburn, "about eight of the clock in the morning." On the day before, he wrote from his prison a letter to his brother which has happily been preserved.1 It is as follows :
" Brother,
" I pray you be careful for my parents ; see them instructed in the way of truth ; so that you be careful for your own state also. What you shall take in hand that way, think no other but that God will send good success. My prayers shall not be wanting to aid you by God's grace. Give thanks to God for all that He hath sent. Cast not yourself into dangers wilfully, but pray to God when occasion is offered you may take it with patience.
" The comforts at the present instant are unspeakable ; the dignity too high for a sinner ; but God is merciful. Bestow my things you find ungiven away upon my poor kinsfolk. A pair of pantofBes I leave with M. N. for my mother. Twenty shillings I would have you bestow on them from me, if you can make so much conveniently ; some I have left with M. N. I owe ten shillings and two shillings ; I pray you see it paid ; M. N. will let you understand how and to whom. If you want money to discharge it, send to my friends, you
got enough learning in two years to be fit to be ordained priest, which as the writer of the Briefe Historic remarks was a strange thing for them to say, as they had thought him learned enough to be one of their own ministers four or five years before. 1 It is printed in the Briefe Historie.
BLESSED EVERARD HANSE 259
know where, in my name. Summa Conciliorum, I pray you restore to M. B[lackwell ?] ; the other books you know to whom.
" Have me commended to my friends : let them think I will not forget them. The day and hour of my birth is at hand, and my Master saith ' Tolle crucem tuam et sequere Me.' Vale in Domino. " Yours,
" EVERARD HANSE.
" Pridie obitus."
Beneath the gallows he appeared with the same bright, frank, untroubled manner which had always been the faithful expression of his character. He told the people he was a Catholic priest, and was most glad to die in testimony of his faith. He then went on to speak of the misrepresentations which had been industriously circulated of his answers at his trial. It had been given out that he main- tained that the Pope could not sin ; that princes had no sovereignty of their own, the Pope being supreme in their realms even in civil things : and that treason to the Queen was no sin before God. (These calumnies were even put out in print.1) He denied them in a few words, and protested that he had never said or meant anything except that
1 See Appendix for an account of this pamphlet. The martyr cannot have mentioned the fact of these calumnies being printed, as they did not appear till after his death. The sentence I have put in parenthesis is evidently an addition of the writers of the Acts. Father Persons (De Persecutione Anglicana, ap. Concertatio, fol. 31 B) indignantly relates how Crowley, the minister, had twisted and misinterpreted the martyr's words.
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the various so-called treasons, which were nothing but the confession of the Catholic Faith, were no offences against God. When asked whether he acknowledged the Queen for his Sovereign, he answered that he did acknowledge her as his Queen, and that he had never offended her Majesty otherwise than in matters of his con- science, which their new-made statutes had made matters of treason.
The ministers asked him to pray with them, but he answered that it was not lawful for him to pray with heretics ; but he humbly begged all Catholics to pray for him and with him. He was praying earnestly when the cart was drawn from under him. About a month later the account of his martyrdom reached the Seminary, and is recorded in the Diary.1 " For a moment or two, scarcely to be counted, he was left hanging, and then alive and fully conscious," the other cruelties were inflicted ; " when his bowels had been torn out and his heart, still palpitating, was in the hand of the executioner, he is said to have pronounced the words : ' O happy day ! ' Moreover, the concurrent testimony of several witnesses has come to us that when his heart was thrown into the fire, it leaped up out of the flames with great violence, and being again flung in and covered with a faggot of wood, a second time it leaped up with such force as to lift the faggot out of its place and hold it for a time quivering in the smoke." "As if," adds the writer of his Acts, "God would manifest the victorious constancy of His 1 Donay Diaries (Diarium Secunduin), August 27, 1581.
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martyr by the miraculous impetuous movement of his heart."1
" Two nights after," writes Mendoza to Philip II., " there was not a particle of earth which his blood had stained that had not been carried off as a relic, and infinite sums were given for his shirt and other clothes." Thus was God glorified in His saints.
E. S. K.
AUTHORITIES. — Brief "e Historie, p. 140. Concertatio, fol. 78 A — 79 B. Yepes, pp. 356 — 360. Champney, p. 756. Challoner, i. pp. 25—28.
RELICS. — The only relic remaining of Blessed Everard Hanse seems to be a little piece of linen stained with his blood, which is preserved in the private chapel of the Archbishop of Westminster.
At St. Scholastica's Abbey, Teignmouth, is preserved a dried heart, which the immemorial tradition of the com- munity describes as " the heart of an English Martyr which leaped out of the fire." It may very possibly be that of Blessed Everard Hanse.
APPENDIX,
There is a pamphlet in the British Museum entitled *!" A true report, of the A \ raignement and execution \ of the late Popishe Traitoiir, \ Euerard Haunce, executed at Ty \ borne, with reformation of the | errors of a former u \ ntrue \ booke published \ cocerning the \ same. Printed at London, by j Henrie Bynneman, | Anno 1581.
This work professes to correct the " untrue
1 Raissius, Catalogus Christi Sacerdotum, pp. 14, 15.
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reportes," of "a pamphlet lately published as gathered by MS., and printed by Charlewoode and White, touching ... a wilfull and obstinate traitor named Everard Ducket alias Haunce," &c.
We glean some facts from this scurrilous libel (which is said to be the work of Anthony Munday), e.g., the names of the martyr's judges. They were, besides Recorder Fleetwood, Sir John Branch, Lord Mayor ; Sir Owen Hopton, Lieutenant of the Tower; Sir William Damsell, Knight ; Master Sekford, Master of Requests to her Majesty, &c.
The indictment was framed " with the advice of a learned Councillor, Master James Dalton, one of the Council of the City and of her Majesty's Com- mission there." It ran thus :
" That Everard Haunce, late of London, clerk, otherwise called Everard Ducket, late of London, clerk, the xxviii day of July, in the year of the reign of our Sovereign Lady Elizabeth, by the grace of God of England, France, and Ireland, Queen, defender of the Faith, &c. At London, that is to say, in the Parish of St. Sepulchre, in the ward of Faringdon Without of London aforesaid, maliciously intending to withdraw the subjects of our said Sovereign Lady the Queen from their natural obedience toward our said Sovereign Lady the Queen, and from the religion by her Majesty's authority within her dominions established, to the Romish religion, in full and open sessions then and there holden, before the Justices of our said Sovereign Lady the Queen of gaol delivery of her
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gaol of Newgate of London aforesaid, then and there judicially sitting, did say and utter these false malicious and slanderous words, that is to say, that he (meaning himself), the said Everard, being in England, is subject to the Pope in ecclesiastical things. And that the Pope hath now the same authority here of England over the Church that he had a hundred years past, and which he now hath at Rome. And that the Pope hath the Holy Spirit of God given unto him and cannot err. And that the Pope in publishing that he hath authority to depose kings and princes, hath delivered true doctrine. And where the Pope by his sentence hath declared the Queen (meaning our said Sovereign Lady the Queen) an heretic, and deprived her of her crown of this realm of England and her subjects discharged of their allegiance, he hopeth that the Pope therein hath not erred. And that he (meaning himself, the said Everard) is a priest, and so made at Rheims beyond the seas, and that he came over to win souls, and wished the Queen's subjects to believe him in all these things. And that, that which he hath spoken before, he spake it with purpose and to that intent that the Queen's subjects should believe him and be of the same opinion.
" And further that the said Everard, by the words aforesaid, by him uttered maliciously and traitor- ously, then and there did put in practice to withdraw the subjects of our said Sovereign Lady the Queen from the religion now by her Majesty's authority established within her dominions, to the Romish religion, with intent to withdraw the same subjects
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of our said Sovereign Lady the Queen from their natural obedience to our said Lady the Queen, against the peace of our said Lady the Queen, her crown and dignity, and against the form of the statute in such case lately made and provided."
The foreman of the jury was one Anthony Hall. The only witness was the councillor who drew up the indictment. The jury very quickly returned their verdict, whereupon the Recorder and Master Sekford made learned speeches against the Papal authority, and the Recorder passed sentence of death.
The martyr having been sent back to Newgate, a minister named Crowley, " a grave preacher," was sent to him by the Bench, but he soon returned, saying he could make nothing of the prisoner, who was unwilling to listen to him, and further, produced a paper signed by himself and fifteen others, in which he declared that the martyr had said, " amongst other traitorous blasphemies, these words following : Treason against the Prince is no sin against God."
This was the calumny which the martyr protested against at his death. It is easy to see how perfectly innocent words might be perverted in this way. The martyr was condemned for treason against the Prince — "Yes," he may have said, "but my so- called treason is no offence against God." And this is what actually passed, according to Father Persons* In any case, the "godly minister" having devised this calumny, urged on the strength of it that the martyr should be executed the very next day, lest the
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Papists should get access to him before his death, and the truth being divulged, he might have an opportunity of refuting the lie at his execution. The writer adds that unfortunately this advice was not taken, so that Hanse took occasion " to qualify his speech touching treason against the Queen to be no sin." The execution was delayed, "not for any hope of doing good with him, which was of all men holden desperate," but in order to know the pleasure of her Majesty's Council, who might order him to be further examined.
His death is thus described. " And so continu- ing in the obstinate profession of his false Romish faith, and requiring the prayers of those of his sect, and refusing all other intercession to God for him, he suffered due pains of death and execution, as in cases of high treason is due and accustomed by the laws of this realm, to the great dread of God's judg- ments to himself, a terrible example to others."
We fools esteemed their life madness and their end without honour. Behold how they are numbered among the children of God, and their lot is among the saints.1
ED.
1 Wisdom v. 4, 5.
IX.
THE BLESSED EDMUND CAMPION, JESUIT.
Tyburn, i December, 1581.
ON the 3rd of August, 1553, the good citizens of London were gladdened by the sight of a brilliant state pageant, the solemn entry of the first Queen Regnant of England, Mary Tudor, through Aldgate, which was festooned and draped with banners, while the whole route was lined by the various crafts in their gayest attire. First came the Lords three and three, with their knights and gentlemen ; the foreign Ambassadors, each with a retinue of his own countrymen ; the officers of the household ; the Lord Mayor, Sir Thomas White ; the Earl of Arundel, bearing the sword of state ; the ladies of the household, and then her Majesty in " a long-sleeved robe of crimson velvet, embroidered with pearls," mounted on a white palfrey whose harness was fringed with gold. Following the Queen came her sister, the Princess Elizabeth, and one hundred and sixty other noble dames according to prece- dence, the Queen's horse, eight thousand strong, and the Aldermen, while the city guard with bows and
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javelins brought up the rear. From the roofs and windows eager and loyal spectators shouted " God save Queen Mary." Minute guns were fired from the Tower, and at various points choirs of school children sang the praises of the Sovereign. The triumph was not an empty show. The rule of violence under Henry and Edward was over, the revolution in what most Englishmen still held to be sacred seemed to have spent itself. The old order was once more triumphant.
Opposite St. Paul's the procession halted, and a bluecoat-boy, thirteen years old, approached her Majesty to make, in behalf of the London scholars, an oration in her honour. The boy thus already conspicuous for his learning, eloquence, and modest grace was Edmund Campion. Well assured did his youthful predictions seem that day, of the reign of justice, mercy, and religion, with which England was now to be blessed. Yet only twenty-eight years later, from the same Tower which Mary now entered in triumph the Blessed Edmund was to be led out as a traitor and felon, to receive the martyr's crown.
The year in which this boy was born was marked by great events, which both for good and evil were to exercise a dominant influence over his life. Father Robert Persons, his companion in later years and his first biographer, thus writes of them :
" His birth happened [on January the 25th] in about the year of God 1540, and the thirtieth of King Henry VIII., which was the year wherein
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the said King pulled down and destroyed the greatest religious houses in England and persecuted most violently the Catholic faith, for defence whereof Father Campion was afterwards by God's holy providence to shed his blood ; as it was also the year wherein the Religious Order, the Society of Jesus, was founded and confirmed in Rome by the See Apostolic, of which Order the said Father was to be so worthy a member, as afterwards he proved. And by this account it falleth out in like manner that when Father Campion so freely and willingly offered himself to suffer death for the Catholic religion, in his own native country and city, he was in the very flower of his age, to wit, between one or two and forty years old, which is a remarkable circumstance, both for merit before God and honour in the sight of man."
His father, by name also Edmund, was a citizen and bookseller of London. His parents were Catholics, not only at the time of Edmund's birth, but also during the reign of Mary, though afterwards they would seem to have yielded to the times. The martyr could only hope that they died in the Faith. The family consisted of three boys and one girl. Of the boys Edmund and another took to learning, the third to military service.
When Edmund was about nine -or ten years of age his parents wished to apprentice him to a merchant, but a member of the Grocers' Company, seeing his sharp and pregnant wit, induced the guild to undertake the boy's education, and he was sent
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first to a preparatory school, and then to Christ- church, Newgate, founded by Edward VI. out of confiscated Church property, as a salve to the conscience of the people. Young Campion carried off prize after prize, not only in his school, but in the general competition which was held between the various Grammar Schools of London. When, there- fore, he was still a boy, probably in 1555, the Grocers' Company had no scruple in applying to Sir Thomas White, already mentioned, to give Campion a scholarship in his new foundation of St. John's College, Oxford. With this Sir Thomas most willingly complied " after he was informed of the youth's rare towardliness in learning and virtue." The Company further gave him an exhibition for his maintenance.
In 1557 Campion, though only seventeen years of age, was already famous for his eloquence and his various gifts, and the charm of his character had so endeared him to Sir Thomas that he made him Junior Fellow of his College. Sir Thomas was a staunch Catholic. His firmness and loyalty in the Wyatt rising had done much to secure Mary her throne, and he had founded the College of St. John as a place of safety for Catholics in the great English heresy. His endowments were, however, too soon turned to other purposes. Anglicanism was pro- claimed the only legal religion of the land. The enforcement of the law was of course a work of time, but the Royal Commissioners, on whom the task was laid, did their work skilfully. In 1559 or 1560, by their order, the Catholic President of
2yo BLESSED EDMUND CAMPION
St. John's, Dr. Alexander Belsize, on account of his religion was deprived of his office, and all the crucifixes, vestments, and holy vessels given to the chapel by Sir Thomas White were taken away. The oath of the Queen's spiritual supremacy was not, however, generally tendered to the members of the University. It was considered more prudent not to drive men to extremities, but to be content with their external acquiescence in the new order of things.
Five years elapsed without any formal test being demanded of Campion, but during this period he was exposed to influences which tended to weaken the strength of his convictions. A number of admiring friends, a large circle of disciples, " Campionists " as much because of their love for the man as for their admiration of his scholarship and of his eloquence, gathered round him. This tended to deaden the voice of conscience, and to persuade him that as a humanist and a layman he need not trouble himself with vexed questions of theology, or with disputes on the Pope's Supremacy. His obligations to his college and to his pulpit were clear, the rest but doubtful, and so in the year 1564 he took the oath, and acknowledged the spiritual headship of the Queen. Thus gradually was the great change effected in Campion's surroundings. Though he remained a Catholic at heart, he had given up the practice of his religion, and had, at least externally, admitted the determining principle of the English Reformation.
Campion's position in the University and his
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pre-eminence as a speaker may be appreciated by some account of his chief oratorical displays. The first was at the reburial of poor Amy Robsart, when her body, under pressure of public opinion, was removed from Cumnor to Oxford for honourable sepulture. The next was a panegyric, composed in idiomatic and eloquent Latin, on Sir Thomas White. Campion enumerates his charities, the thirty towns which he had enriched, the foundation of Merchant Taylors' School, the restoration of Gloucester Hall, and the foundation of St. John's College. "This he had founded when literature was enslaved, imprisoned, in poverty, in despair, half dead with sorrow, washed out with tears ; he has beaten all of us students, with our holy ways, our sacred teaching, our pious talk, and our sacrilegious life. In this man's tongue, manner, gait, there was nothing polished, dressed up, painted, affected or false, all was open, pure, sincere, chaste, undefiled. He begged that we would not pray for his recovery, but for faith and patience in his last moments, and nothing annoyed him so much as wishes for a renewal of health."
His next rhetorical triumph was prompted by an event of a very different character — the state visit of Queen Elizabeth to Oxford in 1566, after she had witnessed the pageants at Kenilworth. Thirteen years before, Campion had welcomed Queen Mary to London. He was now to greet with all the fire of his eloquence the entry of her sister to the University. Sir William Cecil and the Queen's advisers were careful to prohibit the introduction
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of any dangerous or theological matter. Campion was to discourse on "the effect of the moon upon the tides," and of the "higher and lower heavenly bodies." On the 3rd of September, 1573, he defended his thesis before the Queen and her favourite, Lord Robert Dudley, the Chancellor of the University, over whose victim, Amy Robsart, he had, as we have said, but six years previously, delivered a funeral oration. His academic oppo- nent was a dear friend, Richard Bristow, who afterwards became a Catholic, one of the founders of Douay College, and the author of the celebrated Motives. In his preamble Campion declares himself only reconciled to his unequal contest against " four pugnacious youths, by the thought that he is speaking in the name of Philosophy, the princess of letters, before Elizabeth, a lettered Princess, whose blessed ancestors were adepts in science, who set her the example of visiting the poor scholars." Then he addresses " the magnificent Chancellor, whose godly and deathless benefactions to the University he could not deny if he would, and ought not to conceal if he could." Campion's compliments and eloquence went home, and the dispute concluded, the Queen specially recom- mended him to Dudley, who willingly undertook to further the orator's career. Himself the secret friend of Papists, till policy persuaded him to embrace the Puritan cause, Leicester sent for Campion, and bade him ask what he would, as the Queen and himself would provide for his future. Campion modestly replied that the friend-
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ship of the Chancellor was worth more than all gifts.
Four years later, however, in dedicating to him his History of Ireland, he gratefully acknowledges the kindness he had received from the Earl of Leicester, as Dudley was now called. " How often," he says, "at Oxford, how often at the Court, how often at Rycot, and at Windsor, by letters, and by reports, have you not furthered with your advice, and countenance, with your authority, my hopes and expectations, mere student though I was." Campion has never known Leicester, with all his power, harm any man, or enrich himself at other's cost, or act from any unworthy motive. Such in substance is Campion's opinion of Leicester. It may seem surprising that he should think so well of a man whom we now know to have been worth- less, and on many occasions wicked. But Campion's mind was naturally deferential, one that thinks no evil of those placed in exalted positions. He lived amongst Dudley's friends, who would not have talked about his misdeeds, while they would have insisted upon the evidence for the better side of his character. And again this would have been thrown into relief from being ignored or decried by rivals no better than he.
But to return to Campion's oratorical displays at Oxford. Father Persons thus describes the sequel to the disputation last mentioned.
" When by chance one day the Ambassador of Spain, then resident with the Queen, accompanying s n.
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her in this her progress, whose name was Don Diego de Guzman, Canon of Toledo, was asked by the said Queen and her Council how he liked the exercises of learning which he had heard in that University of Oxford, he answered : ' Very well,' but that he marvelled not thereat considering the variety of good wits and talents which then were discovered, and presupposing (as he did) that such, as had done any exercise before her Majesty, did come very well prepared before for the same ; wherefore he desired to hear somewhat done extempore and without preparation.
" Whereupon certain chosen men were called presently to Martin College, there to dispute upon the sudden, and upon the questions and themes that the said Ambassador should propose unto them.
" And so they did, there being present with the Ambassador, the Earl of Leicester, Sir William Cecil, then Secretary but afterwards Great Treasurer of England, and one of the chief persecutors of Father Campion. There were also divers others of the Council and the nobility of England present, together with learned men of that University. And among others that were called to do this exercise upon the sudden, Mr. Campion was one, and he that bare away that day most praise from that place for his excellent doings, as he also did a little after for a certain rare oration that he was forced to make upon the sudden in the Queen's house of Woodstock, some eight miles from Oxford, before the said Queen, in which he confessed afterward that he was like to have lost himself utterly at the begin-
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ning, partly by the hastiness of the time, and partly by the sudden great pomp wherein the Queen came forth to hear him, until after a space (as he was wont to tell) he remembered that she was but a woman and he a man, which was the better sex, and that all that splendour and pomp that glittered in his eyes, was but transitory vanity and had no substance in it, by which cogitations and other the like he was emboldened to g'o through with his speech, as he did to the great contentation of the Queen and others of the Court, and to his own high commendation.
" Sir William Cecil himself, then present at these exercises, who was afterwards made Lord Treasurer of England, as hath been said, and came to be one of Father Campion's judges for his execution about fifteen years afterwards, when this servant of God stood condemned to be martyred, — this man, I say, was the chief and principal praiser of Mr. Campion at that time, who with his voice in Council persuaded his death, when others of his fellow- councillors were of contrary opinion, which I have been told by one that heard with his own ears the consultation about that matter, but yet when he was in Oxford he gave singular praises to Mr. Campion above all the rest for his rare learning and talents, and invited him with many hopes and promises to follow that course. And when about some four years after this Mr. Campion was departed out of the realm and gone over the sea to Douay, the said Cecil said to a certain especial friend of Mr. Campion's, named Richard Stanihurst, gentle-
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man of Ireland, . . . Cecil, that old fox, affirmed that it was very great pity to see so notable a man as Campion was to leave his country, for that indeed (said he) he was one of the diamonds of England."
With all this success, Campion's mind was not at rest. Persons, who had been through similar mental struggles, writes of them as follows.
"The good man had a wonderful fight and combat with himself what to resolve and what course it were best for him to follow. For on the one side there spurred him forward to follow the world all those flattering hopes and allurements which before I have signified, together with youth, ambition, desire to satisfy the expectation of his friends, and emulation to see others of his equals and inferiors to pass on and be advanced : but on the other side held him back and terrified him greatly, his judgment, the remorse of his conscience, fear of death, Hell, and the like, for that he could not persuade his own understanding but that the Catholic religion only was true, and consequently that all the doctrine, life, and whole course of the Protestants was false and damnable, and yet he desired to follow it for a time. So as on the one side was his will and affection, or at leastwise a most vehement inclination of ambition to follow the Protestants, and on the other side was his judgment and conscience, which caused a most strong and dangerous combat within himself for a good time, and what to resolve he knew not, and so much the
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less for that he wanted all or most of those helps which the Catholic Church is wont to assign for men to fly unto in such like cases of doubtful deliberations concerning the soul, to wit, the holy sacraments and the spiritual counsels of a good ghostly father, or of some other godly learned man. Yet did Mr. Campion heartily by prayer commend himself to Almighty God, but still hearkened to both parts inwardly to see whether he could hear or find any sufficient reasons to satisfy his judgment, and to appease his mind to follow that which love of the world for the present did invite him unto."
In 1564, having completed his studies of Aristotle and natural theology, he was compelled by the statutes of his College to take up the Fathers, and then Catholicism . stared him in the face. Let us hear his friend Persons again.
" One thing there was among all the rest that did greatly hold his deliberation in suspense, which was the reading of the works of certain ancient Fathers of the primitive Church ; for that whatso- ever one of us had heard or conceived in the whole day for pulling out of the thorn of conscience, or for smoothing the way to be Protestant, either by good-fellowship and conversation with Protestants themselves, or by hearing their sermons, or reading their books or the like, all this was dashed soon after again by one hour's reading of some book or treatise of the old holy Doctors, and the wound of our conscience was made again so green and grievous
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as ever before by that which in every leaf and page almost we should find to be spoken by those holy men, either of virtue or austerity of life, or of questions and matters of controversies, and that so directly for the Catholic religion, and most perspicu- ously against all that the Protestants did either teach or practise, as if these ancient Fathers had lived and seen their dealings, and had been their open adversaries in these our days."
Still the hour of grace had not struck. If long formed convictions, the voice of conscience, the testimony of Holy Scripture and tradition all called him to abjure the Queen's new religion "the sugared words of great folk, the pregnant hopes of speedy and great preferment," bade him linger, for a while at least, where he was. At this crisis too he had found a friend, who supplied him with what pro- fessed to be a conscientious motive for not making the dreaded sacrifice. This was Richard Cheney, Bishop of Gloucester. Alone of the Elizabethan hierarchy, he detested in his heart the doctrines of the Establishment, but had persuaded himself that he might lawfully adhere to it externally, if in his heart he held and promulgated as far as possible the teaching of the primitive Church. To this course also he persuaded Campion, and prevailed on him in spite of his reluctance to be ordained deacon, so as to be able to preach and carry on Cheney's work. No sooner, however, was the step taken than Campion's conscience stung him anew and he loathed the heretical Orders he had received.
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In 1568, matters were brought to a crisis. The Grocers' Company, whose exhibition he still held, suspecting him of secret Popery, summoned him under pain of losing his scholarship to prove his orthodoxy by preaching at Paul's Cross. Campion, who was then Proctor, obtained a temporary post- ponement, and after further correspondence, in which the demands of the Company were explicitly formu- lated, he resigned his exhibition. At this same time, 1569, when his hold on Oxford was being thus loosened, he was receiving letters from his old college friend, Gregory Martin, calling him to Rome. Martin was a man of mark, " the Hebraist, the Grecian, the poet, the honour and glory of St. John's." He had been tutor to the Venerable Philip Howard, but in this year, when the Duke of Norfolk and his household, on account of his connection with Mary Queen of Scots, were sum- moned to attend Common Prayer and sermons, Martin fled abroad and became a Catholic. Before he left, however, he wrote to Campion warning him against the perils of ambition, offering him a home, and reminding him " that if their money failed one thing was left — Qui seminant in lacrimis, in exultations metent — ' They that sow in tears shall reap in joy.' '
Thus urged alike by conscience within and by hostile pressure without, Campion finally left Oxford at the completion of his Proctorship, on the ist of August, 1569.
From Oxford, Campion turned his steps towards Dublin, where a project was on foot for rebuilding the old University founded by Pope John XXL, which
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had perished with the suppression of the monasteries. The chief promoters of the undertaking were James Stanihurst, Recorder of Dublin, Speaker of the House of Commons, the father of Richard, Campion's pupil, and a zealous Catholic, and Sir Henry Sidney, the Lord Deputy, with whom also Campion was on terms of intimacy. But the Protestant opposition was too strong. The work lapsed into the hands of Elizabeth, who founded Trinity College twenty-five years later.
The University scheme having failed, Campion, who was in March, 1571, the guest of Stanihurst, devoted some ten weeks to compiling a short history of Ireland. As a specimen of his style a short quotation may be interesting. It must be remem- bered that all the other writings of the martyr which we shall have occasion to cite were written in Latin. This is his description of the country.
"The soil is low and waterish, and includeth divers little islands environed with bogs and marishes : highest hills have standing pools in their top. The air is wholesome, not altogether so clear and subtle as ours of England. Of bees good store, turf and sea coal is their most fuel. It is stored of kine ; of excellent horses and hawks ; of fish and fowl. They are not without wolves, and greyhounds to hunt them, bigger of bone and limb than a colt. . . . Sheep few, and those bearing coarse fleeces, whereof they spin notable rug mantle [frieze]. . . . Eagles are well known to breed here. Horses they have of pace easy, in running
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wonderful swift. Therefore they make them of great store. ... I heard it verified by honourable to honourable, that a nobleman offered and was refused for one such horse, an hundred kine, five pounds lands, and an eyrie of hawks yearly during seven years. . . . The people are thus inclined : religious, frank, amorous, ireful, sufferable of pains infinite, very glorious, many sorcerers, excellent horsemen, delighted with wars, great almsgivers, passing in hospitality."
Campion was delighted with his stay in Ireland, adopted its chief Saint as his patron, and when circumstances made him think of disguising himself, his predilection was to adopt the semblance and speech of an Irishman, and he is said to have acted the part admirably.1
Before his History was finished Campion's troubles thickened. He was now considered a Catholic by all, and openly lived as such. But the times were disastrous for the followers of the old Faith. The rising in the North had failed. The Bull of St. Pius V. had been posted by Felton on the Bishop of London's gates on the feast of Corpus Christi, 1570. Elizabeth's Government was resolved on restraining all persons of note supposed to favour the Catholic side, and to apprehend Campion among others. At first he remained concealed in Stani- hurst's house. On March the igth he was at Turvey, then back again in Dublin, and a few weeks later at Drogheda.
1 See Blessed Ralph Sherwin's letter of June 4, 1580, quoted below.
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All this time the pursuivants were at his heels, but Campion remained ever brave and cheerful, and found time to continue his learned researches, and in his hours of retirement to lay deeper foundations of his spiritual life. After many shifts he finally embarked from Tredah, a port about twenty miles from Dublin, disguised under the name of Mr. Patrick, as servant to Melchior Hussey, the steward to the Earl of Kildare. On the 26th of May, 1571, he was present at Dr. Storey's trial in Westminster Hall, and then took ship to Douay. In mid-Channel his vessel was overhauled by the Hare, an English frigate cruising there. As Campion had no pass- port the captain impounded his money and baggage, and landed him as a prisoner at Dover, intending to take him under his own charge to London. Campion, however, perceived that his captor's main object was secured by the appropriation of his effects, and with the captain's tacit consent, effected his escape. Having obtained a fresh supply of money from some friends in Kent, he made his way to Calais and finally reached Douay.
This noble College, the nursery of so many martyrs, which had been founded by Dr. Allen four years previously, as yet numbered only fifteen or sixteen members, among whom were eight or nine doctors or licentiates in theology. The students were for the most part converts, and naturally corresponded with their Protestant friends who were at all inclined to the Church, in the hopes of effecting their conversion. It was thus that Gregory Martin had written to Campion and
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thus that Campion himself wrote to several, who at his invitation left all and followed him to Douay. We still possess one such letter, addressed to the Anglican Bishop Cheney, and dated the ist of November, 1571. It is for us the first- fruit of his reconciliation to the Church. We do not know the exact date of that event, nor how far he had advanced towards it when he was planning and writing his History of Ireland. Here both the suggestion and inspiration are evidently due to his reception. Father Persons calls the letter " a vehement epistle," and doubtless the ardour with which he addresses his correspondent, and the motives he sets before him, show us the fervour and the reasons with which he himself had been actuated at that crisis in his life.
" It is not now as of old the dash of youth, or facility of pen, nor any punctilious care of regularity in correspondence, that makes me write to you. I used to write from the mere abundance of my heart : a greater necessity has forced me to write this letter. We have already been too long sub- servient to popular report, to the times, to reputation. At length let us say something for the salvation of our souls. I beg you, by your own natural good- ness, by my tears, even by the pierced side of Christ and the wounds of the Crucified, to listen to me.
" There is no end nor measure to my thinking of you ; and I never think of you without being horribly ashamed, praying silently, and repeating
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the text of the Psalm, Ab alienis, Domine, parce servo tuo. ' From the sins of others, O Lord, spare Thy servant.' What have I done ? It is written : Videbas furem et currebas cum eo ; and Laudatur peccator in desideriis suis, et impius benedicitur. ' Thou didst see the thief, and didst run with him. The sinner is praised in his desires, and the impious is blest.'
" So often was I with you at Gloucester, so often in your private chamber, so many hours have I spent in your study and library, with no one near us when I could have done this business, and I did it not; and what is worse, I have added flames to the fever by assenting and assisting. And though you were superior to me in your counterfeited dignity, in wealth, age, and learning ; and although I was not bound to look after the physicking or dieting of your soul, yet since you were of so easy and sweet a temper, as in spite of your grey hairs to admit me, young as I was, to a familiar inter- course with you, to say whatever I chose in all security and secrecy, while you imparted to me your sorrows and all the calumnies of the other heretics against you. Like a father, you exhorted me to walk straight and upright in the royal road, to follow the steps of the Church, the Councils and Fathers, and to believe that, where there was a consensus of these, there could be no stain of false- hood. This now makes me very angry with myself for my false modesty or culpable negligence, because I made no use of so fair an opportunity of recom- mending the Faith, and applied no bold incentive to
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one who was so near to the Kingdom of God, but, while I enjoyed your favour and renown, I promoted rather the shadowy notion of my own honour than your eternal good.
" But as I have no longer the occasion that I had of persuading you face to face, it remains that I should send my words to you to witness to my regard, my care, my anxiety known to Him to whom I make my daily prayer for your salvation. Listen, I beseech you, listen to a few words. You are sixty years old more or less, of uncertain health, of weakened body, the hatred of heretics, the shame of Catholics, the talk of the people, the sorrow of your friends, the laughing-stock of your enemies. Against your conscience you falsely usurp the name of a bishop; by your silence you advance a pestilent sect which you love not, stricken with anathema, cut off from the body into which alone the graces of Christ flow, you are deprived of the benefit of all prayers, sacrifices, and sacraments. Whom do you think yourself to be ? What do you expect ? What is your life ? Wherein lies your hope ? Is it in the heretics, who hate you so implacably, and abuse you so roundly ? Is it because of all heresiarchs you are the least crazy? Because you confess the true' presence of Christ on the altar and the freedom of man's will ? Because you persecute no Catholics within your diocese ? Because you are hospitable to your townspeople and to good men ? Because you have not plundered your palace and lands as your brethren do ?
" Surely these things will avail much if you
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return to the bosom of the Church ; if in company with the household of the faith you suffer even the smallest persecution, or take any wholesome counsel. But now whilst you are a stranger and an enemy, whilst like a base deserter you right under a foreign flag, it is in vain to attempt to cover your many crimes with the cloak of virtue. You will gain nothing except perhaps to be tortured somewhat less horribly in the everlasting fire than Judas, or Luther, or Zwinglius, or than those antagonists of yours — Cooper, Humphrey, and Samson. What signifies the kind of death ? Death is the same, whether you are thrown from a high rock into the sea or pushed from a low bank into the river ; whether one is killed by iron or by rope, whether racked in torture or shot dead, whether cut down by sword or axe, whether crushed under stones or battered by clubs, whether roasted with fire or scalded in water. " What is the use of fighting for many articles of the Faith and to perish for doubting of a few ? To escape shipwreck and to fall by the dagger ? To flee from the plague and die of famine ? To avoid the flames and be suffocated by the smoke ? He believes no one article of the Faith who refuses to 1 believe any single one. For as soon as he knowingly oversteps the bounds of the Church, which is the pillar and ground of the truth, to which Christ Jesus, the highest, first, and most simple truth, the source, light, leader, measure, and pattern of the faithful, reveals all these articles — however many Catholic dogmas he retains, yet if he perniciously plucks out one, that which he holds, he holds not by
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orthodox faith, without which it is impossible to please God, but by his own reason, his own con- viction.
" In vain do you defend the religion of the Catholics if you hug only that which you liker and cut off all that seems not right in your eyes. There is but one plain known road, not enclosed by your palings or mine, not by private judgment,, but by the severe laws of humility and obedience ; when you wander from this you are lost. You must be altogether within the house of God, within the walls of salvation, to be sound and safe from injury; if you wander and walk abroad ever so little, if you carelessly thrust hand or foot out of the ship, if you stir up ever so small a mutiny in the crew, you shall be thrust forth ; — the door is shut, the ocean roars, you are undone.
" ' He who gathereth not with Me,' saith the Saviour, ' scattereth.' Jerome explains, ' he who is not Christ's is Antichrist's.' You are not so stupid as to follow the heresy of the Sacramentarians ; you are not so mad as to be in all things a slave of Luther's faction, now condemned in the General Councils, which you yourself think authoritative,, of Constance and Trent. And yet you stick in the mire of your own conceit, so that you may pose as a man who brings to light the artifices of pedants,1 and who presides as an honoured judge over the poorer brethren.
" You will remember the sober and solemn answer which you gave me, when three years ago
1 Cornicum oculos configcre.
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we met in the house of Thomas Button, at Sherborne, where we were to dine. We fell to talking of St. Cyprian. I objected to you, in order to discover your real opinions, that synod of Carthage which erred about the baptism of infants. You answered truly that the Holy Spirit was not promised to one province, but to the Church ; that the Universal Church is represented in a full Council, and that no doctrine can be pointed out about which such Councils ever erred. Acknowledge your weapons, with which you conquer the adversaries of the mystery of the Eucharist. You cry up the Christian world, the assemblies of bishops, the guardians of the deposit, that is, the ancient faith ; these you commend to the people as the interpreters of Scripture ; most rightly do you ridicule and hold up to scorn the impudent figment of certain professors of false patristic.1
" Now what do you say ? Behold the renowned Fathers, the patriarchs and apostolic men, of late gathered at Trent, who were all united to contend for the ancient faith of the Fathers. Legates, prelates, cardinals, bishops, deputies, doctors of diverse nations, of mature age, of rare wisdom, princely dignity, wonderful learning. There were collected Italians, Frenchmen, Spaniards, Portu- guese, Greeks, Poles, Hungarians, Flemings, Illyrians, many Germans, some Irish, Croats, Moravians — even England was not unrepresented. All these, whilst you live as you are living, anathematize
1 Patrunculorum quorundam. So Bombino for Latrunculorum , which might mean " worthless wretches," " mere pawns."
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you, drive you out, banish you, abjure you. What reason can you urge ? Especially now you have declared war against your colleagues, why do you not make full submission, without any excep- tions, to the discipline of these Fathers ? See you aught in the Lord's Supper that they saw not, discussed not, resolved not ? Dare you equal yourself by even the hundredth part with the lowest theologians of this Council ? I have confidence in your discretion and modesty, you dare not. You are surpassed then by your judges in number, value, weight, and in the serious and clear testimony of the whole world.
" Once more consult your own heart, my poor old friend. Show again your old nobility of character and those excellent gifts which of late are smothered in the mud of dishonesty. Give yourself to your mother who begot you to Christ, nourished you, consecrated you ; acknowledge how cruel and undutiful you have been ; let confession be the salve of your sins. You have one foot in the grave; you must die, perhaps directly, certainly in a very short time, and stand before that tribunal where you will hear, ' Give an account of thy stewardship.' Unless, while you are on the way, you make it up quickly and exactly with the Adversary of sin, it shall be required to the last farthing, and you shall be driven miserably from the land of the living by Him whom you will never be able to pay.
" Then those hands which have conferred spurious Orders on so many wretched youths shall
T II.
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for very pain scratch and tear your sulphurous body ; that mouth stained with perjury, and defiled with schism, shall be filled with fire and worms and the breath of tempests. That swelling carnal pomp of yours, your episcopal throne, your yearly revenues, spacious palace, honourable greetings, band of servants, elegant furniture, that affluence for which the poor ignorant people esteem you so happy, shall be exchanged for fearful wailings,. gnashing of teeth, stench, misery, filth, and chains. There shall the spirits of Calvin and Zwingli, whom you now oppose, afflict you for ever, with Arius, Sabellius, Nestorius, Wyclif, Luther, — yea, with the devil and his angels you shall suffer the pains of darkness and belch out blasphemies.
" Spare yourself, be merciful to your soul, spare my grief. Your ship is wrecked, your merchandise lost ; nevertheless seize the plank of penance, strike out with all your might, and come even naked to the harbour of the Church. Fear not but that Christ will preserve you with His hand, run to meet you, kiss you, and put on you th$ white garment ; the hosts of Heaven will exult. Take no thought for your life; He will take thought for you, who gives the beasts their food, and feeds the young ravens that call upon Him.
"If you but made trial of our banishment, if you but cleared your conscience and came to behold and consider the living examples of piety which are shown here by bishops, priests, friars, masters of colleges, rulers of provinces, lay people of every age, rank and sex, I believe that you would give up six
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hundred Englands for the opportunity of redeeming the residue of your time by tears and sorrow. But if for divers reasons you are hindered from going freely whither you would, at least free your mind from its grievous chains, and whether you remain or whether you flee, set your body any task, rather than let its grossness oppress you, and banish you to the depths of Hell. God knows those that are His, and is near to all that call upon Him in truth.
" Pardon, my venerated old friend, for these just reproaches and for the heat of my love. Suffer me to hate that deadly disease, let me avert the perilous crisis of so noble a man and so dear a friend, with any dose however bitter. That it will be so — if Christ gives grace and you do not refuse — I hope as firmly as I love you dearly, and I love you as passing excellent in nature, in learning, in gentle- ness, in goodness, and as doubly dear to me for your many kindnesses and courtesies. If you recover yourself, you make me happy for ever ; if you decline, this letter is my witness. God judge between you and me, your blood be on yourself. Farewell. — From him that most desires your salvation.
" EDMUND CAMPION."
(Nov. i, 1571.)
As a summary of arguments against the via media, as an exposition of the hollowness of the Anglican position, of the absolute, essential and necessary antagonism between Anglicanism and Catholicism, of the impossibility of salvation outside the one Church, and of the consequent need for
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all to join it, this letter is perhaps unsurpassed. How far it told with Cheney, we know not. The last traces of Catholicism were being expunged from Elizabeth's religion. The Communion was no longer to be put into the mouth but into the hands of the communicant ; all ceremonies and gestures not prescribed in the prayer-book were to cease ; people were to communicate, not on the great feasts of Easter or Christmas, but on Ash Wednesday and on one of the two Sundays before Easter, Whit Sunday, and Christmas. All altars were to be pulled down and the altar-stones defaced, and put to some common use. Prayers for the dead, the wearing or the use of the rosary, the burning of candles on the feast of the Purification, and the sign of the Cross were alike strictly forbidden. All this was enough to decide Cheney. Still Campion says of him, in 1581, two years after the Bishop's death, " a most miserable old man, evil entreated by robbers without, who yet entered not his father's house" It is possible that he was reconciled secretly ; in any case he was mistrusted by the Protestants in life and in death, for though he was buried in Gloucester Cathedral, no monument or memorial marked his remains.
At Douay Campion took the degree of Bachelor of Divinity, in acts held on March the 2ist, and the 27th of November, 1572, and the 2ist of June, 1573, and received minor orders and the sub-diaconate.
After nearly two years here, Campion felt drawn to the Society of Jesus, and set forth in pilgrim's garb for Rome. On the road he met an old Oxford
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acquaintance, a Protestant, who had known him " in great pomp and prosperity," and who remons- trated with him on his absurd dress and mean mode of life, as unworthy of an Englishman, and fit only for a crazy fanatic. But Campion, says Persons, " made such a speech of the contempt of this world, and the eminent dignity of poverty, as greatly moved the man and us also his acquaintance that remained yet in Oxford when the report reached our ears."
Campion having reached Rome in the spring of 1573, entered the Society in April, and there being then no English Province, he was allotted to that of Austria. After two months in Prague, he spent one year's probation at Briinn, and then returned to Prague to teach. His fervour in his novitiate may be guessed from the following letters addressed to his late companions at Briinn.
I.
" How much I love you in the bowels of Jesus Christ, my dearest brothers, you may conclude from this, that in spite of my daily occupations which scarcely leave me time to breathe, I have decided to steal time from the midst of my functions and cares to write to you. How could I do otherwise directly I heard of a sure messenger to Briinn ? How could I help being set on fire at the remembrance of that house, where there are so many burning souls, fire in their mind, fire in their body, fire in their words — the fire which God came to send upon earth, that it might always burn there ? O dear walls, that once shut me up in your company ! Pleasant
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recreation-room, where we once talked so holily ! Glorious kitchen, where the best friends . . . contend for the saucepans in holy humility and charity unfeigned ! How often do I picture to myself one returning with his load from the farm, another from the market ; one sweating stalwartly and merrily under a sack of rubbish, another under some other toil ! Believe me, my dearest brothers, that your dust, your brooms, your chaff, your loads, are regarded by angels with joy, and that through them they obtain more for you from God than if they saw in your hands sceptres, jewels, and purses of gold.
" Would that I knew not what I say; but yet, as I do know it, I will say it : in the wealth, honours, pleasures, pomps of the world, there is nothing but thorns and dirt. The poverty of Christ has less pinching parsimony, less of weariness, than an emperor's palace. But if we speak of the spiritual food, who can doubt that one hour of this familiar intercourse with God and with good spirits, is better than all the years of kings and princes ? I have been about a year in religion, in the world thirty-five ; what a happy change, if I could say I had been a year in the world, in religion thirty- five ! . . . Prague, 26 February, 1575.
ii.
"Although the words of men, my dearest brothers, ought to have much less weight and influence with you than that Spirit who without sound of words whispers in your ears, yet since this
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work of love is not altogether useless or unnecessary, your charity will cause you to receive this fraternal letter, the witness of my love and duty, with your usual kindness. I write not to you as though you required the spur, for wherever you go your hearts .are ever inflamed with all the virtues, but that I, while I employ my time in writing to you, may spur myself, and may enjoy the perfume of the remem- brance of your affection, and may testify my affection towards you. And I would that, as I speak and you perform, so you might speak and I perform. For I know what liberty there is in obedience, what pleasure in labour, what sweetness in prayer, what dignity in humility, what peace in conflict, what nobleness in patience, what perfection in infirmity.
" But to reduce these virtues to actual practice, there is the rub, that is the work which you are doing, running in glorious career what I may call races of Heaven on earth. I, as the poet says, will follow as I can, non passibus cequis. My dearest brothers, our life is not long enough to thank Christ for revealing these mysteries to us. Which of us would have believed unless He had called him and instructed him in this school, that such thorns, such filth, such misery, such harrowing sorrows were concealed in the world under the feigned name of goods and pleasures ? Which of us would have thought your kitchen better than a royal palace ? your broths better than any banquet ? your troubles than others' contentment ? your conflicts than their quiet ? your crumbs than their
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abundance ? your mean estate than their triumphs and victories ? For I ask you, whether, if you could compass what they so much desire, and through the whole course of your life feed your eyes on sight-seeing, and changes of scene and of company, your eyes would be the stronger ? If you fed your ears with news, would they be the fuller ? If you gratified your heart's every desire, would it be richer ? If you filled your flesh with feasting, would it become immortal ? This is their dark delusion, who are deceived by vanities, and know not what a happy life means. For while they hope and expect great things, they fancy they are making great progress, and not one in a hundred obtains what he dreamed, and if perchance one obtains it, yet after he has reckoned up his accounts and made an inventory of his load of care, the slipperiness of fortune, his disgraceful servility, his fears, plots, troubles, annoyances, quarrels, crimes, which must always accompany and vex the lovers of the world, he will doubtless find himself to be a very base and needy slave. One sigh of yours for Heaven is better than all their clamours for this dirt ; one conver- sation of yours, where the angels are present, is better than all their parties and debauched drinking-bouts, where the devils fill the bowls. One day of yours consecrated to God is worth more than all their life, which they spend in luxury. My brothers, run as you have begun ; acknowledge God's goodness to you, and the dignity of your state. Can any pomp of kings or emperors, any grandeur, any pleasure, I will not say equal, but shadow forth your honour
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and consolation ? They (I speak of the good among them) fight under Christ their King, with their baggage on their back ; you are eased of your burdens, and are called with the beloved disciple to be familiar followers of your Lord. They are admitted to the palace, you to the presence chamber ; they to such repast as they can find, you to the store-rooms filled with delicious meats; they to friendship, you to love; they to things costly and rare, but you to the innermost recesses of the treasury. Think how hard they are put to, they even who live as they ought in this naughty world ; then you will more easily see what you owe to His mercy in calling you out of infinite dangers into His Society. How hardly shall they follow Christ when He marches forth in haste against His enemies, who have wives on their bosom, children on their shoulders, lands on their back, cares on their heads, whose feet are bound with cords, whose spirits are well-nigh smothered. Is not your happiness great whom the King marshals by His side, covers with His cloak, clothes and honours with His own livery ?
"Yet after all what great thing is it for me to leave friends for Him, who left Heaven for me ? What great thing for me to be a servant to my brethren, when He washed the feet of the traitor Judas ? What wonder if I obey my fathers, when He honoured Pilate ? What mighty thing for me to bear labours for Him, who bore His Cross for me ? What disgrace if I, a sinner, bear to be rebuked, when He in His innocency, was curst, spit upon, scourged, wounded, and put to death ? Whenever
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we look into this glass, my brothers, we see clearly that the temptation of no pleasure, the fear of no pain, should pluck us from the arms of such a master. You see I have nearly filled my paper, though I have plenty to do. It is^time to check myself and to remit you to that Teacher, who by His sacred influences can impress these things more strongly on your minds than I can. Hear Him, for He hath the words of eternal life.— 20 February, 1577."
On the i8th of October, 1574, Campion, having completed his novitiate, was sent to teach rhetoric at the Jesuit College at Prague. He both excited and directed the literary enthusiasm of this College with marvellous success. For the spiritual benefit of his students he founded, in January, 1575, the Sodality of the Immaculate Conception. Besides his professorship he was loaded with other offices. In the morning he rose half an hour before the rest ; he rang the bell to arouse them, and went to each cell to awaken the inmate and light his candle. After fifteen minutes he repeated his visits to see that all were dressing ; then he rang both for the beginning and end of prayers. After two hours of school he went to the kitchen to wash the dishes. Without the house "he preached publicly," says Persons, " made exhortations in private, taught the Christian doctrine unto children, heard confessions, visited prisons and hospitals of sick men, and at the death of sundry great persons made such excellent funeral orations as astonished
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the hearers." Though we are not to suppose that he did all these things every day, it nevertheless seemed a miracle that he could bear all his labours, and yet he was never in better health.
It is interesting to turn at this point to his discourse, De juvene Academico,1 in which he sets forth what he conceives to be the highest ideal of a Catholic scholar.
This imaginary person is supposed to be born of well-to-do Catholic parents, to have been gently nurtured, and to have learnt his religion with his alphabet. His mind was " subtle, hot, and clear ; his voice flexible, sweet, and sonorous ; his walk and all his motions lively, gentle, and subdued, and the whole man seeming a palace fit for wisdom to dwell in." He was taught by one of the greatest scholars of the day, and his pronunciation specially cared for, so that when he grew older, he easily acquired the true terms of eloquence. The school years were devoted to the classics, especially to the works of Cicero in Latin for the purpose of debate, and he acquired a knowledge of painting, playing the lute, and singing at sight. On attaining the age of sixteen he began to meditate on his vocation in life, and to prepare himself for that,
1 The date of this composition is uncertain. Father Persons ascribes it to Campion's stay in Ireland, Mr. Simpson to his residence at Douay, and conceives it to refer to the seminarists. But it is more probable that it was written while Campion was at Prague, where he taught secular students, such as are described in his speech. This speech, moreover, contains no reference to England, or to the very peculiar circumstances of the Bouay seminarists.
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he read philosophy, chiefly in Aristotle and Plato, and his studies further included history, mathe- matics, and the physical sciences, as far as they were then known. All his reading was done in order and moderation. He avoided alike pro- miscuous literature and late hours, and always allowed himself about seven hours sleep. Above all, he never read writings of a dangerous or immoral kind, of which Ovid's Art of Love is given as a type. His religious exercises included attendance at the sermons and catechisms, private conferences with theologians, and the perusal of contemporary Catholic authors, especially contro- versialistic, to arm him against the dangers of the day. He was on his guard against superstition. With his fellow-students he was gentle and kind, especially with those of lowly birth, and was atten- tive and charitable to the sick.
At the age of twenty-three this ideal student begins his course of theology proper, and here Campion artistically ends. The academic course might be considered as completed, and his hearers were left to infer that this ideal school-boy and university man would eventually develop into an ecclesiastic who would effect wonders in the cause of God, of the Church, and of his fellow-men.
After exhorting his auditors not to despair because the ideal was so high, he concludes with an ardent appeal to them to give themselves heart and soul to the service of the Church.
" Listen to our Heavenly Father asking back
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His talents with usury ; listen to the Church, the mother that bore and nursed us, imploring our help ; listen to the pitiful cries of our neighbours in danger of spiritual starvation ; listen to the howling of the wolves that are spoiling the flock. The glory of your father, the preservation of your mother, your own salvation, the safety of your brethren are in jeopardy, and can you stand idle ? If this house were blazing before your eyes, what would you think of the young reprobate who sang or grinned, or snapped his ringers, or rode cock- horse on his cane, in the common crisis ? Behold by the wickedness of the wicked the house of God is devoted to the flames and to destruction, number- less souls are being deceived, are being shaken, are being lost ; any one of which is worth more than the empire of the whole world. Do not, I pray you, regard such a tragedy as a joke ; sleep not while the enemy watches ; play not while he devours his prey ; relax not in idleness and vanity while his fangs are stained with your brother's blood. It is not wealth or liberty or station, but the eternal inheritance of each of us, the very life-blood of our souls, our spirits, and our lives that suffer. See then, my dear scholarly young friends, that you lose none of this precious time, but carry a plentiful and rich crop away from this seminary, enough to supply the public wants, and to gain for yourselves the reward of dutiful sons."
A word must here be said about the interior trials from which Campion suffered at this period.
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Father Persons tells us, that " the greatest and only difficulty which the Fathers there had with him for a time, was to appease his conscience about the scruple, whereof I have spoken, touching his being made deacon in England after the heretical fashion ; the memory of which profane degree and schismatical order did so much torment his mind every time that he did think attentively of it, as it did breed in him extreme affliction. Neither sufficed it to tell him, which also he knew right well of himself, that it was no order, degree, or character at all that he had received, seeing he that gave it to him and laid his hands upon him was no true Bishop, and consequently had no authority to give any such order more than a mere layman, and that it was only an apish imitation of the true Bishops of the Catholic Church, that which the Protestant Bishops did use for a show to the people, as though they had holy and ecclesiastical orders among them ; but indeed themselves did not so esteem thereof that any character was given as in Catholic ordinations by imposition of hands, for that amongst them a man be a priest or minister for a time and then a soldier or craftsman again, and that the Puritans or newer Calvinists did deny flatly all spiritual authority of Bishops. And therefore, albeit the sin was great for a Catholic man, especially such as Mr. Campion then was, to take any ordination at the hands of any such heretical, schismatical, or excommunicated persons ; yet was he to believe that that sin was now fully forgiven by his hearty repentance and turning to Almighty God, and by
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his satisfaction already done for the same ; and therefore that he should trouble himself no more with the memory thereof, but rather put it wholly out of his mind and cheerfully proceed in the service of God which he had taken in hand.
"This, I say, and divers other such-like points were often inculcated to him by these learned men there, and especially by his ghostly fathers ; which though for a time did greatly comfort him, yet every now and then the remembrance of this mark of the English beast, as afterwards he was wont to tell us, did make him sad and melancholy. And he could never wholly be delivered of this inward grief until the absolute order and commandment of his General came from Rome to trouble himself no more about that scruple, and until he was made both deacon and priest by the Archbishop of Prague, after the rite of the Catholic Church, for by the receiving of this true character, the other imagination was wholly blotted out and put in oblivion.
" So then after this he lived in very great quiet and contentment of mind all the time he abode in that country, which was for the space of eight yearsr in which time he applied himself to the labours and functions of his religion with such exceeding charity and zeal and perfect obedience, as I have heard some of the Fathers say who lived there with him, that albeit he was ever fully occupied and many times with divers charges and functions at once, as reading, preaching, and the like, yet it was never known that he so much as propounded any
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other difficulty to his Superior when he laid any new labour upon him but only this : ' Doth your Reverence think I am sufficient to discharge that office together with the other which I had before? ' And if the Superior said yes, he took the same upon him without further reply, persuading himself to hear God's voice by the voice of his Superior ; and if God did lay this charge upon him, He would give him strength also, and ability to perform it. This was his manner of proceeding then, and ever after, and namely in the great affair of his journey to England, as he told to his General, and to us too, when he returned to Rome ; and protesteth the same in his epistle to the Council of England, whereof we shall speak after, and therefore no marvel if Christ his Master prospered him so well and brought him to so happy an end, seeing that in all his actions he cast himself so confidently upon His holy providence."
Whilst at Prague, Campion had several oppor- tunities of helping or encouraging his own country- men. He had interviews with Sir Philip Sidney, the son of his former protector in Ireland, who, though only twenty-one years of age, had been sent to Bohemia on a diplomatic mission. After much argument Sidney professed himself convinced of the truth of the Faith, but said he must remain as he was, though he promised never to injure Catholics.
Later on, in 1577, Campion wrote to Gregory Martin to encourage him, at the time when the English College at Douay was in great danger of
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being suppressed by the machinations of the English and Dutch heretics. It was (in great measure) to guard against this danger that the English College at Rome was first opened, and Martin was sent there to look after the students. Campion cheered him with the following affectionate letter :
" Such accusations as those wherewith you accuse me, trouble me not, for they coax out of you a letter full of endearing complaints, and let me see, to my joy, how lovingly you look for my reply. It may perhaps be stale to excuse myself on the plea of business, but I do, and ever will steal time enough for the religious rites of our friendship, which is always in my heart. I lately sent a parcel to you at Douay : in it there was a long letter to you ; and because you did not receive it, you wrangle with me about the postmen. But don't irritate me, though you are tall and I short.
" Your next sentence gives me sad news, which nips my jokes in the bud. Are there indeed such troubles in Flanders? Has the peril reached to the English College? How far? Are they to be driven out ? Let them be driven anywhere but into their own country. What is it to us, to whom England is imprisonment, the rest of the world transportation ! Be of good cheer ; this storm will drive you into smooth water.
" Make the most of Rome. Do you see the dead
corpse of that Imperial City ? What in this life
can be glorious, if such wealth, such beauty, has
come to nothing ? But what men have stood firm
u n.
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in these miserable changes, — what things ? The relics of the saints — and the chair of the Fisherman. What a work of Providence ! Why is Heaven neglected for worldly glory, when we see with our own eyes that not even on earth have the rulers of earth been able to preserve these monuments of their vanity, these trophies of their folly ! What will this smoke seem in the ether of Heaven, when it so soon blows away in the atmosphere of earth ? How will angels laugh when even men mock ?
"But 7\aO/ca? eh 'AOijvas. It is 'carrying coals to Newcastle ' to write such things to you. For your whole letter breathes a noble spirit ; your story, your hopes, and your requests set me in a blaze at all points. Nor is this the first time ; all your letters show with what prudence, with what Christian love, you love me, when you so heartily congratulate me on the state of life which I have embraced, though it places so strong a barrier to our union. This is real friendship. I remember too how earnestly you called me from Ireland to Douay, how you admonished me, and how effective were your words. . . . What you foretold is fulfilled. I live in affluence, and yet I have nothing; and I would not exchange the hardships of my Institute for the realm of England. If our tears are worth all this, what are our consolations worth ? And they are quite numberless and above all measure. So, as you rejoice with me, you may go on rejoicing, for what I have found is indeed most joyful. As for your praises, I pray you, my dear Father, to commend my soul to God in your Sacrifices that it may become less
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unworthy of your praise. This is the sum — since for so many years we had in common our college, our meals, our studies, our opinions, our fortune, our degrees, our tutors, our friends and our enemies, let us for the rest of our lives make a more close and binding union, that we may have the fruit of our friendship in Heaven. There also I will, if I can, sit at your feet."
Campion had long cherished the hope of returning to England as a missioner of the true Faith, and his desire was now to be gratified. Dr. Allen begged the Pope and the General of the Society to send some Jesuits to England, and it was determined that Campion and Persons should be the first to go. Whilst the General wrote officially to Campion's Superiors, Dr. Allen conveyed the message to our martyr in the following beautiful letter :
" Rome, the 5th of December, 1579. " My father, brother, son, Edmund Campion, for to you I must use every expression of the tenderest ties of love, — Since the General of your Order, and he, as I take it, speaks for Christ Himself, calls you from Prague to Rome and thence to our own England ; since your brethren after the flesh call upon you (for though you hear not their words, God has heard and granted their prayers), I who am so closely connected with them, with you, and with our common country, both in the world and in the Lord, must not be the only one to keep
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silence, when I should be first to desire you, to call you, to cry to you. . . . Make all haste and come, my dearest Campion ; you have done enough at Prague towards remedying the evils that our countrymen inflicted upon Bohemia. It will be dutiful, religious and Christian in you to devote the rest of your life and some part of your extraordinary gifts to our beloved country, which has the greatest need of your labours in Christ.
" I do not stay to inquire what your wish and inclination may be, since it is your happiness to live, by the will of others, not by your own ; and you would not shrink from the greatest perils or the farthest Indies if your Superior bade you go. Our harvest is already great in England ; ordinary labourers are not enough ; more practised men are wanted, but chiefly you and others of your Order. The General has yielded to all our prayers ; the Pope, the true father of our country, has consented ; and God in whose hand are the issues, has at last granted that our own Campion, with all his gifts of wisdom and with increased gifts of grace, should be restored to us. Prepare yourself then for a journey, for a work, for a trial. You will have an excellent colleague. And ' though they still live who sought the Child's life,' yet ' a door is open for you in the Lord.' It is not I that am preparing for you and your Order the place in England that your soul presaged, but it is you, I hope, who will procure for me and mine the power of returning. . . ."
Father Persons thus describes the advent in
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Bohemia of the summons to England, and what followed thereupon.
" As soon as ever the Rector of Prague had intimated the General's order unto him, he, taking it as coming from God Himself, smiling to the Rector, said that he did accept the citation, and would make his appearance as he was commanded ; and being scarce able to hold tears for joy and tenderness of heart went to his chamber, and there upon his knees to God satisfied his appetite of weeping and thanksgiving, and offered himself wholly to His divine disposition without any exception or restraint, whether it were to rack, cross, quartering, or any other torment or death whatsoever.
" After this he asked leave of his Rector to bestow and distribute among certain peculiar scholars and fellows of his that remained in Prague, some dictates and writings that he had gathered there, and some few others he carried with him to Italy, and there gave them also away; and with these and with his breviary only he took his journey on foot to Rome, being not much less distant than his other journey afterward from Rome to England. And surely I remember he came after so venerable a manner to Rome as he might move devotion, for he came in grave priest's garb, with long hair after the fashion of Germany, and he served God so earnestly upon the way, and commended the success of his journey with so great instance and devotion unto Him, as it was not hard to prognosticate what was like to ensue of the same.
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"Yea, not only now, but before he departed out of Prague there happened this. [The night before Father Campion left Prague, a certain Father James Gall, a Silesian and a very simple soul, who was reputed to have ecstasies, wrote over the door of Campion's cell, P. Edmundus Campianus, Martyr. He was reprimanded next day for his breach of discipline, and excused himself by saying that he had felt impelled to act as he had done.]
" Father Campion's arrival in Rome was in the year 1580, upon the Passion Week, and after he had been with his General and understood his mind about the journey to England, and that it should be immediately after the octave of Easter, he made instant suit that, seeing the time was so short, he might be distracted with no other thing or cogitation, but only to commend himself to God, and visit the holy places of the city, and prepare himself for the voyage. In which voyage and mission he desired most earnestly and humbly that he might be charged with no temporal care or solicitude in the world, either to be superior to other, or to provide for meat and drink or the like, but that he might be left alone to his prayers, and to preach and teach when occasion should be offered. And this point he urged so far forth, and showed so hearty an aversion from meddling with the same, as it was the cause that the charge of the mission was laid upon his fellow [i.e., Father Persons himself] , though of less age, standing in religion, and ability than himself.
" Now, then, when Father Campion saw himself freed from all other care and cogitation, but only
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to attend to his devotion, he took his fill thereof; and in those fifteen or twenty days that he stayed in Rome he went every day to pray and say Mass in different churches where Apostles' and Saints' bodies lay. And the like did for their part, and had done all the Lent before, those other priests also of the English Seminary that were appointed by their Superiors to go with us in this first mission. . . . Two of the principal were Mr. Ralph Sherwin and Mr. Luke Kirby, that afterwards were fellows to Father Campion in glorious martyrdom. All these, I say, together used such notable and extraordinary diligence for preparing themselves well in the sight of God, and to obtain His holy grace and the assistance of His blessed saints for this mission, as was matter of edification to all Rome. . . .
" He went very badly apparelled (as I have before signified), to wit, with old buckram under a bare cloak, and this of his own choice, for he would say, that to him that went to be hanged in England, any kind of apparel was sufficient. He took unto himself for this journey the name of his old protector in Ireland, by which he escaped before, which was of St. Patrick, apostle of that country, recommending himself most devoutly unto him ; and so kept the same until he was ready to enter England, at what time he was persuaded to leave it in respect of the new troubles raised in that country by Dr. Sander's arrival there, for which occasion he might be suspected or called perhaps in question for an Irishman, if he continued that name, whereupon he left it and called himself
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Edmonds, in remembrance of St. Edmund, King and Martyr of England, whom he desired to imitate.
"The manner of the whole journey was that one or two only were charged with the care of providing victuals upon the way, so that all the rest might the better attend unto their devotions. In the morning, after the Itinerarium said, each man had his time allotted for their meditations and mental prayer, and after that to say their service of the Breviary and other devotions as each man would, and where commodity of church and of other things necessary was offered, there either all, or as many of the priests as could, or at least some one for all the rest, said Mass.
" After dinner also, besides their ordinary service of Evensong, Compline, and Matins for the next day, they had their several times appointed for saying their rosary or their beads and divers sorts of litanies, and towards night the examen of their conscience, which every man did with so great care and diligence as men that supposed that within very few days after they might chance to see themselves before the judgment-seat of Almighty God ; seeing they knew the entertainment which they were like to receive in their country if they were appre- hended, and for this cause, to prepare themselves the better to this event, the book which they most read and conferred of upon the way was St. Luke's story of the Acts of the Apostles.
" But Father Campion, among all the rest, had a fashion to leave the rest of the company every
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morning after the Itinerarium was said, and to get him before the space of some half-mile or more to the end he might with more freedom make his prayers alone, and utter his zealous affections unto his Saviour without being heard or noted by his fellows. And this he used throughout all the way, which endured more than a month, and would not suffer himself to be overtaken until he had fully finished his devotions, which was commonly some hour before dinner ; and then he would stay to go in company with the rest, and would be so merry and talk of suffering for Christ with such comfort (for of this point commonly was the subject of their talk) as a man might easily perceive with whom he had had conversation in his prayers before. . . .
"[At Bologna the party was hospitably received by Cardinal Paleotto, and] the very like courtesy and kind entertainment had we also afterward of the good Cardinal [i.e., St. Charles] Borromeo, Arch- bishop of Milan, whose rare sanctity is sufficiently known to the whole world. He received us, I say, all into his house and detained us with him for divers days, had sundry learned and most godly speeches with us tending to the contempt of this world and perfect zeal of Christ His service ; whereof we saw so rare an example in himself, and his austere and laborious life, being nothing in effect but skin and bone through continual pains, fasting, and penance, as without saying any word he preached to us sufficiently, so as we departed from him greatly edified and exceedingly animated. . . ."
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Then they pushed on by Turin, and across Mont Cenis for Geneva. There they called on Beza. The door was opened by Candida his so- called wife, whom he had run away with from her husband in Paris. After much difficulty she con- sented to bring them in. Beza appeared in his long black gown, round cap, and fair long beard ; he saluted them courteously but did not offer them a seat. They questioned him on the subject of religion, and Campion who was then disguised as a servant, " faced out the heretical old fool," says Sherwin, by asking him to explain the unity of the Swiss and English religions, seeing their difference on such important points as the Sacraments. Beza soon thought his best plan was to bow them out, which he accordingly did. They left Geneva the next day, saying a Te Deum for their escape from that " miserable " city, and finally reached Rheims on May the 3ist, after a journey of nearly six weeks.
The whole party was received with enthusiasm, " and especially Father Campion was exceeding welcome both to Mr. Dr. Allen, the President, and to all the rest, for that he had been one of them before in Douay, and they had not seen him now for the full space of eight years or more, so as there was no end of their embracing and welcoming the good man ; and so much the more, for that he came now for so holy and honourable a cause, though environed with more difficulties than we had yet heard of."
There were many points about the mission to be discussed with Allen. Persons thus describes one,
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which concerned our martyr in particular. Father Campion went to the President and said :
" ' Well, sir, here now I am. You have desired my going to England, and I am come a long journey, as you see, from Prague to Rome and from Rome hither. Do you think my labours in England may countervail with all this travail, as also my absence from Bohemia, where, though I did not much, yet I was not idle nor unemployed, and yet also against heretics ? '
" Whereunto the President answered :
" ' My good Father, your labours in Bemeland, though I do not doubt they were very profitable, yet do I imagine that another man of your Society may supply the same, [or] at least two or three. But towards of England, I hope verily that Almighty God will give you strength and grace to supply for many men, and seeing that your obligation is greater towards that country than towards any other, and the necessity of help more urgent, and the talents that God has given you more fit and proper for that than for any other land, doubt you not but all is Christ's holy providence for the best, and so be you of good comfort.'
" ' As for me,' said Father Campion, ' all is one ; and I hope I am and shall be ever indifferent for all nations and functions, whereinsoever my Superiors under God shall employ me. I have made a free oblation of myself to His Divine Majesty both for life and death, and I trust that He will give me grace and force to perform, and this is all I desire.' "
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Whilst at Rheims, Campion preached to the students on the text : Ignem veni mittere in terram — "I am come to send fire upon the earth." His words were filled with a loving enthusiasm, and he cried out " fire, fire, fire " so vehemently, describing the zeal for martyrdom, that passers-by thought there was a conflagration, and were going to fetch water- buckets to put it out.
From Rheims, Persons and Campion went to St. Omers, and disguised themselves for their passage to England ; Persons as a soldier returning from the Low Countries, and Campion as a merchant of jewels. Persons reached London via Calais and Dover, without serious difficulty, and found shelter with Mr. George Gilbert and his friends. Of Campion's state of mind at St. Omers, where he was awaiting news of Persons, the following letter tells us. It is addressed by him to Everard Mercurian, the General of the Society :
" Father Robert [Persons] with George, his companion, sailed from Calais after midnight on the day before I began writing this ; the wind was very good, so we hope that he reached Dover some time yesterday morning, the i6th of June. He was dressed up like a soldier ; such a peacock, such a swagger, that a man must needs have very sharp eyes to catch a glimpse of holiness and modesty shrouded beneath such a garb, such a look, such a strut. Yet our minds cannot but misgive us when we hear all men, I will not say whispering, but crying the news of our coming. It is a venture
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which only the wisdom of God can bring to good, and to His wisdom we lovingly resign ourselves. According to orders, I have stayed behind fora time to try, if possible, to fish some news about Father Robert's success out of the carriers, or out of certain merchants who are to come to these parts, before I sail across. If I hear anything I will advise upon it ; but in any case, I will go over and take part in the fight, though I die for it. It often happens that the first rank of a conquering army is struck down. Indeed, if our Society is to go on with this adventure, the ignorance and wickedness against which this war is declared will have to be overthrown. On the 2Oth of June I mean to go to Calais; in the meantime I live in the College of St. Omer, where I am dressing up myself and my companion, [Brother] Ralph [Emerson] . You may imagine the expense, especially as none of our old things can be henceforth used. As we want to disguise our persons and cheat the madness of this world, we are obliged to buy several little things which seem to us altogether absurd. Our journey, these clothes, and four horses, which we must buy as soon as we reach England, may possibly square with our money; but only with the help of Providence, which multiplied the loaves in the wilderness. This indeed is our least difficulty, so let us have done with it. I will not yet close this letter, that I may add whatever news reaches me during these three days. For though our lot will be cast, one way or other, before you read this, yet I thought that, while I am here, I ought to note every particular of
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this great business, and the last doings on which the rest, as yet unwritten, will hang. A certain English gentleman very well informed in matters of State, often comes to me ; and he tells me that the coming of the Bishop of St. Asaph is canvassed in letters and in conversation. Great expectations are raised by it ; for most men think that such a man, at his age, would never undertake such a task, except there was some rising on foot. I told him in the simplest manner the true cause of his coming. Still he did not cease wondering ; for the episcopal name and function is in high honour in England."
On June the 24th, the feast of his patron, St. John the Baptist, Campion finally reached Dover, where he and his lay-brother companion, Ralph Emerson, were at once seized, by order of the mayor, who had received instructions and was on the watch for them. Campion, however, fervently implored the aid of his patron St. John, and they were eventually allowed to proceed.
Father Persons continues : " Being so happily and unexpectedly delivered from Dover, he made all the haste he could to come to London, where he was greatly desired, and much prayer was made for him. The greatest solicitude was how he would do at his first arrival, for that he knew not where to go, and with the same care came he also, what to do in that behalf. But God provided better for him herein than he could possibly imagine, for coming to land upon the Thames side at London, there was there, by God's providence, a certain
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Catholic that partly by his person and apparel, described to him before by Father Persons, and partly by that he saw him accompanied by a little man named Ralph Emerson, whereof also Father Persons had given knowledge, he did suspect him to be the same man, and so, stepping to the boat- side, said, ' Mr. Edmonds (for so he was called), give me your hand. I stay here for you to lead you to your friends.' With which speech Father Campion was wonderfully comforted."
Father Persons had by then already left London, and Campion on June the 2gth, the feast of SS. Peter and Paul, boldly preached in the great hall of a house near Smithfield, which Lord Paget had hired of Lord Norreys, while gentlemen kept watch as servants and porters. This sermon attracted some notice, and made the Council eager to appre- hend him. Campion therefore confined himself to private conferences and constantly changed his abode, but even this became unsafe ; and after Hilary Term, 1580, both he and Persons, who had now returned to London, resolved on making for the country. At Hoxton, before parting for their separate missions, Campion, at the instigation of Mr. Thomas Pound, a Catholic prisoner for the Faith, who had obtained a temporary absence from the Marshalsea, wrote an open letter to the Council, in the form of a public vindication of the presence and purpose of the Jesuits in England. Though not intended for publication, Pound let it go abroad in manuscript, and it soon became widely
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known as Campion's " Brag and Challenge." It was composed in haste, in less than an hour and a half; but is so pithy in substance and in style, that its appearance produced dismay among Protestants, and gave great joy to Catholics.
The chief points of the document, which is drawn up under nine heads, are as follows : That Campion, now eight years a member of the Society, had come to England simply under obedience, with no hope of gain or preferment, to preach the Gospel, minister the Sacraments, and convert sinners ; that he was strictly forbidden to deal in any way with politics, and only asked for three public discussions. The first before the Lords in Council, on the relation of the Catholic Church to the Government ; the second, of which he made most account, before the leading Masters of the Universities, on the proofs of the Catholic religion, which he undertook to demonstrate invincibly ; the third, before the lawyers spiritual and temporal ; " wherein he could justify the Faith by the common wisdom of the laws " then existing.
Though unwilling to say anything that " might sound of an insolent brag or challenge," and being himself dead to the world, and willing to cast his head under any man's foot, and to kiss the ground he treads on, yet was the writer so sure of the truth of his faith that he only asked to meet at once any of the most learned Protestants, who would enter the lists with him. He begged the Queen, Elizabeth, his " sovereign lady," to attend at the conferences he had demanded, and to allow
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him to preach in her presence. He doubted not but that the Lords of the Council would, when they had heard him preach, see through the evil counsel by which they were misled. He concludes with the following impassioned words :
" Many innocent hands are lifted up for you daily and hourly by those English students whose posterity shall not die, which beyond the seas, gathering virtue and sufficient knowledge for the purpose, are determined never to give you over, but either to win you to Heaven or to die upon your pikes. And touching our Society, be it known unto you that we have made a league — all the Jesuits in the world, whose succession and multitude must over-reach all the practices of England — cheerfully to carry the cross that you shall lay upon us, and never to despair your recovery while we have a man left to enjoy your Tyburn, or to be racked with your torments, or to be consumed with your prisons. The expense is reckoned, the enterprise is begun ; it is of God, it cannot be withstood. So the Faith was planted, so it must be restored.
" If these my offers be refused, and my en- deavours can take no place, and I having run thousands of miles to do you good, shall be rewarded with rigour, — I have no more to say, but to recom- mend your case and mine to Almighty God, the Searcher of hearts, Who send us of His grace, and set us accord before the day of payment, to the intent we may at last be friends in Heaven, where all injuries shall be forgotten."
v n.
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This simple, ingenuous, and fearless manifesto made no little stir, and fresh repressive measures were taken. The prisons were crowded with Catholics, and many distinguished sufferers were consigned to Wisbeach Castle. The chief among these were Watson, Bishop of Lincoln ; Feckenham, Abbot of Westminster ; the Earl of Southampton, Lord Herbert, Lord Compton, Lord Paget, Sir Thomas Fitzherbert, Sir John Arundell, Sir Alexander Culpeper, Sir John Southworth, Sir Nicholas Poyntz, Sir Thomas Gerard, Sir George Peckham, John Talbot of Grafton, William and Richard Shelly, Ralph Sheldon, Thomas and Francis Throgmorton, John and Edward Gage, Nicholas Thimbleby, William and Robert Tyrrwhit, Richard Culpeper, John Walker, Mr. Towneley, Mr. Guildford, Robert Price, Peter Tichbourne, Erasmus Wolseley, John Gifford, Brian Fowler, Thomas Cross. Of their treatment at this time a priest writes :
" In their old age they are sent to Wisbeach Castle, a most unhealthy place, under the orders of a sour Puritan. It is certain they cannot live long there. Over and above the miseries of im- prisonment, they are shamefully treated by their keeper. All books but a single Bible are taken from them, ^nor are they allowed any papers of their own- writings or notes. Conceited ministers are let in on them without warning, with whom they must argue without preparation, or endure their insults. The most false and ridiculous libels upon them are published and even printed, in order to lessen the
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consideration in which they are held. Last month an immodest woman was shut up without their knowledge in one of their chambers to give a handle for a false charge of incontinence. No access is allowed, and we are obliged to use tricks to com- municate with them. When any one wants to give them an alms, he walks in the neighbouring fields and cries out, as if he was hunting for game. At this sign one of them looks out of the window, and learns by signal that there is something for the prisoners. The next night, when everybody is asleep, the sportsman cautiously creeps up to the wall, and one of the prisoners lets down a basket from the window whence the signal was given, and draws up what is put into it. The same plan is generally adopted for the other prisons, but the variety of places requires a variety of methods, and the zeal, charity, and bravery of the Catholics is greatly conspicuous in designing and accomplishing these dangerous services." l
While the persecution was in progress, Campion was working with success in Berkshire, Oxfordshire, and Northamptonshire. Among his more notable converts were Sir Thomas Tresham of Rushton, Sir William Catesby of Ashby St. Ledger, and Lord Vaux of Harrowden. Persons' harvest was equally rich, and included John Shakespeare, the father of the poet. Campion wrote as follows to his Father General about his manner of life, and the state of the country at this period.
1 Quoted in Sander, De Schismate (Edit. 1628), p. 317.
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" I ride about some piece of the country every day. The harvest is wonderful great. On horse- back I meditate my sermon ; when I come to the house I polish it. Then I talk with such as come to speak with me, or hear their confessions. In the morning, after Mass, I preach ; they hear with exceeding greediness and very many go to the sacraments, for the ministration whereof we are ever well assisted by the priests, whom we find in every place, whereby both the people is well served and we much eased in our charge. The priests of our country themselves being most excellent for virtue and learning, yet have raised so great an opinion of our Society that I dare scarcely touch the exceeding reverence all Catholics do unto us. How much more is it requisite that those who hereafter are to be sent for supply, whereof we have great need, be such as may answer all men's expectations of them ! Specially let them be well trained for the pulpit. I cannot long escape the hands of the heretics ; the enemies have so many eyes, so many tongues, so many scouts and crafts. I am in apparel to myself very ridiculous; I often change it and my name also. I read letters sometimes myself that, in the first front, tell news that Campion is taken, which noised in every place where I come, so filleth my ears with the sound thereof, that fear itself hath taken away all fear. * My soul is ever in my hands.' Let such as you send for supply premeditate and make count of this always. Marry, the solaces that are ever intermingled with these miseries are so great, that they do not only countervail the fear of what
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punishment temporal soever, but by infinite sweet- ness make all worldly pains, be they never so great, seem nothing. They will find consciences that are pure, courage invincible, zeal incredible, a work so worthy, the number innumerable of every age and sex, both of high degree, of mean calling, and of the inferior sort.
" Here even amongst the Protestants themselves that are of a milder nature, it is turned into a proverb, that he must be a Catholic that payeth faithfully what he oweth, insomuch that if any Catholic do injury, everybody expostulateth with him as for an act unworthy of men of that calling. To be short, heresy heareth ill of all men ; neither is there any condition of people commonly counted more vile and impure than their ministers, and we worthily have indignation, that fellows so unlearned, so evil, so derided, so base, should in so desperate a quarrel over-rule such a number of noble wits as our realm hath. Threatening edicts come forth against us daily ; notwithstanding by good heed and the prayers of good men, and, which is the chief of all, God's special gift, we have passed safely through the most part of the island. I find many neglecting their own security, to have only care of my safety.
" A certain matter fell out these days unlocked for. I had set down in writing by several articles the causes of my coming in, and made certain demands most reasonable. I professed myself to be a priest of the Society ; that I returned to enlarge the Catholic Faith, to teach the Gospel, to minister
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the sacraments, humbly asking audience of the Queen and the nobility of the realm, and proffering disputations to the adversaries. One copy of this writing I determined to keep with me ; another copy I laid in a friend's hands, that when myself with the other should be seized, another might thereupon straight be dispersed. But my said friend kept it not close long, but divulged it, and it was read greedily ; whereat the adversaries were mad, answer- ing out of the pulpit, that themselves certesse would not refuse to dispute, but the Queen's pleasure was not that matters should be called in question, being already established. In the meanwhile they tear and sting us with their venomous tongues, calling us seditious, hypocrites, yea heretics too, which is much laughed at. The people hereupon is ours, and that error of spreading abroad this writing has much advanced the cause. If we be commanded and may have safe escort, we will unto the court.
" But they mean nothing less, for they have filled all the old prisons with Catholics, and now make new ; and in fine plainly affirm that it were better to make a few traitors away, than that so many souls should be lost. Of their martyrs they brag no more now ; for it is now come to pass that for a few apostates and cobblers of theirs burnt, we have bishops, lords, knights, the old nobility, the patterns of learning, piety, and prudence, the flower of the youth, noble matrons, and of the inferior sort innumerable, either martyred at once, or by con- suming prisonment dying daily. At the very writing hereof the persecution rages most cruelly. The
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house where I am is sad ; no other talk but of death, flight, prison, or spoil of their friends ; never- theless they proceed with courage. Very many even at this present are being restored to the Church, new soldiers give up their names while the veterans offer their blood ; by which holy hosts and oblations God will be pleased, and we shall, no question, by Him soon overcome.
" You see now, therefore, Reverend Father, how much need we have of your prayers and Sacrifices, and other heavenly help, to go through with these things. There will never want in England men that will have care of their own salvation, nor such as shall advance other men's. Neither shall this Church here ever fail, so long as priests and pastors shall be found for their sheep, rage man or devil never so much. But the rumour of present peril causeth me here to make an end. 'Arise God! His enemies avoid.' Fare you well."1
Father Persons gives us the following more detailed description of the missionary journey through England, to which Campion briefly alluded above.
"It was -not long after our departure but that the Council, by their spies and other persons whom they apprehended, had notice of our journey, and presently they sent divers pursuivants after us into most shires of England, with large authority to apprehend us wheresoever they should meet with us.
1 No date. Probably November, 1580.
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But we had always warning by the diligence of the Catholics, so as we easily avoided them, and they lost their labour and we had three or four months free to follow our business, in which space, by the help and direction of the young gentlemen that went with us, we passed through the most part of the shires of England preaching and administering the sacraments in almost every gentleman and nobleman's house that we passed by, whether he himself were a Catholic or no, if he had any Catholics in his house to hear us, which commonly was in manner following.
" We entered for the most part as acquaintance or kinsfolk of some person that, lived within the house, and when that failed us, as passengers or friends of some gentleman that accompanied us, and after ordinary salutations we had our lodging by procurement of the Catholics within the house, in some part retired from the rest, where putting ourselves in priest's apparel and furniture, which ever we carried with us, we had view and secret conference with the Catholics that were there, or such of them as might conveniently come, whom we ever caused to be ready for that night late to prepare themselves to the Sacrament of Confession, and the next morning very early we had Mass and the Blessed Sacrament ready for such as would communicate, and after that an exhortation, and then we made ourselves ready to depart again, and this was the manner of providing when we stayed least, but when longer and more liberal and full stay was, then these exercises were more frequented."
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Then, after describing the persecution in London, Persons continues :
" While these things were doing in London, where the Court lay, Father Campion and his fellows proceeded prosperously in their affairs in the country ; for that passing over many shires they confirmed and gained to the Catholic religion very great numbers of all sorts of people, whereunto the most part of all such, as dwell in the country abroad (and so do dwell the better of the English nobility and gentry, and are farther off from great towns, where the infection of ministers beareth most rule with artisans and merchants), are of themselves more inclined, remembering the virtuous life and just proceeding of those of the ancient religion, and seeing and feeling the contrary now. Of this great concourse and proneness of people to be converted, Father Campion in his epistle to his General giveth abundant testimony. And one thing I can affirm of my certain knowledge, that, as it was a most comfortable thing to see the universal inclination of so infinite people to the Catholic religion, so was it an incredible sorrow and compassion to any Christian heart to see the rents and breaches, the wrenches and disjointures, which the preaching of new doctrines for twenty years had made in the con- sciences and belief of this good people, which lived before so many ages in one only faith."
Of the result of Campion's journey, Father Persons says :
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" This may be enough to show how profitable to the salvation of souls and serviceable to Almighty God were the labours of His servants and priests in this work. For many of them that were furthest run out of order were reduced ; others that were not gone so far, but [were] in going, were stayed ; others that were doubtful were resolved ; others that were cold and negligent and seemed to care little for any part, were stirred up ; others, and those very many, that had good meaning and good desire also, but were oppressed with fear, were animated and put both in heart and comfort, and those that were good of themselves were much confirmed. And in these exercises passed Father Campion and his fellows their time in the country with preaching, private conference, exhortations, writing of letters, and administration of the sacraments until the month of October, at what time, Michaelmas being begun, it was thought convenient that they should meet at London again to take further order about their affairs, especially Father Campion and Father Persons, who had not seen the one the other since they departed from London in the beginning of
July.
" At their first meeting they related, the one to the other, the mercies that God had showed unto them in the time of their being abroad in the country, what shires, towns, houses they had visited, what success they had had, what perils they had escaped, what disposition they had found in them- selves for the time to come. And secondly, they consulted what course was to be held for the time
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to come, wherein they resolved that Father Persons for the present should stay in London, or near about, as the persecution and necessity of business should suffer, for that it seemed he was less sought for yet than was Father Campion, who for this and other causes, especially that he was most earnestly desired in divers places, was thought more convenient to return again into the country until the present tempest of persecution was somewhat assuaged or blown over. This being so agreed upon, the next question was whither and to what shire Father Campion should go, for divers did sue for him most instantly, as hath been said, but above other the Catholics of Lancashire and Norfolk, unto which shires he had not time or commodity to reach in his former circuit. But finally it seemed best that he should go to Lancashire both for that it was more distant from London, and more generally affected to the Catholic religion, and for that there was more hope to find commodity of books for him to write or answer the heretics, if perhaps they should provoke him, as it was supposed they would shortly, seeing that his foresaid paper of satisfaction and challenge was now in their hands, and spread over England as it was, and no other talk almost at ordinary tables and other public meetings but of this. And albeit hitherto nothing appeared in answer thereof, yet seemed it impossible but that shortly there would be. For all which causes it was resolved that Father Campion should depart again out of hand and, with all the secrecy that he could, put himself within the compass of Lancashire."
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Leaving London for the North, Campion spent Christmas with the Pierrepoints at Thoresby in Nottinghamshire. Then Henry Sacheverell, Mr. Langford, Lady Foljambe, Mr. Powdrell, Mr. Ayers or Amias, of the Stipte, in Derbyshire, were in turn his hosts. At the Stipte Mr. Tempest succeeded Gervase Pierrepoint as Campion's guide, and led him to Dr. Vavasour, Mrs. Bulmer, Sir William Babthorpe, of Osgodby — who had the previous August given a bond of £200 that he and his family would dutifully repair to church, and apprehend " all rogueing Popish priests, and other like evil Popish subjects" — Mr. Grimston, Mr. Hawkeworth, and Mr. Askulph Cleesby. In the third week of Lent, Mr. Smythe succeeded as conductor, and took him to the house of his brother-in-law, Mr. William Harrington, of Mount St. John, near Thirsk, where one of the host's six sons was so fired by Campion's example, that he went over to Rheims and returned as a priest to be martyred.1
From Mount St. John he was conducted by Mr. Moore, a Yorkshireman, to the houses of Catholics in Lancashire — the Talbots, Southworths, Heskeths, Worthingtons, Mrs. Allen (widow of the Cardinal's brother), the Houghtons, the Westbys, and the Rigmaidens.
This itinerary is supplied by Cecil's papers, whose spies were dogging Campion's steps. Many came to hear him, and persons of quality spent whole nights in barns, so that they might be early
1 The Ven. William Harrington was martyred at Tyburn on February 18, 1594.
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at the place the next day. " Even up to my time," wrote Father Henry More in 1660, " Campion's memory was still popular in the North, and his sermons were still remembered on the Hail Mary, on the Ten Lepers, on the King who went on a journey, and on the Last Judgment. Not only his eloquence and fire, but a certain hidden infused power, made his words strike home." He preached daily save when occupied in writing, or obliged to flee from the pursuivants. At Blainscow Hall he was saved by the ready wit of a maid-servant who, in affected anger, pushed him into a pond, whence he emerged covered with mud and unre- cognisable by his pursuers.
All this while he was composing a fresh book — De Heresi Desperata. " And truly I can affirm of my knowledge," says Father Persons, "that it was Father Campion's perpetual opinion that heresy in England was desperate, and that few or no men of judgment did think in their consciences that doctrine to be true and defensible that was com- monly taught and practised, the absurdities thereof being so many and manifest as they were ; but that some of policy, some for present government, others for ease, others for gain, honour, and preferment, and all commonly for some temporal interest or other, did stretch out a hand to hold it up for a time by force and violence. Which opinion also of his he declareth in divers parts of his little golden book of Ten Reasons, and namely, in the conclusion to the scholars of the Universities."
This title had been adopted by Campion because
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the controversy excited by his Challenge, made it necessary to readjust the plan of his book, and to devote it to explaining, in Ten Reasons, why it was that he had so boldly challenged the Protestants to dispute.
After Whit Sunday, May the I5th, he came up to London to superintend its printing. The book was full of learning, and the quotations were verified by Mr. Fitzherbert at the London libraries. In or near London, Campion was the guest of Mr. William Bellamy, who with his wife and family were converts, at Uxenden Hall, Harrow-on-the-Hill ; of Mr. Brideman, in West- minster ; of Mr. Barnes, in Tothill Street ; and of Lady Babington, at Whitefriars. In going to and from Harrow, Campion passed by Tyburn Gate, which faced the present Marble Arch. Here was the great triangular gallows, which had been erected anew for the execution of Dr. Storey, whose blood had consecrated it, and Campion would always walk between its posts uncovered, and with a profound bow, in honour of the martyrs, and because, as he told Persons, it was one day to be the scene of his own conflict.
After many dangers Campion's book was finally printed at the Lady Stonor's Lodge, in Stonor Park, with the title of Decem Rationes — The Ten Reasons. Four hundred copies of it were distributed on or about Tuesday, June the 27th, the next before the feast of SS. Peter and Paul, when the benches of St. Mary's Church, Oxford, were found covered with the new work. It treated of the Holy Scriptures
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and their authority against Protestants, of the nature and authority of the Church, of General Councils, of Church history, of Protestant Paradoxes, especially those of Calvin, such as God being the author of sin, and of minor controverted points. The work was dated Cosmopolis, 1581, and set the University on fire.
This remarkable book, though written under such great difficulties, was admirably adapted to the temperaments and the needs of the men of that day. It acquired a very high reputation, and twenty- nine editions of it have been published in various languages and at various times. Marc Antony Muretus, the humanist, wrote of it as, Libellus aureus, vere digito Dei scriptus. Elizabeth's Council also paid the book a significant compliment by ordering some Anglican clergymen to write an answer to it — an answer which was chiefly notice- able for the unmeasured abuse with which it attacked Campion.
The publication of Father Campion's Ten Reasons forms, as it were, the climax of his missionary career. He already had a presentiment of what was in store for him, and of this he wrote in the following terms, to his Father General, Claudio Aquaviva, in the last letter we possess from his pen, dated the gth of July, 1581.
" Our adversaries were never more monstrously cruel than now ; the cause of Christ never in better condition or more security, for we are pressed with no other arguments than those, whose premisses
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are the rack, starvation, cursing ; this has already broken down the dignity of our enemies, and turned the eyes and ears of the whole realm towards the Catholics. Nothing else was lacking to this cause, than that to our books written with ink should succeed those others, which are daily being pub- lished written in blood."
This was written a fortnight before he was taken.
Seeing the stir that the book had made, Persons, who was now with Campion at Stonor, thought it prudent that they should part, and that Campion should go back to the North. On Tuesday, there- fore, the nth of July, 1581, after the usual mutual confession and renewal of vows, he desired him to proceed to Norfolk, and knowing his easy temper placed him under obedience to Ralph Emerson, his lay-brother companion, who was to judge when and how long Campion should stay at the houses of the Catholic gentry which they passed on their way.
The first night Campion and Ralph slept at the house of Mrs. Yate, the Mote, Lyford. Her husband, a prisoner for the Faith in London, had begged Campion to visit his family, and Persons had granted an exception in his favour for one day. Mrs. Yate had several nuns and two priests, named Ford and Collington, as her guests, who were all delighted to confess to Campion ; and on Wednesday, July the I2th, he continued his journey, as obedience enjoined.
That same day, however, a party of Catholics came over to see the nuns, and they were
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disappointed and mortified to find they had missed Father Campion, and Ford.was only too glad to ride after him to persuade him to return. He over- took him at an inn near Oxford, where a number of the students and masters of the University had assembled to meet him. After much reluctance Brother Ralph finally consented to Campion's returning for the Sunday, while he went on to obtain books of which the Father stood in need.
On Sunday, July the i6th, more than sixty Catholics and Oxford students were assembled for Mass and to hear Campion preach. His sermon was on the Gospel for the day, the Ninth Sunday after Pentecost — the tears of Jesus over Jerusalem — and he showed how England, like the chosen city, was now the slayer of the prophets. The earnest- ness of the preacher, his own personal danger as he spoke, the circumstances under which the}'- were assembled, made the congregation afterwards declare that they had never heard words like his.
But among the congregation there was a traitor, Eliot — Judas Eliot as he was afterwards called — who had contrived to find admission, and departed immediately after service. A watchman who was placed on the tower reported, while the company was at dinner, that the house was surrounded with armed men. A strict search was made, but without result, for the priests were hidden in a secret cavity above the gateway. Irritated at their failure, the searchers abused Eliot, who was without, for bringing them on a fruitless errand. He retorted that they had not known how to find the priests, w n.
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and re-entered the house with them. But again the search was useless, for the priests were a second time stowed away, and Mrs. Yate, who had a bed prepared for her near the priests' hiding- place, obtained permission from the magistrate that his men should not disturb her rest. All seemed safe, yet at midnight, in her anxiety to hear Campion again, she summoned him to her bed- chamber, and he and his auditors escaped only by a hair's breadth from the searchers, who heard the voices and forced the door.
At length day broke and the intruders, Eliot included, were descending the stairs to leave, baffled and crestfallen, when the traitor, looking at the arch under which he stood, cried out, " This has not been tried." The man to whom he spoke and who was in the secret, turned pale, and said that "walls enough had been broken." Eliot marked his confusion, seized an axe, and after a few blows exposed to view the three priests, lying side by side on a narrow bed, their faces and hands raised to heaven. They had confessed their sins one to another, and had received for their penance to say Fiat voluntas tua, with a triple invocation of St. John Baptist, who had previously more than once saved Campion when in similar straits.
After the capture there followed a delay of three days at Lyford, before instructions were received from the Council to bring the prisoners, who included several laymen with the three priests, under strong escort to London. The party halted at Abingdon, where several Oxford scholars came
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to see the famous Campion ; at Henley, where Campion recognized and saluted Persons' servant, whose master was concealed in the neighbourhood ; and at Colebrook, where a number of Catholics and other gentry came to look at Campion, who managed to give such a turn to his conversation with the guard, that the Catholics could understand its secret import. From Colebrook to the Tower the prisoners were treated with great indignity ; they were mounted with their faces to their horses' tails, their elbows pinioned, and their legs tied under the horse's belly. On Campion's hat was a large placard, Campion, the seditions Jesuit. Through all the insults and ridicule Campion's fortitude, cheerfulness, and cour- tesy never failed.
On July the 22nd Campion entered the Tower,, and was thrust by the Lieutenant, Sir Owen Hopton, into the " Little Ease." On the fourth day, July the 25th, he was conveyed secretly to an interview at which he met the Earls of Leicester and Bedford, two Secretaries of State, and also, it is said, the Queen herself. They told him they found no fault with him save that he was a Papist, and Elizabeth asked him if he regarded her as his true Sovereign, to which he replied, as at his trial, strongly in the affirmative. Of this examination there seems to be no official record extant.
When back in the Tower, Hopton, at the instiga- tion no doubt of Elizabeth's Council, endeavoured to effect Campion's apostacy by fair promises. He was tempted with offers of preferment in the Protestant Church, and the possibility of the
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primacy. Then, as these overtures were entirely ineffective, it was resolved to proceed to the torture. Campion was therefore led to the rack-chamber, where he knelt down at the door, made the sign of the Cross, and while he was being bound to the rack, invoked the holy names of Jesus and Mary. The pangs of the racking were as powerless as the bribes to shake the martyr's constancy, yet lying reports that he had revealed the names of Catholics and abjured the Faith were officially published, and obtained some credence even among Catholics.
As to the betrayal of Catholics, the fact was, that the Government already knew the names of many of Campion's hosts. Of this there can be no doubt, as the official lists of them are still extant among Lord Burghley's papers. These gentlemen were now put under arrest, and were told that Campion had betrayed them, a cruel slander, which could hardly fail to damage the martyr's reputation for the time, as he was not aware of it, and could not, even if he had known, have protested that he had never divulged any name except such as the persecutors were already well aware of, or such as could take no harm from his confession. It was not until his last speech from the scaffold that he was able to explain this, and so to dissipate the calumny finally, though in truth his constancy had by then been so well proved, that the defence was no longer necessary.
Campion's enemies, eager to damage his reputa- tion in every way they could, now endeavoured to discredit his learning and to injure the fame which
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he had won by his book, by making him dispute with certain learned Protestants. To these con- ferences he was brought unprepared, and at the moment when he was in the most unfit condition. Wearied in mind, racked and tortured in body, his face pale and worn, without a seat or support, he found himself with Sherwin, Bosgrave, Pound, and other Catholic prisoners, surrounded by a strong guard, placed in the Tower chapel opposite a table at which were seated his opponents, Nowell, Dean of St. Paul's, and Day, Dean of Windsor, with distinguished professors as notaries in atten- dance.
Three more of these conferences were held, as it would seem in the room now called the Council Chamber in the Lieutenant's quarters ; and though Campion was browbeaten, insulted, and threatened, his answers were so calm, clear, and forcible, though most meek, that the discussions, as the heretical Bishop Aylmer said, did no good to the Protestant cause, and they were discontinued. Among the converts made by them was the Venerable Philip Howard, Earl of Arundel, who was at that time following the life of a worldly courtier in Elizabeth's suite.
The result of these conferences on the popular mind is reflected in the following ballads which appeared at their close.
A Jesuit, a Jebusite ? wherefore I pray ? Because he doth teach you the only right way ? He professeth the same by learning to prove And shall we from learning to rack him remove ?
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His reasons were ready, his grounds were most sure, The enemy cannot his force long endure. Campion in camping on spiritual field, In God's cause his life is ready to yield.
Our preachers have preached in pastime and pleasure, And now they be hated for passing all measure. Their wives and their wealth have made them so mute, They cannot, nor dare not with Campion dispute.
Let reason rule and racking cease,
Or else for ever hold your peace.
You cannot withstand God's power and His grace,
No, not with the Tower and the racking-place.
All attempts to disparage Campion's learning and religious steadfastness having failed, the only course left was to expose him as a traitor to the scorn of his countrymen. Being asked what he thought of certain passages held to be treasonable in the works of Sander, Allen, and Bristow, he replied, " That he meddleth neither to nor fro, and will not further answer, but requireth that they may answer." As to the validity of the Bull of excom- munication and deprivation, he said, "The question dependeth upon the fact of Pius Quintus, whereof he is not to judge, and therefore refuseth further to answer."
In these answers the martyr so expressed himself as to satisfy his duty towards the various powers which, though in conflict one with another, could still lay claims to his allegiance. If he had tried to answer so as to satisfy his persecutors, he would have had to use words distinctly derogatory to the
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dignity of . the Pope. But he did not fail in the least in his respect for the Holy See, while his words signified his loyalty to the Queen, and also nobly asserted his individual liberty.
To appreciate this we must remember that he had always avowed his allegiance to Elizabeth as his Queen. We have heard one strong assertion of this, and we shall hear one stronger still, that which he made with his last breath. Another may be quoted here from the tenth of his Ten Reasons, where, after enumerating the great Catholic Kings, Edward the Confessor, Louis of France, Hermene- gild, Henry, Wenceslaus, &c., &c., who had, in the words of Isaias xlix. 23, been " nursing-fathers " to the Church, he continues : " Give ear, O Elizabeth, most potent Queen ! With those monarchs range thyself. To do otherwise would be unworthy of thy progenitors, of thy wit, of thy learning, of the eulogies passed upon thee, of thy royal fortune. To accomplish this is my only endeavour against thee, and attempt it I will, whatever the event. For the adversaries have already so often threatened me, as though I were the enemy of thy life, with the gibbet. 'All Hail, Holy Cross!' The day shall come, O Queen, the day that shall make it clear as noon-tide which of the two did love thee best — the Company of Jesus or the brood of Luther."
The last touch is thoroughly characteristic of the English Catholics. Not only did they reckon themselves loyal to the Queen, but also that they alone were truly loyal to her. The new religionists,
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they held, would only support her as long as it was their interest to do so.1
Campion's allegiance, therefore, was not in question. They durst not have asked for a pro- fession of it, or they would have injured their prosecution. So he was craftily questioned about the Bull of Excommunication, in order to inveigle him into statements about the limits of Elizabeth's powers of misgovernment. Such statements his bigoted enemies would easily have twisted into an odious offence against the autocratic Queen. Hence the merit of his reticence. In refusing to pledge himself to the formulas proposed by the insidious and deceitful enemies of the Church, he was asserting his liberty in the only way which was possible for him.
On October the 3ist he was for a third time racked in the hopes of extracting some compro-
i Where many authors might be quoted, it will be sufficient to cite Father Persons. In his Reasons why Catholiques refuse to goe to Church, which was published just before Campion's Decein Rationes, he devotes a special section to prove that "The Catholique fay the teachethe obedience more then other religions." He further testifies that the English Catholics were grievously maligned in being called disloyal, "In all which great wronges they have no- appeale but unto God and to your Maiestye, as Vicegerent in his place, before whom they desire, above all other thinges to cleare themselves from this greevous objected crime of disloyalty, by protesting and calling the omnipotent knowledge of our great God and Saviour to witness, that they are deeply slaundered in this poynte, and that they are as readye to spend their goods, landes, livings and lyfe with all other worldly commodities whatsoever, in the service of your Maiestye and their Countrie, as their ancestors have been to your Noble progenitors before this, and as all dutiful subiectes are bound to doe unto their soveraine Princesse and Quene." (Sig. I. vi. vii.)
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mising confession, and the tortures were so cruel, that he thought they meant to kill him in this manner. Of his fortitude, Lord Hunsdon said that one might sooner pluck his heart from his bosom than rack one word out of his mouth that he made conscience of uttering. When asked the next day by his keeper how he felt his hands and feet, he answered : " Not ill, because not at all." These barbarous cruelties produced a reaction in the public mind ; indeed, they raised an outcry all through Europe.
The short-sighted Government had resolved that Campion must be silenced at any cost, and death seemed now the only sure means to attain their end. On Tuesday, November the I4th, at Westminster Hall, with Sherwin, Kirby, Bosgrave, Cottam, Johnson, Orton, and Rishton, he was indicted on an absolutely false charge, of having entered England for the purpose of raising a rebellion, said to have been planned by them with Allen and others at Rheims and Rome.
On hearing the indictment, Campion said : " I protest, before God and His holy Angels, before heaven and earth, before the world and this bar, whereat I stand, which is but a small resemblance of the terrible judgment of the next life, that I am not guilty of any part of the treason contained in the indictment, or of any other treason whatever." Then while the jury was being empanelled for the next Thursday, he lifted up his voice, and added : " Is it possible to find twelve men so wicked and void of all conscience, in this city or land, that will
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find us guilty together of this one crime, divers of us never meeting or knowing one the other before our bringing to this bar ? "
The prisoners were now commanded to hold up their hands and plead Guilty or Not Guilty. But both Campion's arms were so maimed by the racking that he could not raise them, on which one of his companions took his hand out of the furred cuff in which it was, and, kissing it, held it up as high as was possible. Finally, they were taken back to their respective prisons.
On November the i6th the prisoners were brought up for their trial. The foreman of the jury, William Lee, was an informer and a fanatic ; the remainder were men of little note, and only too ready to do his bidding. The presiding judge, Chief Justice Wray, contrived, suggests Lord Campbell, under a show of impartiality, to obtain what convictions he desired. Anderson, the Queen's Counsel, opened the case against the prisoners by accusing them with much vehement extravagance of gesture and language, of conspiracy and sedition, and of being connected with Storey and Felton. Campion replied that they were there, not to be tried by " the descant and flourishes of affected speeches," but by sufficient evidence and substantial witness. As to the sequel, that they were traitors because Catholics and guests of the Pope, it in no wise followed. " If a sheep were stolen, and a whole family called in question for the same, were it good manner of proceeding for the accusers to say, 'Your great-grandfathers and fathers and
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sisters and kinsfolk all loved mutton. Ergo, You have stolen the sheep.' "
He showed that there was no evidence against them of conspiracy, that their oaths, whether of those who were secular priests, or his own as a Jesuit, were of a purely religious character. That they had received money from the Pope merely for their support as missioners ; that in Rome, as elsewhere, he had never denied that Elizabeth was his lawful Sovereign.
In answer to Popham, the Attorney-General, he justified his various disguises and escapes by the example of St. Paul. Finally, when Eliot deposed that he had persuaded his audience to obedience to the Pope, Campion made him confess that the Pope's name had never been mentioned in his sermon ; and showed that the great day of which he had spoken, and which Eliot swore meant the day fixed for the rebellion, was no other than the Day of Judgment.
He also defended the other prisoners and cross- examined their opposing witnesses ; and at the end, on behalf of all at the bar, made an appeal to the jury. The whole discourse against them that day, he said, consisted — first, in presumptions and pro- babilities ; secondly, in matters of religion ; thirdly, in oaths and testimonies of witnesses. He proved that the two first in no way substantiated the charge of treason ; and as to the two chief witnesses, asked what credence could be put in them ; " the one (Eliot) a confessed murderer ; the other (Munday), a well-known and detestable atheist — a
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profane heathen — a destroyer of two men already." The jury now retired for their verdict. During their absence Judge Ayloff, who was on the bench, pulling off his glove, " found his hand and seal of arms bloody, without any token of wrong, pricking or hurt," and the blood returned whenever he wiped it away. This fact was witnessed by Catholics and counted by them as a miracle. The pleadings had occupied about three hours, and after the lapse of another hour, during which a glass of beer was brought to Campion by some one in court, the jury returned with a verdict of Guilty against all the prisoners.
When asked by the Chief Justice why sentence of death should not be passed, Campion replied :
" It was not our death that ever we feared. But we knew that we were not lords of our lives, and therefore for want of answer would not be guilty of our own deaths. The only thing we have now to say is that if our religion do make us traitors, we are worthy to be condemned ; but otherwise are and have been as true subjects as ever the Queen had. In condemning us you condemn all your own ancestors — all the ancient bishops, priests, and kings, — all that was once the glory of England, the island of saints, and the most devoted child of the See of Peter. For what have we taught, however you may qualify it with the odious name of treason, that they did not uniformly teach ? To be con- demned with these old lights — not of England only, but of the world — by their degenerate descendants
BLESSED EDMUND CAMPION 349
is both gladness and glory to us. God lives ; posterity will live ; their judgment is not so liable to corruption as that of those who now sentence us to death."
Campion's defence during the whole day had been clear, pointed, calm, and dignified, but in this last speech, delivered with a noble mien, he surpassed himself, and his fellow-prisoners forgot their fate in the holy enthusiasm his words pro- duced. After the sentence was pronounced in the usual form, Campion broke out into the Te Deum, and all the martyrs were taken back to their prison, their hearts filled with great joy.
Of the trial Hallam says the prosecution was as unfairly conducted, and supported by as slender evidence as any perhaps that can be found in our books. Both judges and jury were in fact bought and predetermined for "the verdict the most unjust," says the old writer quoted by Challoner, " that ever I think was given up in this land, whereat already (1582) not only England but all the Christian world doth wonder, and which their posterity shall lament and be ashamed of."
The public opinion was manifested in a ballad :
They packed a jury that cried guilty straight, You bloody jury, Lee and all th' eleven, Take heed your verdict which was given in haste Do not exclude you from the joys of heaven.
On his return to prison attempts were again made to persuade Campion to apostatize ; this time by his own sister, who brought him an offer from
350 BLESSED EDMUND CAMPION
Hopton of a benefice of £100 a year. He was also visited by Eliot, who professed repentance for having encompassed his death, and declared himself in great fear for his life from Catholics. Campion freely forgave him all his malice and perjury, besought him to do penance, and while assuring him of his safety as regarded his life with Catholics, promised him a letter to a Catholic Duke in Germany with whom he might live in perfect security. This interview had such an effect on Delahays, Campion's keeper, that he afterwards became a Catholic.
After this, the Duke of Anjou, then in England as a suitor for the hand of Elizabeth, was asked to intercede for him, and promised to do so. His confessor, an Abbe, undertook to see that the Duke gave effect to his promises. He found him about to begin a game of tennis. On hearing the message and that the petitioners were without, the Duke stood hesitating, like a man just awakened from a deep sleep, stroking his face with his left hand. After a while he raised his right hand, which held the racket, and said " Play ! " This was all the answer the petitioners could get from him.
In the splash and mud of a rainy morning in December, Campion was led forth from the Tower in the same gown of Irish frieze he had worn at his trial. Undaunted he saluted the vast crowd, saying, " God save you all, gentlemen ! God bless you and make you all good Catholics." He then knelt and prayed with his face towards the east, concluding with the words, In mamis tuas, Domine, commendo
BLESSED EDMUND CAMPION 351
spiritum meum. Then he was strapped on the hurdle, Shervvin and Briant being together bound on a second hurdle. They were dragged at the horses' tails through the gutters and filth, followed by an insulting crowd of ministers and rabble. Still a few Catholics managed to exchange a word with him on spiritual matters, to their great consolation. One gentleman, like Veronica in another Via Dolorosa, most courteously wiped his face, all spattered with mire and dirt, "for which charity," says the priest who saw the deed, " may God reward and bless him ! " Passing under the arch of Newgate, whereon there still stood an image of our Lady, Campion raised himself and saluted the Queen of Heaven, whom he hoped to see so soon. The martyrs had a smile on their faces, and as they drew near Tyburn the people cried out, " But they laugh ; they do not care for death ! "
At the gallows Campion was the first ordered to put his head into the halter, which he did with all obedience ; then when the noise was somewhat stilled he began with a grave countenance and sweet firm voice, Spectaculum facti sumus Deo, angelis et hominibus. But he was interrupted by Sir Francis Knollys and the sheriffs, who urged him to confess his treason. Again and again he maintained his innocence, while divers charges of sedition were again preferred against him. Pressed anew to declare his opinion on the Bull of St. Pius, and urged to renounce the Pope, he replied that he was a Catholic and would not discuss the Bull. Then he prayed, " Christ have mercy on me," or such-
352 BLESSED EDMUND CAMPION
like prayer, and was once more interrupted by a minister offering to pray with him, to whom he humbly said, " You and I are not one in religion, wherefore I pray you content yourself. I bar none of prayer, but I only desire them of the household of faith to pray with me, and in mine agony to say one Creed " — to signify that he died for the confession of the Catholic and Apostolic Faith.
Then he again turned to his prayers, and some called out that he should pray in English and not in a foreign tongue, but he pleasantly answered, " That he would pray God in a language that they both well understood." Being told to ask the Queen's forgiveness and to pray for her, he protested his innocence saying, " This is my last speech, in this give me credit. I have and do pray for her." To Lord Charles Howard, who asked if by Queen he meant Elizabeth, Campion replied, " Yea, for Elizabeth your Queen and my Queen, unto whom I wish a long reign with all prosperity." While these words were being spoken the cart was drawn away and the blessed martyr, among the tears and groans of the vast multitude, went to his reward. At the bidding of someone in authority his body was not cut down till after death.
The greatest precautions were taken to prevent Catholics securing relics. A young man who dropped his handkerchief into the blood on the ground was taken and committed. Another contrived to possess himself of a finger, and later on one of the arms was taken from the gate where it was nailed. Father Persons managed to buy the
BLESSED EDMUND CAMPION 353
rope in which his martyred friend was bound or hanged, and died with it round his neck.
Among the miracles wrought by his relics are those on Mr. Anderton, of Lancashire, twice cured by them, and once when laid out as dead. His picture was hung over altars, his name was assumed by religious in their novitiate, and his intercession was implored even in Bohemia. In his cell at Prague an altar with his picture was erected, and the pavement was kissed on which his feet had stood. His confessors there, Father Anthony Francis and Father Paul Campanus, publicly testified to his sanctity and purity of conscience.
As to the fruits of Campion's death we have the estimate of Father Henry Walpole, that ten thousand persons were converted through it. That a great number of conversions followed is abundantly proved, among others, those of the daughters of Walsingham and Hopton. "Although," says a contemporary writer, " we lost the chief pearl of Christendom, yet it is well, for all men are of opinion that the offences and negligences of our predecessors and forefathers were so great, and our own sins so many, as they must needs be re- deemed by the blood of the martyrs."
H. S. B. J. H. P.
ii.
354 BLESSED EDMUND CAMPION
AUTHORITIES. — The death of Campion called forth several scores of pamphlets, both Catholic and Protestant, a full account of which will be found in Mr. Simpson's work, which will be mentioned immediately. They are all short, and confine themselves chiefly to the martyrdom. Father Persons' Of the Life and Martyrdom of Edmund Campion (written in 1594) is a work of very great value, and enters into many details. Though never finished, it gives us by far the most vivid and complete portrait of the martyr that we possess. It survives in a transcript made by Father Christopher Grene, now among the Stonyhurst Manuscripts, Collectanea P. vol. i. and was privately printed by Brother Foley, in the Letters and Notices (Manresa Press), 1867, 1868, p. 278, &c.
The reason why Father Persons did not complete his work was because another biographer, who was exceedingly well-fitted to attract the attention of that age, undertook to bring out the Life. This was Padre Paolo Bombino, a latinist of note in an age when Ciceronian Latin was the most esteemed and popular of languages among scholars. His Vita et Martyrium Edmnndi Campiani Martyris Angli, was first published at Antwerp, in 1618, and subsequently reprinted at Mantua and elsewhere. Bombino's life is written with extreme care and diligence, and is the fullest of all the biographies ; but the excessive attention to style robs the Life of much of its naturalness and vigour. In the Archives of the Society of Jesus there is a copy of Bombino's work, in which there are many additions by the author, which have not yet been published. It is to be regretted that this work has never appeared in an English dress.
Mr. Richard Simpson's Edmund Campion : A Biography, Edinburgh 1867, London 1889, is an historical work of great importance. Its author, however, a convert from Pro- testantism, drifted during his later years into an extreme aversion to the temporal rights of the Holy See (see the notice of him in the Dictionary of National Biography), and in writing this volume his bias has carried him into many mistakes and some grave errors. Though the defect is in a certain way a fortunate one, in so far as it is likely to disarm
BLESSED EDMUND CAMPION
355
the prejudices of Protestant readers, it of course prevents the biography from being adequate or even entirely just to the martyr, though its scholarship and sympathy (except on the point above mentioned) give it true and permanent value.
Mr. Simpson had access to all the papers relating to Campion, both in public and private archives (including those of the Society of Jesus) so far as they were then known. Notice of some additional papers, which have come to light since his time, and further researches into particular episodes, will be found in the following articles in The Month, by the late Father John Morris, S.J. :
Blessed Edmund Campion at Douay, 1887, vol. 61, p. 330. Blessed Edmund Campion and Companions, Martyrs, 1887 vol. 61, p. 457, &c.
Blessed Edmund Campion and his " Ten Reasons,1' 1889 (July), vol. 66, p. 372, &c.
A new Witness about Blessed Edmund Campion, 1893 (August), vol. 77, p. 457, &c.
Also in the following article, by Father J. H. Pollen, S.J. : Blessed Edmund Campion's Journey to England, 1897 (Sept.), vol. 90, p. 243, &c.
Blessed Edmund Campion's History of Ireland was published, but with some alterations, by Holinshed in 1587, and again by Sir James Ware, in his History of Ireland, in 1633. In Holinshed it was read by Shakespeare, who borrowed from it frequently while writing his character of Wolsey. (Henry VIII. act iv, sc. 2) : On the character and limitations of the History, see Father Edmund Hogan, S.J., Blessed Edmund Campion's History of Ireland and its Critics, in the Irish Ecclesiastical Record, ser. 3, vol. 12, 1891, pp. 629, 725. There is a manuscript copy of the work at the Heralds' College.
On the publication of the Decem Rationes at the Stonor Park Press, see an article by W. H. Allnutt, Bibliographies, vol. ii. pp. 161 — 165, and The Month for January, 1905.
Campion's Opuscula (which consist of a few sermons, verses, and letters, besides the Ten Reasons) have been published six or seven times ; the last and most complete edition being that at Barcelona in 1888. See also the Biblio-
356 BLESSED EDMUND CAMPION
theque de la Compagnie de Jesus, Edit, de Backer, i. 1025 — 1031 ; Edit. Sommervogel, ii. 586 — 597.
RELICS. — i. Bone. Portion of a phalanx-bone. Whether this came from the hand or the foot, cannot perhaps be ascertained with certainty from the bone itself in its present •condition. But all things considered, there can be little doubt that it is part of the "thumb," the rescue of which was recorded by Serrano, the Spanish Ambassador's secretary, three days after the martyrdom (Morris, New Witness, referred to above), and with which the " finger," mentioned on p. 352, is also presumably to be identified. It is preserved in Rome, but a considerable portion has been detached, and presented to the English Jesuit Novitiate at Roehampton.
2. Shirt in which he suffered. One fragment (a) is preserved at Stonyhurst College (Reliquary I.), two others (b, c) by the Jesuit Fathers in London (Reliquary I. no. 7 ; III. no. 3); Relic (a) is inscribed, in a sixteenth century hand, "ex indusio P. Campiani," (b) "of the shirt of Father Edmond Campian in which he suffered," (c) " B. P. Campion M. Soc. lesu." The two latter inscriptions in a late sixteenth or early seven- teenth century hand. Relics (a) and (c) are apparently of the same material, coarse linen, (b) is fine linen.
3. The cord by which he was hanged or bound. A thin rope, about twelve feet long, a good deal worn and frayed. Stonyhurst, Reliquary I, Inscription "Vincula B. Edm. Campiani," sixteenth century hand. Father Persons always carried this relic about with him, and died with it round his neck. (Simpson's Campion, p. 330.)
4. Hat No. i. This relic and the following arose from the custom, common in the sixteenth century, of men exchanging hats in memory one of the other. When Campion entered the Society of Jesus, he was received by St. Francis Borgia ; he was in fact the first new member whom the then recently-elected General admitted. As a sign of esteem the Saint gave the future martyr his hat, and Campion took it with him to Prague, and there it is still preserved.
5. Hat No. 2. When Fathers Persons and Campion parted for the last time, they exchanged hats. Campion was arrested soon after, and whilst he was being carried to London. a placard, CAMPION, THE SEDITIOUS JESUIT, was stuck into
BLESSED EDMUND CAMPION 357-
this hat. A few weeks later in the Tower his fellow- captive Stephen Brinkley, — who had been Campion's com- panion at Stonor, and who was then almost the only person able to communicate with him by messenger, — begged this hat from him. In due time Brinkley was exiled, and carried his relic with him to Flanders, where on the 3rd of August, 1585, he enclosed it in a reliquary, with a Latin inscription, of which the above description is a summary, and which may be read in Father Morris's article on Campion's Ten Reasons, mentioned above. Part of this relic, with a copy of the inscription, was found at Antwerp in 1877, and half of this portion is now at the Jesuit Novitiate, Roehampton.
6. Rosary Ring. A rather large thick ring of white metal or German silver ; ten small knobs on short stems, the bezel is inscribed IHS. sixteenth century. Its history, as at present recorded, does not extend beyond the middle of the nineteenth century, when it belonged to the Rev. R. Vandepitte, who gave it to the nuns of St. Mary's Convent, York, and they to the late Father J. Morris, S.J., who deposited it with the Jesuit Fathers at London.
PORTRAIT. — Though a good many ancient pictures of Blessed Edmund exist, it is not known that any can claim to be a portrait, except that painted immediately after his death for the Gesu in Rome, and under the eyes of those who knew the martyr personally. The painting still exists in Rome, but has unfortunately been very extensively re- coloured. A copy, made from the picture in its original state by Mr. Charles Weld, is at Stony hurst, and photographs of this have been published.
X. THE BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN,
SECULAR PRIEST. Tyburn, i December, 1581.
WE are not surprised to find that attachment to the Catholic Faith long kept its hold upon English seats of learning. Thus Strype says the Inns of Court were " disaffected " in 1569. Mass was privately said at the Temple, and when a number of suspected benchers were examined by the Ecclesiastical Com- missioners about "coming to service," they parried the question by saying " they came to the Temple Church upon Sundays and holidays, meaning no more than that they came and walked about the roundel there." l All through Elizabeth's reign the Universities continued to feed the Seminaries abroad. A paper in the Record Office of 1580, or thereabouts, reports that " Balioll Colledg hathe not bin free from the suspicion of papistrie this longe time.": But one of the strongest instances is Exeter College, Oxford, where, Strype declares, in 1578, " of eighty, were found but four obedient subjects ; all the rest secret or open Roman affec-
1 Strype, Annals, vol. ii. c. Iv. n. 607. 2 Knox, Douay Diaries, Appendix, p. 363.
BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN 359
tionaries, and particularly one Savage, a most earnest defender of the Pope's Bull and excommuni- cation." 1 Some few of these may have been crypto- Catholics, but no doubt the greater number were men brought up in the new religion, but by sympathy and reason drawn to the Church of all ages. Of this class, a little earlier in the decade, was a distinguished fellow of the College, Ralph Sherwin. He was a native of Derbyshire, his home being at a place called Rodesley, near Longford. He was nominated to a fellowship in 1568, by Sir William Petre.2 Anthony a Wood speaks highly of his attainments. " In 1574," he says, " proceeding in arts, he was made senior of the act or public dispu- tation, celebrated July the 26th, the same year; being then accounted an acute philosopher, and an excellent Grecian and Hebrician."3 On this occasion the Earl of Leicester and a brilliant audience were present, and his reputation was greatly enhanced. God's grace, however, would not allow him to follow the career of prosperity which might have been his. The next year he gave
1 Strype, Annals, vol. iv. c. xiii. n. 539.
2 Sir William Petre founded eight fellowships in Exeter College, of which he reserved the patronage to himself, and, it would appear, to his heirs. (See Wood's Fasti Oxonienses.)
3 Ralph Sherwin, sup. for B.A. 26 Apr. 1571, adm. 22 Nov., det. 1572, M.A. 1574, Fellow of Exeter 1568 — 1575. (Boase, Register of the University of Oxford, vol. i. 282.) In the register of Exeter College, vol. II. ii. 32, in the list of students, A. D. 1572, we find " No. 16, Sherwin, Sir Ralph." (Cf. Wood, Athena, i. 478.) On November 24, 1577, he was still a Fellow of Exeter, though then at Rome. (See R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, cxviii. 37 (i.), where he is called Stephen Sherewin.)
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up everything, embraced the Catholic Faith, and was received into the Douay Seminary. Here he gave two years to theological study and was ordained priest by the Bishop of Cambrai on the 23rd of March, 1577. Of ten who were raised to the priest- hood on this occasion, three afterwards gave their lives for the Faith, the Venerable William Andleby in 1597, Blessed Lawrence Johnson in 1582, and Blessed Ralph Sherwin.
Blessed Ralph did not enter at once on the English Mission. A few months before his ordination, a new Seminary had been begun in the very heart of Catholic life, at Rome. The great success of Douay, and the unmanageable numbers which flocked to it, as well as the difficulty of meeting its expenses, suggested to Dr. Owen Lewis, one of the most distinguished and zealous of the exiles, and through him to Pope Gregory XIII., the idea of establishing another College, in the ancient English hospice for pilgrims in Rome. A few students had been detached from Douay in 1576 to make a begin- ning, and were lodged at first in some houses near St. Peter's, then in houses adjoining the hospital, and finally in the hospital itself, transformed into a college.
After a pilgrimage to the relics of St. John Baptist honoured at Amiens, Blessed Ralph started with two other priests and a deacon for the new establishment at Rome, on the 2nd of August, 1577. He passed nearly three years there, and has always been an object of special veneration within its walls, as the first of its members to suffer martyrdom.
BLESSED RALPH S HER WIN 361
The new Seminary had been founded but a few months when very serious dissensions broke out, which though healed for a time were revived again later, and indeed sowed the first seeds of the lamentable discord between the seculars and regulars which so long added to the afflictions of the suffering Church in England. Dr. Maurice Clenock, the first Rector, was not a happy appointment ; rivalries and jealousies between the students of Welsh and English nationality were fostered by his real or supposed partiality for his countrymen, and, worst of all, the division amongst the students soon involved the Society of Jesus. Two Fathers had from the first been associated in the manage- ment of the College, one as Prefect of Studies, the other as Minister ; they appear to have fallen under the suspicions of Clenock as fomenting the discontent against his government with a view to obtaining the entire direction for their own Society. At all events, the English party not only clamoured to have their Rector removed, but also to have the College entrusted to the government of the Society. This is not the place to enter further into the question. It is only thus far touched upon because Blessed Ralph took a decided and leading part in petitioning for the Fathers. He was one of four who urged the suit at the feet of the Pope himself, and again and again pleaded with the Cardinal Protector. On one occasion, when all the students were required to give the Cardinal their opinions in writing, Sherwin wrote,
" I, Ralph Sherwin, call to witness God the reader
362 BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN
of all hearts, that I, solely for the increase of his honour and the benefit of my country, think and humbly beg that the government of this Seminary should be committed to the Fathers of the Society. " Your Eminence's most humble son, " RALPH SHERWIN, Priest." l
But all their petitions having been rejected, our martyr, together with thirty-two others, actually accepted the alternative of leaving the Seminary rather than acquiesce in the existing state of things. At the last moment, however, when they went to obtain the Pope's blessing before leaving Rome, their wishes were complied with, and from this time the College was placed under the government of the Fathers, and so remained until the suppression of the Society. There seems no doubt that the move- ment of which Blessed Ralph was the leader was inspired by a generous desire for the best training in ecclesiastical perfection, and its object had the warm sympathy of Allen. 2
The Register of the Alumni begins from the time of the Society's government. The first entry is that of the Blessed Ralph. It is as follows :
+ JESUS, MARIA.
The names of the A lumni.
On April the 23rd, in the year of the Lord 1579, it was demanded, in the presence of the most
1 Quoted by Father Persons, Story of Domestical Difficulties, p. 67. Stonyhurst MSS.
a See Dodd, vol. ii. pp. 225, seq. and the Historical Introduction to Letters and Memorials of Cardinal Allen, p. Iviii.
BLESSED RALPH S HER W IN 363
Reverend Dom Spetiano of Milan, holding the place of the most illustrious Cardinal Moroni, and the Reverend Fathers Cola, Provincial, and Robert Bellarmine, of the Society of Jesus, from all the underwritten scholars, whether they were prepared to lead an ecclesiastical life, and to proceed to England whensoever it should seem good to Superiors, and they replied as follows :
1579-
i. Father Ralph Sherwin, English, a priest, aged 29, a student of sacred theology, declares and swears upon the Holy Scriptures that he is ready to-day rather than to-morrow, at the intimation of Superiors, to proceed to England for the help of souls. (In the margin by a later hand.} He was sent and became a martyr.
The Annals of the English College says of the holy priest, " It were hardly possible to tell the ardour wherewith Sherwin yearned to fly to the help of his wretched country. While here in Rome the news of the inflictions and tortures which his Catholic fellow-countrymen were made to suffer, far from daunting, fired him with more intense longing. His disposition, talents, and virtue would have enabled him to have been of no slight use to his country had he not been seized soon after landing."1
To this encomium may be added his great love of holy obedience,'2 which would not improbably have led him into a religious order, if it had
1 Foley, Records S.J. vol. vi. p. 78. 2 Cf. Simpson's Life of Campion, p. 183.
364 BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN
not been for his still greater desire to sacrifice himself in the work of the English Mission.
With the year 1580 the time drew near for the satisfaction of his holy longings.
In the latter part of 1579, Allen's influence had succeeded in determining the Society of Jesus to take a part in the glorious labours and perils of the missionary priests in England. About the same time he made pressing representations to Pope Gregory XIII. of the urgent need of Bishops in England. The great increase in the numbers of the clergy continually brought home the necessity of some ecclesiastical government on the spot, and there was also a crying want of someone to administer the Sacrament of Confirmation, which the English had always regarded with special devotion, and which was exceptionally necessary in the fiery persecution then raging. The Venerable Thomas Goldwell, Bishop of St. Asaph, in spite of age and infirmities, volunteered for this service of toil and danger ; and after much hesitation, on account of the exceptional risks he would run, the Pope consented to his departure. In the spring of 1580 the Bishop's party and the first Jesuit missionaries set out together from Rome. The Bishop was accompanied by Dr. Nicholas Morton, Prebendary of York, and now Penitentiary of St. Peter's, and four old priests from the English Hospital at Rome — Dr. Brumberg, William Giblet, Thomas Crane, and William Kemp — and the party was to be joined later by Laurence Vaux, the deprived Warden of Manchester, now at Louvain,
BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN 365
who afterwards died in prison for the Faith. The Jesuits were Blessed Edmund Campion and Father Persons, with Brother Ralph Emerson.
With this noble company of missionaries three of the young seminarist priests were chosen to set out for England, and one of these was Blessed Ralph Sherwin. The others were Blessed Luke Kirby and Edward Rishton, and they took with them two young laymen, John Paschal, Blessed Ralph's pupil and special charge, and Thomas Bruscoe or Briscoe. At this time St. Philip was still living at San Girolamo della Carita, just opposite the English College, and there can be little doubt that the departing missionaries, according to the custom observed as long as the Saint lived, went to get the old man's blessing before they started.1 They all set out on April the i8th, and were accom- panied by a distinguished company of friends as far as the Ponte Molle, where there was an affectionate leave-taking.
In this part of the journey, at all events, Blessed Ralph, with the religious and seminarists, went on foot. At Bologna, where they were delayed some days, they received hospitality from Cardinal Paleotto, the Archbishop, and Blessed Ralph, as well as Campion, was encouraged to speak on some religious topic at dinner. At Milan, again, they were received by St. Charles as his own guests during eight days, and Blessed Ralph preached before him.
1 They were not the first missionaries from the English College. The Rev. John Askew had been sent as early as May, 1579, and four others on November 4 of the same year.
366 BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN
Though the story of this journey properly belongs to the life of Blessed Edmund Campion, the follow- ing letter of Blessed Ralph, describing to one of his friends at Rome their adventures at Geneva, naturally finds a place here.1
" My loving and old acquainted friend, Mr. Bickley,
" Many just causes might have moved me ere this to have saluted you by letters, but, in truth, greater necessities have compelled me to the contrary. I trust nothing can bring you into sinister opinion of me, such is the propension of your sweet nature. But to let all these terms, more officious than needful, pass, you know by letters, I hope, of all contingents that have happened to us between Rome and Turin. Now the rest of our journey briefly I shall impart unto you.
" We entered the Alps all in health, and apt for travel and passed them making great journeys to St. John Maurien, where we encountered with many troops of the Spanish soldiers, and by that means were somewhat distressed for necessary provision for man and horse. Thence we passed to Aquabella (Aiguebelle), where we met with another rout of the army ; and here we understood, if we passed Lyons way, we should sustain much difficulty beside peril of the Dolphinates,2 where the
1 This letter was published (presumably by Dr. G. Oliver) in vol. i. of the Catholic Spectator, in 1824, and again with old spelling, and corrected readings by Father Pollen, Journey of Blessed E. Campion (reprint), p. 25.
2 The insurgent peasants of Dauphine.
BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN 367
rustics are in arms against the nobility. At Aquabella therefore we entered into deliberation how to avoid these inconveniences, and found no means but only by Geneva, and resolved all upon that ; which merrily we jested at and with great ease overcame. But before we arrived near this sink of heresy every man disguised himself, and Mr. Campion dissembled his personage in form of a poor Irishman, and waited on Mr. Paschal ; which sight, if you had seen how naturally he played his part, the remembrance of it would have made you merry.
" Well, thus disfigured we represented ourselves to the gates of Geneva, and there by the soldiers were demanded from whence we were and whither we went. After answer was made, a captain com- manded one of his soldiers to guide and conduct us to the magistrate, whom we found in the open market-place, and forthwith were demanded the place from whence and whither we travelled ; which by us related he demanded the cause why we passed not the ordinary way. It was answered to avoid the Spaniards and Dolphinates who were up in arms. Then he asked what countrymen we were, and it was answered some English, some brought up in Ireland, and here Mr. Campion was called Patrick. After this he inquired whether we were of their religion, and Mr. Paschal answered, No ; and one other of our company boldly told that from the first to the last we were all Catholics. Then he replied saying, ' The Queen and all England is of our religion.' 'No,' saith one, 'there be many
368 BLESSED RALPH S HER WIN
good Christian Catholics,' though many also as he had said. After this he commanded a soldier to guide us to our inn, and gave charge that we should be well used. All this while, above in chambers looking out, we saw the long-bearded ministers of Geneva who laughed at us ; but if we might have had our wills we would have made them to have wept Irish. Passing through the streets of the city, some said, ' These are priests;' others, 'They are all religious men;' and one would needs be doing with Mr. Campion, because he went like a poor Irish serving -man, and in Latin asked him, Cujus es? which he well perceiving answered, Senior, no ; and the fellow therewith amazed, said, Potesne loqui latine ? and Mr. Campion gave a shrink with his shoulder, and so shaked off the knave. Well, our inn being taken, forthwith Father Persons and Mr. Paschal with Mr. Patrick his man and myself went out to talk with Beza, whom we found in his house, and there saluted him, showing that passing that way we thought good to see him, for that he was a man talked of in the world ; and after such speech Father Persons asked how their Church was governed ; who said, by equality in the ministry ; and that they were nine, and every one ruled his week. Then it was said that we had Bishops in England, and how that the Queen was the continual head. He answered shamefully that he knew not that : but after that assertion, though much declining, insinuated that he liked that not ; yet being urged said, as they commonly shift, that they differed in discipline not in doctrine.
BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN 369
All this while Mr. Campion stood waiting with hat in his hand, facing out the old doting heretical fool. After this he told some false bad news, and then came strangers with letters and so we were enforced to leave this reprobate apostate, and returned to our inn, where we found Mr. Powell, a familiar acquaint- ance both of Mr. Persons and mine, and three or four Irishmen more, with whom we had much familiar speech and invited them to supper. But they refused, promising to repair to us after we had supped ; who did so, and Mr. Persons took Powell in hand, and other of us took one Mr. Browne, tutor unto young Hastings who shall be heir to the Earl of Huntingdon, a notable Puritan and Master of Arts of Oxford. With these we disputed in the streets of Geneva almost until midnight, and challenged, by them, Beza and his fellow -ministers to dispute in all controversies, with this condition, that he that was justly convicted should be burnt in the place: which Mr. Browne promised, but God knoweth durst not perform, nor show himself to us any more. At length we went to bed, and in the morning Powell came to us again (he was of Corpus Christi College in Oxford) and broke his fast with us, and used us lovingly and brought us out of the town on our journey. All this while Mr. Campion played the serving-man ; and because he would not be known to Mr. Powell, he walked before, out of the gate of Geneva, alone ; and there by chance met with one of the nine ministers of Geneva, and by-and-by buckled with him in questions about their Church until he had almost made the fellow mad : for when
Y II.
370 BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN
we came in sight Mr. Campion went his way and left the heretic; and when we came to him, he seemed to be in desperation and told us that there was a fellow held a strange opinion and had mocked him about his Church. Then all our company fell upon him, and shook up the poor shackerel1 before the soldiers just by the gate ; until Mr. Powell desired us to leave, lest some harm might grow to us of it. And then Mr. Powell knew Mr. Campion, and he took him and catechised him. Who said to us, ' Why would you not stay and dispute with Beza ? ' And then Father Campion told him, if he would assure us security, that we would return and deal with all the rabble of their ministers. But indeed he could not ; and so, leaving him well-minded to read Catholic books and to visit you in Rome, we bade him farewell and so passed on our journey stoutly until the Monday after Whit Sunday, when eight of our company fell sick in one night ; and so made small journeys, and all, save Mr. Kemp, arrived in Rheims in health, the last day of May. And on this 4 of June, six of our company and of others here parted towards England, and the rest all ready to dispose themselves that way in speed. " Forget us not in your prayers. We are members of one body, now ready to fall into the hands of the tyrant. We find all things in this College poor, but all men religious and zealous. You must labour lest you come behind them. The 5th of June, Father Campion made a zealous
1 A shackle, "a feeble, diminutive, half-distorted person." (Jamieson, Scottish Dictionary.)
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and excellent sermon to the great consolation of all this company : and the 6th day Father Persons with four others departed directly towards Calais. Mr. Paschal and I were appointed to assist my Lord Bishop, and accompany him into England. But he suddenly fell into an ague,1 and we, with Dr. Brombrecke, on the loth of June, are travelling to our country with all speed. Mr. Kirby cometh shortly after with other priests of the Seminary, from whence twenty-two are gone since Easter. Tell Mr. Gratley and Mr. Harrison and Mr. Tirrell and Mr. Brucket, that I forgot them not to Mr. President, who is glad to hear of their zeal, but would have them come better moneyed than we were. Let all them use that place virtuously and fruitfully while they are there ; for I find and well know it is hard to come in the like. Tell my loving and dear friend Mr. Hart, your chamber-fellow, that Mr. Bridgwater was come to the Spa, which we were sorry for. His things were left with Dr. Allen. Tell him that if he remember me in his prayers that I shall hardly forget him. Tell Isaac that he hath a brother here at Rheims, unto whom I delivered his beads. He had need to go forward well in virtue, or else this will over-reach him. Remember my commendations
i The age and infirmities of the good Bishop made it plain that he was unequal to the mission he had undertaken, the growing heat of the persecution in England moreover, and the knowledge that special measures had been taken to seize him on his first arrival, at length broke down his resolution. He returned to Rome with the Pope's approval, and died there in 1585. (See Queen Elizabeth and the Catholic Hierarchy, by Fathers Bridgett and Knox, p. 240.)
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to all your chamber and your whole house ; no less to any than to my inseparable friend Mr. Harrison, whom I shall much look for. It behoveth all my fellows and yours there of Exeter College, to labour much, and well to employ their talents, for I hear that College wholly to be corrupted. I commend me to you all whose company, to my consolation, I hope at the least in Heaven to enjoy. Your prayers I require. Of mine, albeit of small value, account yourself sure. Let Mr. Barrett and Mr. Middlemore understand that I remember well what I promised them and will, by God's grace, perform the same. Mr. Lyster's business with his friends and Mr. Hollowell's and all others commended to my diligence, I shall retain in mind. I pray God they forget me not in their prayers, which in truth I cannot distrust. I pray commend me to William and Gilbert Gifforde, whom God increase in virtue and learning to the great commodity of our country, which hath great need of such wits well trained up in Catholic schools.
" Well, my loving friend Ralph, even while I wrote these letters, came in Mr. Paschal with the frip to frenchify me. Oh, miserable time when a priest must counterfeit a cutter : God give us still priests' minds, for we go far astray from the habit here. Mr. Paschal crieth, ' You will never be handsome,' and I tell him there was never priest handsome in this attire. Thus, for Christ, we put out ourselves in colours ... all which imperfec- tions I hope He hath washed away with His Blood. My loving Ralph, I request thee once in
BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN 373
thy greatest fervour to say over thy beads for me, and procure as many of my friends as you can to do the same there, and let your petition be this, that in humility and constancy with perseverance to the end, I may honour God in this vocation, where- unto though unworthy I am called. And if God will use me, by your intercession, for an instrument of His glory, I shall offer all unto Him in your behalf, that so pray for me.
" If you write to me as you may by Rheims, you shall have answer from me out of England. Forget me not, for I still remember you. I find Mr. Licentiate (you know whom I mean, Mr. Covert) not inferior to my opinion which I had conceived of him. His labour and travail is ready always for our Catholic countrymen. To some of our Roman companions he hath showed much friendship, so that it maketh me marvel to see his charity. To Mr. Paschal and me he hath let no token of love escape him. I pray you to thank him no less for his readiness to perform your desire than for other friendship showed to us. Mr. Paschal saluteth you heartily, and Mr. Dr. Brombrouke.
" From your loving companion,
" R. SHERWINE.
" From Paris, the nth of June, 1580."
This delightful letter tells us more of the martyr's character and of his singular charm than pages of panegyric could do. It was evidently begun at Rheims and continued on the journey. Blessed Ralph left Rheims on June the 8th. The mission-
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aries had separated and taken different routes in the hopes of baffling the spies of Walsingham.
It is surprising that the martyr could find time to write such a long letter at a time like this, especially as Ralph Bickley was not his only corres- pendent. His loving heart was still with his friends at Rome, and found its consolation in imparting to them its joys, and hopes, and sorrows.
Thus, as soon after his arrival at Rheims as June the 4th, Blessed Ralph began a long letter, directed to Father Agazzari, S.J., which is still preserved as a precious relic at Stonyhurst. This letter is of course in Latin. After describing their adventures at Geneva much as in the letter already quoted, he thus continues :
" Oh what a joy to ours from Rome to see the College full ! Allen the same as ever embraces us as sons with exultant joy and cherishes us most tenderly. But we shall soon bid farewell and leave him, for we are not forgetful of the goal. There is one thing I especially wish to impress on your Paternity, that is that all our outfit of clothing is of no use at all, and unless you provide better for the others, they will be unable to carry out their mission as they should. I do not like to say in what great straits we are placed, but they are certainly very great indeed, and we hope the Pope will be informed of it at a fitting opportunity, in order that the others may be better provided for. Not the double of what we received for travelling expenses would be really sufficient. Believe me, everything has to be
BLESSED RALPH SHE R WIN 375
new, from the sole of the foot to the top of the head. Let it be enough to have mentioned this ; my heart is broken as I think of the straits we are in, and our Fathers also, and yet Father Robert [Persons] has foreseen all and arranges everything with the greatest zeal and prudence. Paschal would have written, but he is taken up with other business ; he salutes your Reverence whom he reveres as a father, as indeed all the others do. I am yours and shall always be ; I depend on your prayers, and desire to send my greetings to all your Fathers and my brethren. In two days we start for England. "June the 4th."
The letter was then closed up, but as there was no opportunity of sending it off before they left Rheims, they took it with them to Paris. Here it was re-opened, and Paschal added a post- script, in which he begged that his old friends might pray for him as "for an important intention of Father Rector's." Blessed Ralph also added a long postscript, dated Paris, June the loth. That the letter was closed and re-opened appears from the fact that the writing of the postscripts goes round the little holes through which the fastener went. It is all written in Sherwin's cursive hand, and the last part very hurriedly.1 We quote a part of the martyr's postscript.
" On June the 4th, Father Rishton and Father Crane, with Briscoe and two others of the Rheims
1 It may be interesting to note that Sherwin uses very few capitals, not even after full stops, or for the name of God, &c. Paschal seems to use capitals instead of any stops.
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Seminary, namely, Doctor Ely and John Hart, priest, set out for England.1 On the. 5th, Father Campion preached an excellent sermon in English, and on the 6th left Rheims with a view to England, together with Father Robert, Mr. Giblet, the lay- brother, and Father Robert's brother.2 . . . They say here that our names are betrayed to the enemy, but let them say and plot what they like, we shall take our lives in our hands, and if your prayers are not wanting to us, we shall break through the ranks of our foes. Your Paternity knows what power the assiduous prayer of a just man has with God ; we ask that this may be offered for us fervently and constantly. Believe me, that the nearer we get to the labours and perils of England, the more eagerly we advance upon the country commended to our zeal and the burden laid upon our shoulders. Nor is there any reason why we should fear much as to a victorious result, for our Master and Redeemer has conquered the world long ago, has conquered, I say, and now He calls us, not so much to the conflict as to the crown."
The blessed martyr then goes on to send loving salutations to the friends he has left in Rome, to the Jesuit Fathers in particular, especially to the Father General, Father Robert Bellarmine, and others whom he names ; " to all the English, both ours and yours, among whom John Buxton must
1 The Douay Diaries says June 5, and substitutes Cottam's name for Briscoe's, p. 166.
2 The Diarist says Briscoe went with this party, but adds quod existimo. Sherwin is more likely to be correct.
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take the first place." He commends his " spiritual sons, Hodson and Lyster," to the Rector's special care ; and, finally, " I leave out no one, though I forbear from prudence to name each one separately." He then concludes :
" God grant that we may so run that, as we hope, once the tabernacle of this body is laid aside, we may obtain. And so farewell meus suavis- simus Alphonsus, may God grant you an abundant reward, for only He can give you a worthy one, and it is not right to hope for it from any but from Him. . . . One thing I truly and sincerely desire your Paternity to understand, that we have made this journey together, with the greatest union of hearts and an increase of spiritual love, in which thing your Fathers both by example and help have indeed acted the parts of true Religious. These tidings (with our humble greeting, please, from his and your disciples) we desire should be imparted to Father General, that in this at least he may take some consolation, that we are of one mind, one will, and one counsel in all things with his Fathers. May God preserve him as long as possible for the good of England. Again farewell, and remember your sons.
"Ex latebris Lutetice die 10 Junii"
From Paris the little party made their way to Rouen, where no doubt they stayed with Sherwin's uncle, John Woodward, a priest who lived in exile there, and whom Blessed Ralph loved as a father.
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Their stay was a longer one than was at first intended. We have a letter which Sherwin wrote to Father Agazzari, on the day of his leaving Rouen to continue his perilous journey to England. The date is August the ist. It is not clear what can have been the cause of this delay of nearly six weeks ; for in his letter from Paris, he says : " We are travelling to our country with all speed." Probably it is accounted for by the illness of young Paschal, referred to in the letter, which is as follows :
"JESUS + MARY. " My very dear Father Alphonsus,
" Exactly on the feast of St. Peter's Chains, I left Rouen and started for England, Paschal being well advanced towards his recovery. I have no little hope that He who protected the Prince of the Apostles in his chains will mercifully defend us in all our miseries. Being on the point of departure, Reverend Father, because I cannot say much, in one word I recommend my heart and my soul and myself to you, as to a most loving parent. And because I know well with what eagerness your Reverence seeks after docile young men, who are not less powerful in intellect than fervent in religious piety ; lo ! this Edward Throckmorton,1 the bearer of my letter, is of good family and exceedingly well instructed in polite learning, and, as I know by experience, very praiseworthy in the pursuit of virtue and holiness : wherefore I recom-
1 Throckmorton died two years and some months later in the odour of sanctity at the English College in Rome.
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mend him to your charity no less than myself. Whatever service you render him, consider that it is rendered to me, your most obedient son. And so farewell, my very holy Father, and remember sometimes your son Sherwin, who never forgets his Father Alphonsus in his prayers.
" In haste, your most obedient son, " RALPH SHERWIN.
" Rouen, August i, 1580.
" To the Reverend Father in Christ, Father Alphonsus Agazzari, Rector of the English College. (Rome.)"1
Of the martyr's further journey, or how he passed the first perils of landing in England, we find no account. Once in this country, the self-sacrificing devotion of George Gilbert and his friends would have greatly facilitated the movements and com- munication of the missionaries. It must have been by this means, no doubt, that he kept up correspon- dence with Father Persons, who writes of the holy priest that he would do nothing without consulting him.
Of his ministry a priest wrote from England to Father Agazzari :2 " Your Sherwin who burned with such zeal at Rome, with no less ardour of spirit
1 The original holograph is at Stonyhurst. (Anglia, i. fol. 32, n. 9.) It is sealed, and is written in a fine, bold hand, the letters almost printed. The signature, however, is in a cursive English hand.
2 The writer is evidently Father Persons himself, and the date must be August, 1581. He is, however, mistaken in saying that Sherwin's missionary career lasted for six months. We have seen that he did not leave Rouen till August i, and he was taken in November.
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spent nearly six entire months preaching in various parts of the kingdom : in this work he enjoyed a very special grace and ascendency : and it seemed as if Divine Providence meant to reward such great labours by disposing that he should be taken in the very act of preaching in London."1
In November he met Persons for the first time since they had parted at Rheims, and the Jesuit gives the following account of the meeting.
" We met the night that Bosgrave followed me home from Hogsdon. We passed the night together in spiritual conference ; wherein he told me of his desire to die. The next day he came to tell me what danger we were in, and then went away to preach. For we had agreed that he should stay in London for the arrival of a certain gentleman who had asked for him, and in the meantime should occupy himself with preaching. And it was while preaching in Mr. Roscarrock's house that he was captured. I think he was the first of our confra- ternity that was taken, though he was not the first priest caught since our arrival, for Bosgrave and Hart were already in prison."5
Nicholas Roscarrock3 was a gentleman of
1 Persons' edition of Rishton's Continuation of Sander, Cologne, 1610, p. 405. (Latin.)
2 Simpson's Life of Campion, p. 183.
8 " The family of Roscarrock is populous, but of them two brothers, Hugh for his civil carriage, and Nicholas for his industrious delight in matters of history and antiquity, do merit a commending remembrance." (Carew's Survey, apud J. Morris, Troubles, i. p. 95.)
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fortune, living in London, and a great friend of priests.
It is not known how or by whom the capture was effected. But the Council were well informed as to the missionaries who had succeeded in enter- ing the country : they were stung by the boldness of Blessed Edmund Campion's Challenge which was circulated early in September ; no fewer than four proclamations had been put forth between the arrival of the missionaries in England and the end of November, and the Government spies were furnished with minute descriptions of the priests. It is not surprising, therefore, that they succeeded in tracking down one after another.
Blessed Ralph was committed to the Marshalsea Prison. Here he was loaded with heavy irons.
The priest (i.e., Father Persons) whose letter has already been quoted gives a touching account of this incident in the letter to Father Agazzari already referred to.
" When Sherwin was taken into the inner court of the prison, they fastened on him very heavy fetters, which he could scarcely move. The gaolers then went away to see in what cell or dungeon he was to be confined. On this, looking round and finding himself alone, he gazed up to heaven with a face full of joy and gave God thanks. Then, looking down again at his feet loaded with chains, he tried whether he could move them ; but when he heard the clank of the chains as he stirred, he could not help breaking out into laughter, and then again
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into tears of happiness, and with hands and eyes lifted up to heaven betraying the greatness of his joy. This scene was witnessed by two heretics of the ' family of love ' who were confined in a neighbouring part of the prison, and who were filled with astonishment ; and who have again and again related it since."
The writer goes on to quote a letter of the martyr from his prison.
" Two days before his capture Sherwin spent the night with me, and the cold being very severe (for winter had set in) slipped himself in with much difficulty between two or three of us at the very small fire which we had. He alludes to this in a letter which he wrote to me six days, I think, after his arrest.
" ' I have received the alms you sent me yester- day. May God repay you. I had but very little before. When it is spent, I shall go down to my brothers the thieves in the pit, and subsist on the common basket of alms : and I shall go to it with more alacrity than ever to any banquet ; for that bread of charity, for my Lord's sake, will be sweeter to me than honey or all kinds of dainties.
" ' I wear now on my feet and legs some little bells,1 to keep me in mind who I am, and whose I am. I never heard such sweet harmony before. If I were with you again, they would make room for me at the fire, and you would not crowd upon
1 His chains.
BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN 383
me. Pray for me that I may finish my course with courage and fidelity.' "
Blessed Ralph spent a month in the Marshalsea. During this interval a message from the Knight Marshal was brought by the keeper of the prison, inquiring whether there were any Papists in the prison who dared accept a challenge to disputation, and if so, bidding them name the questions they were prepared to defend. On which Blessed Ralph, together with Father James Bosgrave, and the Rev. John Hart, who were in the same prison, gladly " offered themselves to the combat, drew up questions, subscribed their names, and sent them to the said Knight Marshal." Such at least is the account of the matter given in the Briefe Historic,1 whilst Mr. Simpson, a little less accurately, says Blessed Sherwin, immediately on his confinement, gave a general challenge to heretics to dispute with him. The disputation never came off: for the very day before that fixed for it he was removed from the Marshalsea. Before this happened he had the sorrow of seeing his pupil, young Paschal, brought to the prison. On the other hand, he had the joy of carrying on his apostolate within his very prison. The Diary of the English College of Rome says " he reconciled many of his fellow-captives to the Church." Among them there happened just then to be two members of the disgraceful sect of the " family of love " who were in prison for heresy. They made an attentive study of Sherwin, whose cell was next to theirs. Seeing the joy and delight
1 Life of Campion, p. 183.
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he seemed to take in his fetters, they regarded him as a lunatic, not knowing that the inward consola- tion and delight which appeared in his bright and cheerful bearing sprang from the fact that he was a " prisoner of Christ," as in his letters he was wont to style himself. On making closer acquaintance with him they soon discovered that far from being a madman, he not only had his senses about him, but was very learned. Having on one occasion prolonged the conversation till it was time for Sherwin to resume his Breviary, he politely begged to be excused, and kneeling down said his prayers with all reverence and devotion, at which they were greatly impressed. At the evening meal they began to talk about religion, and after a long dispute they were so won over by Sherwin's reasons that he soon after reconciled them to the Church. Abjuring the immoral heresy for which they had been arrested, they made profession of the Catholic Faith, and were on that account still kept in prison.
On December the 4th,1 without a word of previous warning, he was transferred to the Tower — an ominous change, foreshadowing the infliction of torture. There were no conveniences for its use in most of the other prisons. In the long, vaulted dungeon under the armoury of the Tower, the rack and the "scavenger's daughter" were always ready and seldom idle. On the same day, but from other prisons, there arrived the Blessed Thomas Cottam,
1 See Life of Campion, by Simpson, p. 184, who examined the Tower bills. The Diarist says the 5th ; he probably heard of their arrival only on the next day.
BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN 385
Robert Johnson, and Luke Kirby, and also his good host, Nicholas Roscarrock. The Diary of the Tower begins in the winter of this year, and from it we learn that Blessed Ralph was put upon the rack for the first time on December the I5th, and " severely tortured." A list of questions drawn up by the Council was put to him. Why did the Pope send him and his companions ? To whom were they specially directed to repair ? What hopes had they of an invasion of Ireland ? Why had the Bishop of St. Asaph, Dr. Morton, and others come from Rome to Paris? Who had relieved them? Had the Queen of Scots given them anything ? 'Whom had they reconciled ? What communications had they had with Campion ? Where was he ? Had they had any communication with the Bishop of Ross, or Dr. Sander? Who were the Irishmen most noted as favourers of the rebellion there ? l He was also asked whether he had said Mass at Mr. Roscarrock's, what money he had received from him, and whom he had reconciled in prison,
It was now the middle of December, and the snow was falling thick, and after the torture he was laid out, helpless and in agony, in the snow. The object of this was the infliction of a piece of scientific cruelty on his friend, Mr. Roscarrock, who was thus made to hear, from a cell near the open courtyard, the martyr's pitiful groans. But this terrible trial not having overcome his constancy, Roscarrock was himself racked on January the I4th.2
1 Simpson's Campion, p. 189. Quoted in full in the life of Kirby. 2 Diary of the Tc--.<er.
386 BLESSED RALPH S HER IV IN
On December the i6th, the next day after his first racking, Blessed Ralph was again put to the torture. His brother John afterwards testified that the martyr gave him the following account of his sufferings, when he visited him in the Tower: "That he had been twice racked, and the latter time he lay five days and nights without any food or speaking to anybody. All which time he lay, as he thought in a sleep, before our Saviour on the Cross. After which time he came to himself, not finding any distemper in his joints by the extremity of the torture."1 His brother added, " It was offered him by the Bishops of Canterbury and London, that if he would but go to Paul's Church, he should have the second bishopric of England." It was just at this time that his pupil, Mr. Paschal, was brought from the Marshalsea to the Tower. He does not seem to have been tortured, but on January the I5th was brought handcuffed before Sir Owen Hopton, Lieutenant of the Tower, at the Guildhall. The Lieutenant had probably been able to form an estimate of the unfortunate young man's character ; and by a skilful mixture of threats and flattery, he induced him to purchase his freedom by apostasy. This was no doubt a worse trial to the martyr than his own racking.
On the same day all the Catholic prisoners were forced by the military to go to the Protestant church. This tyranny was repeated on the 26th, and on February the 5th, from which time until
1 MS. relation of Richard Broughton, in the Archives of the See of Westminster, vol. iv. p. 119. The passage is quoted by Challoner.
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"the festival of the following Pentecost we were dragged," says the diarist, "by the hands of our keepers and the soldiers, on all Sundays, to hear heretical sermons ; " but the prisoners interrupted the preachers, sometimes hooting them away, at others convicting them of falsehood, or challenging them to disputation.
On midsummer day they were all summoned to the presence of the Lieutenant, by a special commission from the Council, and asked if they would attend Protestant service. Blessed Ralph of course refused, and was then told that he would be indicted, within a few days, on the Statute of Recusancy which had just been passed. This circumstance is important, as indicating that the condemnation of the martyrs, on the grave charge afterwards brought against them, had not yet been decided upon.
Our martyr's imprisonment lasted more than a year. Probably he never doubted from the first how it would end. He had led a penitential life before, but now in preparation for his last combat he was not content with what others inflicted on him. "The order of his life," says the Briefe Historic, "in his spare diet, his continual prayer and meditation, his long watching, with frequent and sharp discipline used upon his body, caused great admiration to his keeper, who would always call him a man of God, and the best and devoutest priest that he ever saw in his life."
His trial in its general features has been described in that of Blessed Edmund Campion. All that is
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special to him in the Protestant account preserved in the Harleian MSS.1 is as follows:
" Evidence was next given against Sherwin, who, before the Commissioners, had refused to swear to the Supremacy, neither would answer plainly what he thought of the Pope's Bull, but confessed that his coming into England was to persuade the people to the Catholic religion.
" Queen's Counsel. — You well knew that it was not lawful for you to persuade the Queen's subjects to any other religion than by her Highness's instruc- tions is already professed, and therefore if there had not been a further matter in your meaning you would have kept your conscience to yourself and yourself where you were.
"Sherwin. — We read that the Apostles and Fathers in the primitive Church have taught and preached in the dominions and empires of ethnical and heathen rulers, and yet were not deemed worthy of death. The sufferance perhaps and the like toleration, I well hoped for in such a common- wealth, as where open Christianity and godliness is pretended. And albeit in such a diversity of religion, it was to be feared lest I should not discharge my conscience without fear of danger, yet ought I not therefore to surcease in my functions; although that conscience is very wandering and unsteady, which with fear of danger draweth from duty.
" One of the Judges. — But your case differeth from theirs in the primitive Church, for that those Apostles
1 B.M. Harleian, 6265, printed in Cobbett's State Trials, vol. i. 1050, and Simpson's Campion.
BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN 380,
and preachers never conspired the death of the emperors and rulers, in whose dominions they so taught and preached.
" The Clerk of the Crown read a letter which showeth that, by the fireside in the English Seminary beyond the seas, Sherwin should say that if he were in England he could compass many things : that there was one Arundell in Cornwall who, at an instant, could levy a great power : and that if an army were to be sent into England the best landing would be at St. Michael's Mount.
" Sherwin. — I never spake any such matter, God is my record : neither was it ever the least part of my meaning."
There was of course, if not justice, at least statute law for his condemnation, had he been tried upon it. On the charge brought against him, sentence was inexcusable. He spoke the simple truth when he exclaimed, " The plain reason of our standing here is religion and not treason." The wretched trumped - up story of a conspiracy would be laughed or hooted out of court at the present day, it was not believed then. It was not believed by Elizabeth, as Camden, her panegyrist, admits.1 It
1 "The Queen, to take away the fear which had possessed many men's minds that religion would be altered and Popery tolerated, being overcome by importunate entreaties, permitted that Edmund Campion aforesaid of the Society of Jesus, Ralph Sherwin, Luke Kirby, and Alexander Briant, priests, should be arraigned," and a little further on, " Yet for the greater part of these silly priests (he is speaking here of the missionaries generally) she did not at all believe them guilty of plotting the destruction of their country." (Bk. iii. ann. 1581.)
390 BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN
was not believed by her Ministers, who thought the sacrifice of these men necessary to quiet the ferment to which the report of her intended marriage with the Duke of Anjou had given occasion.
But his condemnation was the beginning of his victory, and when it was pronounced he cried, "This is the day which the Lord hath made, let us exult and be glad therein." And going back to his prison he wrote to some of his friends.
"Your liberality I have received and disposed thereof to my great contentation. When hereafter at the pleasure of God, we shall meet in Heaven, I trust you shall be repaid cum fcenore. Delay of our death doth somewhat dull me. It was not without cause that our Master Himself said, Quod fads, fac cito.
" Truth it is, I hoped ere this, casting off this body of death, to have kissed the precious, glorified wounds of my sweet Saviour, sitting in the throne of His Father's own glory. Which desire, as I trust, descending from above, hath so quieted my mind that since the judicial sentence proceeded against us, neither the sharpness of the death hath much terri- fied me, nor the shortness of life much troubled me.
" My sins are great, I confess : but I flee to God's mercy. My negligences are without number I grant, but I appeal to my Redeemer's clemency. I have no boldness but in His Blood. His bitter Passion is my only consolation. It is comfortable that the prophet hath recorded, which is, ' He hath written us in His hands.' Oh, that He would
BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN 391
vouchsafe to write Himself in our hearts. How joyful should we then appear before the tribunal- seat of His Father's glory: the dignity whereof when I think of, my flesh quaketh, not sustaining, by reason of mortal infirmity, the presence of my Creator's Majesty.
" Our Lord perfect us to that end whereunto we were created, that leaving this world we may live in Him and of Him, world without end. It is thought that upon Monday or Tuesday next we shall be passible. God grant us humility, that we, following His footsteps, may obtain the victory." l
Two days before his death, coming with Blessed Edmund Campion out of the Lieutenant's hall, where they had been disputing with some minister, he looked up at the sun and said, " Ah, Father Campion, I shall soon be above yonder fellow."
On the eve of his passion he wrote to his uncle, the Rev. John Woodward, living at Rouen.2
" Absit ut gloriemur nisi in cruce Domini
nostri Jesu Christi. " My dearest Uncle,
" After many conflicts and worldly corrasies, mixed with spiritual consolations and
1 Briefe Historic, p. 83.
2 A John Woodward appears as one of a number of English residents at Rouen who signed a recommendation of the exiled com- munity of Syon, in 1582. (See Douay Diaries, p. 362.) Thomas Covert sent a Latin translation of this letter to Father Agazzari, S.J., Rector of the English College at Rome, January 25, 1581-2. His letter is at Stonyhurst. (Anglia, i. n. 3, fol. 38.)
392 BLESSED RALPH SHERW1N
Christian comforts, it hath pleased God, of His unspeakable mercy, to call me out of this vale of misery. To Him therefore for all His benefits at all times and for ever be all praise and glory.
" Your tender care always had over me, and cost bestowed on me, I trust in Heaven shall be rewarded. My prayers you have still had and that was but duty. Other tokens of a grateful mind I could not show, by reason of my restrained necessity.
" This very morning, which is the festival-day of St. Andrew, I was advertised by superior authority that to-morrow I was to end the course of this life. God grant I may do it to the imitation of this noble apostle and servant of God, and that with joy I may say, rising off the hurdle, Salve sancta crux, &c.
" Innocency is my only comfort against all the forged villainy which is fathered on my fellow- priests and me. Well, when by the High Judge, God Himself, this false vizard of treason shall be removed from true Catholic men's faces, then shall it appear who they be that carry a well-meaning and who an evil, murdering mind. In the mean season God forgive all injustice, and if it be His blessed will to convert our persecutors, that they may become professors of His truth.
" Prayers for my soul procure for me, my loving patron, and that the Saving Victim be offered to God the Father again and again for the expiation of my sins ; and so having great need to prepare myself for God, never quieter in mind nor less troubled towards God, binding all my iniquities up in
BLESSED RALPH S HER WIN 393
His precious Wounds, I bid you farewell. Yea, and once again, the lovingest uncle that ever kinsman had in this world, farewell.
" God grant us both His grace and blessing until the end ; that living in His fear, and dying in His favour, we may enjoy one the other for ever. And so, my good old John, farewell. Salute all my fellow- Catholics. And so without further troubling of you, my sweetest benefactor, farewell. " Your cousin,
" RALPH SHERWINE, Priest.
" From the Tower of London, on St. Andrew's day, 1581." 1
When December the ist the day of the martyr's triumph came, he was tied to the same hurdle as Blessed Alexander Briant.2 The Diary of the English College speaks of some Catholics having prepared a strengthening drink for the martyrs, which was brought them by a kindly disposed gaoler. When Blessed Edmund Campion's mar- tyrdom was over, the hangman, with his bare arms and hands all bloody, seized hold of Blessed Ralph, saying to him, " Corne, Sherwin, take thou also thy wages," but the holy man nothing dismayed* embraced him and reverently kissing the blood on his hands, climbed up into the cart beneath the gallows, where he stood some moments in prayer with his eyes shut and his hands lifted up to heaven. Then he asked if the people looked for
1 Brief e Historie, pp. 84, 85. 2 Foley, Records S.J. vol. vi. p. 102.
394 BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN
any speech from him. Many of the people and some of the more honourable sort crying out, " Yea, yea," with stout courage and strong voice, he said, " Then first, I thank the Omnipotent and most merciful God the Father, for my creation; my sweet and loving Saviour Christ Jesus, for my redemption, and the Holy Ghost for my sanctification : three Persons and one God."
He was then going on to give an account of his faith, his condemnation and death, when Sir Francis Knollys interrupted him and bade him confess his treason against the Queen. " I am innocent and guiltless," he replied, and being further pressed, he said, " I will not belie myself, for so should I condemn my own soul ; and although in this short time of mortal life I am to undergo the infamy and punishment of a traitor, I make no doubt of my future happiness through Jesus Christ, in whose Death, Passion, and Blood I only trust."
Upon this the ministers present said he was a Protestant ; but he took no notice of them, but went on " with a most sweet prayer to our Lord Jesus, acknowledging the imperfection, misery, and sinful wickedness of his own nature, and still protesting his innocence of all traitorous practices." When Sir Francis Knollys again interrupted him, he said, " Tush, tush ! you and I shall answer this before another Judge, where my innocence shall be known, and you will see that I am guiltless of this." Whereupon Sir Francis said, " We know you are no contriver or doer of this treason, for you are no man of arms ; but you are a traitor by con-
BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN 395
sequence ; " but the martyr boldly answered, " If to be a Catholic only, if to be a perfect Catholic, be to be a traitor, then am I a traitor." Then being debarred further speech, he only added, " I forgive all who, either by general presumption or particular error, have procured my death," and so devoutly prayed to his Saviour Jesus. After which he was asked his opinion of the Bull of Pope Pius, to which point he gave no answer. Then being willed to pray for the Queen, he said he did so. " For which Queen ? " said Lord Charles Howard. To whom Sherwin somewhat smiling replied, " Yea, for Elizabeth, Queen ; I now at this instant pray my Lord God to make her His servant in this life, and after this life co-heir with Christ Jesus." To this some objected that he meant to make her a Papist, to whom he replied, " Else God forbid." And so recollecting himself in prayer, he put his head into the halter, repeating the ejaculation, Jesu, Jesu, Jesu, esto mi hi Jesus, the multitude crying out to him, " Good Mr. Sherwin, the Lord God receive your soul ; " and so they kept crying, and could not be stayed even after the cart had been drawn away, and he had been some time dead.
Dr. Worthington, in his Catalogue of Martyrs, states that he had the happiness of instructing his parents in the Faith. He was thirty-one years old. In a letter to Father Agazzari, in 1583, Dr. Allen laments that he had been unable, in spite of all his endeavours, to secure any relics of him.
E. S. K.
ED.
3Q6 BLESSED RALPH SHERWIN
AUTHORITIES. — Briefe Historic, pp. 76 — 84. Concertatio, fol. 68 A — 82 A. Yepes, pp. 337 — 346. Douay Diaries, passim. Challoner, i. pp. 39 — 43.
RELICS. — A bone of Blessed Ralph Sherwin is preserved at Stonyhurst. It is apparently a knuckle-bone or toe-bone with a piece of tendon attached. There are also five fibrous pieces of nerve or muscle, and a small piece of cloth. The last named is labelled " B. Shering, mart.," but is no doubt a relic of Blessed Ralph. His chief relics are, however, his letters preserved at Stonyhurst.
XI.
THE BLESSED ALEXANDER BRIANT,
JESUIT. Tyburn, i December, 1581.
THE violence of the persecution, it has already been observed, had greatly intensified in 1580. This was owing in part to the continually increasing number of missionaries known to have entered the country — no fewer than twenty -nine this year — but especially to the presence of the Jesuits. In the course of 1581 a new cause inflamed it still further. This was the publications of Blessed Edmund Campion and Father Persons. Campion's Challenge was circulated in manuscript, and as one scurrilous attack after another was made by the Protestants, there appeared to their amazement within an incre- dibly short time — on one occasion within ten days — trenchant rejoinders from Father Persons, first against Charke and Hanmer, then against Nichols. The third, the Reasons why Catholiques refuse to go to Church, was a cogent but very conciliatory answer to the new laws against Recusants. The tracts professed on the title-page to be printed at Douay, but to practised eyes they were unmistakably English work.
3Q8 BLESSED ALEXANDER BRIANT
Moreover, without any visible agency, these books were found spread abroad not only among Catholics, but even in Protestant houses, on bookstalls, in the streets, in shops, and even in the Court. How could their publication be stopped ? Where was the press from which they issued ? By what means were they circulated ? A sense of vexation and defeat was now added to the religious bitterness. The persecutors began to do their worst. Searches and sudden irruptions of pursuivants and priest- catchers became continual. Again and again Father Persons had hairbreadth escapes, and sometimes though he escaped, some one else was taken. Thus on one occasion he was to meet a brother of Edward Rishton at midnight at an inn called " The Red Rose," and receive him into the Church, but could not identify the inn and had to give up the attempt regretfully. He had passed the very door, he after- wards found, without recognizing it, though he had been there a few days before, and by a slip of memory had inquired for " The White Rose." All the while there had been officers in the house waiting for his arrival to arrest him. They missed their expected prey, but they captured seven others, and among them Edward Rishton, the publisher of John Hart's Diary in the Tower and the continuator of Sander's History of the English Schism.
Again, Father Persons had hired lodgings " near Bridewell Church," and close to the Thames, a most convenient meeting-place for priests and other Catholics, and also for the work of his publications. It was more suitable for this purpose because it belonged
BLESSED ALEXANDER B RIANT 399
to a Protestant bookseller, and so was not likely to be suspected. Here Father Persons deposited his stock of rosaries, medals, crucifixes, and pious objects which he had brought from Rome. Here too a servant of Roland Jenks (the Oxford book- seller who for the Faith had had his ears cruelly nailed to the pillory and had been forced to free himself by cutting them off with his own hand) had worked at bookbinding. This man unfortunately turned against his master and put the Council on the scent.
Father Persons says : l " While we were together in a house in a wood [i.e., at Stonor] , one night Hartley told me casually that he had been at Oxford, and had heard that Roland Jenks's servant, who had just before been employed by me at my house in London to bind some books, had gone over and had given evidence against his master. I at once saw the danger, and the first thing in the morning I sent to London and found that Wilks, the secre- tary of the Privy Council, and Norton and some of the Queen's guards, had that very night searched my chamber and carried off all he found there." Great must have been the disappointment of Norton and his party. It was plain they had indeed found the nest ; but the bird was flown. It was the dead of night, but they would not give up the chase yet. Perhaps he was not far off. They made an entry into an adjoining house. The coveted prize was not there, but there was something to reward their pains. First there was money, which, as usual, was
1 MS. Life of Campion; Simpson, p. 201.
4oo BLESSED ALEXANDER BRIANT
appropriated. Next they found a "trunk wherein was a silver chalice and much other good stuff." But a yet greater prize awaited them. The house was not untenanted. They found a young man of some seven-and-twenty years, of exceedingly gentle manner, and a countenance of striking beauty. He was at once suspected of being a priest and carried off with the spoils of the two houses.
Norton's prize was the Blessed Alexander Briant. Born in Somersetshire of a yeoman family,1 he was early sent to Oxford and matriculated in the year 1574, being then eighteen years of age. Everything at Hert Hall,2 of which he was a member, was favourable to his conversion. Philip Roundell, the head of the house, is said to have taken every opportunity to guide the minds of those under his charge in that direction. He had for his tutor Richard Holtby, who was already a Catholic at heart, and subsequently became a priest, and having laboured some time on the English Mission, entered the Society of Jesus, and succeeded Father Henry Garnet as Superior in England. He was also at one time under the influence of Persons, who writes, " He was my disciple and my pupil at Oxford and ever inclined to
1 The matriculation list of 1574 describes him as Somersetensis, plebai filius, at. 18. (Boase, Register of the University of Oxford, II. ii. p. 38; cf. Wood, Athena, i. p. 479; Father Henry More, p. 104.) Challoner says he was born in Dorsetshire.
2 Hert Hall was afterwards erected into a College as Hertford College, which however had but a brief duration, and was merged in Magdalen Hall. Recently the collegiate foundation has been again revived under the old title of Hertford College.
BLESSED ALEXANDER B RIANT 401
virtue."1 But Persons' influence cannot have lasted long, for he left Oxford in June, 1574, and indeed surrendered his Fellowship at Balliol on February2 the I3th of that year, though keeping his rooms and pupils for some time longer. It is not surprising then, that after three years spent at the University, Blessed Alexander followed the footsteps of so many of its sons to the Seminary at Douay. The College Diary records his admission on the nth of August, 1577. Holtby had preceded him by a few days, having entered the College on the 3rd. They were both resolved, having themselves received the grace of the Faith, to devote their lives to imparting it to their brethren. Together they became subdeacons on the 23rd of February,
1 From this passage it would seem probable that the martyr, on first going to Oxford, was at Balliol. How should he have been a pupil of Persons at Hert Hall ? And in fact this conjecture is confirmed by a paper in the Public Record Office (Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. cxlvi. n. 10) of the year 1581, evidently written by someone intimately acquainted with the University affairs. It begins thus: " That Balioll Coledg hath not bin free from the suspicion of papistrie this long time, it appeareth by the men yt have bin of the sayd house, namlye Brian and Parsons. With Parsons and since his departure from the College, have Turner, Bagshaw, Staverton, and one Pilcher bin fellowes : all wch were grievously suspected of religion. And certayne it is that this Pilcher is gone this year from thence to Rhems, looking daily for Bagshaw as he did report to one Caesar," &c. (See Douay Diaries, Appendix, p. 363.) Indeed the fact is stated positively in a letter written by one of Father Persons' brothers giving an account of his early life, in which the writer says, " So that he (Father Persons) had in Balliol College and Hall more than thirty scholars under him, whereof many have proved Catholics and some priests, as Mr. Briant, priest and martyr, and Mr. Powell and others." (Foley, Records S.J. vol. vi. p. 679.)
2 More, Historia Provincia Anglican^ Soc. Jesu, p. 40.
AA II.
4o2 BLESSED ALEXANDER B RIANT
1578, deacons on March the i8th, and priests on the 2gth of the same month, Holy Saturday ; all the ordinations being at Cambrai. Holtby started for the English Mission on the 26th of February, 1579 ; Blessed Alexander on the 3rd of the following August.
He laboured at first in his own county of Somersetshire. Father Persons speaks of him as "a priest of the greatest zeal." He reconciled Persons' father to the Church, and this fact probably led to the great intimacy and affection between them — for Father Persons says of the time they were both in England " he never willingly left my side."1 It was perhaps the desire to be near him that led him to choose for his lodging the house where he was taken.2
On his arrest on the 28th of April, 1581, he was, after a short examination by a magistrate, committed a prisoner to the Counter. Some years later Father Garnet speaks of the Counter in one of his letters as " a very evil prison."3 Blessed Alexander was not many days there, but they were days of great suffering. The persecutors, who had so narrowly missed capturing Father Persons, and who were tolerably sure Briant could tell them his where-
1 Simpson's Campion, p. 202.
J One Gilbert Body was taken in Briant's chamber, and was sent to Bridewell, where he was flogged. (Pollen, Acts, p. 54.)
3 Father Morris's Life of Father John Gerard, p. 186. There were two prisons of the name in London — the Counter in the Poultry, close to the parish Church of St. Mildred, and the Counter in Wood Street. They were under the respective authority of the two sheriffs. There was also a Counter in Southwark, adjoining the parish Church of St. Margaret.
BLESSED ALEXANDER B RIANT 403
abouts, were determined to stick at nothing to extract information from him. Strict orders were given to the gaolers that he should see nobody ; that if any persons came to see him they should at once be arrested ; and that he was to be entirely deprived of food and drink. " Who in such order continued," says the original account of Dr. Allen, followed by Challoner, " until he was almost famished. In fine, by friendship, or what means I know not, he got a pennyworth of hard cheese, and a little broken bread, with a pint of strong beer, which brought him into such an extreme thirst that he essayed to catch with his hat the drops of rain from the house eaves, but could not reach them."1 The deprivation of food and drink lasted for two days and nights.2
After six days at the Counter nothing had been gained, and it was determined to try still sharper methods. On the day after the Ascension, that is May the 5th, Blessed Alexander was removed to the Tower. His Acts say3 "he verily thought
1 Brief e Historic, p. 87.
2 Lord Burghley in his tract, A Declaration of the favourable dealing of her Majestie's Commissioners, &c., admits this torture by starvation. " A horrible matter is made of the starving of one Alexander Briant, how he should eat clay out of the walls, gathered water to drink out of the droppings of houses." He contends that he suffered it " wilfully of extreme impudent obstinacy," because he would not write, no doubt for fear his writing would be the means of compromising others ; and throws the blame on him for " persisting so in his curst heart by almost two days and two nights." Hallam says of this tract that " those who revere the memory of Lord Burghley must blush for this pitiful apology." (Constitutional History, i. p. 148.)
3 Briefe Historic, p. 87.
4o4 BLESSED ALEXANDER B RIANT
he would have been utterly famished, and therefore carried with him a little piece of his hard cheese, which his keeper in searching him found about him, but the martyr humbly entreated him not to take it from him." From this time he was given his allowance of food and drink, but only that he might undergo a far fiercer trial. The Brtefe Historic says of him that " these torments and the man's constancy are comparable truly to the old, strange sufferings of the renowned martyrs of the primitive Church, . . . which he could never have borne by human strength, if God had not given him His singular and supernatural grace."
There is still extant the order of the Council, dated the 3rd of May, 1581, directing Sir Owen Hopton, the Lieutenant of the Tower, Dr. Hammond, and the notorious Norton, " the rack-master," to examine " a certain seminary priest or Jesuit naming himself Bryant, . . . and if he shall obsti- nately refuse to confess the truth, then to put him unto the torture, and by the pain and terror of the same to wring from him the knowledge of such things as shall appertain."1 It was, of course,
1 MSS. Lansd. 1162, fol. yb. Printed by Dasent, xiii. 37, 38. " 3rd Mail, 1581.
" [Present] Lord Admiral, Earl of Bedford, Mr. Treasurer, Mr. Vicechancellor, Mr. Secretary.
" A letter to the Lieutenant of the Tower, that whereas there is presently remaining in the Counter in Wood Street a seminary priest naming himself Bryant, lately apprehended and committed to that prison, their Lordships think good to have him removed to the Tower, thereto be further examined, and have him required to send for the said Bryant unto the Counter, and to receive him into his custody to remain close prisoner, and be examined from time
BLESSED ALEXANDER B RIANT 405
with a view to carrying out these instructions, that the martyr was removed to the Tower. Two days after his transfer he was brought before the three commissioners, who began by tendering to him an oath to answer all their questions. The holy priest was, of course, unable to answer those which would have compromised others, "and because he would not confess," says the Brief e Historic, " where he had seen Father
to time, according to such direction as he shall receive in that behalf from their Lordships, &c.
" A letter unto the Lieutenant of the Tower, Dr. Hammond, and Thomas Norton, gent., that whereas there hath been of late appre- hended among others a certain seminary priest or Jesuit, naming himself Bryant, about whom there was taken certain books and writings carrying matter of high treason, and is (as may in good likelihood be conjectured) able to discover matters of good moment for her Majesty. It was therefore thought good that he should be for that purpose substantially examined upon such interrogatories as may be framed and gathered out of the said books and writings, which their Lordships send them herewith, for the doing whereof especial choice was made of them three, and thereby authority given unto them for the drawing the interrogatories and the examining the said Bryant accordingly. And if he shall refuse by persuasion to confess such things as they shall find him able to reveal unto them, then they shall offer unto him the torture in the Tower ; and in case upon the sight thereof he shall obstinately refuse to confess the truth, then shall they put him unto the torture, and by the pain and terror of the same wring from him the knowledge of such things as shall appertain. And for the rest that were apprehended with him, as others that upon his examination shall be touched in like degree, and by their endeavours appre- hended, their Lordships pray them to examine them and every of them, by such convenient ways and means as by them shall be thought convenient and fit for the trying out of the matters where- with they shall be severally charged. And what they shall find by their said examinations they are prayed to certify unto their Lordships in writing, that thereupon such further orders may be taken with them as shall appertain," &c.
406 BLESSED ALEXANDER B RIANT
Persons, how he was maintained, where he had said Mass, and whose confessions he had heard, they caused needles to be thrust under his nails, whereat Mr. Brian was not moved at all, but with a constant mind and pleasant countenance, said the Psalm Miserere, desiring God to forgive his tormentors ; whereat Dr. Hammond stamped and stared, as a man half beside himself, saying, ' What a thing is this ? If a man were not settled in his religion, this were enough to convert him.' " His fellow-prisoner, John Hart, who had the account of his sufferings from himself, shortly before his martyrdom, writes: "Alexander Briant, a priest, was brought into the Tower from another prison, where he had almost died of thirst, and was loaded with most heavy shackles. Then sharp needles were thrust under his nails to force him to disclose where he had seen Father Persons, which, however, with unshaken resolution, he refused."1 This torture is also described in a letter from Father Persons written early in August, 1581, and on the 27th of the same month it is recorded in the Douay Diaries. It was openly stated in the True Report of the Martyrdom of M. Campion, M. Sherwin, and M. Bryan,2 in the December following, and by the Briefe Historic in 1582. Moreover, the defence offered by Norton, to which we shall return imme-
1 Diary in the Tower, [April] 27, and May 6, 1581. There is an earlier record still in the letter from a prisoner in the Tower, R.O. Domestic, vol. cxlix. n. 61, of which a translation is printed in Foley, Records S.J. vol. ii. p. 160.
3 Sander, De Schismate Anglicano, lib. iii. Edit. 1628, p. 319; Douay Diaries, p. 181 ; True Report, sig. D. 3.
BLESSED ALEXANDER B RIANT 407
diately, is quite inconclusive, and rather confirms than invalidates the statements of the Catholics.
It does not appear that any other martyr except Briant was tortured by pricking — but the punish- ment was not unfrequently applied to witches, who seemed insensible to other pain. This perhaps explains its infliction here. If Briant had remained unmoved by previous sufferings, it would have seemed not unnatural to the rack-master to say that this was due to conjuration, and then to apply the needles.
Thirteen questions to be proposed to Briant, regarding the names of Catholics, the whereabouts of Persons and Campion, &c., are extant,1 but the martyr's answers seem to have perished. The Government, however, published such " short extracts" from a later examination, on the depos- ing powers of the Pope, as would be most likely to raise odium against the sufferer.2 The " extracts " are the following :
" Alexander Briant. He is content to affirm that the Queen is his sovereign lady : but he will not affirm that she is so lawfully, and ought to be so, and to be obeyed by him as her subject if the Pope declare or command the contrary. And he saith that this question is too high and dangerous for him to answer. The 6th of May, 1581. Before Owen Hopton, Kt., John Hammond, Thos. Norton.
1 R.O. Domestic, vol. cxlvii. n. 97, printed below in the life of Kirby, and in Foley, vol. iv. p. 348.
2 Declaration of undutiful affection of Edmund Campion and other condemned priests (1582), reprinted in Cobbett's State Trials, vol. i. p. 1078, and Tierney-Dodd, vol. i. p. n.
4o8 BLESSED ALEXANDER B RIANT
" Whether the Pope hath authority to withdraw from obedience to her Majesty he knoweth not.
"ALEXANDER BRIANT. "The 7th of May, 1581."
After this the martyr, as Hart records, "was thrown into the pit," which he describes in the preface to his diary as " a subterraneous cave, twenty feet deep, without light." He remained there eight days and was then drawn out to be taken to the rack-chamber.
Here, says the Brief e Historic,1 " he was, even to the disjointing of his body, rent and torn upon the rack, because he would not confess where Father Persons was, where the print was, and what books he had sold, and so was returned to his lodgings for the time. Yet the next day following, notwith- standing the great distemperature and soreness of his whole body, his senses being dead and his blood congealed (for this is the effect of racking), he was brought to the torture again, and there stretched with greater severity than before ; insomuch that supposing with himself they would pluck him in pieces, ... he put on the armour of patience, resolving to die rather than to hurt any creature living, and having his mind raised in contemplation of Christ's bitter Passion. He swooned away, so that they were fain to sprinkle cold water on his face to revive him again : yet they released no part of his pain.
1 Pp. 87, 88.
BLESSED ALEXANDER BRIANT 409
" And here Norton, because they could get nothing of him, asked him whether the Queen were supreme head of the Church of England or not ? To this he said, ' I am a Catholic, and I believe in this as a Catholic should do.' ' Why,' said Norton, ' they say the Pope is.' ' And so say I,' answered Mr. Briant. Here also the Lieutenant used railing and reviling words, and bobbed him under the chin and slapped him on the cheeks after an uncharitable manner; and all the commissioners rose up and went away, giving commandment to leave him so all night. At which when they saw he was nothing moved, they willed he should be taken from the torment, and sent him again to Wales- boure ; l where, not able to move hand or foot or any part of his body, he lay in his clothes fifteen days together, without bedding, in great pain and anguish."
Of these terrible scenes, Norton himself admitted to Walsingham, as we shall see later, that he had used the inhuman threat that the martyr "should be made a foot longer than God made him ; " that " he was therewith nothing moved;" that he was "racked more than any of the rest, yet he stood still with express refusal " to comply with the requirements of his persecutors.2 And Dr. Allen in a letter to Father Agazzari a few weeks later (the 23rd of June, 1581), says " he laughed at his tormentors, and though nearly killed by the pain, said, ' Is -this all
1 A dungeon, the locality of which is uncertain, perhaps in the now destroyed Coleharbour Tower, perhaps under the White Tower.
2 See the extract from his letter below.
4io BLESSED ALEXANDER B RIANT
you can do ? If the rack is no more than this, let me have a hundred more for this cause.' " l
Indeed in his first racking the martyr was mira- culously preserved from the sense of pain during part of the time. Hart says, " I heard afterwards from his own mouth, a little before his martyrdom, that he felt no pain whatever when his body was extended to the utmost, nor when his tormentors with savage barbarity endeavoured to inflict upon him the greatest pain."2 He gave a more exact account of this grace in a letter to the Jesuit Fathers in England.3
In this long letter, which we quote verbatim from the Briefe Historic, he begs for admission into the Society with touching earnestness and humility.
" Yet now, since I am by the appointment of God, deprived of liberty, so as I cannot any longer employ myself in this profitable exercise, my desire is eftsoons revived, my spirit waxeth fervent hot, and at the last I have made a vow and promise to God, not rashly (as I hope) but in the fear of God, not to any other end, than that I might thereby, more devoutly and more acceptably serve God, to my more certain salvation, and to a more glorious triumph over my ghostly enemy, I have made a vow (I say), that whensoever it shall please God to deliver me (so that once at the length it like Him)
1 Knox, Letters and Memorials of Cardinal Allen, p. 95, and R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. cxlix. nn. 51, 52. a Diary in the Tower, May 6. 3 Briefe Historic, pp. 89 — 92.
BLESSED ALEXANDER BRIANT 411
I will, within one year then next following, assign myself wholly to the Fathers of the Society, and that (if God inspire their hearts to admit me) I will gladly, and with exceeding great joy, thoroughly and from the bottom of my heart, give up and surrender all my will to the service of God and in all obedience under them.
" This vow was to me a passing great joy and consolation in the midst of all my distresses and tribulations. And therefore with greater hope to obtain fortitude and patience, I drew near to the throne of his Divine Majesty, with the assistance of the blessed and perpetual Virgin Mary and of all the saints. And I hope verily this came of God, for I did it even in the time of prayer, when methought my mind was settled upon heavenly things. For thus it was.
" The same day that I was first tormented on the rack before I came to this place, giving my mind to prayer, and commending myself and all mine to our Lord, I was replenished and filled up with a kind of supernatural sweetness of spirit ; and even while I was calling upon the most holy Name of Jesus, and upon the blessed Virgin Mary (for I was in saying the Rosary), my mind was cheerfully disposed, well comforted, and readily prepared and bent to suffer and endure those torments, which even then I most certainly looked for. At the length my former purpose came into my mind, and therewithall a thought coincidently fell upon me to ratify that now by vow, which before I had determined. When I had ended my prayers, I resolved these things
4i2 BLESSED ALEXANDER BRIANT
in my mind deeply, and with reason (as well as I could) I did debate and discuss them thoroughly. I judged it good and expedient for me, I accom- plished my desire, I put forth my vow and promise freely and boldly, with the condition aforesaid.
" Which act (me thinketh) God himself did approve and allow by-and-by. For in all my afflictions and torments, He of His infinite goodness mercifully and tenderly did stand by and assist me, comforting me in my trouble and necessity ; deliver- ing my soul from wicked lips, from the deceitful tongue, and from the roaring lions, then ready gaping for their prey.
" Whether this that I say be miraculous or no, God knoweth. But true it is, and thereof my conscience is a witness before God. And this I say, that in the end of the torture, though my hands arid feet were violently stretched and racked, and my adversaries fulfilled their wicked lust, in practising their cruel tyranny upon my body, yet notwith- standing I was without sense and feeling well-nigh of all grief and pain ; and not so only, but as it were comforted, eased and refreshed of grievous [ness] of the torture bypast. I continued still with perfect and present senses in quietness of heart and tran- quillity of mind ; which thing when the commis- sioners did see, they departed, and in going forth of the door they gave orders to rack me again the next day following, after the same sort. Now when I heard them say so, it [came into] my mind by-and- by, and I did verily believe and trust, that with the help of God, I should be able to bear and suffer it
BLESSED ALEXANDER BRIANT
patiently. In the meantime (as well as I could) I did muse and meditate upon the most bitter passion of our Saviour and how full of innumerable pains it was. And whiles I was thus occupied, methought that my left hand was wounded in the palm, and that I felt the blood run out, but in very deed there was no such thing, nor any other pains than that which seemed to be in my hand.
" Now then that my suit and request may be well known unto you, for so much as I am out of hope in short time to recover and enjoy my former liberty, so as I might personally speak unto you ; (and whether happily I shall once at length speak unto you in this world no mortal man doth know) in the mean season I humbly submit myself unto you, and (suppliantly kneeling) I beseech you to do and dispose for me and of me, as shall seem good to your wisdom. And with an humble mind most heartily I crave that (if it may be in my absence) it would please you to admit me into your Society and to register and enroll me among you, that so •with humble men I may have a sense and feeling of humility, with devout men I may sound out aloud the lauds and praises of God, and continually render thanks to him for his benefits ; and then after being aided by the prayers of many, I may run more safety to the mark which I shoot at, and without peril attain to the prize that is promised.
" As I am not ignorant that the snares and wiles of our ancient enemy are infinite, for he is the sly serpent which lieth in the shadow of woods, winding, whirling and turning about many ways ; and with
4i4 BLESSED ALEXANDER B RIANT
his wiles and subtle shifts he attempts marvellously to delude and abuse the souls of the simple which want a faithful guide ; insomuch as it is not without cause that we are admonished to try the spirits if they be of God.
" To you, therefore, because you are spiritual, and accustomed to this kind of conflict, I commend all this business, beseeching you even by the bowels of God's mercy that you would vouchsafe to direct me with your counsel and wisdom. And if in your sight it seem profitable, for more honour to God, more commodity to his Church, and eternal salva- tion to my soul, that I be preferred to that Society of the most holy Name of Jesus, then presently before God, and in the court of my conscience, I do promise obedience to all and singular Rectors and Governors established already, or to be hereafter established ; and likewise to all rules or laws received in the Society to the uttermost of my power, and so far as God doth give me grace ; God is my witness, and this my own handwriting shall be a testimony hereof in the day of Judgment.
" As for the health of my body you have no cause to doubt, for now well near I have recovered my former strength and hardness. By God's help I wax every day stronger than [the] other.
"Thus, in all other things commending myself to your prayers, I bid you farewell in our Lord, carefully expecting what you think good to deter- mine of me. Vale."
The reader may wonder how this letter, written
BLESSED ALEXANDER BRIANT 415
by a close prisoner in the Tower, found its way to those for whom it was destined. Father Persons has answered this question. In his tract, De Per- secutione Anglicana,1 he tells us that an opportunity was found by certain Catholics, during the disputa- tions held by Blessed Edmund Campion in the Tower, to visit the other prisoners for the Faith who were concealed in that gloomy fortress. The disputations were held in public, and probably the golden key was freely used to obtain access to the dungeons, where the confessors of Christ were languishing. In this way our martyr not only obtained the necessary writing materials, but was enabled to deliver his letter into safe hands. No doubt in this way also the priests were supplied with the means of offering the Holy Sacrifice, for the corporal, on which Briant and his companions said Mass, is still preserved.
Father Persons says that he prints the letter to show that the hand of the Lord is not shortened, and that He still comes to the help of His confessors in their need, and is with them even in the dense darkness of their dungeons.
We have still something to add about Norton's atrocious cruelty. When it became known, an outcry was raised, and the Government was shamed into putting him into prison for a few days, though apparently on some other plea, to make believe that they were not responsible for him. To this occasion we are indebted for his avowal and confirmation of the facts related as to the martyr's torture.
1 First Edition, published in 1581, p. 98.
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Walsingham sent him a tract about the late martyrs,1 upon which he wrote the following attempt at a defence of himself.2
" I find in the whole book only one place touching myself, fol. ult. pa. 2. ' One (meaning Briant) whom Mr. Norton, the rack-master, if he be not misreported, vaunted in the court to have pulled one good foot longer than ever God made him, and yet in the midst of all he seemed to care nothing, and therefore out of doubt, said he, he had a devil within him.' Surely I never said in that form, but thus. When speech was of the courage of Campion and some other, I said truly that there appeared more courage of a man's heart in Briant than in Campion, and therefore I lamented that the devil had possessed poor unlearned Briant in so naughty a cause : for being threatened by those who had commission (to the intent he might be moved to tell truth without torment) that if he would not for his duty to God and the Queen tell truth, he should be made a foot longer than God made him, he was therewith nothing moved. And being, for his apparent obstinacy in matters that he well knew, racked more than any of the rest, yet he stood still
1 The passage referred to by Norton is found at the end of the account given in the Concertatio. But this of course was a transla- tion printed considerably later. It is not quite clear what the original tract was, of which Norton speaks. The True Reporte and the first edition of the Epistola de Persecutione Anglicana would suit the date, but the examples of those works in the British Museum do not contain the page in question.
2 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. clii. n. 72 (March 27, 1582).
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with express refusal that he would not tell the truth. When he setteth out a miracle that Briant was preserved from feeling pain, it is most untrue. For no man of them all, after his torture, made so grievous complaining and showed so open sign of pain as he."
Mr. Simpson has pointed out Norton's care to say that after torture the martyr had shown great signs of pain. This does not contradict the martyr's words, which limit the favour granted him to a certain occasion and a certain part of the time.
Our martyr was in the dungeon or on the rack during the month of May, while his fellow-prisoners were being dragged to sermons in the Church of St. Peter's ad Vincula. This insensate violence ceased at Pentecost, and on June the 24th in- dictments for recusancy since May the 26th were presented at the Middlesex Sessions against the Catholic prisoners. The list of names, however, is sadly decayed, and though the names of Cottam, Robert Johnson, and Sherwin are legible, that of Briant has not been deciphered.1 We have already heard how he communicated with his fellow- Catholics at the time of the disputations in August and September.
The Blessed Alexander was arraigned on the same indictment as Blessed Edmund Campion, Ralph Sherwin, and Thomas Cottam, but on the following day, Wednesday, November the I5th, together with six others, four of whom were
1 Middlesex County Records, Edit. Cordy Jeaffreson, vol. i. p. 124. BB II.
4i8 BLESSED ALEXANDER BRIANT
martyred. The trial took place on the i7th, the day after that of the first three.1
" When he went to Westminster Hall," says the Briefe Historic, " to be condemned, he made a cross of such wood as he could get," apparently a wooden trencher, small enough to be covered by his hand, and upon it he drew with charcoal a figure of our Divine Lord. This rough crucifix "he carried with him openly. He made shift also to shave his crown because he would signify to the prating ministers (which scoffed and mocked him at his apprehension, saying that he was ashamed of his vocation) that he was not ashamed of his Holy Orders, nor yet that he would blush at his religion." We are also told that Blessed Alexander took the most humiliating place, which was here the first, and kept looking down " at the palm of his hand, in which he held the little crucifix." When the ministers reproached him and bade him cast it away, he answered, " Never will I do so, for I am a soldier of the Cross, nor will I henceforth desert this standard until death."2 Another pressed forward and snatched the cross from his hands, upon which he said, " You may tear it from my hands, but you cannot take it from my heart. Nay, I shall die for Him who first died on it for me." This cross was bought by some Catholics and afterwards taken to
1 The record of the trial is on the Coram Rege Roll, and gives the dates printed above, whereas the printed authorities place the trials on the 2Oth and 2ist.
2 Morris, New Witness about Campion (see above), p. 6, and the MS. Life of Campion in the Archives of Westminster, vol. ii. p. 229.
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the English College at Rome together with the ropes used in racking Campion, by one who had been in prison with them. He had been arrested for printing Catholic books, and was probably Mr. Stephen Brinkley.1 George Gilbert died holding the cross in his hands and kissing it with tender devotion.2
Of the trial itself few details have been preserved. It must have been as nearly as possible a repetition of the previous day's proceedings. One contem- porary writer notes that the martyr, who in his University days had been called " the handsome boy of Oxford," still preserved in his countenance after so many inhuman and horrible tortures in the Tower, "a serenity, innocency, and amiability almost angelic." When sentence was pronounced he appealed to God's judgment, in the words of the Psalm, Judica me Dens, et discerne causam meam de gente non sancta. When they were back in the Tower, Briant was punished for having carried the crucifix, by being loaded with fetters for two days.
He was the third of those singled out for execu- tion, and whose martyrdom, as already related, was
1 Foley, Records S.J. vol. vi. p. in. Brinkley was a young man of position and means who had devoted himself to the work of printing Father Persons' books. He was seized with the press at Stonor Park on August 13, 1581, — a month after Father Campion's arrest — and committed to the Tower, where he suffered much for nearly two years, when by the influence of friends he was set at liberty on June 24, 1583. He went to Rome shortly after with Father Persons, and later settled at Rouen, and there continued his old work of printing for Father Persons.
2 Letter of Father Agazzari. Foley, Records S.J. vol. iii. p. 700.
42o BLESSED ALEXANDER BRIANT
finally fixed for December the ist. When he had witnessed the glorious death of the Blessed Edmund Campion and Ralph Sherwin, and was placed in the cart beneath the gallows, he began to speak to the throng, of his early religious education and of his manner of life at Oxford, when he was cut short by some one crying out : " What have we to do with Oxford ; come to the purpose and confess thy treason." He answered with great vehemence : i( I am not guilty of any such thing, nor am I deserving of this kind of death. I was never at Rome, nor was I at Rheims at that time when Dr. Sander came into Ireland " (the time of the pretended conspiracy).1 "He spake not much, but being urged more than the other two to speak what he thought of the Bull of Pope Pius V., he said he did believe of it as all Catholics did, and the Catholic faith doth."2 He then went on, with an expression of great joy in his fair and innocent face, to say what exceeding happiness it gave him that God had chosen him and made him worthy to suffer death for the Catholic faith, and especially in company with Edmund Campion, whom he revered with all his heart. Then, as he was saying Miserere met, Deus, the cart was drawn from under him, and he was, like his two fellow- martyrs, left hanging until he was dead, though from the negligence of the hangman in adjusting the rope, he suffered more pain than either of the others.
1 Briefe Historie, p. 86.
2 MS. Life of Campion. Archives of Westminster, vol. ii.
BLESSED ALEXANDER BRIANT 421
The Briefe Historic records an apparently miraculous circumstance following his death. " After his beheading, being dismembered, his heart, bowels, and entrails burned, to the great admiration of some, being laid upon the block, his belly downwards (he) lifted up his whole body then remaining upon the ground. And this, I add," says the author, " upon report of others, not my own sight." l
Father Persons, in a letter written shortly after, says of this martyr, " Our adversaries hated this young priest chiefly on account of his intimacy with the Fathers of the Society, about whom he would not utter a word in the extremest torments ; and in a letter secretly conveyed out of his prison, he ardently begged to be received into the Society, relating the miracle by which God assisted him in the midst of his sufferings. I think you have already received a copy of this letter." 2 Father More, the historian of the English Province of the Society, adds that " he may well be counted among the Fathers of the Society, seeing he had engaged himself to their fellowship and institute by the bond of so solemn a vow."3 In effect, not only the Society of Jesus, but also the Holy See, has endorsed this judgment. The former has always honoured the Blessed Alexander with a place in its histories and
1 Briefe Historie, p. 86.
2 H. More, Historia Provincia Anglicana Soc. Jesu, p 109.
3 " Merito inter Societatis Patres numerandus quorum se con- sortio et institute voti adeo solemnis religione obstrinxerat." (Ibid. p. 1 06.)
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BLESSED ALEXANDER B RIANT
menologies ; while Apostolic briefs have enumerated him among the martyrs of that Order, and allowed his feast to be celebrated by its members.
E. S. K.
J. H. P.
AUTHORITIES. — Briefe Historic, pp. 85 — 91. Persons, De Persecutione Anglicana (1581), and MS. Life of Campion. True Report of the death of M. Campion, M. Sherwin, and M. Briant (1582), Concertatio, Yepes, &c., as for Campion and Briant. H. Foley, Records S.J. vol. iv. pp. 343 — 367.
PORTRAIT. — There is a picture of Blessed Alexander Briant at the Gesu, and a copy of it, made by the late Mr. Charles Weld, now hangs at Stonyhurst. It represents the martyr holding a crucifix, the rope is round his neck, and the knife buried in his breast. The face is seen in profile. He wears a moustache and very slight beard.
RELICS. — i. A very touching relic of Blessed Alexander and four of his fellow-martyrs exists to this day. It is now at Stonyhurst. It consists of a corporal of very fine linen. There is a minute hem round the sides and bottom, and a cross worked in red silk at each corner. There is apparently none in the centre, unless it is hidden by the inscription which runs thus: Corporate usnrpatum a quinque martyr ibus. Below this are worked, very finely in red silk, the names of the martyrs. Each is surrounded with a border. They run as follows :
LUCAS . KIRBEUS ROBERTUS . IONSONIUS ALEXANDER . BRIANUS IOANNES . SHIRTUS + THOMAS . COTTAMUS
This corporal was used by the five Beati whose names are embroidered on it while they were prisoners in the Tower of London awaiting their martyrdom.
It is a consolation to have this evidence that they were permitted the supreme joy of celebrating the Holy Sacrifice before their cruel deaths. The corporal was secured by their
BLESSED ALEXANDER B RIANT 423
fellow-prisoner, Arthur Pitts, a priest, who was afterwards banished (January, 1585), who sent it through Dr. Allen to Father Alphonso Agazzari, S.J., at the English College, Rome, whence it was transferred to Liege, and ultimately to Stonyhurst, which is the history of many others of the wonderful treasures there preserved. (For this corporal, see Letters and Memorials of Cardinal Allen, p. 202.)
2. Mr. Berkeley, of Spetchley Park, Worcestershire, possesses a Roman Missal which has been ascribed to this blessed martyr. It contains the words, Alexandra Brianto Alexander Farnesius. If this is a true signature, the book would seem to have been presented by the famous Duke of Parma to his humble namesake. It has also some Collects (among them that of St. Augustine of Canterbury) written at the end of the book in the same handwriting, but whether this is the martyr's handwriting is not yet proved.
XII. THE BLESSED JOHN PAYNE,
SECULAR PRIEST. Chelmsford, 2 April, 1582.
SIR WILLIAM PETRE, father of the first Lord Petre, was a typical instance of a class which was the calamity of England at a time when the lusts of her ruler and the religious fanaticism of his tools could only have been remedied by a large fund of steady principle in the nation at large. He was a man of some learning, and as Dr. Petre, was Fellow of All Souls and Principal of Peckwater's or Vine Hall. He was an excellent man of business, a good master, a kind neighbour, and very charitable to the poor. But he acted as a Visitor and Commissioner in the dissolution of monasteries under Henry VIII. ; he presided over the Bishops as proxy for Cromwell in his capacity of the King's Vicar General ; and became one of the Secretaries of State to Henry in 1543. He continued in this office under Edward VI., and in both these reigns enriched himself out of the spoils of the Church. Under Mary he was Secretary of State again, and was such a good Catholic that his church plunder was confirmed to him by a special grant from Pope Paul IV. Stranger
BLESSED JOHN PAYNE 425
still, he was one of those charged to transact all business previous to Elizabeth's coronation, and was still employed on various State affairs. However, as age increased, his attendances at the Council became less frequent. They ceased altogether after 1566, when Petre retired to his manor at Ingate- stone, Essex, where he died the I3th of January, 1571-2. His widow, however, Anne, daughter of Sir William Browne, Lord Mayor of London, was a fervent Catholic, and Ingatestone became a devoted Catholic house and a refuge for the hunted priests. In 1855 a priest's hiding-place was acci- dentally discovered. " The entrance to this secret chamber is from a small room attached to what was probably the host's bed-room. In the south- east corner the boards were found to be decayed ; upon their removal, another layer of loose boards was observed to cover a hole or trap-door two feet square. A ladder, perhaps two centuries old, remained beneath. The hiding-place measured fourteen feet in length, two feet one inch in breadth, and ten feet in height." This house was the chief residence of the Blessed John Payne during his missionary life.
Of his origin we only know that he was born in the diocese of Peterborough.2 He had a brother, a zealous Protestant, but there is nothing to show whether he was himself a convert. He made his way to the Seminary at Douay in 1574, among a great many others — no less than twelve arriving
1 Buckler's Churches in Essex. * Douay Diaries, p. 6.
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by a single ship — and at once commenced his theological course ; though he found time also to take part in the administration of the College as (Economus.1 He was ordained priest on Sitientes Saturday, the 7th of April, I576,2 and after making the Exercises under the Jesuit Fathers in prepara- tion for his mission, left for England on the 24th of the same month in the company of Blessed Cuthbert Mayne. Before separating they had a narrow escape of the loss of their theological note- books and all their pious treasures, as already mentioned. Then Blessed Cuthbert went to Devon- shire and Cornwall, and Blessed John to Essex. Though he usually lived at Ingatestone, he also seems to have worked and even had a lodging in London. Thus the Rev. Henry Chaderton, in his autobiography, says : " Arriving in London we hired a lodging in the house of a very pious Catholic woman, who was very often visited by one of the Fathers of the Society of Jesus, and by the grace of God he received my sister into the Church. In the same house also dwelt Mr. Payne, a priest, afterwards a martyr."3 One of the first fruits of his apostleship was the priesthood of George Godsalve. " On the I5th (of July, 1576) there came to us," says the Douay Diary, " sent by the Rev.
1 Douay Diaries, p. 289.
2 Dr. George Oliver has been too easily misled by the coinci- dence of name into identifying our martyr with an old Marian priest, against whom he found a certificate of recusancy, dated April 19, 1581, in the act-book of Woolton, Protestant Bishop of Exeter at the time. See Collections illustrating the History of the Catholic Religion in the Western Counties (Dolman, 1857), pp. 3, 4.
3 Foley, Records S.J. vol. iii. p. 551.
BLESSED JOHN PAYNE 427
John Payne, priest, who not long since left us for England, a distinguished man, and of varied learn- ing, Mr. Godsalve, who has endured with constancy prolonged imprisonment, besides many other bitter trials, for the Catholic faith. While the faith still flourished among Englishmen he had advanced in Holy Orders as far as the diaconate ; and all his anxiety this long time past had been to receive the priesthood, and so carry out his original purpose. He is accordingly admitted amongst us here, to return later to England for the good of many."1 He was, in fact, made priest before the end of the year, and went to England in June, 1577. He seems to have kept close to Blessed John, and partaken of his fortunes. He was betrayed with him, and shared his imprisonment and torture. After long imprison- ment, he was exiled in 1585, and died at Paris. He brought with him to Douay a letter from Blessed John, which is summarized in the Diary.
" ' On all sides,' wrote the holy priest,2 ' in daily increasing numbers, a great many are reconciled to the Catholic Church, to the amazement of many of the heretics. And when any of them (as does happen) fall into the hands of the raging heretics, with such fortitude, with such courage and constancy do they publicly profess the Catholic faith (especially those who are gentlemen) that the heretics are fairly dumbfounded with astonishment, and already begin to give up all hope of putting
1 Douay Diaries, p. 107. 3 Ibid.
428 BLESSED JOHN PAYNE
them down by violence. Greatly also are they troubled by the very name of the Douay priests (now talked of through the whole of England), which on the other hand fills all Catholics with consolation and the greatest hope of the recovery of the Catholic religion. They lay snares, therefore, for all priests, but especially and most eagerly for those sent from thence.' He writes also that the daily increasing number of Catholics makes them already earnestly look for more priests from us. He says the name of the Calvinistic ministers has fallen into the deepest hatred and contempt with nearly all. Finally, both he and other priests sent from us earnestly beseech us in their letters to commend them earnestly every day to God, that they may persevere in the work they have entered on, with fortitude and zeal, against all the storms of the heretics ; and especially that they may not be infected by the vices that abound there, nor polluted with the filth around them, and the like ; in such a dreadful and unheard of way does the medley of all vices now reign in that unbelieving and unhappy kingdom, as to fill those who are animated with any zeal for God's service, with shuddering horror."
The holy priest's ministry was not long without interruption.1 On the gth of February, 1577, news reached the Seminary that he had shortly before been arrested at Lady Petre's and thrown into prison for the Faith. But this time he was not
1 Douay Diaries, p. 115.
BLESSED JOHN PAYNE 429
detained long. On March the loth, the diarist notes that two new-comers brought word " that the anger of the heretical magistrates lately roused against the Catholics, especially those returning from (Douay) had somewhat cooled, and Mr. John Payne, priest, and Mr. Dryland had been discharged from prison." As the year advanced, however, the storm broke out again and much more violently. It was to this storm that Blessed Cuthbert Mayne, Blessed Thomas Sherwood, and Blessed John Nelson fell victims. Blessed John, perhaps yielding to the times, left England and arrived at Douay on the I4th of November, 1577.
When he returned again does not appear. But whenever it was he found a home once more at Ingatestone. "Judas" Eliot,1 in his evidence at the trial of Blessed Edmund Campion and his companions, stated that he had become acquainted with Payne at Christmas, 1579, at "my Lady Petre's house ; " and it may perhaps be taken as probable that he would not have chosen for his story a period when it could have been shown that the martyr was out of England. The missioner passed as a steward of Lady Petre. But whatever precautions might be used against other perils, there were none that could protect the servants of God against the " perils from false brethren " with which the wiles of Cecil and Walsingham surrounded them. George Eliot, with whom the reader has already made acquaint- ance, was really a Catholic, and was successively employed in positions of trust in the household of
1 Cobbett, State Trials, vol. i. p. 1067.
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Lady Petre, Mr. Roper, and others, where he became acquainted with many priests, of whom he gave afterwards a list to the Government, to the number of thirty. But he was a profligate and a thief. He embezzled sums of money that came into his hands in transactions with which he was entrusted by Lady Petre : and among other immoralities he enticed a young woman away from the Roper household. He then applied to Blessed John to marry them, and on his refusal determined to be revenged. This was unfortunately easy and at the same time profitable. His evil courses had culmi- nated in a murder, which Blessed Campion publicly declared in court that he had confessed. With accusations of murder and dishonesty hanging over him, and under the pinch of need, he saw his way to immunity, to profit, and to revenge at a stroke ; and accordingly the Blessed John Payne was arrested in the county of Warwick, and examined by Walsingham at Greenwich, where the Court was then staying. Walsingham, " so far as he could gather by the examinations that he had taken," thought the charge of conspiracy " would prove nothing. And yet it was happy that the parties charged were taken, for they be runagate priests bred up at Rome and Douay," and so he committed them to the Tower on the I4th of July, 1581. The diarist recording the fact adds that it was "by the betrayal of a certain Eliot, whom he had loaded with many benefits."1
1 Diary of the Tower, July 14, 1581. Walsingham wrote to Burleigh the same day, " I have been all this day by her Majesty's express commandment set at work about the examinations of
BLESSED JOHN PAYNE 431
The same day his friend George Godsalve was likewise examined and committed to the Tower, and we may take it that Eliot was at the bottom of this too, for the following information to the Government, somewhat later, is signed with his initials, " G. E." " Oxfordshire. — John Payne said Mass at Mr. William Moore his house at Haddon, upon Sunday, being the 2nd of July, anno Reg36 23. At which Mass were the said William Moore and his wife. . . . Godsalve said Mass there on Tuesday the fourth of the said month, at which Mass were all the persons aforesaid, the said William Moore excepted."1
We have already heard Walsingham's real opinion on the case. That the only valid objection to Payne was his being a " priest bred at Douay," and that the charge of treason would " come to nothing." But it was by no means his intention to insist on the true charge and to drop the false one. The martyrdoms of 1577 and 1578 had brought great odium on the Government at home and abroad, and a way must be found of basing the butchery of priests on some more presentable
certain persons charged to have conspired to attempt somewhat against her own person. But as far as I can gather by these examinations that I have already taken I think it will prove nothing. And yet it is happy that the parties charged are taken, for that they be runagate priests, such as have been bred up in Rome and Douay, and seek to corrupt her Majesty's good subjects within this realm." (R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. cxlix. 6g.) On July 15 there is an entry in the Treasurer of the Household's Accounts of £12 to John Cooper, under-sheriff of Warwick, for his charges in apprehending Payne and Godsalve and bringing them to the Court at Greenwich for examination. (R.O.) 1 Foley, Records S.J. vol. ii. p. 589.
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charge. If Eliot, Munday, and their like were not told this, they easily came to understand it, and Eliot was soon ready with a new and enlarged edition of his accusation. Here is the precious document, part of a long paper, headed " Certain notes and remembrances concerning a reconciliation by me exhibited to the Rt. Hon. my good the Earl of Leicester," and endorsed in Burleigh's hand, " Payne to be examined."
" The said priest Payne went about once to persuade me to kill (Jesus preserve her) the Queen's Majesty, and said that there were divers matters from the Pope published against her, that it was lawful to kill her Highness without any offence to Godward. And said unto me that he had talked beyond the seas with the Earl of Westmorland, Dr. Allen, and divers others Englishmen touching that matter, who let him to understand that the Pope would yield as much allowance of money as would fully furnish fifty men, to every man a good horse, an arming sword, a privy coat, and a pocket-dagge. These men should be had in readiness against some convenient time that her Majesty went in progress, not all in a livery, but in sundry sorts of apparel. And, for that it was supposed your honour, my Lord Treasurer, and Mr. Secretary Walsingham were like to be there, and that you were all thought to be enemies to the papists, it was appointed that four or five should set upon her Majesty's royal person, and so upon the sudden to destroy her Highness; three upon
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your Honour, three upon my Lord Treasurer, and three upon Mr. Secretary Walsingham, all which in a moment even at one instant, [were] to be destroyed as aforesaid. The rest of the said company of fifty to be ready when the deed were done, to come to and fro with their horses amongst the people to dash them out of countenance, that they should not know what part to take." l
For eight long months the holy confessor was kept a close prisoner without being brought to trial. During this time he was more than once cruelly racked. There is a minute in the Council book on August the I4th,2 ordering his torture, and at the end of the month the news of his racking had reached Douay and is recorded in the Diary. On October the 2gth, another minute in the Council book orders "the examining of Edmund Campion, Thomas Ford, and others, prisoners in the Tower, upon certain matters, and to put them unto the rack," 3 and on the 3ist, the Diary of the Tower records " John Payne, priest, was most violently tormented on the rack.1'
It was on one of these occasions after his racking that Sir Owen Hopton sent his servant to him with this letter.
" I have herewith sent you pen, ink, and paper, and I pray you write what you have said to Eliot
1 B.M. Lansdowne MSS. vol. xxxiii. n. 61 ; Foley, Records S.J. vol. ii. p. 588.
2 Jardine, Appendix, p. 88 ; Dasent, Privy Council, xiii. p. 172. * Jardine, p. 89 ; Dasent, p. 249.
CC II.
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and to your host in London, concerning the Queen and the State ; and thereof fail not, as you will answer at your uttermost peril."
The martyr's hands were crippled by the torture, and he was obliged to dictate his answer to the servant.
" Right Worshipful,
" My duty remembered, being not able to write without better hands, I have by your appointment used the help of your servant. For answer to your interrogations I have already said sufficient for a man that regardeth his own salvation, and that with such advised asseverations uttered, as amongst Christian men ought to be believed. Yet once again briefly for obedience sake.
" First, touching her Majesty, I pray God long to preserve her Highness to His honour and her heart's desire; unto whom I always have and during life will wish no worse than to my own soul. If her pleasure be not that I shall live and serve her as my Sovereign Prince, then will I willingly die her faithful subject, and I trust, God's true servant.
" Touching the State, I protest that I am and ever have been free from the knowledge of any practice whatever, either within or without the realm, intended against the same. For the verity whereof, as I have often before you and the rest of her Grace's commissioners called God to witness, so do I now again ; and one day before His Majesty the truth, now not credited, will be then revealed.
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" For Eliot I forgive his monstrous wickedness and defy his malicious inventions ; wishing that his former behaviour towards others being well known, as hereafter it will, were not a sufficient reproof of these devised slanders.
" For host or other person living, in London or elsewhere, unless they be by subornation of my bloody enemy corrupted, I know they can neither for word, deed, or any disloyalty, justly touch me. And so before the seat of God, as also before the sight of men, will I answer at my utmost peril. " Her Majesty's faithful subject, and " Your Worship's humble prisoner,
"JOHN PAYNE, Priest."
" He was once or twice demanded," says the Briefe Historic, " whether he would go to their church (for that would have made amends for all these treasons). 'Why,' saith he, 'you say I am in for treason. Discharge me of that, and then you shall know farther of my mind for the other.' " l
The trial and martyrdom of Campion, Sherwin, and Briant had passed, and Blessed John was yet left in his cell in the Tower. Another quarter of a year went by, and still nothing more happened. It seemed as if, with the utterly discredited accusation of Eliot only against him, the Government shrank from a trial. The ninth month of his captivity had begun, when one night, March the 2oth, he was roused from bed by a knocking at the door of his room. It was
1 Briefe Historic, p. 128. This is the chief authority for the martyr's trial.
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Hopton, the Lieutenant of the Tower, himself, who summoned him, and he found that officers were waiting to take him to Chelmsford gaol by orders of the Council.1 With very gratuitous brutality he was refused leave to dress himself, for he had nothing on but his cassock, which he had thrown about him to open the door. He was not allowed even to take his purse, and the Briefe Historic affirms that Lady Hopton, with that incredible mixture of meanness, cruelty and injustice, of which instances abound at the period, took care to secure it for her own use.
On the following Friday, the 23rd, the martyr was arraigned at the Assizes, together with a number of thieves and felons. The indictment simply recited Eliot's accusation which has been given.2
That worthy personage of course made no difficulty about swearing to his tale. He had found it profitable already. " Of George Eliot," says Mr. Simpson, " and the charge of murder against him, I have already spoken. That charge had, however, now been entirely wiped out by his good service. He had captured Campion, and had been
1 The letter to the Lieutenant of the Tower from the Council ordering him to hand over John Payne into the charge of the sheriff of the county of Essex is dated Greenwich, March 12, 1582. Dasent, Acts of the Privy Council.
3 George Eliot, "one of the ordinary yeomen of her Majesty's chamber," and Ralph Hill received £$ " for their charges in being sent by commandment of the Lords of her Majesty's Council from Greenwich to Chelmsford in Essex upon special business of her Majesty." Treasurer of the Household's Accounts, April 2, 1582.
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the means of taking nine other priests; he had been made a yeoman of her Majesty's guard, and had come flaunting into court with his red coat. He had shown too well how intimate he was with the secrets of priests, and his testimony, though evidently forged, was too valuable to lose. Campion took nothing by his impeaching this man's witness." l Blessed John Payne also gained nothing by impeach- ing it. He probably knew well that this would be the case. He did impeach it, nevertheless, that he might not neglect any proper defence of his life.
" He refelled Eliot's deposition. First, taking God to witness on his soul, that he never had such speech with him. Secondly, he brought two places of Scripture 2 and a statute to prove that without two sufficient witnesses no man should be condemned. Thirdly, he proved Eliot insufficient to be a witness for having been guilty, ist. Of oppression of poor men, even unto death. 2ndly. Of a rape and other notorious lewdnesses. srdly. Of breach of contract and cozening the Lady Petre (widow of Sir William Petre) of money. 4thly. Of changing oft his religion. 5thly. Of malice against himself, adding that he was also attached of murder and such-like acts, and was a notorious dissembler," &c.
No attempt was made to corroborate Eliot's story. The counsel for the Crown urged as pre- sumptions against the accused, that he had "gone beyond the seas and been made priest by the Bishop of Cambrai," and consequently, as he falsely
1 Simpson, Life of Campion, p. 312. 2 John viii. 7; Deut. xvii. 6.
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inferred, taken an oath to the Pope; "that he had speech with traitors in Flanders, with the Earl of Westmorland, Dr. Allen, and Dr. Bristow, and had travelled with a traitor's son, Mr. William Tempest." It is needless to say what short work a modern counsel for the defence would have made of all this, but in those days no such " indulgence " was accorded to the accused ; however, the holy priest answered that " to go -beyond the seas was not a sufficient token of a traitor, neither to be made priest by the Bishop of Cambrai, for so were many others, nothing at all thinking of treason.1 That for his part he was not the Pope's scholar,2 neither had any maintenance of him ; for when he was at the College it had as yet no pension from the Pope.3 That he had never talked with the Earl of Westmorland ; and that Dr. Allen and Dr. Bristow had never talked, to his knowledge, of any such things. That Mr. Tempest was an honest gentle- man, and never talked to him about treason ; neither was it unlawful for him to keep him company, seeing that he was a servant to a Right Honourable Counsellor, Sir Christopher Hatton."
The jury gave the verdict expected of them, and the next day Blessed John was brought up for
1 The Act of Parliament deciding that ordination over seas should be regarded as treason was not passed till 1585.
2 The Pope's scholars took an oath to labour on the English Mission when sent by their Superiors.
* Gregory XIII. granted an allowance to the College of 100 crowns a month, in 1575, which he afterwards increased. See Douay Diaries, Introduction, p. Ixxiv. Blessed John, however, left early in 1576.
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judgment. He was asked according to the usual form whether he had any reason to offer why sentence should not be given. But he answered that he had said sufficiently, " alleging that it was against the law of God and man that he should be condemned for one man's witness, notoriously in- famous." He excused the jury as " poor, simple men, nothing at all understanding what treason is," and lastly added, " if it please the Queen and her Council that I shall die, I refer my cause to God."
The Judge (whose name was Gaudy) then pro- nounced sentence, and afterwards exhorted the martyr to repent himself, " although," said he, "you may better instruct me herein."
The execution was fixed for eight o'clock in the morning of Monday, April the 2nd. Like most of the martyrs of this period, he was harassed in his closing days by the importunity of the Puritanical preachers. The whole of Sunday, April the ist, till five o'clock, two ministers, named Withers and Sone, were with him, urging him to give up his religion, "the which," said they, "if you will alter, we doubt not to procure mercy for you." So that " by their foolish babbling," as he said, " they did much vex and trouble him." On the other hand, in the town and in the county, where he had long lived and seems to have been well known, the general feeling towards him was one of good -will and sympathy. " All the town loved him exceedingly," says the Brief e Historic, "so did the keepers and most of the magistrates of the shire. No man
440 BLESSED JOHN PA YNE
seemed in countenance to mislike him, but much sorrowed and lamented his death." The writer of this touching account adds, " I, amongst many, coming unto him about ten of the clock with the officers, he most comfortably and meekly uttered words of constancy unto me and with a loving kiss took leave of me."
At the place of his martyrdom he knelt down and prayed for nearly half an hour. He smiled as he went up the ladder, and kissed the gallows. He then addressed the people, and made a full declara- tion of his faith in the Most Holy Trinity and the Incarnation, for the strange reason that the common people, as he was told, thought him to be a Jesuit ; and the report had been sent about that " the Jesuits' opinion was that Christ is not God." He then forgave all, and Eliot by name, and prayed for him, and solemnly protested his complete inno- cence of every treasonable act or word.
Then followed the usual wrangle to induce him to acknowledge some guilt. He answered Lord Rich that to confess an untruth was to condemn his own soul, and " Sweet my lord," he went on, " certify her Majesty thereof, that she surfer not hereafter innocent blood to be cast away." At this a preacher who stood by cried out that by these words alone he proved he was a notable traitor, since he dared to accuse the Queen's Majesty of shedding innocent blood if ever she touched one of those anointed by the Pope of Rome. The martyr meekly answered, " Verily you treat me unkindly, for I did not say this, but only asked his Lordship
BLESSED JOHN PAYNE 441
to beg the Queen not to let innocent blood be shed." Some said he was a traitor like Campion, who had been convicted by several witnesses, to which he replied that he had asked Campion and his companions, a little before their death, if they had really committed the crimes they were charged with, and with one voice they had answered " No." One of the ministers insisted that Mr. Hart had disclosed the whole conspiracy, to which Blessed John replied that he was there to answer for himself, not to defend others. Someone else said he had acknow- ledged his guilt to a certain Lady Pole : but he declared he did not even know any such person. Then one of the ministers " said that Mr. Payne's brother confessed to him in his chamber seven years ago that he talked of such an intention. To this he answered, being somewhat moved, ' Bone Deus ! my brother is, and always hath been, a very earnest Protestant ; yet I know he will not say so falsely of me ; ' and then he desired his brother should be sent for." The brother was not at hand, and the sheriff would not delay ; when he was found, soon after the execution, he swore, of course, that the whole thing was a fabrication.1 Next came the usual pressure on the martyr to pray in English and to join with the ministers, to which he replied " that he prayed in a tongue which he well understood." And they went on to ask if he did not repent of
1 " He swore unto us with great admiration that it was most false, and told us that he would so certify my Lord Rich. Imme- diately he was sent for to my Lord, and I took horse to ride away, and thereof as yet hear no more." (Briefe Historie, p. 127.)
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having said Mass, but his soul was now raised by our Lord into the peaceful region of contemplation, and he no longer heard them.
As they turned the ladder, he was heard to pronounce again and again the holy name of Jesus, and he died without any convulsive movement of hand or foot. The kindly feeling of the crowd inter- fered to prevent the infliction of the last barbarities until he was dead. " They very courteously caused men to hang on his feet, and set the knot to his ear, commanding Bull, the hangman from Newgate, to despatch in the quartering of him, lest, as they said, he should revive ; and rebuked him that he did not despatch speedily."
E. S. K.
AUTHORITIES. — Briefe Historic, pp. 131 — 140; Concertatio, ft. 81 — 84 ; Diary of the Tower in Rishton's Sander.
XIII. THE BLESSED THOMAS FORD,
SECULAR PRIEST.
Tyburn, 28 May, 1582.
OF the little. group of friends, who in 1569 and 1570 left Oxford and what the world had to offer them, to embrace the Faith and give their lives to God in the priesthood, two had now won the martyr's crown ; first Cuthbert Mayne, then Edmund Campion. The Blessed Thomas Ford l was now to join their glorious company. We have seen how even while a Protestant he was the means of saving Blessed Cuthbert Mayne from a premature imprisonment, a trial which might have altered the whole subsequent course of his life. Perhaps it was this charitable deed which obtained for Thomas Ford the grace of conversion and of martyrdom.
Like his friend, he was a native of Devonshire.2 He entered Trinity College, Oxford, where he was a contemporary of George Blackwell, afterwards
1 He was also known as Saltwell and Harwood.
2 He is called " Fourde of Lye " in Domestic, Elizabeth, Addenda, xxviii. 59, iii. Lye is an Oxfordshire hamlet, and Catholic Fords lived at Shifford close by in 1608, but the family came from Devon
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Archpriest. l He became a fellow of his College, and Wood says was made President.2 Even while at the University he had the strongest Catholic sympathies and openly expressed them. Father Warford3 says of him :
" He was a man of most unblemished character, of excellent life, and most fervent zeal. I have often heard it related of him, amongst other things, that when one of his fellow-masters in the ordinary theo- logical disputations of the College gave in to the fashion of the times, and spoke somewhat insolently of the Sovereign Pontiff, he boldly began his answer to the discourse with the words : ' I cannot endure such disrespect towards co virtuous and holy a father.' As he put no restraint on his feelings, he was at last compelled by this and the like outbursts to abandon the College and all its advantages, though indeed he rather hastened eagerly to the priesthood."
It was in the course of the year 1570 that he broke away from every tie and went to the recently established Seminary at Douay, where Gregory Martin, Blessed Edmund Campion, and other friends, had preceded him. He was one of the first three of its students ordained, the other two being
1 " Thos. Forde or Fourde, supplicated for B.A. and disp. May 8, 1563, adm. May 13, supp. for M.A. April 18, 1567, licensed April 21, incepted July 14." (Boase, Register of the University of Oxford, i. 251.)
2 Fasti Oxonienses, April 21, 1567.
3 MS. Relation in the Archives of Westminster, vol. iv. 65 (printed in Pollen's Acts of English Martyrs, p. 251).
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Gregory Martin and Richard Bristow. They went to Brussels for their ordination, and received the tonsure, minor orders, and the three Sacred Orders on different days in March, 1573. He remained another three years in the College and had the happiness of welcoming a continual succession of University men, many of whom must have been old friends ; — William Weston, the intimate friend of Campion ; William Sheprey, of Corpus Christi ; his colleague at Trinity, George Blackwell ; Thomas Worthington, Edward Rishton, and Lawrence Johnson, the martyr, of Brasenose ; Robert Turner and Blessed Ralph Sherwin, of Exeter; Henry Shaw, Henry Holland, Jonas Meredith, and Blessed Cuthbert Mayne, of St. John's; almost all destined to take an important place in the Catholic annals of England.
He left Douay for England on the 2nd of May, 1576, a few days after Blessed Cuthbert Mayne and Blessed John Payne. He was able to work in our Lord's vineyard for five years without interruption, a long career if we look at the average of the mis- sionaries at that time. Father Warford says he laboured chiefly in Oxfordshire, and though known to many at the University, such was the regard which his character inspired that no one thought of betraying him. After a time he appears to have become resident chaplain at Lyford, in Berkshire, where, it will be remembered, the Yate family gave shelter to some of the Bridgettine nuns of Syon, who had returned to England in order to obtain pecuniary aid for their exiled and destitute com-
446 BLESSED THOMAS FORD
munity. He thus found at Lyford work sufficient both for himself and for his colleague, John Collington.
Here it was, on the I7th of July, 1581, that he was captured by "Judas" Eliot, in the little hiding- hole where he lay with Campion and Collington. Father Warford says that in the crisis of their danger Blessed Thomas wanted to give himself up to the searching party in the hope of saving Campion, who, however, would not hear of it. Probably, besides his generous charity, Ford was actuated by the feeling that it was he who had been the means of bringing Campion into their common peril. For he it was who had ridden after the two Jesuits when they had quitted Lyford, on the I2th, and after a hard struggle, brought them back from the inn near Oxford in triumph.
With the holy Jesuit and Collington he shared the three days' journey to London, and the glorious dishonour of the progress through the city, "their elbows tied behind them, their hands in front, and their legs under their horses' bellies,"1 and on Saturday, July the 22nd, was committed a close prisoner to the Tower.2
There are three entries in the Council book
1 Simpson's Campion, p. 228.
2 There exists an Order from Council (July 30, 1581) to the Knight-Marshal to remove Ford, alias Saltwell, and Collington, alias Peters, from the Tower to the Marshalsea ; and not to allow them speech with any other prisoner for religion. (Dasent, Acts of the Privy Council, vol. xiii. p. 147.) But if this order was carried out, both sufferers must have been brought back again later on, for the record of their trial states that they came from the Tower.
BLESSED THOMAS FORD 447
directing his torture, dated July the 3<Dth, August the I4th, and October the 2gth. The commis- sioners were instructed to extract from him and his two companions, "where they have layne, and whether there were a mass said in Mrs. Yate's house or no at their last being there ; '' and again, "to examine Campion, Peters [Collington], and Ford, who refuse to confess, whether they have said anie masses or no, whom they have confessed, and where Persons and the other priests be, touch- ing those points, and to put them to fear of torture, if they shall refuse to answer directly thereto." ]
He was one of the seven priests tried the day after Blessed Campion and his companions on the same charge of conspiracy against the Queen. The verdict had been given against all seven,2 when one, Mr. Lancaster, came forward and declared to the court that he was in company with Collington, Ford's fellow-chaplain at Lyford, in Grey's Inn, on the very day that he was charged with plotting at Rheims, where indeed he had never been in his life. In the face of this evidence from a man of position known to the judges, Collington was not sentenced ; but he was not discharged, and after nearly three years more of imprisonment in the Tower, he was banished the country. As to the rest of the accused, there was no evidence against them but that which had thus been proved and acknowledged to be untrustworthy, but neither
1 Jardine, pp. 87 — 89, and Dasent, Acts of the Privy Council, vol. xiii. pp. 171 and 249.
2 The indictment, trial, and sentence of Ford, Filbie, Briant, Hart, Shert, and Richardson, Coram Rege, 23 and 24 Eliz., Mich., 3°.
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Crown lawyers, nor witnesses, nor judges appear to have been in the least abashed, or to have hesitated a moment about the fate of the prisoners. Indeed, among the spectators of the trial was a priest of the name of Nicholson, who was able to make a declaration about Blessed Thomas Ford similar to that which had saved Collington's life ; seeing the success of Mr. Lancaster's intervention he came forward in his turn to offer his evidence. But the only result was, that the judge immediately ordered his arrest and committal to prison, where he was well- nigh starved to death. As to the Blessed Thomas Ford, whether he had been at Rheims or in London, whether the evidence against him was proved false or not, a traitor he was to be, and so, with the remaining five of his brethren accused with him, he received sentence of death on November the T7th. The execution of the three martyrs, Blessed Campion, Sherwin, and Briant, took place as we have seen on December the ist. What the principle of their selection may have been, at least as regards the two latter, does not appear. But weeks and months went by, and the rest heard nothing more of their fate. The explanation of this is not difficult. The unscrupulous Ministers of Elizabeth, unwilling to go on adding to the odium they had brought on themselves by the martyrdoms of such men as Nelson, Sherwood, and Hanse, yet bent on crushing the apostolic movement of the Seminaries, adopted the expedient of a trumped-up conspiracy. But, thoroughly well informed as they were, they must immediately have become aware
BLESSED THOMAS FORD 449
that their expedient had utterly failed. It was not only abroad that every Catholic land rang with the story of the sufferers, who were thought and spoken of and outwardly honoured on the same footing as the martyrs of old : but in England the general conscience utterly rejected the pretended plot. The wretched instruments employed as witnesses, Sledd, Munday, Caddy, and Eliot ; the cases of Collington and Ford, proved to have been in London, when the story of the plot required them to be in Rheims; the whole character and bearing of the martyrs and their solemn protestations, left no doubt upon the public mind as to the merits of their trial and the cause of their death. The state of public feeling is shown in various ways, but in none more plainly than by the first publication put out by the Government in its own defence. It is called a " Particular declaration of the traitorous affection of Campion and other condemned priests, witnessed by their own confessions, written in reproof of the slanderous bookes and libels delivered out to the contrary by such as are maliciously affected towards her Majestic and the State. Published by authoritie." l In this paper, Simpson says,2 "the pretended plot of Rheims and Rome is prudently forgotten " — the very matter of the indict- ment on which they were tried and put to death ! What was to be done then with the eleven
1 Imprinted at London by Christopher Barker, printer to the Queene's most excellent Majestic, An. Do. 1582, 4to, 14 leaves. Printed in J. Morgan's Phoenix Britannicus, p. 481 ; StateTrials, vol. i. p. 1073, and Tierney-Dodd, vol. iii. Appendix, pp. v. — xvi.
2 Life of Campion, p. 332.
DD II.
450 BLESSED THOMAS FORD
remaining condemned men ? To discharge them was to give up the battle and to acknowledge that the martyrs had been murdered. To execute them on the discredited trial was to court fresh odium. The Ministers reverted in fact to the course that had been followed with the earlier martyrs, Nelson, Sherwood, and Hanse, only in a more elaborate and methodical way. A paper of six questions was drawn up and proposed to each of the confessors under sentence of death by Popham, the Attorney General, and Egerton, the Solicitor General, with two civilians, Hammond and Lewis. These questions bring back the argument from the order of fact to that of belief, or rather of hypothesis. The martyrs are not allowed to declare that they accept Elizabeth as their Queen. There is no question as to what they have done. They are asked what they would hold or do in certain contingencies and under certain circumstances which Catholics and Protestants were sure to understand differ- ently. The Government hoped by these means to cause our martyrs to be suspected of poli- tical and anti-patriotic conspiracy, to make them odious by confounding their zeal for the faith with disloyalty to their Queen and country, and thus gradually to over-ride and pervert public opinion with regard to them. Adroit slander was no less powerful a weapon in such hands than violent persecution, and the skilful use of both combined was in the end but too successful. Here are the questions proposed to the martyrs six months after their trial and sentence.
BLESSED THOMAS FORD 451
" The Articles ministered to the seven priests and others with them, with the answers of these seven to the same.
"i3th May, 1582.
" i. Whether the Bull of Pius Quintus, against the queene's Majestic, be a lawfull sentence, and ought to be obeyed by the subjects of England ?
" 2. Whether the queene's Majestie be a lawfull queene, and ought to be obeyed by the subjects of England, notwithstanding the bull of Pius Quintus, or any bull or sentence that the Pope hath pro- nounced or may pronounce against her Majestie ?
" 3. Whether the Pope have or had power to authorize the Earls of Northumberlande and West- morland and other her Majestie's subjects to rebell or take armes against her Majestie or to authorize doctour Saunders or others to invade Ireland or any other her dominions, and to beare armes against her : and whether they did therein lawfully or no ?
" 4. Whether the Pope have power to discharge any of her highness subjects or the subjects of any Christian prince from their allegiance or othe of obedience to her Majestie or to their prince for any cause ?
" 5. Whether the said doctour Saunders, in his booke of the Visible Monarchie of the Church, and doctour Bristowe in his booke of Motives (writing in allowance, commendation and confirmation of the said bull of Pius Quintus) have therein taught, testified or maintained a truth or falsehood ?
"6. If the Pope doe by his bull or sentence,, pronounce her Majestie to be deprived and no-
452 BLESSED THOMAS FORD
lawful queene, and her subjects to be discharged of their allegiance and obedience unto her, and after, the Pope or any other by his appointment and authoritie, doe invade this realme, which part would you take, or which part ought a good subject of England to take ? " l
Of similar questions Blessed Campion had said : 41 Since it must be answered, I say generally that these matters be merely spiritual points of doctrine and disputable in schools, no part of mine indict- ment, not to be given in evidence, and unfit to be discussed at the King's Bench. To conclude, they are no matters of fact : they be not in the trial of the country ; the jury ought not to take any notice of them."
And though there are still writers, like Mr. Froude, who reject Campion's plea, juster men have come to acknowledge the iniquity of these proceedings. Thus Hallam says of Burleigh's tract, " That any matter of opinion not proved to have ripened into an overt act and extorted only, or rather conjectured, through a compulsive inquiry could sustain, in law or justice, a conviction for high treason, is what the author of this pamphlet has not rendered manifest."2 Blessed Thomas Ford replied as follows :
" Thomas Forde's Answere.
" Thomas Ford. — To the first, he saith that he cannot answere, because he is not privy to the
1 Butler's Historical Memoirs, vol. i. p. 200. Also Tierney-Dodd, vol. iii. Appendix, p. iv.
2 Hallam, Constitutional History, vol. i. p. 150.
BLESSED THOMAS FORD 453
circumstances of that bull : but if he did see a bull published by Gregory the thirteenth, he would then deliver his opinion thereof.
"To the second, he sayeth that the Pope hath authoritie to depose a prince on certain occasions ; and when such a bull shall be pronounced against her Majestic, he will then answere what the duty of her subjects and what her right is.
" To the third he sayeth, he is a private subject and will not answere to any of these questions.
" To the fourth, he sayth that the Pope hath authoritie upon certaine occasions, which he will not name, to discharge subjects of their obedience to their prince.
"To the fifth, he saieth, that doctour Saunders and doctour Bristowe be learned men ; and whether they have taught truly in their bookes mentioned in this article, he referreth the answere to themselves. For himself he will not answere.
" To the last, he sayeth that, when that case shall happen, he will make answere, and not before.
" THOMAS FORDE.
"JOHN POPHAM. DA. LEWIS.
"THOMAS EGERTON. JOHN HAMMOND."1
On the results of this extra-judicial examination it was determined to proceed to the holy priest's execution ; though indeed it would seem that the examination was made as a public pretext, and the execution had been resolved on already. It is said that " whilst waiting for execution, Mr. Forde was
1 Tierney-Dodd, iii. p. xiii.
454 BLESSED THOMAS FORD
put into irons during thirty days.1 It was on the 28th of May, I582,2 a fortnight after the examination, that Blessed Thomas Ford, together with two other martyrs, Blessed John Shert and Blessed Robert Johnson, after so long a series of cruel treatments, and so much art used to make them confess the feigned treason or deny their faith, were all trailed upon hurdles from the Tower of London through the streets to Tyburn, between six and seven of the clock in the morning.3 A touching incident of the journey has been recorded for us by a bitter enemy, the false witness, Munday : " All the way as they were drawen," he writes, " they were accompanied with divers zealous and godly men, who in mylde and loving speeches made knowen unto them how justly God repayeth the reprobate &c., . . . among which godly perswasions Maister Sherife himself both learnedly and earnestly laboured unto them, . . . but these good endevours tooke no wished effect : their own evil disposition so blinded them that there was no way for grace to enter.
" When they were come beyond St. Giles in the Field, there approached unto the hurdell one of their owne secte and a Priest, as himself hath confessed, who in this manner spake unto the prisoners,
1 Note to Challoner, Edition of 1836, vol. i. p. 37.
2 The Privy Council sent a letter to the Lieutenant of the Tower the previous day " that whereas the Sheriffs of London, &c., were to-morrow to receive certain Seminary priests lately con- demned, he should for certain good considerations stay John Harte, and signify so much on their Lordship's behalf to the said Sheriffs." {Dasent, Acts, vol. xiii. p. 428.)
3 Brief e Historic, p. 102.
BLESSED THOMAS FORD 455
* O, gentlemen, be joyfull in the blood of Jesus Christe, for this is the triumph and joye.' Being asked why he used such words he said unto the prisoners againe, ' I pronounce unto you a pardon, yea I pronounce a full remission and pardon unto your soules.' Using these and other trayterous speeches, holde was layde on him . . . and notwith- standing such means of resistaunce as himselfe used, he was delivered unto Mr. Thomas Norris, Pursuivante, who brought him unto Newgate, wher he confessed unto him that he was a priest." l
When the procession reached Tyburn, " first Mr. Forde," says the Briefe Historic, "being set up in the cart, blessed himself with the sign of the Cross, being so weak as he fell down in the cart ; and after he was up, he said, ' I am a Catholic and do die in the Catholic religion.' And therewith he was interrupted by Sheriff Martin, saying, ' You come not hither to confess your religion, but as a traitor and malefactor to the Queen's Majesty and the whole realm, moving and stirring of sedition ; and therefore I pray you, go to, and confess your fault, and submit yourself to the Queen's mercy, and no doubt but she would forgive you.'
1 A breefe and true report of the Execution of certaine Traytours at Tiborne the xxviii and xxx dayes of May e, 1582. Gathered by A.M. who was there present. (Reprinted in Downside Review, December, 1891, vol. x. no. 3, p. 215.) Bitterly hostile as this narrative is, it gives a most striking confirmation of the fidelity of the Catholic Acts. The dedication is to Alderman Richard Martin, then sheriff, and from it we learn that Munday, who had been a witness at the trial, was brought to the place of execution expressly that he might be confronted with the martyrs before the populace.
456 BLESSED THOMAS FORD
" Whereunto Mr. Ford answered, 'That supposed offence whereof I was indicted and condemned was the conspiring of her Majesty's death at Rome and Rhemes, whereof I was altogether not guilty : for the offence was supposed for the conspiring the Queen's Majesty's death in the 22nd year of her Majesty's reign ; at which time I was in England remaining, and long before that.1 For I have remained here for the space of six or seven years, and never during that time departed this realm ; whereof I might bring the witness of an hundred, yea, of five hundred sufficient men, and had there- upon been discharged at the bar, if I would have disclosed their names with whom I had been. Which I did forbear only for fear to bring them into trouble.' Then Sheriff Martin said, ' Here is your own handwriting, with the testimony of wor- shipful men, as the Queen's attorney, Dr. Hammond, Dr. Lewis, and others ; and if that will not serve, here is one of your own companions (Munday) that was the Pope's scholar, to testify your offence/ Mr. Ford answered, ' That notwithstanding, I am altogether not guilty, whatsoever you have written.'
" He continued for the most part in prayer secretly to himself, during the time that the sheriff or any other spoke to him. Then was a scroll of his examination (of which we have spoken above), read by a minister. To some articles he said nothing, but to others he said that the Pope for
1 "Neither was he ever at Rome or Rhemes in all his life." (Briefe Historic, marginal note, p. 102.)
BLESSED THOMAS FORD 457
some causes may depose a Prince of his estate and dignity, and discharge the subjects of their duties and allegiance, 'for' (quoth he), 'this question was disputed thirteen years since, at Oxford, by the divines there before the Queen's Majesty, and there it was made and proved to be a most clear case, in her own presence.' And here, being interrupted, Munday, the Pope's scholar, being called as a witness, said that Ford was privy to their con- spiracies ; but was not able to affirm that ever he saw him beyond the seas. This his assertion Mr. Ford utterly denied upon his death, and being asked what he thought of the Queen's Majesty, and withal willed to ask her and the whole realm which he had stirred to sedition forgiveness, he said that he acknowledged her for his sovereign and Queen, and that he never in his life had offended her.1 And so praying secretly he desired all those that were of his faith to pray with him, and ended with this prayer, Jesu, Jesu, Jesu, esto mihi Jesus," and in a few moments more Jesus had received him into the glorious ranks of His martyrs.
1 Monday's version is : " ' I have not offended her Majesty, but if I have, I ask her forgiveness and all the world, and in no other treason have I offended than my religion, which is the Catholic faith wherein I will live and die. And as for the Queen's Majesty, I do acknowledge her supremacy in all things temporal, but as concerning ecclesiastical causes I deny her ; that only belongeth to the Vicar of Christ, the Pope.' In brief, he granted to nothing, but showed himself an impious and obstinate traitor, and so he remained to the death, refusing to pray in the English tongue, mumbling a few Latin prayers, desiring those that were ex domo Dei to pray for him, and so he ended his life." He was allowed to hang till he was dead.
458 BLESSED THOMAS FORD
In a paper among Father Grene's transcripts at Stonyhurst1 we find the following story.
" The 28th of March [May], 1582, were martyred at London Mr. Thomas Ford, and Mr. John Shert, and Mr. Robert Johnson, priests. The same day they appeared to Mr. Rowsam [i.e., the Ven. Stephen Rowsham, Mart.] in the Tower, and let him feel what pains their martyrdom had been to them, and with what joy they were rewarded."
" In the eyes of the unwise they seemed to die, but they are in peace."
E. S. K. ED.
AUTHORITIES. — Briefe Historie, pp. 102 — 104 ; Concertatio, ff. 86, 87. The subject of the " Six Questions " is admirably treated by Allen in the Modest Defence, pp.62 — 71. See also The Month for November, 1904.
PORTRAIT. — See below.
RELICS. — In the English Convent at Bruges (Priory of Nazareth of the Austin Canonesses of the Lateran) is pre- served a finger of Blessed Thomas Ford. It is white as wax, and is set in a small silver handle, and kept in a glass tube. This finger was taken over to Belgium by the martyr's great-nephew, who married and settled at Bruges. It was given to the convent by Sister Mary Catharine Willis, who received it from her mother, a descendant of the family, June 14, 1748.
The family also possessed the knife with which the martyr was quartered, but it is unhappily lost. This and the finger are said to have been purchased by the martyr's brother after the execution.
1 Printed in Pollen's Acts of English Martyrs, p. 334.
BLESSED THOMAS FORD 459
The relic is certified to have worked two remarkable cures.
The picture of the martyr came with the relic, and was also a family heirloom. It has the following inscription ; Thomas Fordus, Exoniensis, Coll. Angl. Duaci Sacerdos, missus in Angliam, 1576; passtis Londini, 28 Maii, 1582.
There is a scroll painted in the picture with the words, Catholicus ego sum et in Catholica fide moriar, and Jesu, Jesu, Jesu, esto mihi Jesus ; his dying words.
There is also a piece of skin (apparently from the inside of the hand, showing the wrinkles and furrows of the skin) preserved at Stonyhurst, which is labelled B. Ffordei vel Shertei vel Roberti Jonsoni, it not being certain to which of the three fellow-martyrs it really belonged.
Two small fragments of this relic are in Father Morris's collection at Farm Street.
At Archbishop's House, Westminster, is also a small relic which may belong to any of the three martyrs, and is labelled, Ford, Shert, Johnstone incertum cujus. It is a particle of some hard and dark substance.
XIV. THE BLESSED JOHN SHERT,
SECULAR PRIEST. Tyburn, 28 May, 1582.
THE day which had been honoured by the martyr- dom of Blessed Margaret Plantagenet forty-one years earlier, and now by that of Blessed Thomas Ford, was still further glorified by the passion of his two companions. Of these, the first to suffer was John Shert. He was a native of Cheshire, and, according to Dodd, is said to have been born at Shert Hall, near Macclesfield. He was sent to Oxford, where he entered Brasenose College, and took his degree in 1566. l On leaving the University, Wood says he became a schoolmaster in London and was " much resorted to for his excellent way of teaching : but being a Catholic at heart, left his country and went to Douay."2 We may gather that his life in London brought him both honour and profit. But for the sake of the "pearl of great price" he gave up all he had, and became a penniless exile. From the Douay Diary we learn that he did not at once
1 John Shirte, or Sherte, sup. for B.A. May 8, 1566, adm. January 17, 1566-7, disp. February 4. ~ Fasti Oxonienses, January 17, 1566.
BLESSED JOHN SHERT 461
seek admission to the Seminary on his conversion, but entered the service of Dr. Stapleton, perhaps as a secretary or amanuensis.1 But at last he either became clear about his vocation to the priesthood or saw his way to carrying it out, and in January, 1576, the following entry occurs in the Diary : " On January the gth, Mr. J. Shert, in order to devote himself entirely to sacred theological studies, set free from all other cares, commended by that distinguished man Dr. Stapleton, in whose service he formerly was, was admitted to our College, and lives as a poor student at the common expense." For a short time he was the contemporary of Blessed Thomas Ford,2 one day to be the companion of his martyrdom. Another entry in the Diary3 of this year records a short journey to England, whence he returned after eighteen days' absence, with two young students for the College. The fact that the Diarist says he was " sent " to England, implying that the two youths were the object of his journey, and that the College authorities4 sent him for this purpose rather than avail themselves of one of the many trustworthy persons continually passing between England and
1 Stapleton, who was one of the most distinguished of the English exiles for the Faith, was a busy writer and professor. Dodd says "his reputation was so high that he was looked upon as the common master of the time" and his works as "a common storehouse," to which " Cardinal Perron gives the preference without any exception."
2 The Blessed Thomas Ford left for England on May 2. of this year.
3 Douay Diaries, pp. 107, 108.
4 Allen was at this moment in Rome.
462 BLESSED JOHN SHERT
Douay, suggests that the two youths were probably of the number of his old pupils, and were brought to the Seminary by the happy attraction of his influence and example.1 By the November following he was already subdeacon, though the date of his ordination is not recorded. At this period the first beginnings of the foundation of the English College at Rome were being made. William Holt and Ralph Standish left Douay on August the i6th to be the first alumni, and four others followed on October the ist. Pope Gregory XIII. had written to Dr. Allen, says the Diary,2 " enjoining on him to send thither a few chosen youths, who would benefit by this advantage and who were judged likely to be useful labourers in the English harvest." Shert was now selected for this honourable mission and set out for Rome on November the gth. He made the journey as one of a distinguished company : — his old patron and friend Dr. Stapleton ; Dr. Gregory Martin, who was going to the Eternal City to take part in the organization and studies of the new College ; Mr. Dr. White, probably the learned Fellow of New College, who was at this time a layman, but later, after being twice married, was by dispensation of Clement VIII. promoted to the priesthood, made Chancellor of the Uni- versity of Douay, at the special recommenda- tion of the Holy See, and Canon of St. Peter's at Douay ; 3 and lastly, Mr. Sheprey, a priest
1 Douay Diaries, p. 113. Entry of November 9, 1576.
2 Ibid. p. 25. 3 Dodd, ii. 382.
BLESSED JOHN SHEET 463
who had been Prefect of the College of Anchin, at Douay, and was now going to live in Italy, where he became chaplain to Cardinal Paleotto at Bologna.1
On his arrival at Rome he found the new establishment not yet organized : but Cardinal Moroni, Protector of England, under whose authority the old Hospital still remained, now issued a Paper of Instructions, which gave the first preliminary Constitution to the College, and a copy of which exists in the Archives of the see of Westminster. It nominates the first six students and admits them to live in the Hospital, and the very first name on the list is that of Blessed John Shert. The follow- ing is a translation of the passages most immediately to the purpose.
"The number of the community for the present, including the scholars, shall not exceed fifteen, the right to increase or diminish the number being reserved to our discretion, as the income of the said Hospital may require.
" For the present six English scholars shall be received whose names are as follows, viz. :
"JOHN SHERT [SHARTUS], THOMAS BELL.
Subdeacon. JOHN MUSH.
"JOHN ASKEW. WILLIAM Low."2 " JOHN GORE.
1 Douay Diaries, Appendix, p. 360. 2 Westminster Archives, vol. i. p. 33.
464 BLESSED JOHN SHEET
Blessed John Shert remained at Rome until the summer of 1578. Of his residence there and his ordination we have no record, for the existing Annals of the College only commence in March, 1579, when the Jesuit Fathers took over the government. He made the return journey from Rome as he had gone there, with Dr. Gregory Martin, and they arrived on July the 23rd at Rheims, whither the College had been transferred in the interval. He spent a month within its hospitable walls, and on August the 27th left for England. He was thus the first missionary to enter England from the Seminary at Rome,1 and was to be the second of the forty martyrs, who were trained and sanctified in that venerable College.
His ministry in England, like his Master's, lasted nearly three years. Wood and other early biographers tell us, that he lived and worked chiefly in his own county of Cheshire. But the State Papers show that the latter part of his missionary career was passed in or near London. Our martyr is generally called Shorte in these documents, and he was also indicted under this name. The earliest of
1 In the Register, which Foley calls the Diary of the English College, it is stated that John Askew was " the first labourer our College sent into the English vineyard." (Foley, Records S.J. vol. vi. p. 67.) The first Douay Diary also (p. 26) records in 1579, "Joannes Ascuus, qui anno 77 missus erat Roman diaconus, hoc anno redit sacerdos et in Angliam mittitur, primus ex Anglorum Collegia de Urbe." The rightful place is, however, given to Shert in a document of the later years of Elizabeth's reign (Douay Diaries, Appendix, p. 290), where the martyr is thus described : " D. Joannes Shertus, martir, 1582 ; de quo vide Concert., fol. 87. Hie fnit primus Romani Seminarii alumnus qui Angliam ingressus est."
BLESSED JOHN SHEET 465
these references is in a list of priests drawn up by " A. B., late servant to the Earl of Westmorland," and who had now turned traitor. The third name in his list, which is dated i8th of August, 1580, is, " Shorte, otherwise Stalie, in Holborn."1
The next reference occurs just a year later, that is, in August, 1581, when Eliot, the betrayer of Campion, mentions his name among the " Popish priests I have been acquainted withal."2 It would seem that almost all the priests Eliot mentions, lived in the vicinity of London.
On the 4th of August, 1581, moreover, we read in the Privy Council Registers, that the Council ordered Martin, Hammond, and Norton, the inquisitors who were examining the Catholic prisoners in the Tower, "to inquire after one Nashe, &c. . . . and what is become of one Shorte a priest, who resorted to the said Nashe's house, and what other Jesuits or priests have been harboured there," &c. From other passages in the same Registers it appears that the John Nashe, who is here named, lived in Lawrence Lane, and that Father Campion was supposed to have visited the house. John Nashe, however, does not seem to have been a Catholic.3
1 R.O. French Correspondence.
2 Foley, Records S.J. vol. ii. p. 586.
3 On March 19, 1583, a John Nashe, who had been committed by the Bishop of London, was sent from the Marshalsea to Newgate " for causes of religion as a precisian," i.e., a. Puritan (R.O. Domestic, vol. clix. nn. 32, 35, 36.) There was, however, a Michael Nash, a Catholic, living in the county of Oxford in 1574. (Ibid. vol. xcix. n. 55.) Thomas Nashe, the satirist, who is some- times so favourable to Catholics, must at this time have been a mere boy.
EE II.
466 BLESSED JOHN SHERT
The last reference perhaps seems at first sight to prove too much, for according to the Diarium Turris for the I4th of July, 1581, Shert was " brought to the Tower " on that day together with Payne and Godsalve. There is no reason to question the correctness of this entry, which we know to be accurate so far as Payne and Godsalve were concerned. Consequently the Privy Council must have forgotten for the moment the name of one of its victims, or Shert may have been consigned to prison under a different name. There is no doubt that his right name was soon found out, for it appears among the Tower Bills from Christmas, 1581, till his death in the following May.1
We have none of Blessed John Shert's examina- tions, though we may conclude, from his having come to the Tower with Payne, that he was one of those "runagate priests from Douay and Rome," to use Walsingham's phrase, whom that official " by the Queen's express commandment " examined the whole day long, on the charge of having conspired " against her Majesty's person," and then sent to the Tower, while to Lord Burghley he confessed that he thought the charge " will prove nothing."
The martyr's name does not appear in con- nection with Campion's disputations in September, though he may have been there.
Our next information is that he was included in the list of those indicted for the ridiculous " con-
1 The Catholic Record Society is preparing to print these Bills. As the Bills from June to December are wanting, we cannot learn the date of Shert's committal from this source.
BLESSED JOHN SHEET 467
spiracy of Rheims and Rome," though he had been in England the whole of the time in which it was pretended to have been concocted, and though the witnesses had never seen him in their lives before the trial. He received sentence on November the lyth, with Blessed Thomas Ford and his com- panions. He was one of those respited until the following May, and whom the Privy Council required to give a written answer to the "six ai tides" or questions already mentioned, in order to find some new pretext for their execution. He altogether declined, however, to entangle himself in the questions.1 His answer was as follows :
"John Shert. To all the articles he saith that he is a Catholique and swarveth in no point from the Catholique faith. And in other sort, to any of these articles, he refuseth to answer.
"JOHN SHERT.
" JOHN POPHAM. DA. LEWIS.
"THOMAS EGERTON. JOHN HAMMOND."
From his words at Tyburn, it appears that he and his fellow-martyrs underwent some other examination, not otherwise recorded, and also that he was racked either before or after his trial. The above answer bears date May the I3th, and on the 28th, after ten months' weary imprisonment, he was drawn along that Via dolorosa of so many of our
1 Butler's Memoirs of English Catholics, vol. i. p. 204, and Tierney-Dodd, iii. p. xiii. (Appendix).
468 BLESSED JOHN SHERT
English martyrs, from the Tower to Tyburn, between six and seven o'clock in the morning. He was made to look on at the ghastly process of Blessed Thomas Ford's martyrdom, in the hope of breaking down his courage. But the grace of martyrdom was strong in him. While his old friend was hanging from the gallows his face was bright and smiling, and with his hands lifted up,1 he cried, aloud : " O happy Thomas ! Happy art thou that didst run that happy race ! O benedicta anima : O blessed soul, thou art in a good case ! Thou blessed soul, pray for me." Then standing himself in the cart beneath the gallows, and turning (by command of the sheriff) towards the place where his friend was being cut into pieces, he went on praying aloud to him as a martyr just crowned : " O Thomas, O happy Thomas ! O blessed soul, happy art thou ! O blessed soul, pray for me." These prayers were too much for the Puritans present — it was generally the " ministers" who interrupted on these occasions — but his only answer to their protests was to add : " O blessed Lady, Mother of God, pray for me, and all the Saints of Heaven, pray for me." Then the sheriff, in his turn, reproached him with " false doctrine," but he answered that it was sound and true doctrine, and he was about to seal it with his blood. And then he went on to thank God aloud, •enumerating His mercies.
" First, I give Thee most hearty thanks, for that
1 " Holding up his hands as the Papists are wont to do before their images." (Munday, op. cit.)
BLESSED JOHN SHERT 469.
Thou didst create me out of nothing to Thy likeness and similitude. Secondly, for my redemption by the death of Thy sweet Son, Jesus Christ my Saviour and Redeemer. And lastly, that thou wilt bring me, Thy poor servant, to so happy and glorious a death for Thy sake ; although in the eyes of worldlings contumelious and reproachful, yet to me most joyful and glorious, and for the which I yield Thee most hearty thanks." At this point the sheriff interrupted him again and called on him to ask the Queen's forgiveness for his treasons. "The asking of forgiveness," the martyr replied, " doth imply an offence done ; and for me to charge myself, being innocent, it were not my duty. We have been racked and tormented for these things and nothing hath been found. We have also been twice examined since our condemnation, which hath not been seen heretofore in any malefactor. Those supposed treasons for which I am con- demned, I leave between God and myself; and, upon my death, I am altogether innocent and faultless ; and I utterly refuse to ask her forgiveness for this fact whereof I am condemned, for that I am not guilty. But if in any other private matter I have offended, I ask her and all the world forgiveness. For it is impossible for me to be guilty of the conspiracy at Rheims and Rome, being in England long time before the said sup- posed treasons were committed, and continuing here ever since."1 And this, adds his biographer, his accuser Munday did not much deny, for he said
1 Briefe Historie, p. 106.
47o BLESSED JOHN SHERT
he never knew him beyond the seas, neither at Rome nor at Rheims.
The sheriff called on one of the ministers who stood by to read the martyr's examination. For in these strange executions the authorities, as we have seen in the case of Blessed Thomas Ford, had recourse to the novel device of producing the witnesses and the records before the assembled crowd ; a striking evidence of their consciousness that the judicial trial and sentence were estimated by the popular sentiment at their true worth. In this case the minister could only answer that, " as the man is obstinate now, so upon his examination was he as obstinate, for he uttered nothing that is to be read." On this the sheriff went so far as to declare that, if the holy priest would only acknow- ledge himself guilty, he had authority himself to stay his execution and to return him back without more ado. No wonder the Government would have paid a good price for such an acknowledgment, for it would have freed them from the disgrace of these judicial murders, which would have thus acquired a justification. But the martyr answered : " Should I, for saving this carcase, condemn my soul ? God forbid."1
His tormentors had not yet done. He was asked what he thought of the Queen. " I acknow-
1 Munday's charitable comment is : " Whereto with an hypo- critical outward boldness, but an inward fainting fear (as after- wards everyone plainly beheld), he gave this answer : ' What, Master Sheriff, shall I save this frail and vile carcase and damn mine own soul ? No, no, I am a Catholic, in that faith I was born, in that faith will I die, and here shall my blood seal it.' "
BLESSED JOHN SHERT 471
ledge her," he said, " for my sovereign lady and Queen, for whose prosperous estate and well-doing I did always pray." Next they asked him if he thought her to be supreme governor, under Christ, of the Church of England. He answered : " I will give to Caesar that which is his, and to God that which belongeth to God. She is not, nor cannot be ; nor any other but only the supreme pastor." " What ! " broke in the sheriff, " do you mean that whore of Babylon, the Pope ?" "Take heed, Mr. Sheriff," rejoined the martyr, " for the day will come when that shall be a sore word for your soul ! And then it shall repent you that ever you called Christ's Vicar upon earth, the whore.1 When you and I shall stand at one bar, before that equal Judge who judgeth all things aright, then, I say, will you repent your saying ; and then I must give testimony against you."
This constantly recurring wrangle of the dis- putatious and offensive Puritan zealots, ministers, and others, within a few minutes of the martyrs' deaths must have been no small aggravation of their passion. In the present instance, it might have gone on for some time longer had not the people begun to clamour to the hangman " to despatch, saying that he had lived too long." The man beginning therefore to do his office,
1 " ' Oh, Mr. Sheriff, you little remember the day when, as you and I shall stand both at one bar, and I come as witness against you, that you called that holy and blessed Vicar of Christ, the whore of Rome.' At which words the people cried again : ' Hang him ! Hang him ! Away with him ! ' " (Munday, op. cit.)
472 BLESSED JOHN SHERT
the martyr gave him his handkerchief and two- shillings, saying : " Take this for thy hire, and I pray God forgive thee," and then turning to the people on all sides, and with his hands raised up to draw their attention, he cried out, with a loud voice : " Whosoever dieth out of the Catholic Church, dieth in the state of damnation." The few moments that still remained were for God alone. His last words were, " Domine Jesu Christe, Fill Dei vivi, pone passionem, crucem et mortem tuam inter judicium tuum et animam meam, with his Pater noster and Ave Maria and other like prayers; " and he was still praying aloud when the cart was drawn from beneath him.1 His hands instinctively clutched at the rope, and were pulled down by the officers ; and the circumstance suggested to the mind of the Puritan sheriff the characteristic remark : " Notwithstanding his obstinacy, see how willing he is to live ! "
Yes! he was "willing to live," so willing that he did not grudge in that cause to die. He had learned his Master's lesson and practised it to the end : " He that loveth his life shall lose it ; and he that hateth his life in this world, keepeth it unto life eternal."2
E. S. K.
1 " He began his Pater noster in Latin, and before he had fully ended two petitions of it, he fell into the Latin Creed, and then to the Paternoster again : afterward he said the Ave Maria, which done, knocking himself on the breast, he said, Jesus, esto mihi Jesus." (Munday, op. cit.)
2 John xii. 25.
BLESSED JOHN SHEET 473
AUTHORITIES. — The Brief e Historic, pp. 104 — 108, with the parallel passages in the Concertatio, fol. 87, Yepes, fol. 377. Munday, &c., as above. The deaths of those who were alumni of the English College, Rome, were. commemorated in the Annual Letters of the Society of Jesus for 1582 (Edit. 1584), p. 16, and in the Letters of the English College for the same year, in Foley, vi. p. 86, where, however, Shert is erro- neously reckoned among the martyrs of May the soth, and Richardson (vere Laurence Johnson) is named instead of Robert Johnson. Father Christopher Grene's Collectanea N, at Stonyhurst, is largely devoted to notes on the martyrs from the English College, Rome. For Shert see i. 23, ii. 56. See also Worthington's Catalogue (1614), p. 25.
RELICS. — The only relic of Blessed John Shert is the corporal already described, and the uncertain relic, mentioned in the last section (p. 459).
XV. THE BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON,
SECULAR PRIEST. Tyburn, 28 May, 1582.
THE third of that day's glorious victims was the Blessed Robert Johnson. We have no notices of his earl}' life except that he was born in Shropshire, and that in his youth, as Challoner says, he was in the service of a gentleman's family. He seems to have left England about the time of the great increase of persecution which followed the Northern Rising in November, 1569. At all events, he entered the German College, Rome, the English College not being as yet founded, on the ist of October, 1571, and his written undertaking, made on that occasion, to accept the discipline of the house, is still extant among the records of that Seminary.1
1 "Ego Robert** Jonsonus Anglus.diau. Cestrcn ad proposita per R*"* patrem Jacob*m Gennens nomine vtneralilium patrnm superior** Colltgii Germanifi, his meis serif tis responded, ac in primis quantum ad socros or dines attixft, paratus sum initiari q*ando R*" patribus placuerit ; ac in quam- cunque ptrtem ab eis mittar, hbenttr me itnrum promitto : lectiones etiam qmas miki /?*' patres proponent diligenter (deo favente) visitabo. Demum regmlms. observftionts, ac mom pmdicti colltgii sum ma obtdientia observa- turus, R*" patribns debitam obedientiam ac rnerentiam spondee me exhibi- turum.pmsentibms Carole Vienens, Veto MOeto et Baltkasar Kdnig, die
BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON 475
He left before ordination, and betook himself to the Archbishop of Cambray, from whom he passed to the Seminary at Douay before 1576. In the begin- ning of April of that year he was made priest, being sent to Brussels for his ordination. He made the Exercises with the Jesuit Fathers at Louvain in preparation for his ministry, and then set out for England.
After an interval of more than three years, we find him mentioned in the Douay Diary, as arriving at the Rheims Seminary on the 28th of September, 1579, on a pilgrimage to Rome. He was accompanied from England by a youth of nineteen, named Robert Charnocke, afterwards a student at the English College at Rome, and later a well-known priest, and a layman named Hyde.
At Rheims Charnocke parted company with his companions and went to the school of the Jesuits at Douay, an indication that he was not yet formed enough to begin his theology, while the other two " having been to confession and communion," as the Diary goes out of its way to note, "continued the journey towards Rome which they had begun, on October the 3rd. Mr. [Henry] Orton and his pupil, Price, had started the day before." It is probable therefore that Johnson and Orton often met on their way Romewards, and this is interesting,
primo Octobris, 1572. Ego Robert** Jonson*s man* fropria." (Ex MSS. Coll. Germ. Ungar. p. 55.)
"Robert** Jonsontts AngJ*s ingress** est in Collegium i Octobris, anno 1572.
" Discessit mense Aprilis, 1574, ad Archiefm. Cameracenseia. [Alia man*]. Fuit afect*s martyrio, in Anglia, anno 1582."
476 BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON
since they were destined ere long to be fellow- prisoners, and to be condemned to death together, though Orton eventually escaped Tyburn and was sent into banishment. Orton's pupil, Price, is perhaps to be identified with Isaac Price, who entered the English College, Rome, on the 8th of December, 1579, a date which would well accord with the time usually spent in those days on the journey from Rheims to Rome, and which we may provisionally accept as being also about the date of our martyr's return to the Eternal City. Unfor- tunately the "Pilgrim Book" of the English Hospice, at which they would have stayed, can give us no information on this head, for it does not begin until the following year.
In Rome our pilgrim doubtless visited the Holy Places with a fervour increased by the pains and perils of the long journey from England. The one incident, which is recorded of him while there, gives us a very high idea of his spiritual life. He spent " some weeks," that is, no doubt the full comple- ment of forty days, in making the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola. Father Persons writes :
" Mr. Robert Johnson, a very good and godly man, who a little before our departure from Rome [Easter, 1580] came thither for his devotion out of England, where he had laboured faithfully some years before. Being in Rome with intention to return back to England very shortly, presaging, as it were, that some great affliction would fall upon
BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON 477
him ere it were long, for service of his Master, and for better bearing of the same, he earnestly desired to arm himself with spiritual arms, and requested Father Persons, that he 'might retire himself into some solitary place of the Jesuits, for some weeks, to make the spiritual exercises and meditations of Father Ignatius de Loyola, founder of the same order, for his better help ; and so he did." l
From the dates and papers which will follow we gather that the martyr started off on foot on his journey homeward almost immediately after the end of his long retreat, having received from the ever-generous Pope Gregory XIII., the sum of fifty crowns for his travelling expenses. His travelling companion at the outset was Dr. Allen, who had been to Rome that winter to settle the affairs of the newly established English College, and to arrange for the mission of the Jesuits, and who wrote back, on the 2Qth of February, 1580, from Sienna to Father Agazzari a letter, of which some extracts are happily preserved in Father Grene's Collectanea A/".2
He says, after describing the worries of travelling with a bad horse, " I say this in order that those whom you are going to send may know that travellers on foot are freed from much solicitude, labour, peril, and loss. Johnson and the other, who left Rome on
1 Life of Campion, cap. xxiii. This was written in 1594, before St. Ignatius was beatified.
2 Stonyhurst, Collectanea M. fol. 113. This is not included in Father Knox's Edition of Allen's Letters.
478 BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON
foot at the same time as we did, have outstripped
us now for some time."
Allen arrived in Rheims on the 2nd of April,
1580, with Bavand, Saunderson, and Ely, Doctors of Theology or of Law, Mr. Orton, Gabriel Allen, and Father Thomas Darbishire, S.J., and under the date of the nth of April, 1580, the Diary records that the Blessed Robert, together with his future fellow-martyr, Thomas Cottam (who had come from Lyons only), " came to us about this time." x We may presume that these were the names of our martyr's travelling companions during certain stages of the journey, at any rate, for they did not all come from Rome.
On their journey an incident occurred which was to have a decisive influence on Blessed Robert's fortunes. He was joined on the road by one Sledd or Sleydon, who had been a serving-man to Dr. Saunderson in Rome, but was now a spy for the English Government. At Rome, and afterwards at the Seminary at Rheims, he simulated the greatest piety, whilst he was taking notes of the Seminarists and other exiles, to be duly transmitted through the Ambassador at Paris, for the use of the priest- catchers and officers of the ports in England. To his fellow-travellers he spoke as an enthusi- astic Catholic ; but his conduct hardly bore out the character, and Blessed Robert found it necessary to reprove him for his loose behaviour. The wretched man was so incensed at this that he thought, as he himself afterwards avowed, of 1 Douay Diaries, pp. 162, 163, April 2 to n, 1580.
BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON 479
murdering the holy priest.1 But he determined to be revenged in another way.
A few weeks later, unsuspicious of his danger, Blessed Robert started, on May the 2nd, to return to England, leaving behind him his com- panion, who was still only a deacon. From the story told by Eliot at his trial, it would appear that he made his home in Lady Petre's house at Ingatestone.2 It was but a short time, however, before he fell into the toils. A little synod or meeting of priests and laymen was held in a house at Southwark, in the summer of 1580. It happened whilst it was assembled that Sledd was loitering about London on his treacherous mission, when he caught sight of the Blessed Robert, with whose appearance he was but too familiar. He was going through Smithfield in company with Sir John Petre's sister, Catherine, wife of John Talbot of Grafton, on his way to the meeting at Southwark. " Sledd followed him," as Simpson relates, following Father Paolo Bombino, " till he saw a constable, whom he charged in the Queen's name to arrest Johnson as a priest and traitor. The constable, at heart a Catholic, made all
1 Persons' Life of Campion, cap. 23. Allen's Briefe Historic, Introduction, p. 6, or Apologia Martyrum, in the Concertatio, p. 221, Edit. 1588. Sledd's true character was discovered at the Rheims Seminary a fortnight after Johnson's arrival. (Douay Diaries, p. 164.)
2 A spy's report, dated August 18, 1580, as to the where- abouts of various priests, says: " Jhonson lying at the Spyttle with Mr. Hare, and that same Hare is he which conveys over to Rheims and Douay at the least £400 every year."
480 BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON
sorts of excuses ; but on Sledd's threatening to report him to the Recorder, he took up his staff, and told Sledd to show him the man who was to be arrested. Sledd did so, and was about to depart, when the constable told him he must follow to give the man in charge, and to bear the possible consequences of a false arrest and imprisonment. The true motive, however, was to expose Sledd, as an informer, to the mocks and gibes of the people and to make his trade known to the world. So Sledd and the constable dogged Johnson's steps till he came to the Thames, and saw him hire a wherry to convey him over to Southwark, where Persons and Campion were in council with several other priests. Sledd told the constable to take another boat, and row after Johnson ; but the constable, guessing something of the errand on which the priest was bound, told his companion that he could not spend all the day dodging a man in a boat, perhaps to miss him at last ; so he cried out to the bystanders to stop the traitor, and arrested him then and there. And though Johnson was taken and thrust into a prison, from which he only emerged to pass through Westminster Hall to the scaffold, yet the lesson was not lost. Sledd was at once noted and expelled from Catholic society before he had time to do much more mischief. A report of the capture soon reached the assembled priests, who broke up in disorder."1 They were saved by the constable's quick-wittedness and the martyr's capture. 1 Simpson's Life of Campion, p. 128.
BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON
Mr. Simpson's story is founded on the authority of Father Bombino,1 who took the greatest pains in hunting up fresh details about the period he was studying, but he is not always trustworthy in the way he pieces his facts together. Father Persons 2 briefly recounts the incident of the constable following the intended prisoner, but joins it with the arrest of Orton, while no special details are recounted about the capture of Johnson. Dr. Allen3 dwells on Sledd's unwillingness to accompany the constable, but the circumstances are different and the arrest is again that of Orton. Both, as we shall see, were arrested about the same time.
Upon the whole it would seem wise not to rely implicitly on the details of the story, though the substance is undoubtedly true.
Blessed Robert, we learn from a list of Catholic prisoners among the State Papers,4 was committed to the " Compter in the Poultrie ... on the I2th of July, 1580, upon my Lord Mayor his commandment by John Smith officer," probably the constable before mentioned, " and after his com- mitting was examined before Mr. Dr. Hamonde, and Mr. Norton, whose examination was sent to her Majesty's Council."
From this examination, a list of the matters wherewith he could be charged was drawn up, and this is still extant.
1 Vita Campiani, 1620, p. in.
2 Life of Campion, 1594, cap. 21 and 23.
3 Briefe Historic, 1582, Introduction, p. 6.
4 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. cxl. n. 37; vol. cxlix. n. 81.
FF II.
482 BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON
Robert Johnson chargeable with : —
" Going out of the realm for religion, and without licence (In his answer to interrogatories i, 2, 3).
" That he cannot answer touching the lawfulness of the oath of obedience to her Majesty (To interro- gatory 6).
" Making conscience to come to our common prayer (To interrogatory 7).
" That he knoweth not whether that Bull of Pius 5 were lawful or no (To interrogatory 24).
" Receipt of 50 crowns from the Pope's gift."
There is an obscurity in the second clause. When on the scaffold Blessed Robert, like his com- panions, acknowledged Elizabeth as his Queen r while he refused her the title of supreme head. But here he neither rejects the Royal Supremacy, nor accepts the Queen as Sovereign. It is therefore evidently reported wrongly. If we had the question put to him, and his own answer, the obscurity would doubtless be cleared up. Unfortunately both of these are missing. Probably the question was put in a hypothetical form, to which a direct answer was impossible. Cottam and Kirby, it will be seen, are reported to have answered in the same way.
For some months we hear of no further pro- ceedings, but on December the ist the Council informed the Lieutenant of the Tower and other commissioners, in terms very characteristic of the 1 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. clx. n. 43.
BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON 483
Tudor tyranny and without reference to any offence committed, that " considering the number of priests and Jesuits, as they be termed, to come into this realm, and of other persons their con- federates, her Majesty's meaning is to make example of some of them by punishment to the terror of others." So on December the 4th, Johnson was sent to the Tower, together with the future martyrs Sherwin, Cottam, and Kirby, and Johnson's old companion, Henry Orton. About Christmas they were joined by John Hart, Christopher Tomson, James Bosgrave, priests, and by Thomas Briscoe and John Nichols, who fell and caused much trouble to the rest. Father John Hart, who was eventually banished and joined the Jesuits, drew up a kind of journal of their sufferings called the " Diary," or Day book, of the Tower, which has been mentioned many times. From this book, and from a letter smuggled out of the Tower about the month of May,1 we learn that Johnson was " most severely " racked on December the I5th, and after that cast into a "very deep cavern (specu), absolutely dark, and shut in on all sides," probably the same as that which Allen describes as " the grisely dongeon called Whalesboure."2 After this he was probably among the prisoners who were dragged to the Protestant sermons, but we know no details.
As we hear nothing more of our martyr after May, 1580, we may conjecture that he, having
1 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. cxlix. n. 61. Foley, Records S.J. vol. ii. p. 160.
2 Briefe Historic, Introduction, p. 19.
484 BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON
established a character for courage, was left in solitary confinement, while the torturers were essaying the constancy of fresh captives.
At last his trial came on, Blessed Robert being brought up with Blessed Edmund Campion and the first batch of confessors on November the I4th and i6th. The only attempt at evidence against him appears to have been Eliot's story about Blessed John Payne's treasonable proposal to him at Ingatestone. " After which communication," says this notorious villain, "Pain, finding this deponent not so conformable unto him as he hoped, and receiving a bitter and flat refusal of his ungracious proffer, conveyed himself away, and was no more to be heard of. Whereupon this Johnson, now arrived, came to the deponent and enquired what was become of Pain, to whom he answered that he knew not. Then, said Johnson, ' he is gone beyond the seas, fearing lest you would discover his secrets ; and, therefore, I forewarn and conjure you not to disclose anything that Pain hath told you, for if you do, you stand in state of damna- tion.' " The martyr could only reply : " I never in my life had any such talk with him, nor uttered any such speeches tending to any such matter."1
He was sentenced to death with the rest of his companions, but was not executed at that time, and at the close of the year Hopton was anxious to be rid of him. There is among the State Papers a document2 endorsed by Walsingham, " Lieut. 's
1 Cobbett's State Trials, vol. i. p. 1067. a Foley, Records S.J. vol. iii. p. 291.
BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON 485
note of certain priestes in his custody." Blessed Robert is one of them. The Lieutenant adds, after the list: "All these have bin prisoners above xi monethes. Maye it therefore please your Honrs for the lessning of the Queene her Maies chardgis that these persons maye be transferd into some other prison."1 But no notice seems to have been taken of this representation.
The martyr was one of those required in the following May to answer the inquisitorial and entangling questions of the Privy Council already given. The holy confessors, having no opportunity of consultation together, it was of course inevitable that they should take different courses. We have seen that Blessed John Shert refused all answer except that he was a Catholic and swerved in no point from the Catholic faith. Blessed Robert gives some sort of answer to most of the questions, and was evidently anxious not to court his own death. His answer is as follows :
" Robert Johnson. — To the first, he saith, he cannot answer.
"To the second, he cannot tell what power or authoritie the Pope hath in the poynts named in this article.
" To the third, he thinketh that the Pope hath authoritie, in some cases, to authorize subjects to take arms against their prince.
" To the fourth, he thinketh that the Pope, for
1 Letter from the Tower, R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. cxlix. n. 61.
486 BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON
some causes, may discharge subjects of their allegiance and obedience to their natural prince.
" To the fifth, the answere to this article dependeth upon the lawfulnesse of the cause, for the which the Pope hath given sentence against her : but if the cause was just, then he thinketh the doctrine of Doctour Saunders and Doctour Bristowe to be true. Whether the cause were just or not, he taketh not upon him to judge.
" To the last, he saith that if such deprivation and invasion should be made for temporal matter, he would take part with her Maiestie, but if it were for any matter of his faith, he thinketh he were then bounde to take part with the Pope.
" ROBERT JOHNSON. "JOHN POPHAM. DA. LEWIS.
"THOMAS EGERTON. JOHN HAMMOND."1
However reserved the answer was, it was not of a nature to obtain any indulgence at the hands of England's rulers at that day, and a fortnight later he stood ready at the spot where the blood of so many martyrs had already been poured out, to mingle his own with the stream. They made him look on at the quartering of his companions. Then he turned to the people and began by signing himself with the Cross, saying aloud, In nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti. After a momen- tary interruption of the sheriff, he said, "I am a
1 Butler's Historical Memoirs, vol. i. p. 204, also Tierney-Dodd, iii. p. xiii. (Appendix).
BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON 487
Catholic, and am condemned for conspiring the Queen's death at Rheims with the other company who were condemned with me. I protest, that as for some of them with whom I was condemned to have conspired withal, I did never see them before we met at the bar, neither did I ever write unto them or receive letters from them ; and as for any treasons I am not guilty in deed nor thought." The sheriff here ordered his examination to be read and his answers to the six articles ; — an appeal to the hostile judgment of the ignorant Protestant crowd intended to counteract the general discredit known to attach to the judicial sentence under which the execution was legally being carried out. When the minister who was reading came to the fifth answer he falsified it, reading out that the servant of God approved of the actions and writings of Dr. Sander and Dr. Bristow. Blessed Robert here protested : " My answer," he said, " was not what you have read. I answered, and I still say, that of the doings of Doctor Sander and Dr. Bristow I am altogether ignorant, neither was I ever privy to their facts ; and how then could I approve or dis- allow them ? That was my answer at the time, and I still say the same." When the answer to the last article had been read, they asked what he had to say to that. He replied that he was still of the same mind and in that mind he would die. The sheriff said his answer itself was treason, "but you shall hear," he added, "what your own companion, Munday, has to say against you." Munday was called and drew nigh to the cart. " Munday," said
488 BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON
the martyr, " didst thou ever know me beyond the seas, or was I ever in thy company ? " "I was never in your company," Munday replied, " nor did I ever know you beyond the seas, but I was privy to your most horrible treasons, whereof you were most clearly convicted ; and this I say with safe conscience. Why! were not sundry priests sent from Avignon for that purpose ? I pray God you may repent you thereof and that you may die a good subject." " Munday, God give thee grace to repent thee of thy deeds," the martyr said ; " truly thou art a shrewd liar ! But there is no time now to reason these matters with thee. Only I protest before God I am not guilty of any treason."
Here the sheriff asked, " Dost thou acknowledge the Queen for lawful Queen ? Repent thee, and notwithstanding thy traitorous practices, we have authority from the Queen to carry thee back." " I do acknowledge her," Blessed Robert answered, " as lawful as Queen Mary was. I can say no more than to pray to God to give her grace that she may now stay her hand from shedding of innocent blood."
The dialogue went on: Sheriff. — "Dost thou acknowledge her supreme head of the Church in ecclesiastical matters?"
Blessed Robert. — " I acknowledge her to have as full and great authority as ever Queen Mary had : and more, with safety and conscience, I cannot give her."
Sheriff. — "Thou art a traitor most obstinate."
Blessed Robert. — " If I be traitor for maintaining
BLESSED ROBERT JOHNSON 489
this faith, then was King Henry and all the Kings and Queens of this realm, heretofore, and all our ancestors were traitors, for they maintained the same."
Sheriff. — "What ! you will preach treason also if we suffer you ? "
Blessed Robert. — "I teach but the Catholic religion."
Someone cried out, " What do you mean by the Catholic religion ? "
" I mean," he said, "that religion of which the Pope is the Supreme Pastor."
One of the ministers asked him whether St. Athanasius was a Catholic, and what he held. " I am not so well read in Athanasius to know all his opinions," he answered. " What! " said the minister, "have you not read Athanasius' Creed, Quicumque vult salvus esse ? " The wearied confessor, with the moment of his martyrdom at hand, was not attending; his mind, no doubt, was elsewhere. But the ignorant minister was not to be baulked of exhibiting his controversial skill, and returned to the charge, asking if he had not read the Athanasian Creed. "Yes," he answered, "that I have, and I believe it to be good and Catholic." " Well," urged the minister, apparently proud of his advantage, " in all that you cannot find the Pope once named." "No," the patient martyr answered, "it is not necessary the Pope should be named in everything that appertaineth to the Catholic Faith."
At this moment the executioner put the rope about his neck, but not even yet would they let him
490
have peace. For when they heard him praying in Latin, they called to him to pray in English. He said, " I pray that prayer which Christ taught, in a language I well understand." " But we do not understand it," said the sheriff. " I do think your worship doth understand it," rejoined the confessor. "If I do, others do not," said the sheriff. A minister cried out, " Pray as Christ taught." " What ! " said Blessed Robert, " do you think that Christ taught in English ? "
And now at last the weary ordeal was over. For a few moments the martyr was allowed in peace to make his immediate preparation for his sacrifice, which he did by the simple recitation in Latin of the Pater, A ve, and Credo, and In maims tuas, Domine, commendo spiritum meum, and then the cart was drawn from beneath him, and in a few moments he was with his happy companions in the ranks of the white-robed army. E. S. K.
AUTHORITIES. — Brief eHistorie,io8 — in, Concertatio,8g — 91, and others given for his companions. In Father Persons' first or draft Life of Campion he alludes to Blessed Robert having made the Exercises in terms worth quoting: "Jonsonus Roma exercitia spiritualia apud me fecerat, homo doctissimus (soe I read it, or els it may be sanctissimus) postea martyr." The parenthesis in English is added by Father Christopher Grene, who has preserved the passage for us in his transcript, Collec- tanea P, fol. 150 (Stonyhurst). Father Bombino's account of Johnson's arrest may have arisen from another passage in this same draft life.
RELICS. — The only relics known to exist are the corporal at Stonyhurst used by the five martyrs, and the pieces of skin, already described, of which it is uncertain, whether they belong to him or to Blessed Thomas Ford or to Blessed John Shert.
XVI. THE BLESSED WILLIAM FILBY,
SECULAR PRIEST.
Tyburn, 30 May, 1582.
Two days after the martyrdom of the Blessed Thomas Ford, John Shert, and Robert Johnson, four more of the glorious band were dragged on hurdles from the Tower to Tyburn for execution.
The first of these to win his crown was a young man not yet twenty-seven years old. Born in Oxfordshire, William Filby was early sent to the University, where he entered Lincoln College.1 He did not take his degree, but in order to embrace the Faith left all that was dear to him, and on the i2th of October, 1579, was admitted to the Seminary at Rheims, having made the journey from Oxford with Edward James, a future martyr, who was bound for the College at Rome.2
1 Philbye, William, Oxoniensis, of Lincoln College, matriculated in 1575. Described as plebai filius, at. 15. (Boase, Register of the University of Oxford, II. ii. 67.)
a The examination of Yen. Edward James. (R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. clxxxviii. 46.)
492 BLESSED WILLIAM FILBY
Dodd records that Filby's characteristics were " a singular piety and mildness of temper." He was ordained subdeacon on the 2ist of February, 1581, and on the following March the 25th, being Holy Saturday, with twelve others, several of whom were afterwards martyrs, was made priest by the Bishop of Chalons, in the Cathedral of Rheims. He said his first Mass on April the 3rd, and pro- bably left for England a few days later, as most of the companions of his ordination did, though in his case no record is entered in the College Diary.
His missionary career was a brief one. On Thursday, July the 2Oth, about three months after his return to England as a priest, Edmund Campion, Thomas Ford, and the rest of the party seized at Lyford, halted at Henley on their way to London. Blessed William resided in that town or in its neigh- bourhood ; l he had been at Rheims when Blessed Edmund Campion stopped there on his way from Rome in 1580, and thrilled the hearts of the students with his ardent words. He could not resist the chance of seeing and speaking to him now as he passed. Two or three nights before, he had dreamed that his body was ripped open and his bowels torn out, and the terror of his dream caused him to cry out so loudly that the whole house was raised. But the impression made on him had not been enough to teach him caution, and as he approached and
1 Perhaps at Stonor, where the Catholic colony was not broken up till the next month. In his indictment, however, he is described as "nuper de London."
BLESSED WILLIAM F1LBY 493
attempted to speak to Campion, he was seized and added to the company of prisoners.1
There is nothing to show whether he suffered torture in the Tower, and he was removed to the Marshalsea after less than a month's imprisonment there.2 But he was back again before the trial in November, and the Tower Bills record that he remained there till his execution.
He was indicted with the second division of the martyrs on Thursday, November the i6th, and with the rest received sentence of death on the i7th. The joy with which his approaching martyrdom filled him, and which he could not conceal, brought on him additional suffering. Hart's " Diary," on November the 22nd, says, "William Filby, because he appeared after his condemnation to death more cheerful and firm than usual, was loaded with iron manacles to the day of his death." He was also deprived of his bedding, and did not recover it, as we shall learn from a letter of Blessed Luke Kirby, until the middle of January.
His reported answers to the "six articles" of the Council in the following May, are firm and fearless.
1 This is Father Bombino's account in 1618, but the Briefe Historic (1582), followed by the Concertatio, &c., says that he was intercepted while riding to Lyford, and dreamed of martyrdom on his way to London.
2 The Council Order of August 14, 1581, for the torture of Campion, Ford, and Collington, orders " Mr. Lieutenant to receive Philby and Jacob unto the prison of the Marshalsea." (Dasent, Acts of the Privy Council, vol. xiii. p. 170. Cf. Jardine, On the use of Torture, p. 88.)
494 BLESSED WILLIAM FILBY
" William Filbee, his answere.1
" William Filbee. — To the first, he saith, the Pope hath authentic to depose any prince ; and such sentences, when they be promulgated, ought to be obeyed by the subjects of any prince. But touching the bull of Pius Quintus, he can say nothing ; but if it was such as it is affirmed to be, he doth allow it and saith it ought to be obeyed.
" To the second, he saith, it is a hard question, and therefore he cannot answer it ; but upon further advertisement, he answereth as to the first.
" To the third, he knoweth not what to say thereunto.
"To the fourth he sayeth that so long as her Majestie remaineth Queen, the Pope hath no authoritie to warrant her subjects to take arms against her or to disobey her. But if he should depose her, then' he might discharge them of their allegiance and obedience to her Majestie.
" To the fifth he saith he will not meddle with the doctrine of doctour Saunders and doctour Bristowe.
" To the last, when this case happeneth, then, he sayeth, he will answere ; and if he had been in Ireland when doctour Saunders was there, he would have done as a priest should have done, that is, to pray that the right may have place.
" WILLIAM FILBEE.
"JOHN POPHAM. DA. LEWIS.
"THOMAS EGERTON. JOHN HAMMOND."
1 Tierney-Dodd, iii. p. xii. (Appendix).
BLESSED WILLIAM FILBY 495
When the great day of his sacrifice arrived he managed to shave his tonsure, to show how greatly he honoured his priesthood, and also contrived to make a small cross of wood to hold in his hand at the time of his consummation.
Munday gives us the following details as to the passage to Tyburn :
" On the Wednesday following, which was the thirty day of May, in the same manner as I have before expressed, Luke Kirby, William Filby, Thomas Cottam, and Laurence Richardson were committed from the Tower of London to the place of execution, and, as the others were on the Monday before, associated and accompanied with divers learned and godly Preachers, even so were these, as to say Master Charke, Master Herne and divers others, who all the way applied such godly and Christian persuasions unto them (as had not the Child of perdition so marvellously blinded them) were of force to have won them into grace and mercy. The speeches they used to them by the way were needless here to set down, for that they did specially concern causes to root out that wicked opinion in them, and to establish a sound and perfect faith in place thereof, but even as it was in the others, so it did agree in them."
On arriving at Tyburn with his companions, he " being the youngest," was, as has been said, taken first from the hurdle and placed in the cart under the gallows. He began by making the sign of the
496 BLESSED WILLIAM FILBY
Cross, saying aloud : " In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti, Amen," and then to the officers; " Let me see my brethren," and looking towards the others, who still lay on the ground bound to their hurdles, he held forth his hands to them, and said, " Pray for me." Then addressing the crowd, he said : " I am a Catholic, and I protest before Almighty God, that I am innocent of all these matters whereof I am condemned ; and I hope to be saved by the merits and death of our Saviour Jesus Christ, beseeching Him to have mercy on me and forgive me mine offences."
At this point a proclamation was read for keeping the peace, ending with " God save the Queen," to which the martyr said, " Amen."
The bystanders asked him for what Queen he prayed, under the impression that the hopes of Catholics must be fixed upon the captive Queen of Scots. He answered, " For Queen Elizabeth, beseeching God to send her a long and quiet reign, to His good will, and make her His servant, and preserve her from her enemies." Richard Topcliffe, who about this time began to take a prominent part amongst the most cruel agents of the persecution, called out to him to say " God save her from the Pope," to which he answered, " He is not her enemy." Thereupon the minister of St. Andrew's in Holborn said, " Note that he saith the Pope is not the Queen's enemy." At this moment one of the sheriff's men standing in the cart with the martyr caught sight of the little wooden cross which he held partly concealed in his hand-
BLESSED WILLIAM FILBY
497
kerchief.1 The man snatched it from hinrand held it up to the mockery of the crowd, repeating several times, " Oh, what a villainous traitor is this that hath a cross!" some of the people taking up the same cry. The holy priest smiled at them, and made no answer. He was no more ashamed, says the author of the Briefe Historic, of this his Saviour's banner, than of his crown, which he had made shift to shave.
The notorious minister Charke,2 who had been rebuked by Father Persons in his Censure, attacked the martyr, accusing him of disobedience to his natural sovereign in receiving Orders from the See of Rome ; to which he answered that the Sacraments and Articles of Religion were no part of civil allegiance, and that obedience to the Church could not be esteemed disobedience to the prince. As in the previous martyrdoms, the answers to the " six articles " were read out, with a preface
1 Munday says he had two crosses. He adds that the martyr was asked if he would acknowledge the Queen's Majesty his sovereign princess and supreme head under Christ of the Church of England. "No," quoth he, "I will acknowledge no other head of the Church than the Pope only."
2 William Charke had been a Fellow of Peterhouse, Camb., but was expelled in 1572 for declaring in a sermon that the episcopal system was introduced by Satan. He published several tracts against Campion and the Catholics, which were ably answered by Father Persons. The first is entitled, An answer to a seditioiis Pamphlet lately cast abroad by a Jesuit, with a discovery of that blasphemous sect, 1580. He was one of the Protestant divines who disputed with Blessed Edmund Campion in the Tower (September 18, 23, and 27, 1581). In 1581 he was elected preacher to the Society of Lincoln's Inn, but was suspended by Archbishop Whitgift in 1593 for puritanism.
GG II.
4g8 BLESSED WILLIAM FILBY
published by the Government to raise odium against the martyrs. At the last answer, someone asked him " whether Sanders did well in that business in Ireland." He replied : " I know not. I was not privy to his doings. I never saw or spoke with him. Let him answer for himself."
Sheriff Martin now had his turn. Having made the hangman put the rope about the martyr's neck, he said, " Filby, the Queen is merciful unto you, and we have authority from her to carry you back, if you will ask her mercy and confess your fault. Do not refuse mercy offered. Ask the Queen forgiveness." " I never offended her," answered the martyr. " Well then," said the Sheriff, " make an end." And this sort of public disputation being at length over, Blessed William had time to say aloud a Pater and Ave, and In manus tuas, Domine, commendo spiritual meum, and was pronouncing the words " Lord, receive my soul," as the cart was drawn away. Several times, as he hung, he struck his breast, until someone pulled down his hands, and so his brave and gentle soul won its victory.
E. S. K.
AUTHORITIES. — Brief e Historic, pp. in — 113. Concertatio (1588), ff. 90, 91.
RELICS. — At Stonyhurst is a piece of frayed rope labelled ex laqueo B. Philbei.
There are also some small particles in a paper at Archbishop's House, Westminster, bearing the inscription Philbie.
It is indeed extraordinary that there are not more relics of Blessed William and his companions, for in a volume of
BLESSED WILLIAM FILBY 499
MSS. preserved by the Jesuits at Rome we find a letter from William Gifford, Professor of Theology at Rheims, dated October 28, 1582, which informs us that the bodies of these four martyrs who suffered on May 30 did not endure the usual fate. It was thought that the people might murmur at seeing so many limbs exposed on the City gates, and so the bodies were buried under the gallows, as was usually done in the case of felons. Some Catholic gentlemen from the Inns of Court however came by night and stole away the sacred relics. "Jamque per totam Angliam," con- tinues the writer, " imo Franciam et Italiam thesaurus iste diffiisus est."
The same writer adds a story that the death-warrant of these seven holy priests was brought for the signature of the Queen while she was engaged in dancing. She at once signed it, and then took to dancing again. Quid crudelitati cum deliciis ? quid cum funeribus voluptati ?
XVII. THE BLESSED LUKE KIRBY,
SECULAR PRIEST. Tyburn, 30 May, 1582.
WHILST Blessed William Filby was still hanging, the officers brought the next martyr, Blessed Luke Kirby, from the hurdle, on which he lay bound, to witness his holy companion's death and the butchery that was to follow.
This holy priest was perhaps born near Richmond,1 in Yorkshire, and from his age as entered in the Diary of the English College at Rome, when he took the oath, his birth must have been about the year 1549.
He is said to have taken his Master's degree in •one of the Universities, presumably at Cambridge, as he is not mentioned by Wood nor in the Oxford Register. Of his conversion we learn incidentally, from his examination printed below, that he was
1 The Douay Diaries enter him as " Cestriensis ; " the Diary of the English College, Rome, as of the diocese of Durham. Dodd says Richmond. Though the three statements cannot be recon- ciled, the difference between them may amount to very little.
BLESSED LUKE KIRBY 501
" reconciled at Louvain, by Father Laurentius, a Norman."
In 1576 he entered the College at Douay. In August of the next year he is mentioned in the Diary as making a journey to Cambrai on the eve of the Assumption and returning the day after the feast. The diarist calls him a deacon at the time. He was ordained priest at Cambrai on the Ember Saturday of the next month, but out of devotion to his patron saint did not say his first Mass until St. Luke's feast, October the i8th. He started from Rheims for the English Mission on a fitting day for a martyr, the Invention of the Holy Cross, the 3rd of May, 1578. What led to a change in his designs we have no means of knowing, but on July the i5th he was back at the College at Rheims, where he remained over the feast of the Assumption, and started on August the I7th for Rome, of course with the approval of Dr. Allen, " partly for devotion, and partly for further improvement in learning," as Challoner says. He entered the English College, and amongst the other students who were there when the Jesuit Fathers took over its government, is registered as taking the College oath on the 23rd of April, 1579. During his stay at the College he practised great charity towards his countrymen in Rome who needed help, Catholic and non-Catholic. He helped them from his slender purse, he won friends for them among members of the Pope's Court, he gave away the shirt off his own back, and once went forty miles out of Rome to see some safe on their way. We have these facts from his
502 BLESSED LUKE KIRBY
own avowal, wrung from him at the moment of his martyrdom, by the treacherous ingratitude of his accuser, Munday, to whom he had shown especial kindness in Rome, though, even at the time, he saw through his insincerity.
This holy priest was chosen to be the companion of Blessed Edmund Campion and Blessed Ralph Sherwin on their way to England, and the three future martyrs travelled together to Rheims, with the rest of the party enumerated in Blessed Ralph Sherwin's Life, leaving Rome on the i4th of April, 1580, and arriving at Rheims on the last day of May. In Father Persons' Life of Campion we read that the Blessed Luke had shown such fervour in preparing himself during Lent for the mission to England " as was a matter of edification to all Rome." Also that he had been one of those, who, with an ardour characteristic of the Elizabethans, challenged Beza to dispute, on the condition that the losers should suffer death.
On June the i6th he set out from Rheims for England once more, together with the Ven. William Hartley. His companion was to follow him a few years later in the glorious path of martyrdom, his mother looking on at his death and thanking God that she had brought forth a son to die for Him. They made the journey to the coast, by Douay and Dunkirk, after the apostolic fashion, on foot.
On landing in England the martyr was imme- diately seized, for, as we shall see, he was arrested at Dover, and had been re-examined (probably as
BLESSED LUKE KIRBY 503
soon as he was sent up to the court) on July the i6th. A list of prisoners among the State Papers1 shows where he was at first confined. He is thus referred to : " Gatehouse ; Lucas Kirky, priest, now in the Tower." The Gatehouse at Westminster was, at this time, a comparatively comfortable prison, and the martyr would perhaps be allowed to enjoy the society of the venerable Father Lawrence Vaux, who was seized and committed to the Gatehouse about the same time, and of the many good Catholics whom it held captive.2 It must have been during this imprisonment that the following paper was drawn up from examinations, which are now no longer forthcoming.
" Lucas Kirby chargeable with, " Departing out of the realm without licence
upon misliking of religion here established. (In answer
to the four first interrogatories.)
" Refusing to answer the sixth interrogatory, of
the lawfulness of the oath of obedience.
" With being reconciled at Louvain to the Church
of Rome by one Father Laurentius, a Norman. (In
answer of the i8th.)
1 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. cxlix. n. 83. Printed by Foley in Records, S.J., vol. iii. p. 290.
1 "Ad carcerem igitur Westmonasteriensem bonus Senex (Vaux) cum Tichboyne mittitur, qiti captivis abundat et multis et bonis, quorum primus Townlius est, vir sc. nobilis, deinde Mra Heth, fcemina nobilis, ejusque filia, multi praterea gravissimi et optimi sacerdotes, multi valde pii laid." (Douay Diaries, p. 171.) One cannot help wondering whether this Father Lawrence may not be the same as he who (though described in the following examination as " a Norman ") reconciled our martyr to the Church at Louvain.
504 BLESSED LUKE KIRBY
"With confession that he heard of an excom- munication being in Paris a month since, lately gotten out by a Cardinal at Rome. (Answer to the 24th.)1
" He cannot answer whether the Pope's excom- munication be lawful and according to the word of God. (To the 2$th.)
" Confession of advice received at Rome (sic) of the Rector of the English Seminary there, to do what he could at his coming into England for stay or persuasion of others (meaning in the Pope's religion). (In a re-examination on the i6th of July, 1580.)
" Confession that he thinketh the Pope only hath power in ecclesiastical causes, and none other. (In his examination taken at Dover.")-
At the beginning of December, as we have already seen, the Privy Council resolved to send some priests to the Tower, where they might be tortured " for the terror of the rest," and Kirby, being chargeable with the above-mentioned crimes against their persecuting laws, was selected, with Sherwin, Cottam, and the rest, to be one of the first victims. He was conducted thither on the 4th of December, and at the same time the following inter- rogatories were drawn up to assist the Protestant inquisitors in their wicked work.
1 Cardinal Alessandrino is said to have reprinted the Bull of Excommunication about this time, to show at Paris, where Catherine de Medicis was negotiating a marriage between Elizabeth and the Duke of Anjou.
9 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. cxl. n. 43.
BLESSED LUKE KIRBY 505
"Articles to be ministered to Cottam, Kirby, and others of late committed to the Tower.
" i. What was the principal cause why you were sent into this realm by the Pope or by some [other] minister of his ?
" 2. To whom were you specially directed to repair unto within this realm ?
"3. What hope before your departure were you put in, of somewhat to be attempted both against Ireland and England ?
"4. Upon what comfort did the late B. of St.Asaph, D. Morton and the rest of the principal persons, that remained before at Rome, repair upon a sudden to Paris with intent to have come into England, and upon what cause did stay to repair hither ?
" 5. What relief have you received since you were committed to prison, and from whence and by whom came the same relief?
" 6. Whether was there not some relief delivered you as sent from the Scottish Queen, and by whom was the same delivered ?
" [7.] How many have you reconciled to the Church of Rome since your imprisonment, and what be their names ?
" [8.] How many have you heard of late to have been reconciled to the Church of Rome by others, what be their names, and by whom were they reconciled ?
" [9-] What conference have you had with Campion, since his coming over, or what message or letters have you received from him ?
506 BLESSED LUKE KIRBY
" [10.] Where do you know, or have heard, that Campion is ?
" [n.] Whether have you not heard of some Catalogues of names of the principal favourers of the Romish religion within this realm have been delivered to the Pope, and what principal persons do you remember to have been contained in the said catalogue ?
" [12.] What acquaintance have you with the Bishop of Ross, or what letters or messages have you received from him since your return into this realm ?
" [I3-J What letters or messages have you received from D. Saunders in Ireland ?
" [14.] What principal persons in Ireland are noted to be favourers of the rebellion there, and have given their promise to join with such persons as should be sent from the Pope?"1
It is unnecessary to comment on the animus that inspired these questions. It is reckoned a crime, forsooth, to reconcile a man to the Church, a crime to supply poor prisoners with alms, a crime to withhold the names of Catholics from their perse- cutors, a crime for a Catholic Bishop to come to England, a crime to carry or receive a message from a Catholic missionary. It is taken for granted that Catholic priests are in connection with the insurgents of Ireland. No priest could in conscience answer these questions, and the next thing that we
1 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. cxlvii. n. 97. Printed also by Foley, Records S.J., vol. v. p. 348.
BLESSED LUKE KIRBY 5o7
hear about Kirby is that five days after his arrival in the Tower he was subjected to the cruel torture of "The Scavenger's Daughter."1 This horrible instru- ment Lingard describes as " a broad hoop of iron . . . consisting of two parts, fastened to each other by a hinge. The prisoner was made to kneel on the pavement and to contract himself into as small a compass as he could. Then the executioner, kneeling on his shoulders, and having introduced the hoop under his legs, compressed the victim close together, till he was able to fasten the extremities over the small of the back. The time allotted to this kind of torture was an hour and a half, during which time it commonly happened that from excess of compres- sion the blood started from the nostrils ; sometimes, it was believed, from the extremities of the hands and feet." 2 The martyr underwent this cruel inflic- tion for more than an hour. As we afterwards hear no more of tortures inflicted on the martyr, we may hope that his courage under his dreadful ordeal, warned the persecutors that it was no use harassing him by further violence.
From the 5th of February 1581, to Pentecost, May the i4th, he was, with the rest of the Catholic
1 The invention of Sir William Skevington, Lieutenant of the Tower in the reign of Henry VIII., and called Skevington's Irons, then Skevington's Daughters, and by degrees The Scavenger's Daughter.
2 History of England, vol. vi. note U. Hart, in his "Diary," writes briefly, "The Scavenger's Daughter — a name derived, as I think, from its inventor — consists of a hoop of iron, which fastens together hands, feet, and head into one ball." The implement now shown under this name at the Tower must be a later and more humane form of this instrument of torture.
5o8 BLESSED LUKE KIRBY
prisoners, " dragged by the hands of the keepers and soldiers," as the diarist says, to hear the sermons of John Nichols, a Calvinist minister, who had been converted at Rome, and then relapsed. We shall meet him again. The sermons were full of invec- tives against the Faith and abuse of the confessors, who were called rebels, seditious men, idolaters, and traitors; while they on their part interrupted, exposed his false assertions, challenged him to disputation, and after the discourse hissed him away, in spite of the threats of Hopton, who was present. Blessed Thomas Cottam distinguished himself especially on this occasion.
Blessed Luke was arraigned with Campion and the rest, on Tuesday, November the i4th, and tried on Thursday the i6th. In the report of the trial printed in Cobbett's State Trials,1 it is recorded that " Kirbie, in his examination for the Supremacy and the Pope's authority, was of no other opinion than was Campion."
" Sledd, a witness, deposed against Kirbie, that being sick beyond the seas, this Kirbie came unto his bedside and counselled him to beware how he dealt with any matters in England, for there would come a great day wherein the Pope, the King of Spain, and the Duke of Florence should make as great an alteration as ever was. He deposed that Kirbie was at a sermon of Dr. Allen's, who then persuaded the priests and Seminary men to take
1 Cobbett, State Trials, vol. i. p. 1069 ; Harleian MSS. 6,265, P- 234-
BLESSED LUKE KIRBY 509
their journey into England to remove the English- men from their obedience to her highness, and to persuade them to aid the Pope and his confederates. He deposed moreover that beyond the seas he spake with one Tedder, a familiar friend of Kirbie's, of whom he, deponent, demanded whether he were of kin to her Majesty, for that his name was Tedder. Where- unto he answered that if he knew himself to be kin to that whore of Babylon, that Jezebel of England, he would think the worse of himself, as long as he lived. But one day he would make a journey into England, and if it were possible despatch her out of the way.
" Kirbie. — ' As I hope to be saved at the last doom, there is not one word of this deposition that concerneth me, either true or credible. Neither at any time made I the least mention of that alleged day : neither was I present at any sermon so preached ; but I always bore as true and faithful a heart to her Majesty as any subject whatsoever did in England ; insomuch that I never heard her Majesty evil spoken of but I defended her cause, and always spake the best of her highness. It is not unknown that I saved English mariners from hanging only for the duty I bore to her Majesty, with the love and good-will which I bore to my country. But you that have thus deposed, when was this sermon that you talk of, so preached ? at what time of the day ? '
" The witness answered that the same day there were three philosophical disputations, after the which the sermon was preached."
5io BLESSED LUKE KIRBY
Though the holy priest was declared guilty of high treason and received sentence, his martyrdom was delayed, as in the case of many of his com- panions, for several months. On the 2gth of April, 1582, the Diary of the Tower states that he was put into irons, and so continued till his execu- tion. It was during this time that he was required to answer the "six articles" of the Council, which he did as follows :
" Luke Kirbye's Answere.1
" Luke Kirbye, to the first saith, that the resolu- tion of this article dependeth upon the general question whether the Pope ma}', for any cause, depose a Prince ; wherein his opinion is that for some causes he may lawfully depose a Prince, and that such sentence ought to be obeyed.
" To the second he thinketh that in some cases, as infidelitie or such like, her Majestic is not to be obeyed against the Pope's bull and sentence ; for so he saith he hath read that the Pope hath done, de facto, against other Princes.
" To the third he saith he cannot answer it.
" To the fourth that the Pope, for infide- litie, hath such power as is mentioned in this article.
"To the fifth he thinketh that doctour Saunders and doctour Bristowe might be deceived in these points of their bookes. But whether they were deceived or not he referreth to God.
1 Tierney-Dodd, vol. Hi. p. xii. (Appendix.) For the questions, vide supra, p. 451.
BLESSED LUKE KIR BY 5n
" To the last, he sayeth that when the case shall happen, he must then take counsel what were best for him to doe.
" LUKE KIRBYE.
"JOHN POPHAM. DA. LEWIS.
"THOMAS EGERTON. JOHN HAMMOND."
Whilst Elizabeth's Ministers were thus intent on casting new odium upon the martyrs, one of their miserable instruments was seized with remorse for his share in this very work. John Nichols, a Welshman by birth, scholar of Brasenose, Oxford, a curate in Somersetshire, went abroad in 1579, was converted, but, so he afterwards said, was not fully convinced. He was admitted as a student at the English College at Rome, and afterwards at Rheims, and returned to England in 1581, where he was arrested at the end of a week, and sent to the Tower. There, partly from want of principle, partly through fear of torture, partly through the flatteries of the Lieutenant, Sir Owen Hopton, he made a solemn recantation of Popery, and wrote, under the inspiration of his host, and with the help of the Puritans Stubbs and Wilkinson, three books, his Pilgrimage, his Recantation, and his pretended Oration and Sermon before the Pope and Cardinals.
These three publications were rilled with vile slanders against the Pope, the Cardinals, Bishops, clergy, and Seminarists, and helped to foment the persecuting spirit, by representing them as busied with nothing but hatred and machinations against the Queen. For a time Nichols was made much of
5i2 BLESSED LUKE KIRDY
and subsidized. But an exposure, immediately printed and circulated by Father Persons, effectually pricked this windbag.1 It is noticeable that he kept out of the way during the trials of Campion and the rest in November. He declared afterwards that he did so purposely, that he might not bear false witness against any of them individually. Then in the first days of January, 1582, that is a month after the martyrdoms of December the ist, he came to Blessed Luke Kirby's cell under the pressure of remorse. The martyr describes the interview in a letter written three or four days later, January the loth.
"A true copy of a letter sent by Mr. Kirby to some of
his friends.
" My most hearty commendations to you and the rest of my dearest friends. If you send any-
1 A correspondent of Father Agazzari, who, as was shown before, must be Father Persons himself, though he is named in the third person, writes: "It can scarce be believed what praises are lavished on this gull. He is the most learned Jesuit of them all, the Pope's scholar, the Cardinals' preacher, a theologian, philosopher, Grecian, Hebraist, Chaldaist, a perfect master of all languages and every science. He has printed his renunciation of the faith in which he tells enormous lies about Rome, the Pope, your College, the Jesuits, the scholars, and all orders of monks and priests. The book was received and distributed by the heretics with mighty triumph ; but next month or so there came out another book, A Discovery of Nichols, proving clearly that he was neither Jesuit nor priest, theologian nor philosopher; that he had never preached before Pope or Cardinals, except when he abjured the heresy of Calvin before the Inquisitors ; that he knew nothing of any learned language or science, but was merely a relapsed minister, an ignorant grammarian, a vagabond tramp, and an egregious liar." (Persons' edition of Sander's De Schismate Anglicano, Cologne, 1610, p. 397, translated in Simpson's Life of Campion, p. 204.)
BLESSED LUKE KIRBY
513
thing to me, you must make haste, because we look to suffer death very shortly, as already it is signified to us. Yet I much fear least our unworthiness of that excellent perfection and crown of martyrdom shall procure us a longer life.
" Within these few days John Nichols came to my chamber window with humble submission, to crave mercy and pardon for all his wickedness and treacheries committed against us, and to acknow- ledge his books, sermons and infamous speeches to our infamy and discredit, to be wicked, false and most execrable before God and man : which for preferment, promotion, hope of living, and favour of the nobility, he committed to writing and to the view of the world. Whereof being very penitent and sorrowful from his heart, rather than he would commit the like offence again, he wisheth to suffer a thousand deaths. For being pricked in con- science with our unjust condemnation, which hath happened contrary to his expectation, albeit he offered matter sufficient in his first book of recanta- tion for our adversaries to make a bill of indictment against us, yet he minded [expected] then nothing less, as now he protesteth. He knoweth in con- science our accusations and the evidence brought against us to be false and to have no colour of truth, but only of malice forged by our enemies. And for Sledd and Munday he is himself to accuse them of this wicked treachery and falsehood and of their naughty and abominable life, of which he is made privy and which for shame I cannot commit to writing. In detestation of his own doings and of
HH II.
514 BLESSED LUKE KIRBY
their wickedness, he is minded never hereafter to ascend into pulpit nor to deal again in any matter of religion, for which cause he hath forsaken the ministry and is minded to teach a school, as I understand by him, in Norfolk. In proof whereof he showed me his new disguised apparel, as yet covered with his minister's weed.
" I wished him to make amends for all his sins, and to go to a place of penance, and he answered me he was not yet conformable to us in every point of religion, nor ever was : but lived at Rome in hypocrisy, as he hath done ever since in his own profession. Again, he thought that if ever he should depart the realm, he could not escape burning.
" He offered to go to Mr. Lieutenant and to Mr. Secretary Walsingham and declare how injuri- ously I and the rest were condemned, that he himself might be free from shedding innocent blood ; albeit he was somewhat afraid to show himself in London, where already he had declared our innocent behaviour, and his own malicious dealing towards us in his book and sermons.
"To give my censure and judgment of him, certain I think that he will within a short time fall into infidelity, except God of His goodness in the mean- time be merciful unto him and reclaim him by some good means to the Catholic faith. Yet it should seem he hath not lost all good gifts of nature, when as in conscience he was pricked to open the truth in our defence and to detest his own wicked- ness, and treacheries of others practised against us to our confusion. Now I see, as all the world
BLESSED LUKE KIR BY
515
hereafter shall easily perceive, that rather than God will have wilful murder concealed, he procureth the birds of the air to reveal it.
" I am minded to signify to Sir Francis Walsing- ham this his submission unto us, except in the meantime I shall learn that he has, as he promised faithfully to me, already opened the same. Mr- Richardson and Mr. Filbie have now obtained some bedding, who ever since their condemnation have laid upon the boards. Mr. Hart hath had many and great conflicts with his adversaries. This morning the loth of January he was committed to the dungeon, where he now remaineth. God comfort him ; he taketh it very quietly and patiently : the cause was, for that he would not yield to Mr. Reynolds of Oxford in any one point, but still remained constant the same man he was before and ever. Mr. Reynolds, albeit he be the best learned of that sort, that hath from time to time come hither to preach and confer, yet the more he is tried and dealt withal, the less learning he showed. Thus beseeching you to assist us with your good prayers, whereof now especially we stand in need, as we by God's grace shall not be unmindful of you, I bid you farewell this loth day of January, 1582.
" Yours to death and after death,
" LUKE KiRBY."1
What happened afterwards we learn from Nichols himself.
1 Brief e Historic, p. 118.
5i6 BLESSED LUKE KIRBY
" When I had declared to Mr. Luke Kirby in the Tower of London that I repented of having written those books, which were contrary to truth, he related my words to Mr. Reynolds of Oxford, who in turn told Sir Francis Walsingham. He, on hearing this statement, told the Lieutenant of the Tower to examine me, in presence of Mr. Luke Kirby, whether the statement reported to him was true or not. I accordingly went to the Tower to be examined as to what I had said, when Mr. Kirby thus addressed me: 'Tell the truth, Nichols, and shame the devil.' ' I will, indeed,' I freely answered ; * have no doubt about it.' Mr. Kirby was examined separately : I too would have manifested the truth, if the Lieutenant of the Tower had allowed me. But when I said, ' I declared to Mr. Kirby that I wrote those books from ambition,' he said, ' Don't say that,' and turning to the secretary told him to write, ' He declares that he said to Mr. Kirby he was sorry he wrote those books in such a rough and un- polished style.' And when Master Reynolds, in presence of Dr. Humphrey, told me he would prove before him and Mr. Kirby that I had declared my repentance for having published my books, because they contained more lies than truth, and that I was resolved not to speak any more against the Papists either in the pulpit or the press, the Lieutenant of the Tower commanded Master Reynolds to say no more about the matter."
So the incident was suppressed, and the martyrs were sent to Tyburn. But the Government well
BLESSED LUKE KIRBY 517
knew the truth, and Nichols testifies that on the following All Saints' Day, still urged by his remorse, he declared to the Lord Treasurer his repentance for the falsehoods he had published. Burleigh answered that the Papists had exposed his lies long ago.
Nichols kept his resolution of giving up the Pro- testant ministry, and soon after went abroad. Early in 1583 he was arrested and imprisoned at Rouen, but through the influence of Dr. Allen, whom he had grossly slandered, regained his liberty. Before his discharge he wrote a confession in which he professes himself a Protestant, but fully acknow- ledges his offences against Catholics. He declares, however, that his books were written at the instiga- tion, and even under the dire threats, of Hopton. After his liberation he confirmed his confession before many Catholics. It was printed by Allen at Rheims in 1583, l and from it most of the facts here related are taken. They are a specimen of the way in which the great Protestant tradition about Catholics was created in Elizabeth's reign.
And now we come to the last scene of the holy martyr's conflict and victory. On being placed in the cart under the gallows, he addressed the people, declaring that though he was condemned for pre- tended treasons, he was really about to be put to death for his religion ; and then made a touching
1 Report of the late apprehension, confession, and answers of J . Nichols, &c., J.Fogny, Rhemes, 1583. A Latin translation in Concertatio, Edition of 1588, pp. 231, seq.
5i 8 BLESSED LUKE KIRBY
prayer to our Blessed Lord, aloud, for salvation through His Death and Passion, and for forgiveness of "manifold sins and offences." Then followed a long altercation with Munday, who repeated the story which he and Sledd had told at the trial, that the hoi}' priest had advised him and another young man, named Robinson, to stay in Rome and not come to England, because shortly some stir or trouble was like to come, and to persuade their friends to become Catholics against " the great day." The martyr not only once more denied this lying invention, but published what had taken place at an examination of Munday in the Tower, similar to that we have seen described by Nichols. Blessed Luke declared that when hard pressed before Sir Owen Hopton, and a keeper named Cowdridge, Munday had acknowledged that he could charge him with nothing, and that Cowdridge had said that " upon that confession he might take advantage." But Munday, unlike Nichols, had hardened his con- science against remorse. He admitted the interview and its purport. " When as I came unto the Tower and made known to Master Lieutenant for what cause I was sent to speak with you, you were brought into a chamber by your Keeper; "x he also relates the martyr's account of it : " Oh, Munday, consider with thyself how untruly thou hast charged me with that which I never said nor thought.
1 Report of the Execution of Tray tours, 1582, by A.M., in "John a Kent and John a Cumber," printed for the Shakespeare Society, p. 119. Reprinted in the Downside Review, with a valuable intro- duction, vol. x. No. 3 (December, 1891), p. 215.
BLESSED LUKE KIRBY 519
Besides, thou knowest that when thou earnest to the Tower to me, before Master Lieutenant and other who was there present, then thou wast demanded what thou couldest say against me ? When, as thou madest answer, thou knewest no harm of me, neither couldest thou at any time say otherwise of me than well. Whereupon thou wast asked wherefore thou reportedst otherwise at my arraignment ? " * Munday, however, now boldly denied that he had ever made the acknow- ledgment affirmed by the martyr, who appealed in vain to him, by the memory of the kindnesses he had done to him and other Protestants in Rome, to tell the truth in the fear and love of God.
The answers to the "six articles" already related, were now read over by the preacher Field, and a long discussion ensued with him and with another minister, Crowley, who seldom lost an opportunity of attacking the martyrs in prison or on the scaffold. " I do acknowledge," the martyr declared, "to my Queen, as much duty and authority as ever I did to Queen Mary, or as any subject in France, Spain or Italy doth acknowledge to his King or prince." And thereupon Topcliffe demanded, " What ! if they all be traitors, will you be traitor too ? " To which he answered, " What !
1 Ibid. p. 118. The martyr had entrusted Munday at Rome with some " Silke Pictures halowed by the Pope" to give to his friends in Rheims and England, one of which, representing the Crucifixion, he gave to Munday himself. He also gave him " two Julyes " to buy more pictures. After he had left Rome, he sent him fifteen shillings to Rheims, but Munday had already left for England before the money came.
520 BLESSED LUKE KIRBY
be they all traitors ? God forbid ! For if all they be traitors, then all our ancestors have been traitors likewise. And as for Dr. Sander and Bristow, they might err in their private opinions, the which I will defend no farther than they do agree with the judgment of Christ's Catholic Church."
Sheriff Martin here broke in, to say " the Queen was merciful and would take him to her mercy, so he would confess his duty to her, and forsake that man of Rome, and that he had authority himself to stay the execution and carry him back again," who answered that to deny the Pope's authority was denying a point of faith, which he would not do for saving of his life, being sure that this would be to damn his soul. Then was it tendered to him that if he would but confess his fault and ask the Queen's forgiveness, she would yet be merciful to him. He answered again, that his conscience did give him a clear testimony that he had never offended ; and therefore he would neither confess that whereof he was innocent, nor ask forgiveness where no offence was committed against her Majesty. '"Well then,' said Sheriff Martin, ' do but acknowledge those things which your fellow Bosgrave1 hath done,
1 James Bosgrave had been a Jesuit missionary in Germany and Poland. He was sent back to his native country to try the effect of his native air in restoring his health, and arrived during the summer of 1580. He knew nothing of the controversies raging in England, and had almost lost the use of his native tongue. He was arrested on landing, and having been examined by the Bishop of London, gave great scandal by professing his readiness to go to church. Bosgrave afterwards explained that in Germany and Poland any learned man might go freely to the meetings of the Calvinists, Lutherans, or other sectaries, and hear their folly and
BLESSED LUKE KIRBY
such as appeareth by his examination, and I will yet save your life ; ' who denied likewise to do this. By these numbers of proffers it is plain they judged (the martyrs) innocent in their conscience of those pretended treasons." l
One last effort was made by the preachers to induce him to yield something to their importunity. " Then preparing himself to his prayers," Munday writes, " the preachers desired him to pray in English with them, and to say a prayer after them, wherein, if he could find any fault, he should be resolved thereof. ' Oh,' quoth he again, ' you and I are not of one faith, therefore I think I should offend God, if I should pray with you,' at which words the people began to cry, 'Away with him! ' So he saying his Pater noster in Latin, ended his life."
blasphemy in order to refute it. This is why he offered to go to the Anglican churches, just as in Constantinople he would have been willing to go to the mosque. When he found that this was regarded as an act of apostasy in England, he at once retracted his consent, was sent to the Marshalsea, and afterwards to the Tower, and was condemned with Campion as a traitor.
He was, however, reprieved in consequence of his answers to the "six questions," in which he declared his allegiance in spite of the Bull, said that he thought the Bull was "at no time lawful," nor to be obeyed, and that the Pope had no authority to release the subjects of a sovereign from their allegiance. If the Pope invaded the realm he would take part with her Majesty against him.
It must be remembered that Bosgrave, though an Englishman, had lived so long abroad that he was totally unprepared to face questions of such difficulty, and knew nothing of the true condition of things in England. He was afterwards banished, and returned to his mission in Poland. (Simpson's Life of Campion, pp. 133, 134, 333 ; Tierney-Dodd, iii. p. xv. Appendix.)
1 Brief e Historie, p. 117.
522 BLESSED LUKE KIR BY
The writer of the Briefe Historic adds, " After that he had ended his Pater noster and began his Ave, the cart was drawn away, and there he hanged until he was dead, and until his two fellows Richard- son and Cottam did take the view of him. His speeches were very intricate, for that many did speak unto him and of several matters, but here are the principal things by him uttered to my remem- brance."
The blessed martyr had argued in defence of his life, as St. Paul did, for the honour of the truth, and in order that he might not co-operate towards his own death. But death for our Lord had long been his desire, and, as we have seen, he wrote some months before, " We look to suffer death very shortly, as already it is signified to us. Yet I much fear lest our unworthiness of that excellent perfection and crown of martyrdom should procure me a longer life."
E. S. K.
J. H. P.
AUTHORITIES. — Briefe Historic, pp. 113 — 120, Concertalio, (1588) ff. 91 — 93. Cobbet, State Trials, i. pp. 1068, 1069. Grene, Collectanea, N.I., i. 19, ii. 6, 57. (Stonyhurst MSS.)
RELICS. — There are two relics of Blessed Luke Kirby at Stonyhurst. One is a phalanx bone of the foot, the other is inscribed, Pars manus carnis et planete B. Kirbei. The corporal with which he and four other martyrs said Mass in the Tower has been already described in the life of Blessed Alexander Briant.
XVIII.
THE BLESSED LAWRENCE RICHARDSON (vcn JOHNSON), SECULAR PRIEST.
Tyburn, 30 May, 1582.
IMMEDIATELY the cart was drawn from under the Blessed Luke Kirby, Blessed Lawrence Johnson, and Blessed Thomas Cottam were brought to witness his death, and as soon as his body was cut down to be quartered, they were made to get up together into the cart beneath the gallows.
Blessed Lawrence was of a Lancashire family of considerable antiquity, which suffered greatly for its religion, and it was only on his entering the English Mission as a priest that he took the name of Richardson. His father was Richard Johnson, of Great Crosby, son of Nicholas Johnson and Margaret, daughter of Robert Blundell of Ince Blundell. Helen Johnson, who was imprisoned in Salford gaol for recusancy, in 1582, was pro- bably the martyr's sister. The family remained Catholic all through the times of persecution. Our martyr, after studying at one of the local grammar schools, in due time was sent to Brasenose College,
524 BLESSED LAWRENCE RICHARDSON
Oxford, where he was the contemporary of Blessed Ralph Sherwin, of Edward Rishton at his own College, and of several other martyrs and confessors. Anthony a Wood says, under the date of the 5th of December, 1572 : " The Principal and Fellows of Brasenose College gave leave to Lawrence Johnson, one of their Society, to take the degree of Bachelor of Arts in the University, with certain conditions to be by him performed ; but whether he took the said degree, it appears not."1 Considering the circum- stances of the times, we may conjecture that Lawrence had now drawn very near to the Faith of his fathers, and that the conditions required by the Principal and Fellows were such as brought the struggle within his conscience to a crisis, which ended in his leaving the University.
In 1573 we find him at Douay following the courses, first of philosophy and then of theology. He was ordained priest at Cateau-Cambresis by the Bishop of Cambrai on Sitientes Saturday, the 23rd of March, 1577, with Blessed Ralph Sherwin and several others. He said his first Mass on Sunday, April the 2ist, St. Anselm's feast. His friend, Edward Rishton, had been ordained a fort- night after him, and said his first Mass on the same day ; the solemnity being increased by a sermon on the dignity of the priesthood, preached in the college chapel by Dr. Richard Hall, who was at that time lecturing on Holy Scripture. On July
1 Wood, Fasti Oxonienses. "Johnson, Lawrence of Brasenose, suppl. B.A. November 25, 1572 (he was a fellow of Brasenose in )-" {Boase, Register of the University of Oxford, II. iii. 18.)
BLESSED LAWRENCE RICHARDSON 525
the 2yth he left the College to begin his missionary life.
He went to his own part of England and resided chiefly it would seem in the family of a Lancashire gentleman, Mr. Houghton, of Park Hall,1 county Lancaster, by whom, as well as by all the neighbourhood, the holy priest was looked upon as a man of extraordinary zeal and piety. Of the early fruits of his labours we have probably a trace in a letter, which fell into the hands of the Government, and is now among the State Papers in our Record Office. It is dated from Venice, April 12, I58o,2 and addressed to L. Johnson. It is from a Mr. Christopher Hodgson, who writes :
" It was not as Mr. Johnson3 that I addressed you, but as my father, who brought me out of Egypt and slavery. If a man is not plain with you, he does not love you ; and if a man is not so with another, it is either because he is afraid to displease, which is not love but fear, or because he looks for some commodity from him, which is also not love but courtesy. Whatsoever I said therefore came of love ; and if I said you had forgotten me, it was
1 Among the State Papers printed in Gibson's Lydiate Hall, is one of 1592, headed " A note of keeping of scholemasters," in which occurs the following passage: " Mr. Richard Houghton, of the Park Hall, hath kepte a recusant scholemaster I think this twentie yeares. He hath had one after another — the name of one was Scholes, of the other ffawcet, as I remember, but I stand in doubt of the name."
2 Domestic Calendar, Addenda, vol. xxvii. n. 9.
3 Among friends in his own county the martyr would be known by his true name.
526 BLESSED LAWRENCE RICHARDSON
because I thought so, and that I might get you to write. I am sorry I was so vehement. I doubt not you will interpret both what I have said and now say, and pray God to speed you. I mean to adven- ture the best joint I have with you one day. I do not desire you to help my parents, as they do not need it. I have sent you 1,000 grains,1 five gilded crosses, the pardon whereof the bearer will tell you, and three A[gnus Deis] . I have sent you all I could get, as I shall not have so good an occasion here- after."
This affectionate convert of the Blessed Lawrence was a young man named Christopher Hodgson, who had entered the English College at Rome, and had taken the College oath there on the 23rd of April, 1579, being then eighteen years of age. He was ordained priest in 1583, and afterwards taught philosophy and theology at Rheims, and later in some monastery in Lorraine.
It was perhaps partly in consequence of this very letter that the Bishop of Chester was ordered by the Council to call up certain Lancashire gentle- men whose sons were being educated in parts beyond the sea, and Mr. Hodgson among them.2 It is also noteworthy that this letter was the occasion for the first written accusation against the martyr, which survives among the State Papers. In a document concerning Catholics who are to be proceeded against, we find his name fifth amongst
1 Rosary beads. s T. E. Gibson, Lydiate Hall and its Associations, 1876, p. 218.
BLESSED LAWRENCE RICHARDSON 527
" Persons of evil disposition, come [to] or being in England." The note includes an indication of his whereabouts, viz., " Lawrence Johnson. He is to be found by Mrs. Garnet, by Kendall, and by William Ffurth, son to Alexander Ffurth."1 The conclusion one would draw from these names is that the martyr occasionally lived with all of these persons. The Ffurths at least were a Lancashire family, and are described as "of Swindley," but where Kendall and Mrs. Garnet lived does not as yet appear.
For some four years in all, Blessed Lawrence like so many of his faithful and heroic brethren, lived a hidden life, and was occupied in a work which has left no record, that of strengthening the weak, bringing back wanderers, giving the sacraments to famished souls ; and thus keeping .alive the brave and patient perseverance of Catholic Lancashire.
Dr. Thomas Worthington, in his Relation of Sixtene Martyrs, published in 1601, gives an instance of the dismay felt by the governing powers when they first heard of the arrival of the priests from the Seminaries. Edmund Fleetwood, who had most unjustly seized upon Rossall Grange, the property of Mrs. Allen, sister-in-law to the great Cardinal, was at this time one of the most promi- nent persecutors in Lancashire. He was a justice of the peace, writes Worthington, and "when sitting upon causes of religion, he heard that there
1 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. cxlvi. n. 137. The entry is followed by another stating that Christopher Hodgson had "sent in grains, gilt crosses, and Agnus Deis."
5a8 BLESSED LAWRENCE RICHARDSON
was one Mr. Lawrence Johnson, a young man and a Seminary priest (afterwards a martyr), come into the same province. ' Nay then,' saith he, ' we strive in vain. We hoped these old Papistical priests dying, all Papistry should have died and ended with them. But this new brood will never be rooted out. It is impossible ever to be rid of them nor to extirpate this Papistical faith out of the land.'"
During his abode with Mr. Houghton, Blessed Lawrence met with a great trial, which prepared him for sufferings of an even graver nature. By a former wife, Mary, daughter of Ralph Rishton of Pontalgh,1 Richard Houghton had three children, a son and two daughters, who, upon his marrying, as his second wife, "a young gentlewoman very virtuous and wise," dared to insinuate that the holy priest was unduly familiar with their step-mother. What follows is best told in the words of the sub- contemporary document, which is our authority for the whole incident.
"As soon as Lawrence heard this, he comforted the gentlewoman by exhorting to patience, and continuance in virtue, and immediately departed from the house with intention to go over seas. But before he took that journey in hand, he made one Mr. Blundel 2 acquainted thereof, whose eldest son
1 Gillow, Dictionary, iii. p. 636.
2 This was presumably Robert Blundell of Ince-Blundell, who died three years later. His third son, Richard, may have been the Blundell who visited the College at Rheims in June, 1580. (T. E. Gibson, Lydiate Hall and its Associations, 1876, pp. 84, 85, and 106 — no; Douay Diaries, p. 166.)
BLESSED LAWRENCE RICHARDSON 529
the said Mr. Blundel had sent by him before into France. Therefore, understanding his intention, he desired him either to bring back or send back his son, because now he began to be very aged, and for that purpose gave him some money in Lancashire, and appointed him to take others of a kinsman of his at London.
" So Lawrence departed and came to London, where not long staying, but he went to see a country- man, one Francis Goare, a tailor, and of old acquaintance. Here he met by chance the afore- said gentleman, and after saluting of one another, Lawrence said unto the gentleman : ' Sir, your cousin Blundel sent me unto you for such or so much money.' To whom he answered : ' 'Tis true I owe my cousin some money — but, I pray, sir, was't not you that carried my cousin, Richard Blundel, overseas ? ' ' Yes, indeed,' said he, ' it was I that took him over, and it is I, if God spare my life, that will bring him back again.' 'Faith,' said the gentleman, ' I am very glad : therefore, I pray, expect here awhile, and I'll presently return, and despatch your business,' — and so departed.
" Lawrence supposed the gentleman had meant that he would have brought in the money at his return. But the event was contrary, for, instead of money, he brought two Serjeants [" Sagants"], who, apprehending, carried him before the Magistrates. And being accused to be a priest was committed to prison, &c.
" But that we may see what became of the rest, we will first return to the gentlewoman who was ii ii.
530 BLESSED LAWRENCE RICHARDSON
accused. She therefore lived many years very piously without all suspicion of disloyalty towards her husband, and died very blessedly. So that the virtuous lives, both before and after the accusation, and the happy deaths of both these two did plainly demonstrate their former innocency.
"But the accusers, neither in life nor death, had any such tokens to prove their false and detestable assertions but plain contrary."
The narrator then gives many particulars of their misfortunes. The son was disinherited. One of the daughters had a child by her father's groom, and was reduced to beggary. The other also lost her reputation, and married a "strolling fellow," and fled with him to Ireland.
" All that knew these three did greatly wonder to see them all fall into so great misery, especially that they all were so notorious unchaste : but those, who before had known of the slander, imputed it as a just revenge of Almighty God." l
But to return to our martyr. We seem to know nothing of his examinations. He was committed to Newgate, and as the record of his trial shows, he was brought up from that prison to his arraign-
1 This seems a fitting place to note another rash accusation of this class, and the only other one which is recorded as having been brought against any of the martyrs whose lives we have been studying. While the Blessed Thomas Cottam was on the scaffold, a Protestant minister reproached him with " lewd behaviour" in Fish Street four years previously. But another minister at once interposed, and said that it was not this Cottam, but his brother, and the martyr proved the falsity of the charge, by showing that
BLESSED LAWRENCE RICHARDSON 531
ment at Westminster Hall, " on Thursday next after the eve of St. Martin . . . under the custody of Richard Martyn and William Webbe, Sheriffs of the City of London, in whose custody he had been committed by virtue of letters of our Lady the Queen de Habeas Corpus." After his indictment, " the aforesaid Lawrence Richardson was com- mitted to the Marshal" of the Queen's Bench prison. Next day, " Friday," he was brought back by the Marshal for trial, and was condemned in company with Ford, Filby, Briant, Hart, and Shert, as has already been described. The sentence of death again changed Richardson's prison. It consigned him to the custody of the Lieutenant of the Tower, and specified that he was to be drawn to the place of execution from that prison. To the Tower he was therefore now taken, as the Diary of the Tower correctly states. We have already heard from Kirby's letter, that he on his arrival was left without bedding for some two months. Four months later still he was dragged to Tyburn with the three companions of his martyrdom on May the 3Oth, as we have seen.
The fact that the Blessed Lawrence was selected to be tried and executed among the more notable of
he had not been in London for seven years. Then two or three bystanders also affirmed that the person in question was not Thomas, but his brother ; and the matter dropped. (Briefe Historic, p. 129; Concertatio, S. 94 and 216 b.)
It is to be noted that Munday, in his Execution of Certaint Traytours, passes over the incident in silence. As he was favourably placed for hearing, and gives publicity to all that can discredit the martyrs, we have here a fresh proof that the refutation of the calumny was complete.
532 BLESSED LAWRENCE RICHARDSON
the imprisoned priests, whilst others were left to languish untried, makes it probable that the Govern- ment had some special suspicion or gravamen against him, and, though the matter is not clear, it would seem that they believed him to be some one else, whom they were eager to punish for having dis- tributed Campion's books. This, or something like it, seems to be implied in Dr. Allen's introductory chapter to the Briefe Historic,1 when he says, " If Mr. Richardson, whose name and person were wholly mistaken even till his death, had been arraigned the former day, as he was the latter, Mr. Campion might belike have discharged him." That is to say, if the formal evidence against Richardson (which seems unfortunately to be no longer on record) had been given in Campion's presence, during his trial on the i6th, instead of at the trial of the second group of martyrs on the lyth, Campion would have been there to prove its irrele- vance, and Richardson might have been acquitted, as Collington actually was acquitted in a parallel case. But so effectually was the evidence mangled, that Richardson's identity was mistaken, and he was condemned for some one else.
As soon as he and Blessed Thomas Cottam were in the cart, " with cheerful countenances," Challoner says, " they signed themselves with the sign of the Cross, saying, In nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti. Mr. Cottam turning him about said, ' God bless you all. Our Lord bless you all,' with a
1 Briefe Historic, p. 10; Concertatio, p. 219.
BLESSED LAWRENCE RICHARDSON 533
smiling countenance. Mr. Richardson being com- manded by the sheriff's man to look upon his companion who was in cutting up, said : ' Oh! God's will be done.' With that, one Field, a preacher, said, Despatch, despatch ! To whom Mr. Cottam said, with smiling countenance, ' What, are you an executioner or a preacher ? fie, fie ! ' A minister standing by said, ' Leave off those jests, it is no time to jest; he is a preacher and not an executioner; he cometh to exhort you to die well.' Mr. Cottam replied, ' Truly by his word he seemed to be an executioner ; for he said, Despatch, despatch.' '
At this point a number of persons began to attack Blessed Lawrence on various subjects, and he was obliged to say, " I pray you do not trouble me. If you demand any questions of me, let them be touching the matter whereof I was condemned, and do not move new questions." On this they made him turn round to see the butchery which was being carried out on the body of Blessed Luke Kirby. When the venerable head was cut off and held up before the people, and the hangman accord- ing to the custom cried out, " God save the Queen," they asked the martyr what he said to that. He answered, " I say, Amen ; I pray God save her." Then he went on to say to the people, " I am come hither to die for treason, and I protest before God, I am not guilty of any treason, more than all Catholic bishops that ever were in this land, since the conversion thereof till our time ; and were they alive, they might as well be executed for treason as I am now."
534 BLESSED LAWRENCE RICHARDSON
For a time the attacks of the ministers were directed against Blessed Thomas Cottam, but they returned to the charge against Blessed Lawrence by reading out the "six articles," and his answer to them, which was as follows :
" Lawrence Richardson. To the fifth article he answered, that so far as Doctour Saunders and Doctour Bristowe agree with the Catholique doctrine of the Church of Rome, he alloweth that doctrine to be true. And touching the first and all the rest of the articles, he saith that in all matters not repugnant to the Catholic religion, he professeth obedience to her Majestic, and otherwise maketh no answer to any of them, but believeth therein as he is taught by the Catholique Church of Rome.
" LAWRENCE RICHARDSON.
"JOHN POPHAM. DA. LEWIS.
"THOMAS EGERTON. JOHN HAMMOND."
Topcliffe, who was present, and some of the ministers cried out that he built his faith on Saunders ; to whom he answered, " I build not my faith on any one man whatsoever, but upon the whole Catholic Church."
When the rope was fixed upon the neck of each of the confessors, the sheriff made a last attempt to overcome their constancy. " Now, Richardson," he said, " if thou wilt confess thy faults and renounce the Pope, the Queen will extend her mercy towards thee, and thou shalt be carried
BLESSED LAWRENCE RICHARDSON 535
back again." " I thank her Majesty," the martyr answered, "for her mercy; but I must not confess an untruth, or renounce my faith." The same offer was made to Blessed Thomas, and either mistaking, or feigning to mistake his answer, they loosed the rope from the gallows and removed him from the cart. On this they again pressed Blessed Lawrence to confess and ask pardon of the Queen, to which he could only answer again that he had never offended her to his knowledge. At this Topcliffe cried out in a rage, "The like mercy was never shown to any offender, and if you were in any other commonwealth, you should be torn in pieces with horses." Finally, when he had asked all Catholics present to pray with him, and had recited the Pater, Ave, and Credo, the cart was drawn away, whilst he was heard saying : " Lord, receive my soul ; Lord Jesus, receive my soul."
E. S. K.
AUTHORITIES. — Besides those mentioned above, the chief general authorities are Briefe Historic, pp. 121 — 124. Concert atio (1588), ff. 93 — 96, 219.
The Annals of the English College, Rome, are apparently in error when they state that this martyr aliquandiu commoratus est (" was sometime a resident," Foley, vi. 86), in that College. Dr. Worthington's Catalogus Marty nun in Anglia, 1614, denies it, but says that he had had the intention of going to Rome for the sake of devotion. It is probable that the mistake arose from a confusion between the two Johnsons; for, whereas Robert Johnson did go to Rome, this is not mentioned in the Annual Letters.
XIX. THE BLESSED THOMAS COTTAM,
JESUIT.
Tyburn, 30 May, 1582.
LANCASHIRE, with most of the north, had been comparatively little affected by the Reformation when Elizabeth came to the throne. But amongst those who had been seduced from the faith of their fathers were Lawrence Cottam and his wife Ann, daughter of a Mr. Brewer or Brewerth, of Brindle, in the same county. Lawrence Cottam possessed some property at Dilworth and Tarnaker, on which he lived himself, as his family had done for many generations. Their son Thomas was born there in the year I549-1 He was early sent to Oxford and entered at Brasenose College, and will most probably have been there with Blessed John Shert, at least when he first entered. He took his degree as Bachelor on the 23rd of March, 1568. 2 On leaving
1 Gillow, vol. i. p. 574 ; Bartoli, Inghilterra, lib. iv. cap. iii. p. 260.
2 " Cottam (Cotam and Cotton) Thomas supplicated for B.A- March 22, 1568-9, admitted March 23, determined in Lent, supplicated M.A. in June, licensed for M.A. July n, 1572, incepted July 14." (Boase, Register of the University of Oxford, I. 274 and II. iii. 21.)
BLESSED THOMAS COTTAM 537
the University he was appointed to the mastership of a free grammar-school in the city of London, where he became " well known and beloved," says Arther Pitts, long afterwards his fellow-prisoner in the Tower. At this time he had the happiness to meet with Thomas Pound of Belmont, one of the noblest of the many heroic confessors of those days. For God's sake Pound gave up the royal favour, a large fortune, and his liberty for some thirty years. During this space he was committed to gaol sixteen several times, passed through ten or eleven different prisons, and was three times tortured, yet he never lost courage, cheerfulness, or even playfulness. Pound converted Cottam to the holy faith, and at the same time to a holy life. It does not appear at what exact time his conversion took place. In a letter full of gratitude to Pound, dated the I2th of May, 1575, he speaks as though it had happened some time before :
" Your charity like its Author is eternal, and as there is no comparison between things eternal and perishable goods, between time and eternity, so am I neither able by word or writing to express sufficiently the testimony of gratitude I owe you. I remember when you were to me a consoler in my solitude, the guide of my path, my helper in my afflictions, and my refuge in need. Through you the divine mercy recalled me from my wanderings, raised me up when fallen, sustained me in my wavering, preserved me in my trials, restored me when lost. So great a thing is it to possess a
538 BLESSED THOMAS COTTAM
faithful friend. Such you have been, and have shown at the same time how far one, whose Christianity is pure and sincere, excels ordinary men, and those devoted to pleasures. I had already begun to know vice, which I deeply lament. Now I follow virtue, and wonderfully does it refresh my soul, which is now freed from earthly cares, safe from enemies, and in no great fear of hell. These are great things indeed, and for all of them I am indebted to you. But that is by far the greatest of all, which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of the Apostle saith, Testimonium reddidit spiritui nostro quod sumus filii Dei. I beseech you by the same Holy Spirit, by Christ this day ascending into heaven, by the Eternal Father, at Whose right hand He sitteth, by the Omnipotent and Immortal God, Three in One, that you be always mindful of me, and sometimes solace me by your letters. I will implore this same God, even to my latest breath, that He may long preserve you safe, with the highest increase of His honour and glory, and at last crown you with a holy end. Farewell. This feast of the Ascension of our Lord, in the year 1575. "1
The presumption is that, when this letter was written, our martyr had already given up his school, and had gone to Douay. The tone of the writer leaves no room for doubt that his reception into the Church had already taken place, and in
1 H. More, Historia Provincia Anglican^ Soc. jfesu, IV. vii. p. 127 ; Bartoli, Inghilterra, lib. iv. cap. ii. p. 261.
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his examination, printed below, we hear that he was received at Douay. How he was occupied there we do not know, probably making some preliminary studies outside the College, for when he was eventually admitted there as a student for the priesthood, on the 22nd of May, 1577, his ordination as subdeacon and deacon followed very shortly. He received both Orders at Cambrai, the first in August and the second in December, of the same year. The College Diary records a journey to England in the following month, January, 1578, and his return from England on May the I4th with five Oxford students. It may be conjectured, as in the similar case of Blessed John Shert, that these were some of his old pupils, for whose sake he had expressly gone to England.
This was just at the time of the troubles at Douay and the transfer of the College to Rheims. From Rheims, on the i6th of the February follow- ing, 1579, Blessed Thomas, still only a deacon, set out for Rome. He was one of a party of nine, seven being students of the College, and they are said in the Diary, without distinction, to have gone "partly for devotion, partly for study." When he arrived in the eternal city, he probably entered the German College,1 for its historian speaks of him as an alumnus. But as his name is not on the College Register we may surmise that he was only there for a short time, as a probationer. He soon felt himself inflamed with the desire to embrace the
1 Historia Collegii Germanici et Hungarici MS. Auctore P. Gul. Fusbano, 1580.
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religious life, asked to be admitted into the Society, and was received into the Novitiate at Sant Andrea on April the 8th. His holy desires grew with each step, and now he longed to devote himself to the missions in India, and, though only a novice, begged his Superiors to send him there. But the heats of his first and only Roman summer brought on " a consuming and lingering sickness, and he was by his Superiors sent to Lyons to try if, by change of air, he might be recovered." As he left the Novitiate, and passed out of the gates of Sant Andrea the Brother Porter, bidding him adieu, said, "Cave ne alius accipiat coronam tuam" — "Beware lest another receive thy crown," and the words remained deeply impressed in his tender conscience, as we shall see.1
Cottam must have arrived at Lyons early in December, 1579, for on the 2ist of January, 1580, a letter was sent by the Father General to Father William Crichton, then Provincial of the Jesuits in that part of France, and afterwards a well-known missionary in Scotland, in which the following clause occurs :
" Father Maionus writes that one Thomas Cottam, an Englishman and a novice, has come to you. Your Reverence must know that he was sent thither to make trial of his health, for here in Rome he was sick. Wherefore, if he does not get better there, your Reverence is empowered to
1 Brief e Historic, p. 127, and MS. Relation of Arthur Pitts, Westminster Archives, vol. i. p. 5, printed in Pollen's Acts of English Martyrs, p. 281.
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dismiss him, as he is a novice, and was sent there on this condition. He is, moreover, not a man of great, or perhaps even, of average talents."1
The reader will, doubtless, not lose his respect for the future martyr, by learning that he was made of the same clay as most of us, but we must all regret that we have not got Father Crichton's answer, and cannot say what he thought of Cottam's talents, or what the conditions were, under which he sent him back to Rheims in the following spring. But at all events we do know how the Blessed Thomas understood the terms on which they parted. He considered himself accepted for the Mission of India, if his health should sufficiently recover for him to go there, and the doctors decided (rightly for a wonder), that a return to England would give him his best chance of a permanent recovery. The martyr therefore accepted the situa- tion, with all the duties that followed from it. He would return to England despite the dangers of so doing, and as the reception of priestly Orders would also facilitate the end in view, he would apply for these at once.
Blessed Thomas therefore turned towards his old home, the College at Rheims, and made the journey with his future companion in prison and martyrdom, Blessed Robert Johnson, with whom the cunning Sledd, as has already been related, had associated himself on the road from Rome. The two martyrs arrived at Rheims on the nth of April, 1580, while the spy made a detour to Paris, to give 1 Archives S.J. Ep. ad Galliam, 1576 — 1579, f. 41.
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the English Ambassador a minute description of their persons and plans. Having done this he went back to Rheims, where he arrived on the 24th. of the same month. Blessed Thomas's health was too much broken to allow of his continuing his studies any further, but " being a deacon and a good preacher long before," it was resolved to allow him to receive the priesthood at once and then to go to England.
Accordingly on May the 25th, the Wednesday of Whitsun week, he left the College for Soissons for his ordination, which no doubt took place on the 28th, the Ember Saturday. His last days at the College were memorable ones, the whole house being thrilled by the presence of the missionary party just arrived from Rome, Campion, Persons, Sherwin, Kirby, and the others, and on June the 5th, he set out for England with one of them, Edward Rishton, and three other companions, Dr. Humphrey Ely, John Hart, and Thomas Crane. They arrived at Dover about the i6th or i8th of June, sufficiently disguised, as they supposed, to be safe. But Sledd's work had been but too well done. After they had landed and gone to their inn, they were searched to their skins, and though nothing suspicious was found about them, Cottam was at once recognized and arrested. Hart also was stopped, being taken for Orton, who was afterwards captured. Rishton escaped for a time, but fell into the hands of the London officers in the course of a few months, as we have seen. The Mayor, Mr. Allen, and the searcher, Stevens, now held a consultation, and as
543
a way of saving expense, proposed to Dr. Ely, who passed by the name of Havard, and had come and gone repeatedly by the same name without exciting suspicion, to take charge of their prisoner to London. He would only have to hand him over, with a letter from the Mayor to Lord Cobham, the Warden of the Cinque Ports. Dr. Ely agreed, and his host of the inn made himself responsible for the faithful fulfilment of his undertaking.
But the good lawyer had no idea of keeping his promise. He was a religious man, and had himself ten years before sacrificed his prospects and taken the road of exile for his faith.1 And no sooner were they well out of the town than he said to his prisoner, " I cannot in conscience, nor will not, being myself a Catholic, deliver you, a Catholic priest, prisoner to my Lord Cobham. But we will straight to London, and when you come there, shift for yourself, as I will do for myself." So, on arriving in London they separated.
But Cottam, "a man of marvellous zeal and of
1 Dr. Humphrey Ely, of Brasenose and afterwards of St. John's, on declaring himself a Catholic, was obliged to leave Oxford and betook himself in 1570 to Douay. Here he devoted himself to the study of law, in which he graduated, and obtained a professorship. He also took a convenient house, where he boarded English students in the University, of whom there were a good many besides those at the English College. (See Douay Diaries, March, 1576.) From March, 1577, he became a member of the College, and followed its fortunes to Rheims. After the committal of his friend, Blessed Thomas Cottam, Ely retired to Spain, but returned again imme- diately to Rheims, and became a priest. He received the three sacred Orders in March and April, 1582, and said his first Mass on St. George's Day. He became Professor of Civil and Canon Law at Pont-a-Mousson in 1586, and died there in 1604.
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a timorous conscience," could not enjoy in peace a liberty which might cost others dear. He went immediately to one of the prisons to consult a Catholic friend, probably Pound, who at that time was in the Marshalsea,1 in Southwark, and asked his advice on the whole case. His friend told him "that in conscience he could not make that escape," and urged him to give himself up to the authorities, and so secure Ely against harm.
Blessed Thomas at once went to Ely and asked him for the letter from the Mayor of Dover to Lord Cobham. "Why, what will you do with it?" said his friend. " I will go and carry it to him," answered the holy priest, " and yield myself prisoner ; for I am fully persuaded that I cannot make this escape in conscience." "Why," said Ely, "this counsel that hath been given you, proceedeth, I confess, from a zealous mind ; marry, I doubt whether it carrieth with it the weight of knowledge. You shall not have the letter, nor you may not in conscience yield yourself to the persecutor and adversary, having so good means offered to escape his cruelty." The martyr persisted ; Ely, unwilling to yield, proposed that they should consult with "one newly come over, whom Mr. Cottam greatly honoured and reverenced for his singular wit and learning, and for his rare virtues."
It is clear that Persons or Campion is meant,
1 He was there till September 18, when the Bishop of London sent him heavily ironed to solitary confinement in the half-ruined episcopal castle at Bishop's Stortford, where he remained until he was brought to the Tower on August 17, 1581.
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and Persons has left a record of what actually happened : " The Fathers, consulting the case with some other priests and discreet Catholics, all were of opinion that, his case standing as it did, and the obligation of his appearing lying rather upon another than himself, he was not bound to offer himself to so manifest danger. Which determina- tion, though he were content to accept and follow for the time, yet seemed he still rather to incline to offer up himself, if he might be permitted."
After this, Dr. Ely sent back the Mayor of Dover's letter to its writer, and before long the host of the inn there, who was held responsible for the loss of the prisoner, came up to London to search for him, and meeting Dr. Ely, insisted on having either him or Cottam, and thus Dr. Ely had no choice between going to prison himself or finding his friend. So, meeting Blessed Thomas in Cheapside, he said : " Mr. Cottam, such a man is come to town and hath so seized upon me for your escape, that you or I must needs go to prison. You know my state and condition, and may guess how gently I shall be treated, if once I appear under my right name before them. Now it is in your choice whether of us shall go ; for one must go, there is no remedy ; and to force you I will not, for I had rather sustain what punishment soever."
Mr. Cottam, lifting up his eyes and hands to heaven, said: "Now God be blessed! I should never, while I lived, have been without scruple and grudge of conscience, if I had escaped them. Nothing grieveth me, but that I have not despatched JJ n.
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some business that I have to do." " Why," said Ely, " it is but ten of the clock yet, and you may despatch your business by four of the clock, and then you may go to them." " Whither is it," said he, " that I must go ? " " To the sign of the Star," quoth Ely, " in New Fish Street ; and there you must enquire for one Mr. Andrews, my Lord Cobham's deputy. To him you must yield yourself."
Arthur Pitts adds that, as they parted, the martyr spoke these words, which show that he was actuated not by a timid scrupulosity, but by a holy ambition for the crown intended for him. " Now God be thanked," said he, " for I was never quiet in my minde since you let me go ; still it ran in my head that which the porter of St. Andrew's sayd unto me."
Father Persons here takes up the story again. "As soon as ever Mr. Cottam understood that the inn-holder at Dover and Mr. Dr. Ely were called in question about his escape, and that one of them was necessarily to come in trouble, he returned to consult the case again with the said Fathers, who upon this new accident inclined more to his desire. And so with a merry countenance, he went of himself and all alone, and offered himself prisoner."1
And now began his long martyrdom, which lasted nearly two years. We might have expected
1 It is characteristic of the dishonesty prevalent among Elizabeth's officials that Andrews, who had taken over Cottam in New Fish Street, should have applied for and have received, on July the 4th, the then considerable sum of £5 for bringing up Cottam from Dover. (R.O. Treasurer of the Chamber's accounts.)
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that his chivalrous self-surrender would have won for him some sort of consideration, but in fact he suffered more than the rest of the glorious band, presumably because of the informations brought against him by Sledd, or some other spy. He was first carried to the Court, which was then at Nonsuch or Oatlands, and there a number of ministers plied him with arguments and per- suasions for five days, and then he was committed to the Marshalsea, " close prisoner by the com- mandment of the Hon. Council, the 27th of June, for papistry ; anno 1580." 1
"Close-prisoner" means one who is deprived of all intercourse with his fellow-captives. This must have been very galling to Cottam, as there were in that prison many Catholics, Pound amongst them, whose company would materially have light- ened the sufferings of confinement. Still, means were found by the others to communicate with him, and in the Gesta of the Rheims College for 1580, an extract is given of a letter from a priest, who was his fellow-prisoner. It runs thus, somewhat obscurely, " Cotmus is in close-custody next to me. He will say his first Mass in my cell. . . . We make nothing of these dangers."2 Thus it would seem
1 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. cxl. n. 40.
2 Gesta Seminarii Pontificii Anglorum apud Rhemos, 1580. (Clergy Brotherhood MSS. vol. iii.) "Cotmus est in arcta custodia proximus meus, qui faciet primitias apud me (hie ordinatus presbyter statim ex qui- busdam causis migravit in Angliam, licet tamen sub obligatione pecuniaria dimissus sit, iste eo tempore adveniens captus est) nos de istiusmodi periculis nihil curamus." It is probable that some words have fallen out between Angliam and licet.
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that Cottam never had the consolation of saying Mass in a Catholic church or chapel, but only in the narrow prison-cell, and amid the terrible risks which celebration under those circumstances involved.
Without a doubt he needed all the spiritual assistance he could obtain, for, as we have already seen, the cruel and remorseless persecutors had singled him out to be a special victim of their malice.
Writing on the iyth of November, 1580, from London, to Father Agazzari, Father Persons sends him greetings from Father Sherwin, Father Luke [Kirby], Father Johnson, Father Hart, Paschal and Orton, all of whom were in prison, Sherwin having been captured only four days before. " We expect," he adds, " that two priests will be publicly executed ere long, Cottam and Clifton." l
Though Cottam was not executed at that time, there is no reason to doubt that Father Persons had good foundation for what he said, and that his death was actually under discussion. The following paper, which from various circumstances we conclude to have been drawn up during this month, gives us the points, with which he might be charged, the matter contained in them being amply sufficient for a capital conviction in those days.
" Cottam chargeable with
" Departing the realm without licence for satis- fying his conscience, misliking religion here now
1 Stonyhurst MSS. Collectanea P. fol. 299.
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established. (In his answers to the four first interrogatories.)
" Refusing to answer the 6th interrogatory of the lawfulness of the oath of obedience to her Majesty.
" Refusing to conform himself to the religion now here established. (In his answer to the 7th.)
" With being reconciled at Douay to the Church of Rome by a priest whom he will not name, as also with refusing to declare, who be the reconcilers to the Pope within the realm. (In his answer to the i6th and 17th.)
" Refusing to confess her Majesty to be a godly Princess, though lawful. (In answer to the 23rd.)
" Refusing to answer whether the Pope's excom- munication of her Majesty be lawful, and according to God's Word.
" Refusing to answer anything before confessed upon oath, or to take any oath therein.
" [Second Interrogatories.'} Receiving out of England £20 for scholars of Rheims, but refusing in conscience to confess who sent the said money. (In answer to the third interrogatory.)
" With receiving the book of seditious questions of an Englishman at Rheims, to be brought over to one herein this realm, but saith he remembereth not the names of either of those men, but refuseth on his oath to make this answer."1
If this paper should not be connected with a plan to prosecute Blessed Thomas to the death,
1 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. cxl. n. 43.
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then it will be one of the papers prepared for an ordeal even more painful than death. Early in December, as we have seen, the Privy Council resolved " to make an example of some by punish- ment to the terror of others," and Cottam was perhaps the first picked out for the torture.
On December the 4th, he was transferred to the Tower. On the loth he was subjected to the horrible invention of Sir William Skevington l for upwards of an hour, the blood flowing freely from the nostrils. It would appear that at some other time he was racked. Besides the questions which we have seen were prepared for him and others by Elizabeth's Council,2 he himself declared at his trial that he was asked, under threat of torture, what penances had been given him in confession. In order to escape from their cruelty, he told them, with a jest. They then required him to say for what sins the penances were given him, and because he would not answer, they applied the torture. When he complained of their inhuman cruelty, they gave him blows, and then he protested that, though they killed him by their torments, he would never disclose any such thing whether about himself or others.
Upon this open declaration in court, Hopton got up and had the effrontery to deny the whole story. But the martyr was not to be cowed, and answered : " And is not this true ? Here is present Dr. Hammond and the rest of the Commissioners
1 i.e., the instrument of torture known as "The Scavenger's Daughter."
2 See the Life of Blessed Luke Kir by, above.
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that were at my racking, to whose consciences I appeal. God is my witness that it is most true."1
Neither infirm health, nor the sufferings of prison and torture, broke down the courage of the martyr. In the spring of 1581 he was one of the Catholic prisoners, who were dragged to hear the sermons of Nichols, and who boldly reproved him. On March the loth, in particular, when a number of courtiers and magistrates were present to give greater importance to the preacher, the diarist -of the Tower records, that Blessed Cottam " with wonderful courage most seriously admonished them of their duty, which circumstance is thought to have been the means of accelerating his death. From that day forward, however, Nichols was held in utter contempt."
The dragging to sermons ceased, as we have heard, after Pentecost, and at midsummer the prisoners were indicted for recusancy, Cottam's name being still legible on the sessions roll.2 God gave His servant a great desire of martyrdom ; yet at his trial he did his best to defend himself against the unjust charge brought against him.
" You came into England at or near the time that the rest came," said the prosecuting Queen's Counsel, " so that it must needs be intended a
1 Cardinal Allen, Sincere and Modest Defence (1584), pp. n, 12, gives the whole incident, saying that it was " verbatim left behind in writing." (Latin translation, Ad Persecutores Anglos pro Catholicis Responsio, in the Concertatio, 1588, f. 297 ; also More's Historia Provincice Anglicans Soc. Jesu, p. 128.)
a See above, pp. 387, 417.
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match between you, for the furtherance of those affairs which were then a-brewing, and how answer you thereunto ? "
Cottam. — " It was neither my purpose nor my message to come into England ; neither would I have come, had not God otherwise driven me ; for my journey was appointed to the Indians : and thither had I gone, had my health been thereto answerable. But in the meanwhiles it pleased God to visit me with sickness, and being counselled by the physicians, for my health's sake, to come into England, — for otherwise, as they said, either remaining there or going elsewhere I should not recover it, — I came upon that occasion, and upon no other, into this realm."
Campion. — " Indeed the physicians in Rome do hold for a certainty that, if an Englishman shall fall sick amongst them, there is no better nor scant any other way for his health, than to repair into England there to take his natural air, which agreeth best with his complexion."
Cottam. — " And that only was the cause of my coming, and not any determinate intent either to persuade or dissuade, being otherwise by my Provost charged to the Indians. Neither after my arrival here did I hide myself, nor dealt otherwise than might beseem any man that meddled no more than I did. I lay for the most part in Southwark ; I walked daily in Paul's ; I refrained no place, which betokened my innocency."
Queen's Counsel. — " Did you neither persuade nor dissuade ? Was there not a book found in your
BLESSED THOMAS COTTAM 553
budget, the contents whereof tended to no other purpose ? The which book was made by one d'Espignata, entitled Tractatus Conscientice, contain- ing certain answers to the Supremacy, and how sophistically to frustrate any kinds of demands ; with a further method how you ought to demean yourself in every sort of company, whether it were of Protestants or Puritans, and what speeches you should use to convert them both : — as, unto the Protestants, highly commending them and showing them that they are far nearer the right way than the Puritans, and whom you should utterly dispraise unto the Puritans ; likewise in commending the Protestants and persuading them to the obedience of the Pope. To what end then should you carry this book about you, if you were not purposed to do as it prescribeth ? "
Cottam. — " I protest before God I knew nothing of that book, neither how nor when it came to me."
" Then Campion, seeing him driven to so narrow an exigent as to deny that which was manifest,1 said :
" Many casualties and events may happen, whereby a man may be endangered, ere he beware,. by the carrying of a thing he knoweth not, as either the malice of others, that privily convey it among other his provisions, or his own negligence or oversight, which marked not attentively what he took with him. Whereof both are to be judged errors, yet not deemed an offence ; and therefore this cannot be maintained to be done by Mr. Cottam 1 This of course is only the Protestant reporter's gloss.
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on purpose, which we see flatly to be out of his knowledge. But suppose that purposely he brought the book with him, yet what can that make against him for treason? It treateth of conscience; it toucheth good demeanour ; it showeth how to make the unbelieving faithful, — matters wholly spiritual, points of edification, preparing to Godwards. Where is then the treason ? But were these reasons impertinent, yet it is a custom with all students beyond the seas, when any man learned or well thought of draweth a treatise touching either conscience or good behaviour, to copy it out and carry it about with them, not aiming at any faction or conspiracy, but for their own proper knowledge and private instruction." l
The martyr was taken back to the Tower after sentence, and probably there suffered an increase of severity, such as we know was inflicted upon several of his fellow-sufferers.
We get a passing glimpse of Cottam in a letter written from the Tower by John Hart, whose Diarium has been so often quoted, and who was afterwards a Jesuit. His letter was in fact a petition to the Society, like those of Woodhouse and of Briant mentioned above, to be received even while in prison. Hart says that he has asked Cottam's advice, and that Cottam had encouraged him to consider his desire for the religious life as a genuine vocation from God. Considering the
1 Harleian MSS. 6,265, printed in Cobbett's State Trials, 1809, p. 1065. The merit of Campion's answers is enhanced, when we remember that the reporter was decidedly hostile.
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complications of the case,1 this showed no small discernment on the future martyr's part, and his judgment was verified by the event.
Some months after Blessed Cottam's condem- nation, he was amongst those examined again by the " six articles " of the Council. But like his brothers in martyrdom, Blessed John Shert and Blessed Lawrence Richardson,- his answer kept to the one point of his agreeing in all things with the teaching of the Church.
"Thomas Cottam. — To the first; in this, and all other questions he believeth as the Catholique Church (which he taketh to be the Church of Rome) teacheth him. And other answer he maketh not to any of the rest of these articles.
" By me, THOMAS COTTAM, Priest.
" JOHN POPHAM. DA. LEWIS.
"THOMAS EGERTON. JOHN HAMMOND."2
On May the zgth, Tuesday in the octave of the Ascension, the martyr " received a bill from the
1 J. Morris (Troubles, ii. 30 — 34) prints the important passages of Hart's letter to Walsingham (R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. cl. 80), in which pleading for his life, he offered terms which were very dis- honourable, though Foley (Records S.J. vii. 338) is mistaken in calling the letter an act of apostasy. On May 12, 1582, he wrote the letter alluded to in the text, begging for admission into the Society, and his courage rising, took of his own accord the vows of religion. (Archives S.J. Anglia, ii. fol. 731 a.) After this his constancy fully atoned for his previous weakness. He was next year admitted to the Society in prison, and after banishment in 1585, died in 1586, in a College of the Society in Poland.
- Butler's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 202 ; Tierney-Dodd, vol. iii. p. xii. Appendix.
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Lieutenant of the Tower," says Arthur Pitts in his relation, " that the next daie he should suffer.1 Whereupon he came to his window, over againste my doore, saying with a joy of heart and voice, ' Give God thankes with me, for to-morrow is my day. And now I hope I shall not escape the happy houre, which I have earnestly so long desired, because I finde my name first in the rovvle of the four assigned to dy to-morrow.' The next daie he departed joyfully. But arriving to the place of his martyrdom, he was quailed againe : for albeit he was first taken up, yet the officer, fearing that his example might draw many to be of his Religionr because he was well known and beloved in the cittie, having been before a schoolmaister there, they, desirous to save his life, solicited him earnestly to recant his Religion ; in which he persisting, they take him downe, to see if the death and torments of the other his brethren could move him. But when they perceived that his courage by their blood encreased, he had his desired crowne of martyrdom. The occasion that he had so much this crowne printed in his head, and the fear of losing it was this." And then follows the story of the Brother Porter's farewell at Sant Andrea at Rome, which has been related before.2
Far, indeed, from being overcome by the spectacle of the death and butchery of his brethren, which he
1 It is curious that his diet in the Tower was only charged for till May 27, as he suffered three days later. (Pollen, Acts of English Martyrs, p. 280, note.)
2 P. 540. Westminster Archives, vol. ii. p. 5, printed in Pollen's Acts of English Martyrs, pp. 280 — 282.
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had been forced to witness, the martyr, whilst it was in progress, and whilst the discussion between the ministers and Blessed Lawrence Richardson was going on, tried to make a good impression on Bull, the hangman. Taking him by the sleeve, he said : " God forgive thee, and make thee His servant : take heed in time and call for grace, and no doubt God will hear thee. Take example by the executioner of St. Paul, who, during the time of the Saint's execution, a little drop of blood falling from St. Paul upon his garment, white like milk, did afterwards call him to remembrance of himself, and so he became penitent for his sins and became a good man : whose example I pray God thou mayest follow ; and I pray God give thee His grace." " What ! " cried one of the ministers, who had caught the last words, " do you believe he was saved by the blood that fell on him ? " And so they continued for some time to cavil against him on this new score.
When they returned to the charge, calling on him to confess his treasons, he said : " How willingly would I confess, if I did know anything that did charge me. And if we had been guilty of any such thing, surely one or other of us either by racking or death would have confessed it, or else we had been such people as never were heard of. And I protest that before my coming into England I was prepared to go into the Indies, and if I were to be set at liberty, I would never rest on the journey towards those countries." " The Queen will be merciful to thee, if thou wilt thyself," said the
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sheriff. Upon which the martyr answered, " I thank her Grace; do with me what you think good." And then it was that, affecting to see some sort of yield- ing in these words, and with the hope of entrapping him into some expression of disagreement with his fellow-martyrs, the sheriff ordered Blessed Thomas to be removed from the cart as we have seen.1 On this, the martyrdom of Blessed Richardson was carried out, Blessed Cottam repeating again and again, " O good Lawrence, pray for me. Lord Jesus, receive thy soul."
They all now clustered round Blessed Cottam, urging their arguments and persuasions, and the witness, whom Challoner quotes from the Briefe Historic, says he heard him well utter these words : " I will not swerve a jot from my faith in anything. Yea, if I had ten thousand lives, I would rather lose them all than forsake the Catholic faith in any point," and the sheriff, despairing of any success, said, " Despatch him, since he is so stubborn," and he was once more lifted into the cart.
Another witness explains that the martyr was at first under the impression that he was really pardoned, because of the entire blamelessness of his return to England, even from the point of view
1 Munday's version is : " But Cottam seemed to utter such words, as though there had been hope he would have forsaken his wicked- ness, so that the halter was untied and he brought down out of the cart again. In which time Lawrence Richardson prepared him to death, confessing himself a Catholic, and that he would believe in all things as the Catholic Church of Rome did, unto the Pope he allowed one only Supremacy. In which traitorous opinion, after certain Latin prayers, he was committed to God."
BLESSED THOMAS COTTAM
559
of his adversaries. " At length they said it was requisite he should stand up, and speak a few words to the people, to signify that he was sent for no such ill-purpose [as the rest], and that he misliked much the Pope's doings in these matters. . . . But God gave him grace to see their legerdemain, and to stand upon the truth and innocence, and so he was executed with more despite than the rest." l
All the time that they made him look on at the quartering of Blessed Richardson, he continued praying aloud. " Lord Jesus, have mercy on them !
0 Lord, give me grace to endure to the end ; Lord, give me constancy to the end. Good Lawrence, thy soul pray for me.2 O Lord, what a spectacle hast thou made unto me ! " The head of his friend was held up by the executioner with the usual words, "God save the Queen," and the martyr added, " God save and bless her, and with all my heart
1 wish her prosperity as my liege and Sovereign Queen and chief governess." But when they once more tried to get him to add, "and supreme head in matters ecclesiastical," he said, " If I would have put in those words, I had been discharged almost two years since. You say I am a traitor if I deny that. No, that is a matter of faith, and unless it be for my conscience and faith I never offended her
1 Briefe Historie, p. 26. Munday says: "Then was Cottam brought up to the cart again, and the good opinion had of him afore, changed into that obstinate nature, that was in them all."
2 " For which words both the Preachers and the people rebuked him, telling him he ought to pray to none but to God only, all help of man was but in vain. Whereto he answered, he was assured that he could pray for him." (Munday.)
560 BLESSED THOMAS COTTAM
Majesty," and looking up to heaven he cried: "In te Domine speravi, non confundar in atermim" and " Domine, tu plura pro me passus es," three times repeating "plura." For some time longer they let him continue praying ; he recited some verses of the Miserere, he asked pardon of all he had ever injured, and pardoned all in turn, praying God mercifully to turn away His anger from this country, and call its people to repentance ; then he begged all Catholics present to join in prayer with him, and after a last Pater and Ave, his sacrifice was completed.1
When his body was stripped for quartering they found next his skin a rough canvas cloth like a sack, the best substitute he could procure for a hair-shirt. We have already heard from the Annual Letter for 1582, of the English College at Rome, that the mangled bodies of the martyrs of May the 3Oth, instead of being as usual fixed in various parts of London, were buried under the gibbet, on account of the murmurs which began to be heard among the people, and that certain Catholics removed the relics during the night.2
That Blessed Thomas Cottam never ceased to belong canonically to the Society of Jesus, as other novices do, is clearer to us than it was to his Catholic contemporaries, who had no access to the Protestant and comparatively full report of the statements made by Cottam during his trial, which
1 Munday adds that "as the cart was drawing away, he said, 'In mantis tuas Domine commendo spiritum meum.' "
2 Foley, Records S.J. vol. vi. p. 86.
BLESSED THOMAS COTTAM 561
have been printed above. The compilers of the Briefe Historic, chief of whom was Dr. Allen, knew that he was not sent away from the Society, at the time he left the Novitiate, though several Jesuit historians, amongst them Father More and Father N. Southwell, have stated that he did leave the Order at that time. This inaccuracy we have seen corrected by the letter of Father General Everard Mercurian. Of the conditions on which Cottam eventually parted from the Provincial, Father Crichton, at Lyons, we have no official record. But Father Persons tells us that Cottam "accounted himself still of the Society," because he had " express promise to be received again, whensoever his health should serve him for the same," and now we know that the undertaking on the side of the Society was even more explicit. The Order had agreed to receive him, no longer on trial, but for the missions. In his own words, " he was by his Provost charged for the Indians," when his health should be restored. But his convales- cence had certainly been effected by his native air, the agreement with the Order had therefore clearly taken effect. On the scaffold he declared that his obligation to go to the Indies was so great, that " if liberty be allowed me, I shall never rest till I go there." The Society, on her side, has fully acknow- ledged her bond of attachment to him, through her historians and martyrologists, and he is reckoned a member of the Order in the Brief of Beatification.
It is uncertain whether it was in Blessed Cottam's lifetime or at what period, but his brother KK n.
562 BLESSED THOMAS COTTAM
John, who succeeded to the estates, and his wife, Catherine, became Catholics, and frequently appear in the recusant rolls.1 Their only child was a girl, Priscilla ; but in the Register of the English Catholic non-jurors2 in 1715 appears a " Lawrence Cottam, of Dilworth, Gent.," so that through some other branch the martyr's blood had obtained perseverance in the faith for a Catholic succession up to that time.
E. S. K.
J. H. P.
AUTHORITIES. — Briefe Historic, pp. 12, 26, 124 — 131; Conccrtatio,ft.93 — 96,224,226; Yepes; Gillow; The Dictionary of National Biography, &c.
For Cottam's arrest we have three primary authorities, (i) The Briefe Historic, p. 127, &c. As this was composed at Rheims, at a time when Dr. Ely was residing there, we may take it that he is responsible for its accuracy. In effect it touches on those points, on which Ely, and Ely alone could then have given evidence, and on no others. (2) Father Persons, MS. Life of Campion (1594), cap. xxiii., wrote with this earlier account before him, and supplemented it from his own personal knowledge. (3) Arthur Pitts' relation seems to be independent of both (Pollen, Acts of English Martyrs, pp. 280 —282).
H. Foley, Records of the English Province S.J. vol. ii. pp. 145 — 177, contains some useful documents, and a list of the older writers and historians who have commemorated the martyr.
In the Vatican Archives, Castel S. Angelo, Caps. XIV. ii.
1 Gillow's Bibliographical Dictionary of the English Catholics, vol. i.
P- 574-
3 The Catholic Non-Jurors of 1715. E. E. Estcourt and J. O. Payne, p. 106.
BLESSED THOMAS COTTAM 563
36, there is an undated letter, sent to Father Agazzari from England about April, 1581, in which there is a full account of Cottam's courage in speaking against Nichols in the Church of St. Peter ad Vincula.
PORTRAIT. — At the Gesu, with those of other Jesuit martyrs. A copy by the late Mr. Charles Weld, at Stonyhurst. He is represented three-quarter face, with rope round his neck, and knife and palm in his right hand.
RELICS. — The only relics of this martyr are the corporal at Stonyhurst, on which he and four other martyrs said Mass in the Tower (see Life of Briant), and possibly a particle of his heart preserved by the Archbishop of Westminster in his private chapel (see Life of Ford). There is also at Stonyhurst a piece of bone, perhaps half a carpal, in Case I. n. i, marked Ex sept em martyribus Anglis. The martyrs of the 28th and 3oth of May, 1582, form the only group of seven who suffered at this period.
XX. THE BLESSED WILLIAM LACEY,
SECULAR PRIEST.
York, 22 August, 1582.
THE city of York had long formed the seat of a distinct government for the northern counties, under a Lord President and his Council. On the ist of December, 1572, Elizabeth appointed as Lord President of the North, Henry Hastings, Earl of Huntingdon ; a fanatical Puritan filled with venom and hatred against everything Catholic. Alas ! his mother was Catherine Pole, grand-daughter of the Blessed Margaret Plantagenet ! Lord Huntingdon's Council was of one mind with the Lord President, and it seems as though the Tyburn martyrdoms had roused their emulation, and within a few months the blood of five martyrs consecrated the northern capital.
The first victim was William Lacey. He was born in Yorkshire, at " Hauton," Challoner says. Some fifteen years before his consecration he held an im- portant position in York of a judicial character, which brought him in a good income. He was of a good stock, and connected with the chief families
BLESSED WILLIAM LACEY 565
of the county. He was married to the widow of a Yorkshire gentleman named Creswell, the mother of a son, Arthur (afterwards called Joseph), who the year after his step-father's martyrdom, entered the Society of Jesus, and eventually became Rector of the English College at Rome, and held many posts of importance. Blessed William was particularly zealous in keeping all belonging to him from going to the Protestant services, and he was one of the first and foremost to give a shelter and a welcome to the priests, who came from the seminaries abroad to devote themselves to the souls of their brethren in England.
This was of course noticed before long and occa- sioned much animosity against the servant of God in various quarters. One who had for some time coveted Lacey's office, now saw his opportunity, and on a certain day, when the future martyr was going to his tribunal to hear the causes waiting for him, his enemy went to make an application to the Archbishop to put the laws in force against him. Blessed Lacey, hearing in time what had taken place, gave up his office and even paid a large sum of money to escape further molestation. But the heavy fines levied upon him for the recusancy of himself and his family, and continual summonses before the magistrates and other vexations, obliged him to take to flight with his wife and children, leaving his house to the care of servants.
Step by step God continued graciously to use the cruelty of his enemies and the afflictions which overtook him, in order to detach him more and
566 BLESSED WILLIAM LACEY
more from the world and prepare him for the grace of martyrdom. No sooner had he left the city than his servants were evicted, and his house pillaged, as if he were a public enemy. Wherever he took refuge, the persecutors tracked him down with the skill and sagacity of bloodhounds, and denounced him to the Bishop of the place, so that he might be arrested and thrown into prison. And thus for many years he wandered with his family from place to place, without a settled home or a moment's security. Once, 'arriving at Beverley he was received by a relation. He did not stay, however, but left his horses and his servant and went to a friend's house not far off. Scarcely had he done so when his kinsman's house was surrounded by the magistrates with a posse of men ; his horses were carried off, and his servant was thrown into prison and severely examined about the houses his master had frequented, and where he now was. This was in the year 1579, and at this very time the holy confessor's wife, under the pressure of so many trials, fell grievously sick. The Bishop, as usual, informed of her where- abouts, was about to arrest and imprison her, in spite of her sex and illness, when death released her from his malice.
His wife dead, his children provided for, himself a wanderer, there were no ties to hold him back, and he determined to devote himself to the service of God and of souls in the holy priesthood. He went to Rheims, where he was received into the College on the 22nd of June, 1580. Here the grey-haired old
BLESSED WILLIAM LACEY 567
man, with touching humility, took his place with the young students in the theology class, wrote down the dictations and went through the other exercises with quite a youthful ardour. In September of the same year he went to continue his studies at Pont-a-Mousson, and then, after a short stay, -went to Rome to visit the Holy Places, and to apply for the dispensation necessary for his ordination, on account of his marriage with a widow. Having obtained the dispensation required by the canons, he made his retreat for ordination at the English College, and then successively received the sub- diaconate, diaconate, and priesthood.
Pope Gregory XIII. was very much struck by his grey hairs, his prudence, piety, and zeal, and granted him many unusual Indulgences and other favours to future penitents. He set out for England in company with the Jesuit Fathers, Jasper Haywood and William Holt, who were going to assist Fathers Persons and Campion. They visited Loreto on their way, and from thence Lacey wrote the following letter to " a friend in Rome." l
" I wish to take my leave of you yet once more with this letter, as I do not know whether it may not be the last I shall write to you in this life. We arrived on Tuesday at this Holy House, where my companions and I served the Lord in His own home, and at the shrine of His most holy Mother. At this
1 This was probably Father Joseph Creswell, S.J., then a student at the English College. His "election" will probably signify his choice of the Society, which he entered a year later.
568 BLESSED WILLIAM LACEY
we all experienced an extraordinary consolation, though indeed we felt much spiritual joy all through the journey. I am particularly charmed with the devotion and zeal of my companions, and with the holy communings in which we pass our days. Indeed it seems to me that I take my part with them in that sweet harmony. I frequently exclaim in my heart, ' Is Saul also among the Prophets ? ' l And I remind myself of the disciples' words, ' Was not our heart burning, when He spoke with us upon the way ? ' 2 Truly in my measure I feel the truth of the Prophet's words, ' With the holy, thou wilt be holy.'8
" For this reason I rejoice with you over the election you have made. It causes me and will cause me to think often of you and of the words which you, or rather Jesus Christ by your mouth said, Quod ego facio, tu nescis modo, scies autem postea — ' What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter.' 4 How often did you not repeat those words to me, when to tell the truth I could see no signs of the Lord's will, that is when I was detained in Rome for a longer time than I wished. But in this space His holy providence was preparing to give me this admirable company, et tribuere mihi desiderium cordis met in bonuin — ' to give me my heart's desire in good,' 5 satisfying my desires, and putting my affairs into better train, than I could have imagined — for the greater glory (so I hope) of His Holy Name for ever and ever.
1 i Kings x. ii. 2 St. Luke xxiv. 32. 3 Psalm xvii. 26.
4 St. John xiii. 7. 5 Psalm xx. 3.
BLESSED WILLIAM LACEY 569
" Give loving messages to all my friends, and especially to good Father Alphonso Agazzari, to whom I remain for ever bounden. Father Jasper and Father Holt commend themselves much to you, and we all desire that you should remember us in your holy prayers, which may our Lord hearken to ad gloriam suam, and that we may serve Him (as in reason) in the place to which we are going. From Loreto the loth of May, 1581." 1
He reached England safely,2 and the Concertatio records that his work was blessed with great fruit, and that he won many souls to Christ and His Church. It is also said that he laboured for two years, but it can have been but little more than a year, for in the summer of 1582 his career was cut short.
The circumstances of his capture were very characteristic of those strange days, at once terrible and consoling. The prisons of York were crowded with Catholic confessors. Several priests were in the habit of visiting these holy prisoners daily to console and encourage them in their grievous sufferings, to distribute such help as they could obtain for their destitute condition, and to admin- ister the sacraments to them. One of these priests was the glorious martyr William Hart, and to their number Blessed William Lacey associated himself. On Sunday, July the 22nd, he, Blessed William Hart, and several other priests, managed to meet
1 Yepes, Htstoria Particular, p. 409.
2 Douay Diaries, Appendix, p. 163.
570 BLESSED WILLIAM LACEY
before day-break in the Castle on an exceptional occasion. Thomas Bell, " the illustrious con- fessor," as Dr. Bridgwater calls him, had, a good time before, spent six years in that prison, and in particular had been cruelly hung up by the feet for three days, touching the ground with his head and shoulders only. At that time he was a layman. In the spring of 1582 he had returned as a priest to England and, in fulfilment of a vow, was deter- mined with a holy boldness to sing a High Mass in the very scene of his sufferings, in thanksgiving and praise to God. A devout prisoner's room was chosen, remote from the quarters of gaoler and turnkey, and as many of the other Catholic prisoners as were able to assist were admitted to share the common joy and consolation. The Holy Sacrifice had just terminated in peace when a prisoner in another part of the Castle, who could not come sooner, in trying to make his way to the little gathering, in haste and in the darkness, struck against a bench, and with the sound roused the keepers. The noisy search of these men for the cause of their alarm quickly showed the company of Catholics the extent of their danger. The lights were extinguished and the priests hid themselves as well as they could. Had they quietly waited until the disturbance was over they might have escaped notice. But thinking it their best chance to try to get away under cover of the confusion, they left their concealment and began to make for the outer walls. Blessed William Hart succeeded in clearing the wall and made his way through a
BLESSED WILLIAM LACEY 571
muddy pool or moat, in which he was up to the chin in water and mire. Bell also escaped, and the zeal and fidelity of the Catholic citizens protected him from the hot search made for him.1 Probably his age was against Blessed William Lacey, and he was captured at the foot of the wall.
Early next morning he was brought before the Lord Mayor of York and Henry Cheke, both of whom were members of the Council of the North, and the latter the Secretary. The holy man was well known in York as a determined Catholic, but he had only lately returned from abroad, and nothing else was known about him. The night before, however, when he saw he could not escape, he
1 There are few more melancholy stories in the history of our Church than that of this unhappy man. Born about 1551, sent at an early age to Cambridge, where the heretical spirit was then supreme, he became a minister while quite a young man. But in a very short time through his own study of St. Augustine and St. Jerome, he became convinced of the truth of the Catholic faith, and embraced it with great fervour. He was soon thrown into the Ousebridge Kidcote at York, and then transferred to the Castle, where he suffered a long and cruel captivity with courage and constancy. Regaining his freedom, he betook himself at once to the College at Douay, where he was admitted on February 3, 1576. (Douay Diaries, p. 100.) On October i he started for Rome, one of the first scholars selected for the new foundation in the "English Hospital; " and his name is found among those of the six first students admitted by Cardinal Moroni (see p. 463). He had been only a few months in England as a priest at the time of the event related in the text ; but for several years he laboured indefatigably in Lancashire and Yorkshire, and was made Superior of his brethren in the latter county. And then he fell, with a treachery, a malice, and a shame- lessness without a parallel in the cases of Tyrrell, Gifford, Langdale, or the other apostates who were the affliction of the Catholics of that day. A detailed Report of forty folio pages is extant (Westminster Archives, vol. iv.), addressed by him to Henry, Earl of Derby, who
572 BLESSED WILLIAM LACEY
threw away a bag, which he had about him, con- taining his certificate of ordination with other papers and pious objects. In the morning it was found and brought in, and became the chief evidence against him. After a long examination he was committed to the Castle, and as if he were some great criminal, loaded with heavy irons, which he kissed with great devotion when they were brought in to be riveted upon him.
It was determined to make the most of this capture, both to degrade the priesthood, and to terrify Catholics. So the servant of God was next marched as a criminal along the road to Bishop- thorpe, about two miles distant, bearing his heavy- chains which almost prevented him from walking.
died in 1593, furnishing the Government with a mass of information against all the Catholic families of Lancashire, and the priests who laboured amongst them. He had already been a hypocrite for some years, for he writes: " Every priest, as well old as Seminary, useth ordinarily to say Mass every day and three upon the day of Christ's Nativity ; which myself have not done of latter years because my mind was altered, though to them unknown." And two letters among the State Papers (R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. ccxliii. nn. 51, 71) of October and November, 1592, from the Queen to Lord Derby, and from Lord Derby to the Council, confirm his odious treachery. The Queen speaks of his disclosures to Lord Derby and the Archbishop of Canterbury, and " thinks it meet that Bell should be returned thither to be used as Council advises, for better searching and apprehending of Jesuits and Seminaries." And Lord Derby regrets that " the apprehension of priests did not take such good effect, because Bell's first repair to their Lordships and their conversation being generally known, bred suspicion." When he could no longer play the spy and traitor, he became a public enemy. Father Persons replied to one of his attacks with The doleful Knell of Thomas Bell, and Dr. Richard Smith, afterwards Bishop of Chalcedon, published an answer to his Downfall of Popery in 1605.
BLESSED WILLIAM LACEY 573
What passed at his examination before the Arch- bishop did not transpire. But he was not likely to receive much indulgence from a man like Sandys; and on his return to the city he was put into an underground hole, and rigorously deprived of all communication with outsiders, and even with his fellow-prisoners. His zeal found means however to write an earnest appeal to a gentleman whom he knew to be in great danger and temptation with regard to his faith, and Bridgwater says the letter contained powerful arguments from Holy Scripture and the Fathers, and would have amply sufficed for any man who cared for his salvation. But the holy confessor had the sorrow to learn before his martyrdom that his zeal had been without success.
During the three weeks which intervened before his trial, the martyr was several times called before the Council, and the charge on which he was indicted was no doubt framed on the information obtained from him. The trial took place on Saturday, August the nth. The court was crowded with Catholics full of concern and sympathy. There is a letter of Henry Cheke's to Lord Huntingdon, written the next day, in the collection of State Papers,1 in which he says " the assembly at the arraignment of the priests2 was very great, espe- cially of Papists ; so that the court was in great disorder, and the justices of assize forced to make room for themselves like ushers." Bridgwater,
1 R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, Addenda, August 12, 1582, vol. xxvii. n. 107. - Blessed Richard Kirkman was tried on the same day.
574 BLESSED WILLIAM LACEY
followed by Challoner, says Blessed William was indicted for having been ordained at Rome, but he must have been mistaken, as the Act which made it high treason for any priest ordained abroad to come into the realm, and under which so many martyrs afterwards suffered, was not passed till three years later. But the letters of Orders found in his bag, and publicly read in court, and the blessed and indulgenced objects also found, and which were held up to the derision of the people, were probably held quite sufficient matter for a conviction under the existing statutes. He openly acknowledged his priesthood, and was then asked by one of those on the bench why he was so imprudent as to carry his letters of Orders about him; to which he answered, that it was to satisfy all men that he really was a priest as he professed to be ; for it was a difficult matter to convince many of his acquaintances, especially Protestants, that he was in Orders, having lived in a married state so long, and having been absent from his country so short a time. He had been asked, when before the Council, how he could be ordained, as they were aware the sacred canons do not allow of the ordination of one who has either been twice married himself, or whose wife has been twice married. And no doubt he was either asked again at the trial or evidence was given of his previous answer, which was, of course, that the impediment had been removed by the authority and dispensation of the Holy Father. Finally, he was asked what the Con- certatio calls "that murderous question," whether
BLESSED WILLIAM LACEY 575
he would acknowledge the Queen as supreme head of the Church, to which he answered very calmly, " About this and all other things I hold with the Catholic Church and all good Christians." Dodd says his confession was very surprising to the court, especially when they saw so little concern in him for the consequences.
There was no hesitation on the part of judge or jury, and the verdict having been given, sentence was at once pronounced. The martyr listened without a change of countenance, and then said, "God be for ever blessed. I am now old and by the course of nature could not expect to live long. This will be no more to me than to pay the common debt a little before the time. I am rejoiced there- fore at the things that have been said to me, we shall go into the house of the Lord, and so we shall be with the Lord for ever."
Being remanded to prison, several gentlemen of the county, some of whom were his relations, came to visit him and offer their sympathy and condolence. He thanked them, but gave them to understand that what was a subject of grief to them, was a happiness to him. Some interest was made by the neighbour- ing gentlemen for his pardon, and it would seem as if there was some doubt about the carrying out of the sentence ; for Cheke, in the letter of the next day above quoted says, "The attainder of these traitors [Lacey and Kirkman] has done some good, but their present execution would do more. Pray labour with Council for it as soon as may be, or, at the least, that of one of them."
576 BLESSED WILLIAM LACEY
Cheke had his way, and the execution of the venerable and innocent priest was ordered for the 22nd, the octave of the Assumption of the Blessed Mother of God, the Queen of Martyrs.
He was drawn from the Castle on a hurdle, together with his fellow-priest and martyr, Blessed Richard Kirkman, to the usual place of execution, in the Knavesmire, about a mile outside the city. As they went, unhindered by the jolting of the rough way and the gibes of a rabble who accom- panied them, each made his confession and received absolution from his companion, in preparation for the last conflict. At the place of execution Blessed William was allowed to spend some time in prayer, and then began to speak to the people, earnestly exhorting them to shun heresy as a pestilence. But he had not gone far when some of the ministers who were present, afraid of the effect of his words, were urgent with the executioners to turn the ladder on which he stood beneath the gallows, and so, without further warning, his happy martyrdom was completed.
E. S. K.
AUTHORITIES. — For the history of the persecution in the North, which presents some points of difference from those in the South, the reader should consult Father J. Morris's Troubles of our Catholic Forefathers, vol. iii., which is entirely devoted to this subject.
The Life of Lacey and the three subsequent martyrs was put together by Thirkeld, but his manuscript fell into the hands of the persecutors at the time of his arrest, and it does
BLESSED WILLIAM LACEY 577
not appear to be still extant. Knox, Letters of Cardinal Allen, p. 203.
The fullest account of the martyr is that given by Yepes, Historia Particular de la persecution de Inglaterra, 1599, pp. 404 — 413. We may presume that he was supplied with informa- tion by Blessed William's stepson, Father Creswell, who was living in Madrid at that time, and to whom the letter printed above was most probably addressed.
For Lacey's stay in Rome see Father Grene's Collectanea N., I. i. 25 ; ii. 47, 58 (Stonyhurst MSS.).
See also Concertatio, f. 96 ; Historia di Sedici Sacerdoti (1584), p. 192 ; Worthington's Catalogue (1614), p. 28, &c. There is a eulogy of Lacey's wife in Cornelius a Lapide's commentary on Hebrews, cap. x. vers. 34.
LL II
XXI. THE BLESSED RICHARD KIRKMAN,
SECULAR PRIEST.
York, 22 August, 1582.
BLESSED RICHARD KIRKMAN was born of a gentle- man's family at Addingham in the West Riding of Yorkshire, five miles south-east of Skipton. He had already made good progress in learning when he went abroad to the English College at Douay in 1577, in order to study for the priesthood. From Douay he was transferred, with the rest of the College, to Rheims, in 1578. He was ordained subdeacon at Rheims on the i4th of March, 1579, together with sixteen other students of the English College, among whom was Blessed Richard Thir- keld, who was to tread so closely in his footsteps. On Holy Saturday in the same year fifteen of these seventeen were ordained priests, and among them the future martyrs. There were about sixty students at this time in the Seminary, and their growing numbers caused some anxiety to the authorities of the city. On April the 28th, Blessed Richard Thirkeld and William Hanse, a brother of the martyr Blessed Everard Hanse, said their first
BLESSED RICHARD KIRKMAN 579
Masses in the college chapel, and two days later Blessed Richard Kirkman and another newly- ordained priest celebrated the Holy Sacrifice for the first time in the Abbey Church of the Benedictine nuns of St. Peter's. During the first week of May, 1579, almost every day saw the glad celebration of a first Mass in the college chapel, and stirring indeed it must have been to assist at the Sacrifice thus offered by young men, full of generous ardour for the glories of martyrdom, who with joyous hearts offered up their own lives to God together with the Immaculate Victim of Calvary.
Our martyr stayed on at Rheims till August the 3rd, when he left for the English Mission, in the company of Blessed Alexander Briant and three other young priests.1
On reaching this country Blessed Richard appears to have found a retreat at Scrivelsby Court, in Lincolnshire, the home of the Dymokes, here- ditary Champions of England. Scrivelsby was then in possession of Robert Dymoke, Esq., who was to shed a new lustre on his name and family by the glory of martyrdom, becoming the champion of the King of kings against the usurpations of his earthly sovereign. Scrivelsby is situated about two miles from Horncastle, which had been one of the centres of the Lincolnshire rising in defence of the ancient faith. Sir Edward Dymoke, the martyr's father, who was sheriff of the county, and his brother Thomas, were actively concerned in it. Their banner bore on it the figure of a plough, to encourage the
1 Douay Diaries, pp. 152, 153.
58o BLESSED RICHARD KIR KM AN
husbandmen, the Chalice and Host, and the Five Wounds. The " articles of grievance " devised by the insurgents were drawn up by the Dymokes. Unhappily, at the suppression of the insurrection, the brothers proved but time-servers, and even gave evidence against the venerable Abbot Mackarel, of Barling, whom they had forced to supply their men with victuals.
The faith of many grew cold during the first sixteen years of Elizabeth's reign, and numbers fell off altogether under the pressure of the persecution. But fervour was re-kindled by the arrival of the Seminary priests in 1574, and when the first Jesuits, Blessed Edmund Campion and Father Persons, landed at Dover in June, 1580, they found the ground well prepared for a great religious revival.
It would appear that Robert Dymoke, the Champion, although he welcomed Blessed Richard to Scrivelsby in 1579 and harboured him there under the guise of schoolmaster to his sons, had not yet found courage openly to declare himself an adherent of the proscribed faith. He had yielded to the pressure of the laws by attending the Protestant service, with the natural result that his mind was utterly confused by the various doctrines of the heretical preachers whose sermons he attended.1
But the generous reception he gave to our martyr doubtless won for Robert Dymoke the grace of true conversion, and that steadfast constancy in 1 Simpson's Life of Campion (Edit. 1896), p. 241.
BLESSED RICHARD KIRKMAN 581
the faith by which he was to be so greatly distinguished.
Scrivelsby Court is a Tudor house now un- fortunately much modernized. It is still inhabited by the family of the Champions, who acquired the office on the marriage of Sir John Dymoke, temp. Edward III., with the heiress of the Marmions, lords of the feudal manor of Scrivelsby, to which the Championship was attached. The right con- sisted in riding completely armed upon a barbed horse into Westminster Hall during the coronation festivities, and there challenging combat with whom- soever should dare oppose the King's title to the crown. The right was last exercised at the corona- tion of George IV. Robert Dymoke, however, had never exercised it, though his father, Sir Edward, who died in 1566, had been Champion at the coronations of Edward VI., Mary, and Elizabeth.
Robert Dymoke married Bridget, eldest daughter and co-heiress of Edward Baron Clinton, Lord High Admiral, who was created Earl of Lincoln in 1572. They had several children, their eldest son Edward being about twenty-one years of age at the time that Blessed Richard Kirkman came to Scrivelsby. The names of the other sons, to whom he acted as tutor, were Robert, John, and Nicholas.1
On the 24th of July, 1580, both Robert Dymoke and his wife, the Lady Bridget, were indicted for hearing Mass, and for not coming to the Protestant service, together with thirty-three other Lincolnshire
1 Inquisitio post mortem, taken January n, 1581. (R.O. Court of Wards, vol. xx. n. 175.)
582 BLESSED RICHARD KIRK MAN
Catholics.1 The presence of a priest in the house, had, it would seem, been detected by the vigilant spies of the Government, who were at that time actively engaged in tracking down Father Campion. It is asserted indeed by Mr. Simpson that this glorious martyr actually visited Scrivelsby, and reconciled Mr. Dymoke to the faith of his fathers.
Whether this be so or no, Mr. Dymoke was cited to appear before the Protestant Bishop of Lincoln, on the charge of recusancy and of con- cealing a priest in his house. He was quite unable to obey the summons, as for some years past he had been stricken with paralysis, which completely confined him to his house ; indeed he was unable to move hand or foot without assistance. He tried to excuse himself by letter, but was unable to appease the fanatical fury of Bishop Cooper, who was one of the most zealous of Elizabeth's per- secuting prelates.2 The Bishop himself came to Scrivelsby, but the sight of Mr. Dymoke's helpless condition did not move him to compassion. On the contrary, he ordered him to be carried at once to prison, in spite of his pitiable state. In the miserable gaol at Lincoln the poor old man soon fell dangerously ill, but even when dying he was not left in peace. As usual in such cases, he was tormented with ministers endeavouring to perplex him and force their prayers upon him. " For they
1 B.M. Lansdowne MSS. 30, 75.
2 He wrote to Walsingham urging that Catholics should be compelled not only to attend church, but also to receive the Sacrament. " To the Lord's table they must go, or else to her Majesty's gaols." (White, Lives of Elizabethan Bishops, p. 190.)
BLESSED RICHARD KIRKMAN 583
come," writes Father Persons, " when he is extreme sick, they come when he is wrestling with the pangs of death, they come whilst he is passing out of this life, they come whilst he is yielding up the ghost. Even then they do not suffer him to rest, nor permit him to die in such sort as he desired to die, for his desire was to die according to the custom of the universal Christian Church. Even then the ministers flock about him. Even then they urge him to pray such sorry prayers of their own making as in health he contemned, in sickness with open voice he rejected, and now, dumb and half-dead, by his countenance, by signs and tokens, and by gesture of his body, he did utterly contemn and abhor/' Robert Dymoke, having resisted their efforts to his last gasp, died in the Lord, the nth of September, 1580. l
When his host was thrown into prison, Mr. Kirkman had, of course, to take to flight. He went to the north country and pursued his apostolic labours in various parts of Northumberland and Yorkshire. He was finally arrested about two miles from Wakefield by Francis Wortley, of Wortley, a member of the Council of the North and one of the most active persecutors of the Catholics. A contemporary writer called by Father Morris "A Yorkshire Recusant,"2 thus comments on the incident :
1 Persons, De Persecutions Anglicana, p. 30; Inquisitio. ut supra. Robert was buried in Scrivelsby Church.
a J. Morris, Troubles, iii. (The Catholics of York under Elizabeth), p. 68. The MS. is at Oscott College.
\
584 BLESSED RICHARD KIRKMAN
"Some of our knights and justices are so vain- glorious, rude, uncivil, and uncourteous, that no stranger almost can pass or travel unexamined by them ; who is he, from where he came, whither he goeth, yea, and what affairs and business also in particular he hath. They have conceit that to be thus inquisitive and busy in other men's matters, how clownish and rude soever it be among civil men, yet it be a good gentleman-like quality, for hereby they may be known to have authority and to be diligent and serviceable for the preservation of the State. . . . These uncivil gentlemen do not so vaingloriously practise this in the highways and abroad, where they might meet with passengers ; but the hungry catchpols and bailiffs, yea the tipplers and innholders, use it as braggingly in towns also, especially nigh to the houses of such justices, hoping not only for lucre and bribes, but also desiring to pick thanks of their masters for the imitating of their malapert and undecent manners. This point of rudeness is not in all, nor in the best and wisest sort of our knights and gentlemen, but in some few haughty-minded and busy-headed men, which have great conceit of themselves as pillars of the present State, and God be thanked we suffer not so much harm by this kind of discourtesy and clownishness, as many honest men are molested and many times horse-stealers and such like com- panions of their own religion are apprehended, hereby also the justices themselves are not a little discredited and misliked among their neighbours, and condemned as rude, troublesome and toto-officious.
BLESSED RICHARD KIRK MAN 585
By these means I have known divers Catholics in danger and partly affrighted, but not many appre- hended, besides Mr. Kirkman, a priest, and now martyr, and with him a virtuous layman, in the way, by Mr. Wortley."
The Justice not being satisfied with our martyr's answers, was for sending him and his companion to prison, as vagrants and disturbers of the peace. Whereupon Mr. Kirkman, foreseeing the inevitable results, thought it best to acknowledge what he was, and to leave the issue to Providence. Accordingly, calling for a pen, he wrote that he was a Catholic priest. After this Wortley ceased to question him, but ordered his baggage to be searched, in which a chalice and other things necessary for Mass were found. Thereupon the Justice at once committed his prisoners to the Castle at York, to which city indeed he was on his way at the time, with a large following, to attend the assizes there. On their way they passed the night at Tadcaster, where the prisoners had to lie on the bare floor.
They arrived at York next day, and the assizes having just commenced, Blessed Richard was straightway brought to the bar. To the various questions put to him, he replied with prudence and constancy, denying that he had come over to seduce the people from their allegiance to the Queen, but rather to persuade them to embrace the true religion and administer the holy sacraments according to opportunity. He confessed his relations with Mr. Dymoke, since that good man was already
586 BLESSED RICHARD KIR KM AN
out of his enemies' power, and that he had said Mass in Northumberland, but refused to say where or in whose presence.
An indictment was then drawn up against him, and a jury impanelled, who brought him in guilty of high treason, first, for being a priest of the Seminary of Douay or Rheims, and secondly, for persuading the Queen's subjects to the Catholic religion. He was then carried to gaol, where he was again examined by Justice Wortley and Justice Mainwaring, the former of whom, unable to extort from him what was wanted, flew into a passion, calling him Papist and traitor, and loaded him with abuse. To this the blessed martyr calmly replied : " You might, sir, with the same justice, charge the Apostles also with being traitors, for they taught the same doctrine that I now teach, and did the same things for which you condemn me."
After this he was again brought to the bar to receive sentence, which was . pronounced in the usual form. With wonderful calmness and modesty, the martyr thereupon addressed the judge, saying: " I beseech you to consider well what you do, for I am an impure man, altogether plunged in the mire of sin, and therefore infinitely unworthy of so sublime a grace." The judge, misunderstanding him, replied : " The sentence that has been passed upon you is agreeable to what the law directs, and nothing remains for you but to prepare for death." The holy man again begged him to weigh well what he was doing, for he knew that he was unworthy of so great a favour as a death of this kind, fit
BLESSED RICHARD KIRKMAN 587
only for a holy martyr ; whereupon the judge warmly replied that his wickedness had well deserved that kind of death. But the humble servant and disciple of Christ spoke for the third time : " Must it then be so ? Am I to be honoured with so sublime a dignity ? Good God ! how unworthy I am of it ! But since it has thus seemed good to Thy divine mercy, may Thy most holy Will be done on earth as it is in Heaven ! " And then, no longer being able to contain the joy that filled his breast, with a loud and cheerful voice he burst forth into that hymn of praise and thanksgiving: " Te Deum laudamus, te dominum confitemur"
He was then taken back to the Castle, where for a time he was shut up in a very narrow turret-room together with Blessed William Lacey. But four days before his execution he was sent for by the High Sheriff and two ministers. What passed between them was kept private ; nor had the Catholics any opportunity of learning it from the martyr himself, for from that time he was separated from his fellow-sufferer, and kept in a dark under- ground dungeon, which was wont to be reserved for the greatest criminals. Here, deprived of bed, food, light, and of every necessity of life, he awaited with patience the happy day of his departure from this miserable world.
At length, on the 22nd of August, 1582, he was pinioned, placed on a hurdle, and drawn \vith his fellow-collegian and martyr to the place of execu- tion outside the city of York.
There he remained in silent prayer till his
BLESSED RICHARD KIRKMAN
companion had been executed ; then, upon the call of the officers, he cheerfully mounted the ladder, and commenced an exhortation to the vast crowd which had assembled to witness the martyrdoms. But when he began to speak of the schism, he was interrupted and ordered to desist, and so, mounting higher up the ladder, and raising his eyes towards heaven, as he pronounced those words of the royal prophet : " Heu mihi, quia incolatus meus prolongatus est : habitavi cum habitantibus Cedar, multum incola fuit anima mea,"1 he was flung off the ladder, and yielded his blessed soul to God his Creator.2
ED.
AUTHORITIES. — The same as those quoted at the end of the Life of Blessed William Lacey.
1 Psalm cxix. 5, 6.
2 Concertatio , ff. 100, 101. The martyr's brother, John Kirkman of Addingham, gent., suffered a long imprisonment for the faith in the Castle and in Ousebridge Kidcote, about 1590-1. John's daughter Alice married Christopher Danby of Knaresborough, gent., about 1584. (Gillow, Dictionary, iv. 55.)
XXII.
THE BLESSED JAMES THOMPSON (alias HUDSON), SECULAR PRIEST.
York, 28 November, 1582.
THE next martyr who suffered was also a Yorkshire- man, the Blessed James Thompson (or Hudson), who was born in or near the city of York, where he spent many years of his life and was well known to the citizens. He was a devout Catholic, and owing to his fidelity to the old religion, had been deprived, says his biographer, "of a pension which he had in the Church of Derun."1 Being desirous of consecrating his life to God's service, he went over to Rheims in the summer of 1580. But after a short period of study, he fell so ill that his life was despaired of by the physicians. Under these circumstances he besought Dr. Allen to allow him to be ordained as quickly as possible, saying that he confidently believed that God intended to employ him in His service in England. So a dispensation was obtained from Rome, and the future martyr,
1 Historia delglorioso Martirio di Sedici Sacerdoti, etc. (1584), p. 197. Perhaps Durham is meant.
5QO BLESSED JAMES THOMPSON
together with another student named Foxe, received all the sacred Orders within the space of twelve days, in May, 1581, at Soissons ; although he was still so ill that he could hardly put foot to the ground.
He returned to Rheims on May the 27th, and on June the 8th he said his first Holy Mass in the college chapel.1
Two months later, on August the loth, he was sent on the mission, being accompanied on his journey by a young student named Cotton, who was also an invalid, and who hoped to regain his health in his native air. This was a frequent occurrence in the days of persecution, and more than one martyr has gained his crown while he was seeking to gain health and strength.
James Thompson, after a little rest, regained a certain amount of strength, and then threw himself ardently into the fatigues and dangers of the mission. He was, however, allowed hardly a year of apostolate, being arrested in the city of York, on the nth of August, 1582. It is possible that he had ventured to assist at the trial of Blessed William Lacey and Blessed Richard Kirkman, which took place on this very day, and that some circumstance had then aroused the suspicion of the authorities against him. Perhaps he had ventured to join his voice in the Te Deum of exulting gladness intoned by Blessed Richard after his condemnation. How- ever this may be, he was arrested on this day in the house of one Mr. Branton, a Catholic, who was 1 Douay Diaries, pp. 179 and 180.
BLESSED JAMES THOMPSON 591
at the time a prisoner for the faith in the Kidcote dungeons on Ousebridge. On his arrest he was taken before the dread Council of the North, which sat in the Old Palace of the Abbots of St. Mary's, near Bootham Bar.1
On being examined as to what he was, the martyr frankly confessed that he was a priest. This reply astonished his examiners, for as they said, he had lived a long time in the city and was well known to all, and they could not imagine how he
1 The Mr. Branton in whose house he was taken, may have been either William Branton, a locksmith, of the parish of St. Olave's, or Stephen Branton, probably his brother, both of whom were prisoners in the Ousebridge Kidcote. William Branton was kept with ten other confessors in the horrible lower dungeon, not permitted to come to the grate where the other unhappy prisoners begged the charity of the passers-by, nor was he allowed visitors or relief of any kind, not even to have pen, ink, or paper. (J. Morris, Troubles, ii. p. 307.)
Stephen's career is so characteristic of the time, that we may give it as a specimen of the sufferings of the humble lay Catholics of York. He was committed to the Kidcote prison about 1571, and was kept there a close prisoner for three years. It was a place that ' "would have almost rivalled the notorious Black Hole of Calcutta. Air, light, and ventilation were absent, and the waters of the river rushed in when they were above their usual level." (Raine, Deposi- tions from the Castle of York, Surtees Society, 1861, Preface.) He was then removed to York Castle, and from thence to Hull, where he was first imprisoned in the castle. The keeper, John Bisby, then carried him off to the North Blockhouse, " for that he could not give so much rent as the keeper asked," and there he was kept a long space in a low house by himself. After, he was removed to the South Blockhouse, under Hawcock the tyrant, where he remained divers years. Lastly, he was removed with many others to York Castle, where he died July 19, 1591, and was buried under the Castle wall, after an imprisonment of twenty years for the simple profession of the Catholic faith. (J. Morris, loc. cit. ii. p. 322.)
592 BLESSED JAMES THOMPSON
could have been made a priest. To this he replied that he • had crossed the seas, and had received sacred Orders abroad. When they asked him how long he had been in those parts, he replied, " Not one whole year." " Why then had he come back so quickly ? " The answer was, that he had suffered so much from a serious complaint that he had been forced to return earlier than he had intended.
They bade him tell them sincerely whether he had not come back to his country in order to reconcile the Queen's subjects to the Church of Rome. " The cause of my return," he said, " was no other than I have already told you, for I was exceedingly ill from Candlemas day last year till the beginning of May. But withal," says he, " I will tell you ingenuously, that I returned in order to do some service to my country."
They asked him if he had reconciled any to the Church. He answered that where opportunity offered, he had not been wanting to his duty. They asked how many and what persons he had recon- ciled. He begged to be excused from answering a question that might bring others into danger. Then they asked whether he acknowledged the Queen's Majesty to be Supreme Head of the Church. He replied that he did not acknowledge her as such. " Very well," said they, " you need say no more, for you have now said enough." Then said he, " Blessed be God."
But not content with this, they asked him further, whether he would take up arms against the Pope should he invade the kingdom. The priest
BLESSED JAMES THOMPSON 593
replied, " When that time comes, I will show myself a true patriot." "But," said they, "will you fight against the Pope now ? " " Certainly not," he said.
They then began, after their custom, to abuse him with many injurious words, calling him rakehell, Papist and traitor, and so brought him to the prison, where they ordered that he should be loaded with double irons. The holy priest remained in this condition for no less than seventeen days. This was a private prison (the Kidcote, no doubt, or St. Peter's prison), and when all his money was exhausted and he could no longer pay the keeper's extortionate charges, they had to remove him to the Castle. Yet even then they would not take off either of his chains, though it was the custom to do so even for the greatest criminals, but escorted him through the streets in triumph loaded down with double irons.
At first the martyr was thrust into the common side of the prison, where he had to herd with murderers and criminals of the lowest class, but afterwards the keeper, moved rather by the bribes of the martyr's friends than by compassion for his cruel sufferings, allowed him to be removed to a chamber, where he had the company of two other priests, prisoners for the same cause.
On November the 25th, he was brought to the bar, tried and condemned. When the terrible sentence of death was pronounced in the usual form as in cases of high treason, not only was he not terrified, but he was so transported with joy that he seemed to have quite forgotten the pains of his
MM II.
5Q4 BLESSED JAMES THOMPSON
disease which had afflicted him so long and so grievously.
After his sentence he spent his time, night and day, either in prayer and meditation or in labouring to gain souls to God and His Church. And in this by the Divine blessing he had good success, for after his condemnation he had been put back again among the felons. Here his virtues so won the hearts of these poor men, that in spite of the devil and the devil's ministers, he led not a few of them from the darkness of error to the light of Catholic truth, and finally brought them with him to the glory of Heaven.
His ancient biographer, to whom we owe these details, tells us that he heard from men worthy of credit, that ever since he was made a priest Blessed James Thompson had never worn linen next his skin. He was wont to exhort his spiritual children when they visited him, to remain firm and constant in the faith and never to vacillate under the tempest of adverse circumstances. The time, he said, was short, the reward ineffable, and the victory almost won already. When that happy and joyous day arrived on which the saintly priest was to offer his body as a sacrifice holy and acceptable to God, and the hurdle on which he was to be drawn to the gallows in the Knavesmire was before his eyes, he was asked by someone how he felt. He replied that never in all his life had he felt so glad and joyful.
Then a certain Anglican minister intruded himself on him to dispute with him by the way, but the
BLESSED JAMES THOMPSON 595
martyr would have nothing to say to him. And this example was followed by the others who were to suffer with him (though not for a like cause), who plainly told the parson that no consideration would induce them to give ear to his doctrine.
When he was come to the Knavesmire he gave himself to prayer, in which he continued for a long space, praying with exceeding fervour. He finally mounted the ladder, and turning to the people, said these words in Latin : Omnes nos manifestari oportet ante tribunal Christi, ut referat unusquisque propria corporis, prout gessit, sive bonum sive malum.1 But before he had finished the sentence, one Lindsay, a minister, interrupting the thread of his discourse, cried out : " Thompson, speak in the vulgar tongue, that the people may understand thee." The priest most meekly replied : " I beg you to hear me patiently." And then he repeated in English the text he had already quoted in Latin. And when he came to the explanation of the words, " every one shall receive the proper things of the body," he added : " And I first of all, now already destined to death, for the crime of treason, as people think, but really for the profession of the Catholic religion."
Then the minister again interrupted, since he could not endure to hear these words. " Thy treasons and thy plottings," quoth he, " against
1 " We must all be manifested before the judgment-seat of Christ, that everyone may receive the proper things of the body, according as he hath done, whether it be good or evil." (2 Cor. v. 10.)
596 BLESSED JAMES THOMPSON
thy prince and country have been sufficiently dis- covered and laid bare to us ; and, moreover, thou hast been convicted of them by the verdict of the jury." "Nay, indeed," replied the priest," "I call God to witness, that I never plotted in any wise against my prince or my country."
Then Maude, the vice-sheriff, said : " Thompson, it is fitting that thou shouldst crave her Majesty's pardon." " Why should I beg the Queen's pardon," he asked, "when I have never done anything against her ? If I were to do this, I should imply that I was guilty. But I call God to witness for my soul, that never have I practised aught against her Majesty in any thing." He was about to add more, but the minister, in a rage, shouted out to the people : " Listen to the villain ! Listen to him ! Inasmuch as from his boyhood he has lived wickedly and impiously, so now he has determined to persist and die in his iniquity." The vice- sheriff having at last silenced him, the priest said quietly : " You come to me, as you give out, in order to teach me patience, but you do not yourself exercise patience but the contrary. May God forgive you."
Having said this, he turned again towards the gibbet, and went higher up the ladder. And then, after commending to God in silent prayer the sacred conflict on which he was about to engage, turning his head a little towards the people, he said : " I had forgotten one thing. I pray and beseech you all to bear witness that I here die in the Catholic faith."
BLESSED JAMES THOMPSON 597
Then, having been cast off the ladder, he seemed still to act with a certain grave deliberation, so that one would have thought he was not hanging from a gibbet, but lying in bed and still fully conscious. For in the first struggle, as the rope began to throttle him, he raised his hands to heaven with great devotion, thus, as it were, pronouncing with the motions of his limbs : " My help is in the Name of the Lord, who hath made heaven and earth." Then he struck his breast with his right hand, as though to express by this sign, in such wise as he could, his own unworthiness and weakness, that the strength of God which is made perfect in weakness might be made manifest. And lastly, as he was giving up his blessed spirit he made a great sign of the Cross with his hand, forming it most perfectly arid deliberately, to the great amazement of the bystanders. Thus did the martyr fortify himself with the glorious sign of Christ against the spirits of evil, over whose armies he was now about to triumph most gloriously and to receive the crown of gold from the hand of Christ, which He Himself has promised to those who strive lawfully.1
The blessed martyr was not disembowelled and quartered according to the barbarous sentence, but was buried under the gallows with the criminals who suffered with him. Thus, when the Venerable Margaret Clitherow made her midnight pilgrimages to the York Tyburn, she did not merely visit the place of suffering, but the very tomb of one of those
1 C oncer tatio, fol. 103.
598 BLESSED JAMES THOMPSON
holy priests who had been her consolation and support in life, and for the crime of ministering to whom she was in her turn to suffer a cruel and agonizing death.
The old writers remark that the behaviour of the authorities in this case showed that they had some- what changed their tactics. Before this they had tried to bring the martyrs into discredit by loading them with every species of calumny ; by publishing libels and inventing charges of treason and regicide against them, so that they might first destroy their reputations and then their lives. But now they thought it better to adopt a simpler method, that of condemning and executing them in the company of criminals of every description, so that it should be supposed that they were not proceeded against for religion but, like their companions, for some crime. This however they were slower to adopt in London than in the provinces, for their tricks were almost worn threadbare in the capital, and were more easily seen through.
The Catholics on their side, seeing that none of those who fell into their enemies' hands ever escaped from them except at the price of apostasy, resolved to reply so clearly and plainly at their trials, that there should be no manner of doubt possible as to the fact of their having been condemned for religion and religion only.
Sarnelli's epigram on Blessed James Thompson may here be quoted.1
1 Delia Specchio del Clero Secolare, by Mgr. Pompeo Sarnelli. Naples, 1679.
BLESSED JAMES THOMPSON 599
Castus, inops, humilis, domat, horret, vincit lacob, Corpus, opes, Satan, verbere, mente, prece.
It may be rendered thus :
Chaste, poor, and meek, he tames, loathes, puts to flight, Flesh, wealth, and Satan, armed with triple might.
ED.
AUTHORITIES. — The same as those quoted at the end of the Life of Blessed William Lacey.
XXIII. THE BLESSED WILLIAM HART,
SECULAR PRIEST.
York, 15 March, 1583.
BLESSED WILLIAM HART is one of the most attractive figures in the glorious band of our martyrs. Beloved by all who knew him, his zeal and eloquence gained for him the title of " a second Campion." He was born in the beautiful cathedral city of Wells, in Somersetshire, and his godfather was William Good, who was a native of Glastonbury, and afterwards a Jesuit Father, and for many years confessor in the English College at Rome.
He was educated at Lincoln College, Oxford, where he was elected Trappes Scholar on the 25th of May, 1571, and supplicated B.A. on the i8th of June, I574.1 His happy disposition and great talents made him much beloved at Oxford, where a dis- tinguished career would have been his, had he not preferred the supernatural benefits of the Catholic
1 Boase, Register of the University of Oxford, II. ii. p. 37. Cf. Wood, Athen. Oxon. i. 490, and iii. 45. He is the first Trappes Scholar recorded.
6oi
religion to any honours which the world could offer him.
In this resolution he was no doubt confirmed by the example of Dr. Bridgwater, his Rector. This good man had been chosen Rector of Lincoln College in 1563, which dignity he held together with other benefices, but in 1574 (the very year that our martyr took his degree), " no longer able to support himself under so notorious a conformity contrary to his conscience, he quitted his rectorship of Lincoln, together with all his other preferments, and went abroad. He first retired to the English College at Douay, and was followed by several students whom he had privately instructed in the principles of the Catholic religion." l
During his term of office Lincoln College had naturally become a centre for those who were favourably affected towards the old religion. And among these students the most prominent was the future martyr, William Hart, whose glorious conflict for the faith Dr. Bridgwater himself was one day to relate in his Concertatio. Indeed, it was difficult for a talented, and at the same time deeply religious mind, such as his was, to acquiesce for long in the miserable compromise established by Elizabeth.
He therefore, like so many of Oxford's noblest students at this period, left the University and went to join Dr. Allen and his old Rector at Douay. Here he became a model to all in the College. "Although this College," says an eye-witness,2
3 Dodd, Part IV. Bk. II. art. ii. p. 60. 2 Historia del glorioso Martirio di Sedici Sacerdoti, etc. (1584), p. 198.
602 BLESSED WILLIAM HART
" both from being a new foundation, and also on account of other inconveniences, was ruled rather by the internal law of charity than by external rules and constitutions, he nevertheless, directed without doubt by the Spirit of God, conducted himself in such a manner that, from the very hour of his arrival, he gained the hearts of all by his modesty, patience, and extraordinary devotion. But in particular, God willed, by continually trying him, that for our instruction he should give us a signal example of patience. For he suffered the most acute pains from the stone, which were almost continual, and these he endured with such constancy, that he astonished all those who saw him." Bridgwater says on this point, that it seemed that the Divine Providence had sent him to Douay for this very purpose, to incite his fellow-students to imitate the extraordinary calmness and patience with which he bore his pains.
He seems to have been sent back to England for a time in search of health, as in the Douay Diaries [ we find that William Hart and Mr. Maurice returned from there on the i7th of June, 1577, bringing with them two young Throckmortons. But this may refer to another student of the same name. At any rate, on July the 22nd of this year, he was sent to try the waters at Spa, in the hope that they might give him relief (propter extremum quern patiebatur vesiccB dolorem ad balneos se contulit}? This hope, however, proved vain, and he returned to Douay early in September, little better than when he left.
1 P. 124. * Ibid. p. 125.
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 603
The College was at this time undergoing a time of great anxiety owing to the intrigues of the revo- lutionary party in the Netherlands against the King's authority. The Prince of Orange and the Calvinists succeeded in spreading distrust and discontent among the people, and on the 24th of July, 1577, Don John of Austria, who had lately been appointed Viceroy, had to withdraw for his own security to the fortress of Namur. On July the 2Qth the College diarist writes : " Dr. Bristow admonished us to be very guarded in our behaviour, and, as far as possible, to walk less frequently in the streets, because the common people had begun again, as in the former troubles, to spread reports and excite murmurs against us." Dr. Ely was called a traitor in the streets, and it was reported that arms were concealed in the College. Agents of the English Government were active in exciting the popular suspicion against their countrymen. In January, 1578, civil war broke out once more, and on March the 2Oth the governor and magistrates, who were favourable to the English exiles, were summarily deposed and new magistrates appointed, who at once proceeded to proclaim that all the English in the town were to leave the place before five o'clock next day. Though it was Holy Week, the students had to set out at once on a four days' journey to Rheims, where the forethought of the Superiors had already provided for them a place of refuge, and where the greater part of them arrived, on the 27th of March, 1578. l This journey gave a
1 Dovay Diaries, Introduction, pp. liii. liv.
604 BLESSED WILLIAM HART
special occasion for exhibiting our martyr's fortitude. He made it entirely on foot, although he was in continual pain, and indeed during the journey under- went unusually violent paroxysms of the disease, so that his companions, observing the humility and constancy with which he endured them, were forced to confess that they had never witnessed such extra- ordinary patience under agony so acute.
On reaching Rheims he was employed to give lectures in logic, which he performed in a way that gave great satisfaction. But as his disease grew daily worse, and all the remedies prescribed by the doctors had little or no effect, he was advised to undergo an operation at the hands of a surgeon who had a great reputation for cures of this kind. Though he felt that death itself would be preferable to such a remedy, nevertheless he considered that he ought to take the advice, so that if his life perchance were to be spared, he might devote it to gaining souls to Christ and His holy Church. He resolved, too, to offer up the suffering that the opera- tion would inflict on him in expiation for the sins of his past life. And so on the 5th of May, 1578, he set out with Dr. Humphrey Ely for Namur, where, apparently, the famous surgeon lived.1 Here he gave himself up at once to the knife. An operation in those days, when anaesthetics were unknown, was a very different ordeal from what it now is, and William Hart well knew that there was a great risk that he would not survive it. His first biographer and Dr. Bridgwater give terrible details as to the 1 Ibid. p. 141.
BLESSED WILLIAM HART
operation, into which we need not enter. The young man who endured it, went through it deliberately as a preparation for the greater sufferings of martyr- dom, for which he yearned. He earnestly besought God's help, and then endured the frightful operation with such extraordinary constancy that he never moved a muscle. So absorbed was he in prayer, that he seemed scarcely to perceive what was being done to him, and the surgeon himself was struck with wonder and admiration. The operation proved perfectly successful, and when, after some months, the wound was healed, he returned to Rheims, the 22nd of November, 1578. l Soon after this he was sent by Dr. Allen to the new College at Rome. Here there were about forty students at the time, under the rectorship of Dr. Maurice Clenock, who was replaced in April by Father Alphonso Agazzari, SJ. Our martyr's name is 32nd in the College Diary, which is headed by the glorious name of Blessed Ralph Sherwin. He took the college oath, the 23rd of April, 1579, in presence of the Jesuit Provincial and the illustrious Father Robert Bellarmine, afterwards Cardinal. He swore, with his companions, upon the Holy Scriptures, that he would ever be ready at the order of the Sovereign Pontiff or the Superior of the College to embrace the ecclesiastical state, to take Holy Orders and to proceed to England in order to aid souls.2
1 Ibid. p. 147.
2 Foley, " Diary of the English College ; " Records S.J. vi. pp. 127 and 136. There was another William Hart in the College at the time. He is aist on the list in the Diary. He left various MS. books
606 BLESSED WILLIAM HART
His life at Rome, as at Douay and Rheims, gave the greatest possible edification to all who knew him. His biographer says that his obedience to his Superiors, and his trust in them, were only equalled by his assiduity in study and his devotion to spiritual things. This was so remarkable that his whole life could be described as a continual study in the acquirement of virtues. Such extraordinary signs of solid virtue were indeed seen in him, that everyone felt, that he was destined by God to become a most glorious martyr. He earnestly begged, while at the College, to be admitted into the Society of Jesus, but his old infirmity proved an insurmountable hindrance to his pious desire. He had an excellent talent for preaching, and pronounced several public discourses before Cardinal Buoncompagno, at his first visit as Protector of the College, and before Cardinal Moroni and others. But his health was always feeble, and Dr. Allen hearing that Rome did not agree with him, asked that he should be sent back to Rheims.1
He remained however at Rome till March, 1581, when he was ordained priest, no doubt at the Lent Ember-tide ordination. On March the 26th he left Rome, together with three priests and Ralph Standish, the first student who had entered the College, but who was obliged, on account of ill-
which also bear the name of Ven. Robert Southwell inscribed in them. (Grene's Collectanea N at Stonyhurst, quoted below.) This Hart became a Jesuit, and after serving on the English Mission, died at Rome.
1 Foley, Records S.J. vol. iii. p. 147.
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 607
health, to leave with them before taking priest's Orders. Before their departure they went to kiss the Pope's feet according to custom. His Holiness received them most graciously, and granted to each a sum of fifty gold scudi for the journey. Blessed William Hart made an address to His Holiness, which both moved and consoled the Pontiff and all who were with him.1 He warmly thanked His Holiness for his many benefactions.
" Of all the monuments which your virtues have raised to themselves throughout Christendom, none are more glorious, or shine with purer lustre, than the provision made by you for the welfare and salvation of the souls of our fellow-countrymen who are being dragged down to perdition. By your fatherly tenderness, care, and solicitude, has it been brought about that those who were children of wrath have now become heirs of God, fellow-heirs with Jesus Christ. You have opened up and cleared of its obstacles the way of return to the faith and practice of our ancestral religion for all who are willing to enter upon it and to walk therein, and have encouraged us to look forward to the complete re-conversion of our country, by opposing to the barbarous rage of the heretics those schools of virtue and learning, the Seminaries of Rome and of Rheims. . . . Remit not, Most Blessed Father, your efforts to aid the afflicted and comfort the wretched, nor withhold that fostering care for
1 Foley, Records S.J. vol. vi. p. 72. He prints the whole text of the address.
1508 BLESSED WILLIAM HART
our dear England, which it needed no one to inspire you with, though events prove contrary and the times evil. This is the prayer addressed to you by the cries of helpless infants, the meanings of mothers, the tears of our nobles, the earnest entreaties of the clergy, the loyalty to this Holy See, of which so many of our countrymen have given proof. What they, being absent, are unable to say, may not be suppressed by us who are privileged to behold your fatherly countenance."
We do not know how the little band fared on their journey, but on the I5th of March, 1581, St. Charles Borromeo had written to Father Agazzari, promising a hearty welcome to the next company of scholars which should pass.1 The company in this case was that of which Blessed William Hart was spokesman. When they came the Saint was doubt- less as good as his word, and showed them the same kindness and hospitality which, as we have already seen, he had shown to Blessed Edmund Campion and his fellow-travellers the year before.
Pitts and Standish reached Rheims before their companions, on April the igth, and left again for England on the 22nd. The other three, William Hart, William Harrison, and Hugh Proberts, only reached Rheims on May the I3th. Perhaps they had been delayed by sickness. On May the 22nd, Blessed William and Mr. Harrison left for England, and on the 24th Mr. Proberts also left. The times were so dangerous that it was doubtless thought best that they should not all travel together.
1 Knox, Douay Diaries , p. 340.
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 609
On reaching England Blessed William Hart directed his steps towards Yorkshire, where he threw himself into the work of the mission with characteristic ardour. So great was his fervour and his success, that it was predicted of him that he would be the fourth martyr of York. His sermons were so eloquent and persuasive, that the people compared him to Father Campion, and though his missionary labours lasted but little over a year, he had already won for himself the title of " Apostle of Yorkshire." He made many converts, some of whom he sent to Rome. Besides a singular piety towards God, a great love for his neighbours, and an extraordinary zeal for the Catholic faith, which were conspicuous in him from the beginning, his carriage and behaviour were so winning that everyone loved him. His devotion to the august Mysteries of the Altar was so great, that whilst he celebrated them, he was often observed to shed an abundance of tears. Above all else, his charity to the poor Catholic prisoners was very remarkable. The gaols were full of them, and they were perishing daily through the many hardships of their imprisonment. At the risk of his own life, he visited them daily in their fetid dungeons, and gave them all the consolation in his power, hearing their confessions, encouraging them to constancy, ministering to their temporal neces- sities, and feeding their souls with the Bread of Heaven. Many were dying of the filth and squalor of their dungeons, and these he tenderly prepared for death. Well he knew that, if he were captured,
NN II.
6io BLESSED WILLIAM HART
he would have to endure an even worse fate than theirs ; but far from counting his own life precious, he only longed to gain the martyr's crown. Father Persons tells us, that when he spoke with Catholics on spiritual things, he was wont to give them a crucifix, which he wore, to kiss, desiring that they should practise so good and Christian a custom.
He was present at the Mass which Mr. Bell celebrated in York Castle, on the night that Blessed William Lacey was apprehended, and only escaped by letting himself down the wall into the rnoat, where he was up to his chin in water and mire. But within six months after, God was pleased that he should fall into the hands of the persecutors. He was betrayed by an apostate, who was inflamed with hatred against all that was Catholic.1 This man went to York, where the Father usually dwelt (probably in the house provided by the Venerable Margaret Clitherow, who was our martyr's penitent), and having dis- covered his place of abode, obtained from the Earl of Huntingdon, who was eager to do an ill turn to Catholics, a posse of officers to arrest the priest. Taking a number of constables, he went on Christmas night to the house where the martyr was concealed, broke down the doors, and made a forcible entry. The priest was found by some of these ruffians sleeping quietly in his chamber, for during the five preceding nights he had been so
1 Many of the following details are taken from the Annual Letters of the English College, Rome. (Foley, Records S.J. vol. vi. pp. 103, 104.)
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 6n
busy in hearing confessions and administering the Blessed Sacrament to his numerous flock, that he could not obtain more than two hours' sleep. They roused him and asked him his name. " William Hart," was his reply. At the first surprise, and perhaps not yet fully awake, he said to them, with some emotion : " Beware lest any of you lay violent hands on me, for I am a priest, anointed with the holy chrism ; suffer me to rise and dress, and I will accompany you forthwith."
As soon as he was dressed, they carried him to the house of the high sheriff, where they kept him till day, and then brought him before the Lord President of the North. Here he was strictly examined, but the details did not come to the ears of his friends, except that, at the end, a nobleman who was present said to Lord Huntingdon, who was accusing the martyr of treason : " This man, my Lord, seems to me to be altogether guiltless of any such crime." Another account says that having begun a theological discussion, the Earl was driven into a corner by the martyr's arguments, and was fain to call in some ministers to take up the disputation, who, finding themselves speedily worsted, took refuge in abuse. He was then com- mitted a close prisoner to the Castle, and thrown into an underground dungeon, in which he remained till his martyrdom. He was kept on short commons and otherwise ill-treated. Nevertheless the joy he felt so transfigured him, that his enemies, on St. John's day, the second after his capture, put on him double irons in order, if possible, to depress
BLESSED WILLIAM HART
his spirit by physical burdens. But the result was quite the contrary, for the more cruel were his bodily sufferings the greater were his spiritual consolations.
After a fortnight he was carried before Dean Hutton, being dragged through the streets in chains, which chafed his legs and occasioned no slight suffering. When the Dean saw him, he caused his fetters to be removed, and in a friendly tone sought to win him over to his side. But prevailing nothing by fair words, he took to controversy, and misquoted a passage of St. Augustine. Hereupon Hart observed, that if he could have a copy of that Father's works, he could easily establish every article of his faith by quoting from his writings. The Dean thereupon lent him a copy of St. Augustine, and he was taken back to gaol.
After consulting these volumes in his cell, he wrote two letters, one to the Council and the other to the Dean, in which he offered to prove from the works of the holy Doctor that he upheld the Catholic doctrine.
We quote these letters, since they have never before been published. Bridgwater only summarizes them, but a Latin version of the originals is still extant in the archives of the see of Westminster.1
"To the Council.
" Most Worshipful, — Now that I have sufficiently consulted Saint Augustine as to what I wanted to prove, I think it very important that I
1 Vol. iii. fol. 229.
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 613
should expound to you his words, and that for various reasons. For he believes in the Real Presence, he acknowledges the Propitiatory Sacrifice, he prays for the dead, he implores the intercession of the Saints, he defends tradition, he asserts the possibility of observing the commandments. In a word in everything he is altogether on our side, and attacks our adversaries. Wherefore let it clearly be seen from this, that our faith is not so new, nor our religion so false, nor our doctrine so erroneous, as our adversaries commonly pretend.
" Wherefore wishing to your Honours grace in this life and glory in the next, I humbly take my leave.
" Your Honours' most humble bedesman,
"WILLIAM HART."
"To the Dean.
" Sir, — Since our religion is suppressed as false, and accounted as erroneous, I beseech you for the love of Jesus, to deign to answer this one question either privately or publicly. If Purgatory, the invocation of Saints, prayers for the dead, the Real Presence, the Sacrifice of the Mass, Justification by works, and the like, are errors, show when, in what way, and by what means, they crept into the Church ; bring forth one Father or one historical or authentic testimony, which informs us as to their origin. If they are errors, who wrote against them, or what really pious or erudite doctor contradicted them ? If no one can be produced, what is there against all these things
614 BLESSED WILLIAM HART
belonging not to condemned error but to the approved truth ? This is the question, Reverend Sir, in which I desire so greatly to be satisfied, in order that the truth, which now lies hidden, may be made clear. Hoping, therefore, that you will pardon my boldness, and will deign to answer me as to the aforesaid matters, I commend you to God from my heart.
"Yours who prays for you daily,
"WILLIAM HART."
These letters having been read, the Council summoned him before them, ten days after his interview with the Dean. Here, in that dignitary's presence, he made good his promise, and so over- whelmed the Dean with his arguments, that the bystanders were put to the blush by the feebleness of their champion's answers. At last the Dean was forced to confess that St. Augustine was on the Catholic side and with him all antiquity also, as to the Real Presence of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament, and also as to, what he called, the false doctrine of Purgatory. An impudent, coarse and ignorant minister was called in to continue the dispute, but as this brazen-faced man denied even the most obvious points, there was no making any progress with him.
The Dean and his assistants, in spite of their defeat, had had the audacity to proclaim that the servant of God would prove an easy conquest, being already half-converted to the new religion. The martyr, who was much disturbed by the report,
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 615
wrote a long letter to some of his Catholic friends, giving the true version of what had passed. He told them how the Dean and the Councillors had been forced to confess that he had well answered their objections, and that there was not a word of truth in their cries of victory. Since that time he had been constantly visited by ministers, who dis- puted with him about the doctrine of the Holy Mass and the Real Presence, and made every kind of objection to these sacred truths. Among these divines a Mr. Bunny seemed, in his own opinion at least, to be the chief preacher of the new Gospel. A Mr. Palmer had argued that the Mass not being a public action did not agree with the institution of Christ, since all those who assisted at it did not communicate. The martyr's replies had been twisted and misinterpreted in the usual fashion, but he had at last silenced his opponents with the authority of St. Chrysostom, St. Ambrose, St. Augustine, Gratian, and others. Finally, Palmer had said, " I allow that the Mass was in use in the times of those Fathers, but it was a quite different thing from what the Papists have in use now." The martyr concluded by saying that if, as Gregory Martin had shown in his Discoverie of the Manifold Corruptions of the holie Scriptures by the Heretikes of our days,1 these men wrested the inspired words in such a shocking way, it was no wonder that they should deprave the words of a prisoner to their own liking, and maliciously misinterpret his arguments. Yet although the contest was so unfairly conducted, 1 Rheims, John Fogny, 1582.
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and Catholics had no opportunity of replying to the false reports circulated by their enemies, he did not despair. Nay, they might piously hope that God Himself and Christ their captain and standard- bearer, would again by means of a young David destroy that fierce Goliath, and by his poor servant Stephen overthrow the forces of the adversary.
But now the Lent Assizes drew on at which he was to be tried. He was arraigned for high treason on two counts, first, that he had brought into the realm certain writings from the See of Rome ; secondly, that he had said Mass, heard confessions, reconciled numbers to the Church, and had seduced them from their allegiance.
The judge asked him why he had left his native country to go beyond the seas ? He answered, " For no other reason, my Lord, than to acquire virtue and learning ; and whereas I found religion and virtue flourishing in those countries, I took Holy Orders (to which I perceived myself called by a divine vocation), to the end that, renouncing the world, I might be more at liberty to serve my Maker." They asked him how he had employed his time since his return to England. He answered, " Everywhere I have been, I have tried, as far as I could, to instruct the ignorant, in order that they might be more prepared to give an account of the faith that is in them. I have also fed them with heavenly Food, in order that being confirmed in good, they might strive to keep their consciences pure, and by their pious and religious life stop the mouths of those who calumniate us." Then the
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 617
judges, as if with one voice, cried out against the martyr of God as guilty of treason. First, because he had left the realm without the licence of the Queen's majesty and attached himself to her chief enemy, the Roman Pontiff; and next, because he had induced John Wright and one Couling to abjure their allegiance to their lawful prince ; as if, forsooth, civil obedience could not be reconciled with the profession of the Catholic faith. But the martyr replied that the obedience which he taught men to give to the Supreme Pontiff and Vicar of Christ on earth, not only detracted in nothing from the complete allegiance due to the prince, but on the contrary, rather confirmed and increased it. He called God and the whole company of Heaven to witness, that he had never in his life entertained so much as a thought derogatory to the authority of Elizabeth, whom he recognized as his lawful sovereign and true queen. As to Mr. Wright and Couling, neither they nor any one else could say that he had ever spoken so much as one word to them to dissuade them from their obedience to her Majesty. As to his having brought into the country writings from the See of Rome, he protested that he had brought nothing from Rome except his Letters of Orders, and that could not be objected against him.
He ended by pointedly appealing to the judges to bear witness to his innocence, showing by the testimony of Scripture and the Fathers that no one could be accounted a criminal because he defended the truth with constancy and fidelity.
6i8 BLESSED WILLIAM HART
After this powerful appeal, a great silence fell on the court, the judges being unable to say anything in reply. But fearing that the people would suspect their injustice, one of the Protestant ministers (who were ever hounding on the authorities against Christ's servants) got up and made a foolish speech which only served to make things worse. The judges, seeing the bad effect which had been pro- duced on the people, were forced at last to try to justify themselves. One of them, therefore, put forward a statute of Henry VIII., which condemned to the penalties of high treason any one who should leave the realm without the royal permission, and should ask or receive assistance from the Roman Pontiff. The martyr replied, " My Lord, I confess that this, if taken literally, is fatal to me. But if your Lordship be pleased to take into consideration, as is only just, the sense of the statute and my intention, you will clearly see that my neck is not endangered by this statute. For, as I already confessed, I did not leave England with any inten- tion of practising treason against my sovereign or my beloved country, but merely that, like a good citizen, I might apply myself to study and to the practice of virtue, so that I might be able to help you and your children to attain eternal happiness." Then the judge replied, " Hart, I acknowledge that your intention was by no means evil, and I even admit that your desire to acquire learning and virtue was a laudable one ; but as you know, in the time of Henry VIII. it was decreed that if any one should leave the realm without his
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 619
sovereign's permission, he should be accounted guilty of treason."
No more was said ; for the judge came to a standstill, owing, as he said, to his having studied law and not divinity. The jury at once returned a verdict of guilty, and the terrible sentence was pronounced. The people openly murmured at the injustice of the sentence, and many thinking that he would be privately got rid of, followed the martyr back to his prison.
Blessed William, however, received the sentence with unruffled calmness, using the words of holy Job : Domimis dedit, Dominus abstulit; sicut Domino pi acuit, ita factum est ; sit nomen Domini benedictum — "The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away ; as it hath pleased the Lord so is it done ; blessed be the name of the Lord," x adding that he had good hope that soon his mortal life and all its miseries would be brought to an end, and that he would obtain eternal joy.
During the six days before his execution, he prepared himself by a rigorous fast, taking nothing but a crust and a little small beer, to which he sometimes added an apple. The nights he spent in prayer, as if he had already left the body and become a fellow-citizen of the saints. His desires were fixed on Heaven, and with the utmost eagerness he looked forward to the hour when at length, released from the bonds of the flesh, he should go to meet in Heaven the Lord whom he had confessed so nobly on earth.
1 Job i. 21.
620 BLESSED WILLIAM HART
The letters of farewell which he wrote at the time breathe this spirit. No wonder that they were eagerly treasured up by those who had the happiness to receive them, and that no less than eleven of them have been handed down to us. Two of them are addressed to his spiritual children; they are full of the most tender piety. He speaks with the deepest humility and com- punction of his past life, as if he had been the greatest of sinners, begs them to persevere, and above all to value and to frequent the sacraments. He says he would give ten worlds, if he had them, to obtain the assistance of a Catholic priest, but none could come to him. Let them take a warning from him and frequent the sacraments while they may. He begs them to remain indoors the day of his execution, unless they can assist at it with a joyous face and tranquil mien.
Another beautiful letter is addressed to the afflicted Catholics, urging them to constancy and patience : to fight till death for the faith, and refuse to go to church ; if an angel from Heaven preach another gospel, he says, let him be anathema. If " Sandys, the ringleader of the ministers," if Bunny or the Dean teach them another faith and religion from what they have received, let them be anathema. They must welcome fines, poverty, prisons, death, tortures. He then continues as follows :
" Stand fast, brethren, stand steadfast, I say, in that faith which Christ planted, the Apostles
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 621
preached, the martyrs confirmed, the whole world approved and embraced ; stand firm in that faith, which as it is the oldest, is also the truest and most sure, and which is most in harmony with the Holy Scriptures and all antiquity. Stand constant in that faith, which has a worship worthy of all honour and reverence, sacraments most holy, abounding with spiritual consolation. For if ye have remained constant in this faith, that is in the Catholic Church, in the ark of Noe, in the house of Rahab, with what joy and consolation of soul will ye not be flooded : to you will be imparted the sacrament of penance for the cleansing of your souls ; to you will be given the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of our Saviour for the refreshing of your souls ; you will be partakers of all the satisfactions and merits of Christ, of the fellowship of the saints, of the suffrages, prayers, fasts, and almsdeeds of all the just, whom the Catholic Church diffused throughout the whole world holds in her bosom. O blessed they, yea and thrice blessed, who stand firm in the faith of Christ, according to the Apostle's warning : especially in this most deplorable time when God is blasphemed, the priests of Christ are hanged, the sacraments trampled under foot ; for these will be partakers of all graces, yea and of eternal hap- piness. God is my witness that I speak from my heart, when I say that I would rather be the last in the family of Christ than be saluted as leader in the sect of the Protestants. Wherefore again, I pray you, through Jesus Christ, that ye be firm and constant, that is in the Catholic faith to which
622 BLESSED WILLIAM HART
you are called. This is the first, the last, the only request I make, and have yet made or ever shall. Fulfil these my desires, hear my voice, keep to my counsel. But why do I, a miserable and unhappy sinner, beg of you, that in this age most poisoned and most dangerous to the good, you should per- severe firm and constant in your confession, when angels, archangels, patriarchs, prophets, apostles, martyrs, confessors, virgins, the whole world beseech it, when the salvation of your souls, and the good God Himself, make the same entreaty, that you should remain firm in the faith you have once received, and in your confession of the truth ? May God of His infinite mercy help you to do so, and I, your spiritual father, though weak and loaded with innumerable sins, will never cease to pray for you both in this life and in the next. Wherefore, I entreat you, in every way I can, to be mindful of me as often as you offer your devout prayers to God, lest I be like a melting candle, which giveth light to others, and itself consumeth. Again and again, farewell, my much desired ones. The servant of all and every one of you,
" WILLIAM HART."
In a postscript the blessed martyr warns his children against two Protestant errors : the first that it was not possible to observe all God's com- mandments, and the other that a man who had once been in a state of grace could never fall from it.
He wrote yet another letter congratulating the Catholic prisoners on their happiness in being
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 623
Catholics. He would give anything to see them again, for they were his joy and his crown.
" You are a holy nation, a people specially dedicated to God, that you may be partakers of His eternal inheritance ; ye are safe in the Ark of Noe, in a most happy condition, placed on a mountain which is subject to no evil chance. Therefore proceed as ye have begun in the ranks of God's army, remain firm in your holy vocation, fight to the very end; and heaven, heaven I say, in which is infinite joy and bliss never to be put into words, shall be yours for ever. Let this be your one and only study, to worship God and to fear Him, and nothing will be wanting to you. He is almighty, who will defend you ; merciful, who will rule over you ; rich, who will feed you ; sweet and loving, who will console and strengthen you. You will find Him in your doubts a skilful doctor, in dangers a faithful guide, in labours an ever present help, in all other troubles whatsoever a most speedy comforter. . . . You, then, who are in bonds for Christ and separate'd from the world, are not subject to those temptations by which the children of this world are harassed. . . . Take account of time, and do not let a day pass without fruit ; let all your thoughts and meditations be on heaven and heavenly things. Let your prayers be ardent, but your actions discreet and well considered ; bear trials with patience. I pray you, for Christ's sake, that you so live and so bear yourselves in all things that the enemies of the faith may be forced to
624 BLESSED WILLIAM HART
account you, not as relaxed, but as modest and religious. But before all things, carefully preserve unity of spirit in the bond of peace, loving each other with fraternal charity, let there be no dis- sensions among you, no discords ; for thus will God embrace you with His love and the angels proclaim your praises.
" And I beseech you for Christ's sake, most beloved brethren, daily, nay every hour, to pray for me a wretched and needy sinner, in order that I may finish my course to the glory of God, the salvation of my soul, and the good of my neighbour. As for me, be sure that I neither will nor can forget you in my prayers, for just as while I was with you I did my best to comfort and help you, so will I do the same much more powerfully in heaven, if God grant me that grace. Farewell, my most beloved sons. I beseech you to pardon me whatsoever I have done you wrong by offence or by negligence ; so forgive me as I forgive you. Pray for me, as indeed I pray and will pray for you. This have I written to you in greatest haste when almost overcome with sleep and greatly wearied."
Another touching letter is to a friend. In this we see, as elsewhere indeed, the playful and joyous spirit which made him so beloved, and which sprang from an innocent, childlike heart. He tells his friend he is about to buy an estate of immense value, and that his friend must help him. •" If the day fixed be kept, if the gibbet does not fall, if by my fault that which has been settled and fixed
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 625
does not come to naught, beyond doubt the estate is mine." Heaven is the estate, and his friend, if he will persevere, may win it too.
Yet again he writes to his beloved children in prison. He tells them that he is their most loving though unworthy father. He would fain leave them some last gift, as Elias left his cloak to Eliseus. But as you can get nothing from a cat but its skin, so from a poor Hart, naked and bereft of all things, what more can they expect than his heart ? But that they have always possessed ever since he knew them ; and they will have it always for their own, not only while he lives, but also when by the infinite mercy of God, he is admitted into the heavenly choirs. He ends by telling them that if they choose to mount to Heaven by sufferings and tortures, as by a rope, they will have him as a companion on the journey.
He writes "to a spiritual son" that though time, ink, and pen are wanting, he must wish him and his a happy and prosperous year. Though he is in pain and darkness, and loaded with heavy chains, never has he been so flooded with joy, he seems already to live in Paradise. The only thing that grieves him is the cunning of the adversary, which deceives simple souls. To " a noble lady" he writes, to thank her for her charitable visit and the other kindnesses she had shown him, although he was a stranger to her. God will reward her. Her visit caused him joy in the Lord, but sorrow on one account, that she seemed so grieved at his sufferings. She must rather thank God. Is it not a glory and honour to the servant to follow his lord, to drink oo ii.
626 BLESSED WILLIAM HART
out of his king's own cup? If the poor man rejoices who has found a hidden treasure, shall not he be filled with a like jubilation who has found the treasure of priceless worth ? Let her rejoice with him and grieve no more.
These beautiful letters set before us the vivid picture of a zealous priest, who was surely worthy to stand beside Blessed Thomas More, so full was he of heroism tempered with mirth, and a calm, sweet joy in suffering for Christ. Father Good, we are told, kept many of his spiritual letters with great veneration at Rome, and it is probable that these are the same from which we have quoted. The most touching of all is that written by the martyr to his mother, a few days before he suffered. As this is printed by Bishop Challoner, it should be well known to all, and so we forbear to quote more than one passage.
" Be of good cheer then, my loving mother, and cease from weeping ; for there is no cause why you should do so. Tell me, for God's sake, would you not be glad to see me a bishop, a king, or an emperor ? Yes, verily, I dare say you would. How glad then may you be to see me a martyr, a saint, a most glorious and bright star in heaven. The joy of this life is nothing, and the joy of the other life is ever- lasting ; and therefore thrice happy may you think yourself, that your son William is gone from earth to heaven, and from a place of all misery, to a place of all felicity. I wish that I were near to comfort you ; but because that cannot be, I beseech you,
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 627
even for Christ Jesus' sake, to comfort yourself. . . . I can say no more, but desire you to be of good cheer, because I myself am well. If I had lived, I would have holpen you in your age, as you have holpen me in my youth. But now I must desire God to help you, and my brethren, for I cannot. Good mother, bless me, be contented with that which God hath appointed for my perpetual comfort ; and now in your old days, serve God after the old Catholic manner. Cry unto Him daily, beseech Him heartily to make you a member of His Church, and that He will save your soul : for Jesus' sake, good mother, serve God. Read that book that I gave you, and die a member of Christ's body ; and then one day we shall meet in heaven by God's grace. . . . Farewell, good mother, farewell ten thousand times.
" Out of York Castle the loth of March, 1583. " Your most loving and obedient son,
"WILLIAM HART."
We cannot forbear from quoting here the prayer which the holy sufferer composed in prison, and which he earnestly besought his spiritual children to say for him daily.
" Grant, sweet Jesu, to Thy most wretched servant Hart, the grace of finishing his course to the glory of Thy Name, and his eternal salvation. Direct his words, thoughts, and works, that every- thing in him may respond to his priestly vocation and to his divine office. Give him patience in
628 BLESSED WILLIAM HART
adversity, kindness in his words, wisdom, prudence and constancy in all his doings, that through his means Thy glorious Name may be honoured and our faith upraised. Grant this, sweet Jesu, by Thy bitter Passion : Who livest and reignest with the Father and the Holy Spirit world without end. Amen."
The day before the blessed martyr's execution the sheriff gave him notice that he was to die on the morrow ; he received the intelligence calmly, only asking that he might be allowed to speak to the people — a petition granted, but afterwards recalled. On the next morning, the people thronged the approaches to the gaol. He bade farewell to the Catholic prisoners and besought their prayers. Calling the chief gaoler, he humbly thanked him for his lodging and food, though the man had indeed shown him scant kindness. Then, like an innocent lamb, he was stretched out on the hurdle, and bound to it with cords. The prisoners commended themselves aloud to his prayers, and he replied with unruffled countenance, that he would forget no one, words which greatly moved the bystanders. A certain noble lady, detained in prison for her faith, asked him to look towards her and pray for her ; he gave a sign of consent, and then was dragged to the place of execution along with some thieves. All the way he kept his eyes fixed on heaven, and in silence implored the Divine help. When he had nearly reached the place of execution, which is about a mile outside Micklegate Bar, two Anglican
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 629
ministers, Bunny and Pace, drew near to insult and outrage him, calling out to the people that he was a villainous traitor against the Queen's majesty, and was to die for his crimes. The martyr meekly replied that never had he harboured even a thought against the Queen, and that it was altogether repugnant to his sacred office to mix in political affairs.
On reaching the gallows, a crier gave notice that it was forbidden under heavy penalties to approach within forty feet. The martyr at once cheerfully mounted the ladder, and as he was silently praying he was asked if he prayed for the Queen of England. " I have prayed God for her/' he replied, " up to this day, and while I live I will not cease to pray. I freely acknowledge her as my sovereign, and am ready to obey her promptly and gladly in everything which is permitted by the Catholic Church."
Bunny, a prebend of York and a rabid Calvinist, at once arose, and began to read in a loud voice the sentence of excommunication pronounced by Pope St. Pius V. against Elizabeth, in order to persuade the people that the martyr had come back to England to draw her subjects away from her obedience, and therefore richly deserved his fate. He, however, replied briefly, " I have ever prayed for the safety of the Queen, and the good estate of the kingdom, and I wish her all that I, even at this moment, can desire for the salvation of my own soul." Pace interrupted him, telling him to prove his words by praying God to confound her Majesty's enemies. To whom the holy man mildly answered,
630 BLESSED WILLIAM HART
" Who is so foolish as not to see what you mean by this prayer ? " for of course the minister wanted the servant of Christ to pray that the Pope, as the Queen's enemy, might be destroyed.
The martyr then began to speak most movingly to the people on the miseries of man and the end of his creation. But the ministers again interrupted him, and charged him openly with ignorance and stupidity, and with not knowing the grounds of his religion. He answered calmly and tried to proceed, but his voice was drowned in their furious clamour. Bunny and Pace were joined in their abuse and insults by two of the councillors, by the Lord Mayor Goodrich, and other principal men ; for God willed that he should thus be made like to his Divine Master, against whom the chiefs of the people took counsel together, and decried as a blasphemer. Pace was the worst of all, and the nearer he saw the martyr approach his heavenly crown, the more furious he grew, shouting out against him every kind of insult, and using language altogether unworthy of a Christian man.
But the martyr bore all their bitterness with great calmness and patience, quietly answering their calumnies, and pleading with the ringleader after this sort : " Good Mr. Pace, I beseech you to leave these my last moments in peace." But this gentle- ness only excited Pace the more. He shouted to the people, " This traitor would fain abuse your simplicity ; he would fain persuade you that he endures this shameful death for his religion ; but it is not so, for he goes to the gallows, not as a
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 631
martyr, but as an enemy of his country and an infamous traitor."
Meanwhile the martyr, with eyes raised to heaven, commended himself to God, saying: "Ad te levavi oculos meos" But he was again interrupted by the furious ministers, who cried out that he should pray with them. "As I do not belong to your Church," he replied, " I may not pray with you ; " adding, " This one request I earnestly make of all Catholics that they pray for me, and bear witness to all men that I die a Catholic and for the Catholic faith, not for any crime or treason."
The hangman then fixed the rope round his neck and turned him off the ladder. When the assistants came forthwith to cut him down, in order to dis- embowel him while still alive, the crowd, disregard- ing the prohibition already mentioned, hindered them from doing so. Finally, pressing round the gallows, some took his shirt, others his clothes, others his shoes, while portions of his flesh were cut off by some to be kept as relics. Several of these persons were arrested and cast into prison for what they had done. Amongst them two women were lodged in the very dungeon wherein the blessed martyr had been confined.
But the martyr's blessed soul was carried by the angels to the throne of God, there to stand at the tribunal of a Judge who cannot err, and to receive from Him the reward of all that he had suffered for His Name's sake.
His virtues were so illustrious, says Bridgwater, that they shone as the stars of heaven, and com-
632 BLESSED WILLIAM HART
pelled the admiration, not only of his friends, but even of his deadly foes. One of the jurymen at his trial had been so struck by his holiness that he openly said to his colleagues that he would have no part in condemning one so innocent and holy, and he was in consequence thrown into prison, although he was a man of good name and much respected in York. Even the porter of the prison, callous and hard-hearted as he was, was moved to tears when he saw the holy martyr dragged so cruelly to death. In spite of all the efforts of the magistrates the people could not be hindered from carrying off his sacred relics, and proclaiming aloud his innocence and sanctity, though many were im- prisoned for doing so.
Two earls, we are told, attended the execution, one of whom will have been, no doubt, the fierce Lord Huntingdon, President of the Council. A Catholic bought from the hangman his bloodstained garments, of which portions were distributed among the faithful, and held in great veneration. A part also was given to a certain gentleman of great wealth, who later on suffered death in the same place and in the same cause, and who whilst in prison was reduced to great straits, and left destitute even of clothing.
His glorious martyrdom created a great impres- sion in his old colleges of Rheims and Rome. Allen wrote to Agazzari on the loth of June, 1583, that two Catholics who had just come from England had brought him various relics of the martyr, especially the shirt and vest in which he had
BLESSED WILLIAM HART 633
suffered. They also brought the letters he had written before his death. " He suffered all his pains most constantly and with most tranquil soul." 1
" The week before Palm Sunday," wrote Birkett to Allen on April the i6th, " William Hart gloriously poured out his blood for the Church of Christ and the authority of His Vicar, a young priest, who (as you know) was both innocent, modest, learned, and holy. As he was being carried to execution very many saluted him with the greatest kindness and love. Among them were two brothers of the noble family of Ingleby of Ripley, who are now in prison on this charge." These were no doubt brothers of the martyr, Ven. Francis Ingleby, who was ordained priest this year at Rheims.
Unhappily, none of Blessed William Hart's relics seem to have come down to us. More precious, however, than any material relics are the records of his life and virtues, the letters he has left us so full of noble resolution and joyous conformity to the Divine Will, and finally his example, the example of a saint of our own race consumed with the sacred passion of the love of God and the love of his brethren.
ED.
AUTHORITIES. — Hart's speech before Cardinal Moroni, June 6> 1579) is preserved in MS. in the Annales, of the English College, Rome, pt. ii. p. 3. The speech before Cardinal Buoncompagno, December 29, 1580, Ibid. p. 13. Speech before the Pope, Ibid. p. 15, and in an English translation (made from the Stevenson Transcripts (R.O.), vol. xiii.)in Foley, 1 Letters and Memorials, pp. 196, 197.
634 BLESSED WILLIAM HART
Records S.J. vi. p. 72. See Grene, Collectanea N.I. i. 2 (Stony- hurst MSS.)
A Latin translation of his letters is in Concertatio, ff. 105 and no — 116, Westminster Archives, vol. iii. pp. 228 — 234. The letter which comes sixth in the above collections, and is there headed Ad afflictos Catholicos, is also found in the original English (but with many faults of transcription) in R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, Addenda, vol. xxviii. n. 58, iv.
The Life of Hart, given in the Historia di Sedici Sacerdoti (1584), pp. 198 — 202, is jejune, but a much better one was supplied by Dr. Ely to Dr. Bridgwater for the Concertatio, ff. 104 — 116. An interesting letter from Dr. Ely about it has survived (B.M. Lansdowne, xcvi. 26), which is cited by Father Morris, Troubles, ii. p. 20.
See also Father Warford 's Relation of the Martyrs ; Pollen, Acts of English Martyrs, p. 252; Allen's Letters, pp. 113, 163, 172, 181, 197, 203; and the letters of Dr. Barrett and George Birkett (afterwards Archpriest) in the Douay Diaries, pp. 327, 328, 349, 353. The letters of Doctors Allen and Barrett are quoted by Father Persons in his Punti della Missions d'lnghil- terra (Stonyhurst, Collectanea P. ff. 33, 40, 44), and he adds his praises of the martyr.
Father Grene has been very diligent in gathering refer- ences concerning this martyr from various authors in his notes, Collectanea N.I. i. 70 ; ii. 8, 36, 59.
XXIV. THE BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD,
SECULAR PRIEST. York, 29 May, 1583.
BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD (whose name is spelt variously Thirkill, Thrilkelde, Thirkell, Trelcell) was born at Cunsley in the bishopric of Durham. Bishop Challoner did not know " where or what education he had at home," but the Oxford Registers show that he was a student (probably a scholar) of Queen's College in 1564-5. x
He was one of the numerous Oxford men who went abroad to study for the priesthood at Douay or Rheims. He was ordained subdeacon at Rheims together with Blessed Richard Kirkman and fifteen others, on the I4th of March, 1578-9, and was ordained priest on Holy Saturday of the same year. On April the 28th the future martyr said his first holy Mass in the college chapel, together with another new priest, William, brother of Blessed Everard Hanse. The two were sent over to England
1 Reg. Oxon. ii. 23. His name is No. 36 on the list, in the third division, which is probably that of the scholars. From this it would appear that he was not so old at his martyrdom as has been supposed.
636 BLESSED RICHARD TH IRK ELD
together, and left Rheims on the 23rd of May, I579-1 They passed through Douay on their way.
Blessed Richard had the greatest possible vene- ration for the sacerdotal character, and his ordina- tion filled him at once with joy and with confusion. We are told that as he was coming home from the place where he had been ordained, lifting up his hands to heaven with astonishment, he cried out, " O good God ! O good God ! " and then turning to one of his companions, he said, " God alone knows how great a gift this is that hath been conferred on us this day! " " He considered," wrote one of his intimate friends,2 " how excellent and singular a gift it was to offer up daily to God for his own and the whole people's salvation, the spotless and undefiled Lamb ; and the frequent meditation of this gift produced in his soul that daily increase of divine love and heavenly courage, that there was nothing in life he desired more, than in return for what Christ had done for him, to shed also his blood in Christ and for Christ." The same writer adds that he had often heard him say that for eight whole years he had made it the subject of his prayers that he might one day lay down his life for his faith.
His mission was chiefly in and about York, and he carefully compiled the Acts of the blessed martyrs who glorified that city with their blood
1 Douay Diaries, pp. 151, 152, 153. A Henry Therkell of the diocese of Durham, who was probably a relative of the martyr, received the tonsure and minor orders at Rheims, February 24, 1592, and was sent to the Seminary of Valladolid on June 30 of the same year.
2 Quoted by Challoner (Edit. 1874), p. 77.
BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD 637
during the time he lived there. He was often an inmate of the house which Venerable Margaret Clitherow kept for the use of the persecuted priests, and he succeeded the martyrs Blessed William Hart and Blessed James Thompson as confessor and spiritual director to that valiant woman. Unhappily at his arrest his papers fell into the hands of the persecutors, and so his history of the martyrs of York perished, a disaster much regretted at the time by Dr. Allen,1 and now entirely irreparable.
Blessed Richard Thirkeld's hour came in due time. On the night of March the 24th, the eve of the Annunciation, he went to visit a Catholic prisoner who was lying in one of the loathsome dungeons of the Kidcote prison on Ousebridge. It was a great feast of the Church (" our Lady's day in Lent," as it is called in the contemporary account of the apprehension), and no doubt the holy priest went to strengthen and console the confessor with the sacraments of God's Church. He fell, like Blessed William Lacey before him, a victim to his heroic charity.
While he was conversing with the captive, three pursuivants burst into the room, and on seeing him, instantly suspected that he was a priest. When challenged, he answered without any hesitation, " I will never deny my vocation ; do with me what you will." He said this with great courage and resolution, clapping one of the officers on the back with his hand, as though to encourage him to do
1 Knox, Letters and Memorials of Cardinal Allen, p. 203.
638 BLESSED RICHARD TH IRK ELD
his worst. "What," said the man, "dost thou strike me ? " " Nay," said he, " nothing was further from my thoughts. But relying on the divine grace, I wished to show to thee and to all of you that I was a priest, and that I could never be deterred by any of your words, blows, prisons, chains or tortures from defending so glorious a cause even until death."
The man of God then took the pursuivants aside ; he began to entreat them to conceal from the authorities the place in which he had been taken, promising them all the money he had if they would not tell that he had been captured in a private room. The martyr's friends could not find out for certain whether the men promised this or not ; but it was generally believed that they took the money and then carried him off to the Lord Mayor's house. Here he again acknowledged himself to be a priest, with a frankness and courage which made all present marvel.
The Lord Mayor sent him for that night to the house of Standeven, the high sheriff. This man made it his first business to rob the martyr of all he possessed. He began by questioning him closely as to where he lodged, as he hoped thereby to get possession of his horse and anything else that might belong to him. But the martyr steadily refused to answer any questions that might bring others into trouble. The sheriff therefore ordered his underlings to thoroughly search his person, and having done so they found on him two keys, one being that of his room and the other of his chest. Thereupon the
BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD 639
high sheriff was much delighted, and he imme- diately caused inquiries to be made among the locksmiths of the city, until he at last found one who recognized the keys and admitted that he had made them. Taking this man for guide, the sheriff at once set out for the place, which was the house of a poor Catholic widow, and having opened the good priest's chest, he found there a great store of sacred vestments, pious books and other things, all of which he sacrilegiously carried off.
He also visited the house of William Hutton, a well-known Catholic then in prison for the faith, where his search was rewarded by the discovery of a secret hiding-place which contained a trunk full of Catholic books. These were seized upon as contraband, and carried off to the market-place, where they were publicly burned.
We have most of these details from Hutton himself, who was at that time a prisoner in the Ousebridge Kidcote, where indeed he languished for over twenty years.1 It seems very probable that it was he whom Blessed Richard was visiting at the time of his arrest.
Blessed Richard was himself committed to one of the most dreadful Kidcote dungeons on the day after his arrest. Here he remained until the gaol delivery, the week after Whitsun week, when he was removed to the Castle for his trial, which took place on May the 27th. In the meantime he was twice examined by the Dean of York and three members of the Council concerning his character and func-
1 J. Morris, Troubles, ii. p. 307.
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tions, and he was very free in his answers, except where other persons were concerned. They asked him his reasons for going beyond the seas, and with what design he had returned to England. He answered that it was for conscience sake, that he might serve God the better, and that he had returned to his own country in order to gain souls to God and the Church. He confessed that he had said holy Mass, and administered other sacraments as occasion required. They touched also upon the crucial question of the Supremacy, though the Dean seemed unwilling to have that matter pressed home ; however, the martyr himself volunteered the statement that he believed the spiritual jurisdiction did not belong to the Queen, but to the Pope.
The time he spent in the subterranean dungeon on Ousebridge was given almost entirely to prayer and spiritual exercises. How heavenly were his dispositions may be learned from the beautiful letters which he wrote at this time, and of which Dr. Bridgwater has preserved six. We shall quote from them later on.
The venerable priest was brought, as we have said, on May the 27th to the Castle. By some means he had obtained a cassock and a priest's cap, and these he wore, much to the displeasure of his persecutors. But the sight of his priestly garb filled the Catholics with consolation, which was still more increased by his demeanour. His countenance and whole bearing expressed so much dignity and courage, mingled with the sweetest modesty and patience, that the spectators were
BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD 641
touched with admiration. Like a lamb in the midst of wolves the holy man moved slowly, surrounded by guards and the high sheriff's officers, his meek- ness and gentleness rilling even Protestant beholders with reverence.
Among them was a certain nobleman, who was himself a prisoner, not indeed for the profession of the Catholic religion, but because he seemed inclined to embrace it. When this man saw the priest, thus attired, being led to the judgment-hall, he humbly craved his blessing and prayers, and returning to his chamber, he cried out, "What is this ? Innocent men are led out to death, and are we most vile of beings suffered to live? "
Our author complains that he could not learn the particulars of the trial, so great was the mob of common people who pressed in to stare at the martyr, and so tumultuous the noise they made. But the issue of it was of course a foregone conclusion, a verdict of guilty was brought in on his own confession. The statute which made the mere fact of being a priest a treasonable offence was not passed till three years later, but Blessed Richard was indicted and condemned for having sacra- mentally absolved and reconciled the Queen's subjects to the Church of Rome.
The jury having brought in their verdict, the martyr was carried back to the Castle and put down into the condemned hole among the felons. He managed, however, by raising his voice, to make himself heard by the Catholic prisoners who occupied the cell above his underground dungeon ; PP II.
642 BLESSED RICHARD TH IRK ELD
and he cried out to them, " Pray for me, my dearest sons, for now I cannot pray myself. I am indeed filled with joy that at length I may suffer for so good a cause. Had I a thousand lives how gladly would I give them all for this ! "
He passed all the night in instructing the condemned prisoners who shared his dungeon how to make a good death. On the following morning, May the 28th, he was brought up again before the court to receive sentence. It was eight o'clock in the morning. As he stood some little time in the open air, four Catholic prisoners, who were to appear at the bar that same morning, took the opportunity of commending themselves to his prayers and begging his blessing. This he gladly gave them, turning towards them, hand upraised. Then he was taken to the bar, and at first leaned over it, his head in his hands, his face towards the judges, but his whole attitude showing that he was absorbed in contemplation. When, however, the other Catholic prisoners were called up by name and arraigned for recusancy, he turned a little round to hear what they would answer. A touching scene now took place. Among these prisoners was a good old woman who was brought up to receive sentence. As soon as she reached the bar and perceived the holy priest standing there, before making any reverence to the judges, she fell on her knees and humbly asked his blessing, which he at once gave her with a smile of encouragement. When the martyr's enemies saw this they began to murmur, and one of the judges cried out : " He
BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD 643
even usurps the office of Christ Himself." The venerable priest answered : " No, indeed, but I have the power from God, and I only do what belongs to my function." But they blasphemed the more, saying: "Thou wouldst equal thyself to Christ." He replied simply : " Let God judge between you and me. I impart this blessing to the woman by the authority I bear from Christ."
Among the prisoners was also a gentleman of great note, who was brought to the bar, together with his wife, both arraigned for not going to church, for which same crime they were both afterwards cast into prison. This gentleman, being sick and weak, did not answer so loud as to be well heard by the court, upon which one cried out : " He looks at the priest," and one of the gentlemen on the bench said: "This is the traitor who has persuaded him to all this." Upon which, a third, who was also one of the bench and a kinsman of the prisoner, said to him : " Cousin, I beg you would think seriously on the matter ; now is the time, before the jury bring in their verdict; your submission afterwards will come too late. Do not wilfully fling away your goods and possessions." Then he added to his fellow-magistrates: " If this traitor of a priest were not here, no doubt but my cousin would be much more tractable."
The martyr thereupon interposed : " 'Tis better," said he, " to cast away one's goods than to run the risk of losing one's soul." Then, turning to the gentleman : " Let your goods go," said he, " stick you close to God, and bravely confess His holy
644 BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD
Name." The judges angrily bade him keep silence, but the courageous priest replied : " I am filled with joy and consolation to see them so brave and constant in their defence of this most sacred cause, and I cannot do otherwise than exhort them to persevere ; for it is altogether my duty to encourage those who are combating for the faith."
Upon this, one of the judges, filled with fury at the evident effect his words had made, called him by name, saying : " Richard Thirkeld, come up to the bar. What can you say for yourself why sentence of death should not be pronounced upon you, as you have been here arraigned and found guilty of high treason ? "
The martyr replied that he had yesterday brought forward five proofs from the holy Fathers, by which he had demonstrated that he was not guilty of high treason by exercising the power of the Keys in absolving sinners. They denied that he had ever found such things in the Fathers, whereupon he begged them to bring the books, and if he failed to show them the passages he referred to, let him lose his credit for ever. But they took no notice of the challenge, which they were of course afraid to take up, and at once proceeded to pronounce sentence, in the usual terrible form.
On hearing it pronounced in all its dread details, the martyr at once knelt down, crying out with an accent of indescribable joy : Hcec est dies quam fecit Dominus, exultemus et Icetemur in ea — " This is the day which the Lord hath made, let us rejoice and be glad in it."
BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD 645
Then, that his presence might no longer encourage the other Catholics, he was hurried out of the court and thrust into the lowest dungeon of the Castle.
On the following day, May the 2gth, he was brought forth to suffer martyrdom. Contrary to the usual custom, the holy man was suffered to follow Blond, the under-sheriff, quietly on foot as far as the Castle gate. Here, however, he was laid on the hurdle, as usual. The object of this seems to have been to prevent the Catholic prisoners who were confined in different parts of the building from hearing what was passing, lest they should cry out loudly after him in order to receive his last blessing.
But as to what happened at the Knavesmire Tyburn, our author could glean but the scantiest information. Scarcely any of the citizens were allowed to come near the place, guards being posted at the city gates on purpose to prevent Catholics from passing out. In order further to engage the public attention elsewhere, the Lord Mayor ordered that a general meeting of the citizens should take place that day under pretext of making the drawing for the militia.
The martyr's friends could only learn that,
He nothing common did or mean Upon that memorable scene,
but bore himself with the dignity of a true Christian priest. They were assured too that the sentence was carried out in all its ghastly details while the martyr was still alive. In order that the faithful
€46 BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD
might not gather up any of his blood, a great fire of straw was made to consume every vestige of it. But though men might destroy his sacred relics, the martyr's blood still cries to Heaven for vengeance, the vengeance of the saints — the conversion of the land he loved so well.
His head, so dear to men and angels, was parboiled in the cauldron, and, it would seem, set up, beside that of Blessed William Hart, on stakes fixed on the leads of the Ousebridge prison, where he had been arrested. Mrs. Hutton, the wife of the confessor William Hutton, had her chamber next the leads ; for in those days women had to suffer imprisonment for their faith as well as men. Within a few days after it had thus been exposed, both heads disappeared. Mrs. Hutton was naturally suspected of having removed these precious relics, and was threatened with hanging unless she confessed to the fact. Her poor little children, who were imprisoned with their mother (the eldest was less than nine years old), were brought before the magistrates, who had with them four beadles armed with great birch-rods to terrify them into confession. The children were thus forced to admit that their mother had removed the holy heads. She was subsequently thrust into the underground hole called the "low place" of the prison, amongst the felons. As the place was already infected by a prisoner who died there, this was tantamount to a sentence of death. And in fact Mary Hutton caught the gaol-fever and died in that horrible place within a month after her incarceration there.1 1 Camm, A Benedictine Martyr in England, pp. 99 — 101.
BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD 647
It is a great pity that these holy relics should have been subsequently lost. We have, however, what is perhaps even more precious, the letters of the blessed martyr, already referred to. In closing this memoir we may be permitted to make extracts from documents so full of sacred interest.
The letters are six in number. The first is addressed, " To the Catholics who were his fellow- prisoners" It is a fervent exhortation to constancy, much resembling those written by Blessed William Hart. He entreats them to bear charitably with the miserable fall of certain ladies, who had yielded to the threats and solicitations of the adversary, and given sad scandal by going to the heretical services.
"Who has now cast you into prison," he con- tinues, " or who can do so without the permission of Divine Providence ? Whose cause is it that you have taken upon you to defend, but that of Christ Himself? Whose soldiers are you, but Christ's? Whose is this standard, under which you serve Christ, but the Holy Spirit's ? Who is the captain of your warfare, but Christ ? Who is it that will pay you the reward due to veteran soldiers, but Christ ? Who is it that will crown you as conquerors, but Christ ? Who is it that will unite you to those holy men of God, who have waged these battles before you, but Christ ? Who is it that will bring you to the glorious palms of the martyrs, but Christ ? Who is He, by whose help and blessing you hope to obtain for your possession the bliss of eternal glory, together with Blessed Lacey, Kirkman, Thompson and Hart, and your other
648 BLESSED RICHARD TH IRK ELD
fathers of happy memory, but Christ ? . . . Be brave and faithful then, and let no torments, crosses, or afflictions lead you to fail in courage. If the Lord Mayor should cause you to be committed to yet closer custody, Christ your captain will bring you forth into freedom, and will grant you to roam at your pleasure far and wide in His royal palace of delights. If the judges and commissioners have seized unjustly on your goods, Christ your King will grant you to receive in this world a hundred- fold for every farthing you have lost, and in the world to come eternal life and bliss that shall never know an end. If wicked gaolers use force and cruelty, continually annoy and torment you, frequently examine and persecute you, let not all these things cause you the least trouble of mind, or make you remiss in the divine service. You will see that Christ will visit you the more quickly, that He will give you greater consolations day by day, and will make His throne in your hearts with the more frequency and the more pleasure. Therefore be of good cheer, beloved, clap with your hands, yea let every member of your bodies exult with joy, in that you have a cause so noble, Christ for your captain, the Holy Spirit for your comforter, and for your advocates and defenders the Blessed Virgin Mary, the angels, the holy apostles, the martyrs, the confessors, the virgins, the blood of your fathers so freshly spilt, which cries out loudly to Heaven and does violence to the divine ears that it may obtain for you consola- tion, fortitude and holy perseverance to the end.
BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD 649
" And so, beloved sons in Christ, since it is yet altogether uncertain how soon I may have to lay aside this my tabernacle, how quickly you may be deprived of your father — an unworthy and wretched one indeed, but still the only one now left to you, — and since it is by no means certain what will be my future fate, when already I am overwhelmed with so many crosses and afflictions that they seem to equal or surpass in number the very hairs of my head ; seeing that I may be thrown into some underground pit by permission of Divine Providence, and loaded with chains which to me are dear and sweet, for I have determined to look upon all these things as blessings and as special marks of the divine love; since, I say, I am ignorant how quickly all these things may come upon me, I wished first to give you this little token of my love for you (written in a simple style indeed, but inspired, as I trust, by God), to console and encourage your hearts to endure even yet greater afflictions for the sake of Christ your Saviour, who redeemed you at the cost of His Most Precious Blood."
A second letter is written to a friend who was grieving over his capture, probably to him in whose company he was taken. He tells him that the only lawful reason for grief is sin, while this event has caused him joy which he cannot express. Under all these trials lies hidden a sweet Manna, if they are received with joy as a chalice which Christ Himself presents.
To one of his spiritual daughters (possibly the
650 BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD
Venerable Margaret Clitherow) is addressed a third letter.
" O happy prison," he cries, " O blessed enclosure, O solitude full of solace, O prison long desired, where hast thou delayed so long ? O crosses, where have you lingered up till now ? O solitude, why hast thou not suffered me to taste thy sweetness long ago?"
A fourth letter, written to certain friends, gives some account of what happened during his examination before Dr. Hutton, Dean of York. The martyr frankly told that dignitary and his assessors that they were not in any sense members of the Catholic Church.
The Dean admitted that the Catholic faith had flourished in the Roman Church during some centuries, but asserted that it had afterwards died out : whereupon our martyr pertinently inquired in what year, under what Pontiff or Emperor this change had taken place, who they were who had attacked the primitive faith, whether all those about the Apostolic See were so dumb and mute that they had not attempted to defend the faith in its hour of danger. The reply naturally seemed to him a lame one. The Dean could only urge that error had crept in little by little, so that at first it was not detected, and that it grew, just as a tree does, without our observing its growth from day to day. Then he attacked the invocation of saints, and the martyr offered to defend it from St. Augustine. At first the Dean pretended to accept the challenge, in order to see if the priest really meant it, but
BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD 651
seeing that he was prepared to prove his point, he changed his ground, and said that this doctrine was a novelty introduced into the Church but little before the time of St. Augustine. Then the Dean began to abuse the Pope, calling him Antichrist. Thereupon our martyr, filled with holy indignation, cried out, " The Pope is the Vicar of Christ on earth, and the Supreme Head of the Church." The Dean, in a fury of passion, leaped from his chair, crying that he could by no means suffer such language. But the priest having declared that he would never cease from defending the Holy Father as long as he lived, the Dean was afraid to pursue the subject, and the matter dropped.
A fifth letter is addressed to one who seemed likely to fall away from the faith. It is an affec- tionate and touching warning of the great danger in which he stood. What is he about to do ? Will he become the enemy of that God who loves him so dearly and has given such astounding proofs of His love ? Will he cause a grievous scandal to the Church, and bring grief and mourning to the tender mother who nursed him at her breast ? Who knows whether, if he falls now, he will ever have the chance of returning to God ? What evil spirit has bewitched him to risk his soul for the sake of this world's joys, or to avoid a little temporal suffering ? Let him take courage and show his contempt for the devil and all his satellites, crying out from his heart :
" O Father of mercies Who didst create me, O sweetest Son Who didst redeem me, O Holy
652 BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD
Spirit Who didst sanctify me, O blessed Trinity, Three Persons and One God, preserve, defend and keep me in the unity of the Catholic and Apostolic Church, that in her I may deserve to live and die and at the last to attain to the glory of Thy divine Majesty."
The sixth letter is addressed to the Catholic prisoners ; it is a fervent exhortation to them to embrace and love the Cross. There follows a long poem written to the same prisoners, and breathing the same glowing zeal and fervent joy in suffering.1 There is nothing more touching than to see how, in the midst of their own unexampled trials, our martyrs were constantly occupied with the thought of their flocks. They forgot themselves and their pains, that they might console those who were committed to their care, and encourage them bravely to follow in their own footsteps. They had the hearts of true pastors, of good shepherds who care only for the sheep. ED>
1 It is not impossible that the martyr wrote his verses in English, as he did his letters. This, however, is not stated in the Concertatio, fol. 125, where they begin thus :
Qui mecum, amid, sicut oves neci Hoc destinata car cere degitis ; Durate constantes, et aures His adhibete animosque dictis.
The refrain runs as follows :
Perstate fortes fortiter in fide, Diri Dathanis cedite semita. Differt; suum tandem fidelis Sed reparabit ovile Christus.
BLESSED RICHARD THIRKELD 653
AUTHORITIES. — Historia del glorioso Martyrio di dieciatto Sacerdoti, Macerata (1585), Concertatio (1588), ff. 116 — 126, and the authors treating of persecution in the North mentioned in the four previous Lives.
RELICS. — Only one relic of this martyr is known to exist. It is preserved at St. Benedict's Priory, Colwich, and consists of a small piece of coarse linen, with the inscription, " Of ye shirt of Mr. Thirkeld pl and mart, at York."
ADDENDA ET CORRIGENDA.
I. u, line 10 for 29 April read 28 April.
I. 12, n. i, line 5, for pleaded guilty read were found guilty.
I. 90 n. Delete 1535. Ellis is in error here. The Bishop of Rochester was not Fisher, but Hilsey. (J. Gairdner, English Historical Review, January, 1905, p. 165.)
I. 145, for Elizabeth read Cecily.
I. 384.— John Rugge was born at Tiverton, his father having been a tenant of some Winchester College property at Downton, Wilts. He became a scholar at Winchester in 1488 at the age of twelve, and was admitted Fellow there, March 5, 1520, having already taken his M.A. degree from New College, Oxford ; but he had vacated the Fellowship before 1535. He was the first holder of the Wickamical Prebend at Chichester, but had a dispensation from residence, and was living at Reading in 1532. (Notes and Queries, Series V. vol. xi. p. 350.)
I. 387. Mr. Gairdner, ut sup., says that Abbot Beche's name is never John in contemporary documents, always Thomas.
I. 491, line 10 for even readonly.
I. 545, „ 24. The date should be, Friday, February 15, 1544. Throughout the article the year should be 1544, not 1545.
II. in (title), for January 4, 1572, read January 4, 1571. II. 121, line 20 for Joseph read James.
II. 124. — A further trace of the Earl of Northumberland's Catholicity at this time was his entertainment of a priest, Mr. Thomas Mudd, formerly a monk of Jervaulx, and for many years after a confessor in chains. (J. Morris, Troubles of our Catholic Forefathers, iii. 319.)
II. 148, 149. — The following additional information about B. Thomas (here called Sir John) Plumtree and the absolution during the Northern Rising of priests whohad conformed, is taken from a violent diatribe against Catholics, published by John Day, without date (about 1570), in a broadside entitled A bull graunted by the Pope to Dr. Harding (Vatican Archives, Varia Politicorum Ixvi., 258). "How notorious is their byeword of
656 ADDENDA ET CORRIGENDA
their golden day ! It is known (for the letters be yet extant in good custody), how one of their Northern Sacrificers, wrote to another of his own faction, viz Sir John Plumtree, to be satisfied in a matter that troubled his conscience, which was that he had at one of the rebellious Earl's commandement said Masse before absolution obtained from the Pope in such forme as other had it."
II. 214 n. — B.Cuthbert Mayne's Examination, R.O. Domestic, Elizabeth, cxviii. 46, calls for further notice. The seventh answer contains an erroneous statement regarding the third decree of the fourth Council of Lateran, the well-known disciplinary measure enjoining the deposition of heretical princes. In the examination we read that this decree was "ratified at the last Council of Trent, where there was a consent of Catholic Princes for [deposing heretical rulers] &c."
There are two errors here. The Council of Trent did not re-enact the Lateran decree, and much less was any agreement of Catholic Princes made at that Council for the execution of the decree. The latter mistake, however, is perhaps only grammatical. If the relative "where" be referred, not to the immediate antecedent, "the Council of Trent," but to the remoter antecedent, i.e., " the Council of Lateran," the truth of the proposition will be saved. This, we may be sure, was Mayne's meaning, for the facts themselves were well known to all Catholic theologians. The Protestants, on the other hand, had frequently stated that a Papal League for the extirpation of heretics was agreed to at Trent (see Introduction, p. xxvi.). It may therefore be that the Protestant reporter of the Examina- tion was influenced by his prepossessions in setting down Mayne's words, and this may account for his cautious subscrip- tion, "These things, affirmed by me, Cuthbert Mayne, I think to be true."
II. 220, line 28 for George read Henry.
II. 402. — A long and characteristic story of the difficulties encountered by students on their way to the Seminaries, a story in which Blessed Alexander Briant plays a part, will be found in Foley, Records S.J., vi. 89.
II. 483, line 29 for 1580 read 1581.
II. 606 note. „ Richard ,, Robert.
J. H. P.
INDEX.
ABBOTSLEIGH, More's hair-shirt at I. 241 «.
Abel, B. Thomas, Life I. 462— 483. Degrees at Oxford 462 ; instructor, chaplain, and advo- cate of Queen Catherine xxxiii. 67, 462, and «. ; sent to Charles V., Rector of Bradwell- on-Sea, appeals for protection against Henry 463 ; book on the divorce, 464, and n. I, 466 ; in Tower, there says Mass before the Lieutenant, conditionally released 464 ; again in Tower 465 ; charged with favouring Holy Maid of Kent 465, 466 ; "convict" of treason 82, 467; grounds of attainder 466, 467 ; sentenced to imprisonment and forfeiture 467 ; his rebus on the wall of Beauchamp Tower 467, 468 ; correspondence with Forest 283, 468 — 471 ; refuses the oaths 471 ; expenses in prison 472 ; pleads for relief 473, 474 ; re- leased on bail by his keeper 474 ; his keeper sent to Marshalsea 475, 496 ; succoured in prison by Bishop Sampson and Dr. Wilson 475 — 477 ; condemned by Parlia- ment without trial 475, 481 ; second attainder 477 — 479 ; brought to Smithfield 479 ; hanged 480.
Aberdeen, II. 167.
Aberdeen, Old II. 182 n. 2.
Abingdon, Abbey Church I. 426, 449 ; White Hart Inn 449 ; II. 33.8.
Addingham, Yorks. II. 578, 588.
Agazzari, Father Alphonso, S.J. Rector of English College, Rome II. 379, 605 ; letters to 252, 374 — 379 and nn. 381 — 383, 409, 410, 477, 478, 512 «., 548, 605, 608, 632 ; 563,
569-
| Aleyn, Joan I. 228.
j Allen, Dr., afterwards Cardinal, William II.So, 100, 205, 314, 362, 364, 432, 477 ; letters from to Agazzari 477, 478 ; to Campion 307, 308 ; letters to from Henry Shaw 207, 209.
Alnwick Castle II. 173, 174, 186. Alva, Duke of II. 52—54, 84, 85, loo, 167.
j Amiens II. 360.
! Andleby, Ven. William II. 360.
j Antwerp I. 137, 138; II. 53, 56, 68, 69, 76, 77, 99, 108 «. 167,
357-
Ap Rice, John I. 340 n. Aquaviva, Claudio, General S.J.,
letter to II. 335, 336. Arche, Richard I. 490. Arundel, Sir John II. 219. Arundel, Henry Fitzalan, Earl of
II. 117 ; Percy's proxy 121. Arundel, Ven. Philip Howard,
Earl of, converted II. 341. Arundel, Thomas I. xl.
II.
658
INDEX
Arundell of Wardour, Lord, relics
belonging to I. 412. Aske, Sir Robert I. 369, 370 ;
II. US-
Assenden, Oxon I. 440. Attainder, Statute of I. xlviii.
379-
Audley, Edmund, Bishop of Salis- bury I. 485.
Audley, Sir Thomas, complains of | Fisher I. 70 ; Lord Chancellor 30, 97, 187, 191, 197 ; intercedes ] for More 193, 197 ; interrogates More 217 ; intimidatesjury 101 ; sentence on Fisher 102 ; tries More 221 ; gives sentence 223; intercedes for Abbey of Col- chester 391.
Augustinians (Canons Regular) I. 269, 374 «• i» 514; (Friars or Hermits) 269.
Ayleworth, Mr. II. 46.
Aylmer, Dr., Protestant Bishop of London, lauds Anne Boleyn I. xxv. ; II. 341 ; 544 n. I.
Ayloff, Judge II. 348.
Barker, — , Queen Catherine's chaplain, in Tower I. 465 ; examined 473.
Barlow, William, last Prior of Bisham, surrenders I. 514.
Barnard Castle II. 139, 154.
Barnes, George, heretic I. 164 ; abuse of the Catholic Church 165 ; burnt 479, 480, 496.
Barnstaple, B. Cuthbert Mayne, at Grammar School II. 208 ; 220 n.
Barton, Elizabeth, the Holy Maid of Kent, Benedictine nun I. 80, 189; predictions against the King, interviews with him, Fisher and More 8l, 190; her supporters, confession at St. Paul's Cross 190 ; attainted 191 ; hanged at Tyburn 82, 281 n. 2.
Basset, James, Alumnus of Read- ing Abbey I. 360, 361.
Bath I. 357 and n.
Batmanson, John, Carthusian I.
3, 251.
Battle of the Spurs I. 417. Beauvale, Charterhouse I. 3, 9,
258 «. Beatification of English Martyrs
I. xv., xvii., xviii. ; text of the decrees lix. — Ixvi.
Beatification of Saints I. xi. — xx. ; meaning of xi. ; process xii., xiii.
Beaufort, Lady Margaret, Countess of Richmond, mother of Henry VII., chooses Fisher for con- fessor I. 48 ; foundations at Cambridge 49, 51.
Beche, B. John (or Thomas Mar- shall), O.S.B., at Oxford 387; Abbot of St. Werburgh's, Chester 388; of Colchester 363 n. I, 388; takes Oath of Supremacy 388 ; refuses to surrender Abbey 392 ; pro- bably sent to Tower 393 and n. I ; final arrest, witnesses against him 393 ; their testimony to his loyalty to the Holy See 394 — 396; fails 396 and n. i, 397, 409 — 411; tried at Col- chester 397 ; pleads guilty, con- victed 398, 409 ; in Tower 384 ; secretly condemned 350, 351 : martyrdom 387, 399, 407 ; con- temporary picture of 399 ; his case compared with St. Thomas Becket's 400 ; relic 399, 400, 412. (see Addenda.')
Bedford, Francis Russell, 4th Earl
II. 92, 93, 214.
Bedyll, Thomas, King's Commis- sary, visits London Charterhouse I. 37 ; summons Exmew 38 ; letters to Cromwell 38, 263.
Belchiam, Ven. Thomas, O.S.F. Observant, dies in prison for denying Royal Supremacy I. 274.
Bell, Thomas, Protestant minister, converted and tortured II. 570, 571 ; sings High Mass in York Castle 570 ; becomes apostate 571 and ;/. I.
INDEX
659
Bellamy, William, of Uxenden Hall
II. 334- Belsize, Alexander, President of
St. John's, Oxford, deprived II.
269, 270.
Benedict XIV. Pope I. xx. n. 2. Benson, Abbot of Westminster I.
197, 203, 205. Bere Court, near Pangbourne I.
372 n. 2. Bere, B. Richard, Life I. 259
— 267 ; birth 266 ; at Glaston-
bury Abbey School 266, 331 ;
at Oxford 266 ; monk and priest
in London Charterhouse 267 ;
refuses Oath 259 ; never brought
to trial 260 ; starved to death
260, 264 ». i, 267. Bere, Richard, O.S.B., Abbot of
Glastonbury I. 266, 330 n. 2,
331. 332.
Bergen-op-Zoom II. 56. Bermondsey Abbey, Cluniac, II.
3 and n. I. Berwick II. 171, 173. Beverley I. 47. Bird, Robert I. 483. Bisham Priory I. 423 — 425, 514. Bishop Auckland, St. Helen's
Church, II. 147, 148. Bishop's Hatfield Church I. 426. Bishop's Stortford, Bishop of
London's Castle at II. 544 n. Bishopsthorpe, York, Archiepisco- ;
pal Palace at II. 572, 573. Black Friars, Convent of, Legatine
Court held at I. xxxiii. 67 ; 183,
423, 444, 445 n. Blackwell, George, Archpriest II.
443—445.
Bleadon, Somerset I. 484, 492. Boarstall I. 433. Bodmin II. 220 n. i. Body, Gilbert, scourged II. 402
n. 2. Boleyn, Anne, Queen, her '
marriage the primary cause of:
the Reformation I. xxiv. — xxvii. ,
xxxviii. ; marriage xxxv. 368 ;
coronation xxxvi. 189, 368, 435
n. i ; suspected connivance in
Fisher's attempted murder 77 n. i ; reported insult to his severed head 115; beheaded xliv. 448.
Boleyn George I. 12 n. 2.
Bologna II. 313.
JBolton Castle, Yorks II. 128.
Bonner, Edmund, Bishop of London, character vindicated by Protestants II. 24, 25, 33 ; in Marshalsea 48, 127, 128.
Bonvisi, Antonio, of noble family of Lucca, merchant II. 107 «. I ; succours More and Fisher I. 90, 232 «. 2, II. 22, 108 «. ; friend of Storey at Louvain 22, 32 ; his executor 22, 106 — 108 and nn. ; death 108 n.
Bosgrave, Father James, S.J., arrested II. 520 n. ; in Marshal- sea 383, 521 n. ; and Tower 341, 483, 521 n. ; indicted 345, 521 n ; banished 521 n.; 380.
Bouge, Dom John, Carthusian, priest of St. Stephen's, Wall- brook I. 132 and «., 155 ; 154.
Bowes, Sir George II. 155, 157.
Boxley, Rood of, destroyed at St. Paul's Cross I. 307, xlv. 304.
Bradeston, Glos. I. 439.
Bradwell-on-Sea I. 463.
Bragge, Martin II. 56.
Bramber, Sussex II. 39 n. 2.
Brancepeth Castle, Durham II. 137 and «. 2, 139, 143.
Branton, Stephen, Confessor, and his brother William II. 590, 591 and n.
Brecknock I. 497.
Brentwood I. 393.
Briant, B. Alexander, S.J. Life IL 397—423 5 family, birth 400 and n. i ; at Oxford 400 ; at Douay 401 ; ordained, goes to England, affection for Persons, reconciles his father 402 ; arrest 400, 402 ; sent to Counter in Wood Street 402 and n. 3, 404 «. ; nearly starved 403 and n. 2, 404 ; in Tower 403 ; examined 405, 406 ; needles thrust under
66o
INDEX
his nails 406, 407 ; extracts from examination 407, 408 ; eight days in the ' ' pit " 408 ; twice racked 408, 409 ; miraculously preserved from pain 410, 412, 413, 417, 421; in "Wales- boure " 409 and n. I : begs admission into Society of Jesus 410 — 414, 421, and n. 3, 422 ; indictment 417 ; trial and sen- tence 418 and M. i, 419, 447 «. 2 ; shaves tonsure 418 ; crucifix 418, 419; martyrdom 351, 393, 420, 421 ; portrait 422 ; relics 415, 419, 422, 423. (See Addenda. )
Bridgettine Order I. 27, 28.
Bridg water I. 357 and n. I.
,, Dr. John, Author of
the Concertatio II. 601.
Brightwell, Oxon. Church I. 425 ; Manor 426, 451, 452.
Brinckley, Stephen, Esq. Prints Persons' books, two years in Tower II. 419 and «. I.
Brindholme, Edmund, priest I.
483-
Brindle, Lanes. II. 536.
Bristol, Church of St. Mary Red- cliffe I. 484 ; St. Augustine's Green 489 bis ; Newgate Prison 488.
Bristow, Richard, Oxford friend of Campion II. 272 ; one of first Douay students 205, 272, 444, 451.
Brookby, Ven. Anthony, Obser- vant, dies in prison 1. 274.
Browne, John, Minor Canon of Durham, curate of Witton Gil- bert II. 149 ; reconciled 149, 150.
Bruges I. 141, 266; Augustinian Convent at, primary relics of BB. More I. 244 ; Ford II. 452, Mayne 222.
Briinn II. 293.
Brussels II. 52, 58, 182, 445, 475.
Bruton I. 333, 339.
Brynston, John, O.S.F. I. 346, 347-
Bunny, Mr., Calvinist II. 615, 620,
629. Buoncompagno, Cardinal II. 606,
639. Bynche, Belgium II. 224.
Caddy, — , spy II. 449.
Calais I. 141, 427, 483, II. 4, 316.
Cambrai, Treaty of I. 176; martyrs ordained at II. 402, 501, 539-
Cambridge University, martyrs educated at I. I, 29, 42, 47, 331, 332, 497, II. 250, 500; Colleges : I. Christ's 29, 49 and n. i ; King's Hall 17 n. 2 ; Michael House (Trinity) 47, 48 and n. i ; Monk's College (Magdalene) 331 ; Queen's 51 ; St. John's 51, 267.
Campeggio, Cardinal, Papal Legate, tries Henry's divorce I. xxxii. 67 ; Legatine Court of xxxiii. 67 ; deprived of his See of Salisbury xxxvi.
Campion, B. Edmund, S.J., Life II. 266 — 357 ; birth 267 ; parent- age 268 ; school and college 269; orations 271 — 275; made Anglican deacon, remorse 278, 302, 303 ; goes to Dublin 279 ; writes History of Ireland 280,
281 ; date of reconciliation un- certain 283 ; escapes to England
282 ; at Storey's trial 80, 282 ; at Douay 80, 209, 282, 283, 292 ; letter to Cheney 283 — 291 ; enters the Society of Jesus 293 ; at Briinn and Prague, fervour in spiritual exercises, letters to novices 293 — 299 ; discourse De juvene Academico 299 and ;/.,
301 ; sent to England with Persons 308, 309; aliases 311, 312 ; devotions 312, 313 ; in- cidents of the journey 313 — 318, 365 — 370 ; temporary arrest at Dover 318 ; writes the so-called Challenge 319—321, 325, 326 ; missionary work 323— 333, 335, 336 ; writes Decent Rationes
INDEX
661
333—335 5 taken at Lyford 338 ; . brought to London 338, 446, j 493 ; in "Little Ease" (Tower) 339, 446 ; secret interview with Elizabeth 339 ; racked 340, 344, 433, 447 ; conferences with Protestants 341, 342, 415, 417 ; examined, asserts loyalty to Elizabeth 343, 344 ; indictment 345. 433, 447, 552—554 ; trial 346 — 349 ; sentence 349 ; Via Dolorosa 350, 351; martyrdom 351, 352; asks Catholics to say Creed for him, protests loyalty to Elizabeth, not cut down alive 352 ; honoured after death 352, 353 > conversions and miracles 353 ; relics 352, 353, 356, 419 ; portrait 357.
Canonization, process of I. xi. — xiv.
Canterbury, Religious Houses I. 80, 269 ; Churches : St. Dunstan 242 ; St. George, St. Gregory 269 ; Dane John 272 ; William Roper's house 243.
Canterbury Cathedral I. 176.
Capgrave, John, Austin Friar I. 269, 270.
Carew, Sir Nicholas, in Tower I. 518 ; arraigned 520 ; executed
521 ; 514-
Carlisle II. 124, 128, 157. Carthusian Martyrs, Lives I.
I— 16, 35—46, 116, 239, 247—
268. Carthusian Priors, of London,
Beauvale, and Axholme I. I —
1 6 ; in Tower 9 ; refuse Oath of
Supremacy, indictment xlii., n,
19; trial, sentence n, 12, 35;
More's comment on 15, 219 n. I ;
their exhortation and martyrdom
12, 25, 26, 35. Carthusian Rule I. 2, 3. Casale, Sir Gregory I. xxxi. Castle Farley, Somerset I. 502. Catesby, Sir William II. 323. Catherine of Arragon. Marriage
to Prince Arthur I. 415, 507;
marriage to Henry VIII. xxix.
508 ; goes to the Field of the Cloth of Gold 427 ; affection for B. Margaret Pole 508 ; and her children 5IO5 l°ve f°r the Observants 276 ; divorce xxx. ; visited by Campeggio xxxii. ; shows copy of brief, sends B. Thomas Abel for original xxxiii. 463 ; refuses to enter a nunnery xxxii. ; cited before the Legatine Court, appeals to Rome xxxiii. 487 ; patience and firmness xxxv. ; King separates 276 ; marriage declared null by Cranmer xxxvi. ; refuses to give up title of Queen 464; household broken up 465 ; letters to her daughter 497, 512; correspond- ence with Forest 283 — 287 ; death xliii. 287 n. i, 448.
Cavendish, William I. 391.
Caversham, Our Lady of, chapel
I- 373, 374-
Cecil, Sir William (first Lord Burleigh), packs Parliament II. x- 38> 39 5 schemes to entrap Storey 53 ; at his martyrdom 93 ; his spies 253, 254 ; Campion's chief persecutor and judge 274, 275 ; letters to 62 — 66, 122,
I31— !35, MS, 15°, !56 "•> I6o> 172, 191, 201, 430 n., 466; roo, 123, 128, 157, 158. Chalfont St. Giles, parsonage II.
38.
Chapman, Thomas, O.S.F. 1.267, 290, 296.
Chapuys, Charles V. 's ambassador in England I. 12 n. 2 ; letters to Emperor 12, 13 n. 2, 21, 74, 75 n. 2, 79, 80 and n. I, 117 n. I, 471, 472, 498, 512, 513 ; veneration for B. Margaret Pole 521 ; describes her martyrdom 533—5355 77, 92, 98 n. 2, 112 n. 2, 184, 278 n. I, 464, 465.
Charke, William, Protestant min- ister II. 495, 497 n, 2.
Charles V., Emperor I. 141, 237, 428.
Charnocke, Robert II. 475.
662
INDEX
Chauncy, Maurice, Carthusian I. 8, 258, and n. I, 259, 266.
Chedsey, William, Archdeacon II. 46.
Cheke, Henry II. 571, 573, 575.
Chelmsford, B. John Haile, vicar I. 17 ; B. John Payne in gaol at, tried at Assizes II. 436 ; mar- tyred at 424.
Cheney, Richard, Protestant Bishop of Gloucester II. 278; letter to, from Campion 283 — 291 ; death 292.
Chester, B. John Beche, twenty- sixth Abbot of St. Werburgh's I. 388.
Chester-le-Street II. 148.
Christchurch Priory, Hants, B. Margaret Pole's chantry at I. 539, and n.
Circiniani, Nicholas, frescoes of I. xvi. Ix.
Clark, Griffith, Vicar of Wands- worth I. 453.
Clarke, John, Bishop of Bath and Wells I. 174, 179, 189, 362.
Clement, Dr. John, tutor in More's family, married to Margaret Giggs
I. 145, 261 ; their children 241 «. I, 261, 262.
Clement, Margaret, see Margaret Giggs.
Clement VII. Pope, besieged in Rome I. 176; Brief of reproof xxxv. ; excommunicates Henry xxxvi. ; pronounces validity of first marriage xxxvi. 91, 197, 282, 350 ». I.
Clenock, Maurice II. i, 361, 605.
Clifford of Chudleigh, Lord, relic belonging to I. 399, 412.
Clifford Moor, Yorks. II. 154.
Clitherow, Ven. Margaret II. 597, 610, 637.
Colchester I. 397 — 399.
Colchester Abbey I. 391.
Coldingham II. 171.
Cole, Henry, Dean, in Tower
II. 46, 48, 49.
Colet, Dr. John I. 124, 127.
Colley, Dorothy I. 145, 227, 228,
240. Collington, John, alias Peters,
priest, taken with Campion
II. 336 — 338, 446 ; tortured,
escapes death, banished 447. Colnbrooke (Colebrook), Bucks. I.
437, 445, II. 339 bis. Colte, Joan, More's first wife I.
131, 132, 137, 243. Colwich Priory relics I. 411, II.
652. Common Prayer, First Book of
II. 18, 19. Compton Chammerleyn, Wilts.
I. 491. Convocation I. xxxiv. 63, 64, 71 —
79, 36i, 362.
Cook, B. Hugh see Faringdon. Cook, Laurence, Carmelite prior
I. 313, 464, 480 n. ; attainted 477 — 480 n. ; hanged at Tyburn 313, 480 n. 483; Prtetermissus 478 n.
Copley, — , priest II. 125, 136 «. Cort, Ven. Thomas, Observant,
dies in prison I. 274. Cottam, B. Thomas, S.J., Life
II. 536 — 563 ; at Brasenose, degrees 536 ; master of Grammar School in London 537, 556 ; converted 537, 538 ; at Douay 538 ; and German College, Rome 539 ; Jesuit novice 540 ; priested at Soissons 542 ; sent to London with Dr. Ely 543 J gives himself up 546 ; harassed by Protestant ministers 547 ; in Marshalsea 482 ; his first Mass 547, 548 ; charges against him 548, 549 ; trans- ferred to Tower 482, 550 ; racked, tortured by " Scavenger's Daughter" 550 and «. i ; dragged to sermons 508, 551 ; indicted for recusancy 417, 551 : tried for conspiracy 345 ; sentenced 554 ; examined 555 ; brought to Tyburn 495, 556 ; martyrdom 556—560 ; blesses the people 532 ; tries to convert hangman
INDEX
663
557 ; profession of faith 558 ; protests loyalty to Elizabeth, but rejects Royal Supremacy 559 ; last prayers 559, 560 ; buried under scaffold 560 ; portrait and relics 563 ; brother, and descendants 562.
Council of the North II. 564, 591 ; tries Lacey 573; Thompson 591 ; and Hart 614.
Cowdray Park, near Midhurst
I. 524—527.
Cox, Dr., Protestant Bishop of Ely
II. 39, 40, 235.
Cox, Leonard, schoolmaster I. 360.
Cranmer, Thomas, Archbishop of Canterbury I. xxxii. xxxiv. xxxvi. 79, 511 ; tries Fisher and More 84, 197 ; perhaps sent to confess Fisher on the scaffold 117 and ;/. ; tries Forest 308, 310 n. I ; letters to Cromwell 33, 86 n. 2, 87, 301— 303; 191,205, 206 and n. I, 217, 254, 281 ; trial of II. 34.
Creswell, Father, S.J. II. 565 ; letter to 567—569 ; 577.
Croft, Sir James II. 121 — 123.
Crome, Dr. Edward II. 254.
Cromwell, Thomas, character I. xli. ; originates the schism and becomes Henry's Vicar General xxxiv. xliii. xliv. xlviii. 9, 191, 197, 340 ; persecutes Fisher and More 93, 94, 96. 217, 218, 221 ; and Forest 319; and Benedictine Abbots and monks 338 — 341, 340 and «., 343 and ««. I and 2, 35°. 35 !> 384; suggests Pole's assassination 516; injustice to B. Margaret Pole 528 ; created Earl of Essex 450 ; attainted xlviii. ; of heresy and treason 450 ; executed xlviii. 265, 450, 480 ; his Remembrances 297, 349, 351,
354, 383, 384, 475 »-, 532 «. i; letter from to Whiting 347, 348 ; letters to 38, 86 «. 2, 87, 89 «., 114, 115, 190, 194, 250 «.,255, 259 n. I, 260, 263 and w.,277, 278, 280, 297, 301, 304, 312,
313- 339, 340 «-, 34i «• 2, 342—345. 356 «. I, 368, 369, 37i, 374, 375. 382 and n. 2, 383 «•» 389, 398, 473, 474, 476, 477, 490, 5*4, 522—527, 539 « 5 9— 11, 80, 189, 255, 265, 273,
307, 364- Crowley, — , Protestant minister
II. 259 «., 264, 519. Cumnor II. 271. Cunsley, Durham II. 635. Cupham, Oxon. I. 420. Curwin, Dr. Richard I. 278.
Dacre, Leonard II. 55- Darbishire, Father Thomas, S.J.
II. 478.
Darlington II. 153, 174. Dartford I. 90. Daunce, Elizabeth, see More. Davy, B. John, Carthusian I. 259 ;
not tried 260 ; starved to death
260, 263, 264, n. I. Decim Rationes, by Campion,
printed at Stonor Park I. 414,
415, II. 334, 335. De Marillac, French Ambassador
I. 480 ; letters : to De Castillon 405 and n. ; to Francis I. 265 and «., 346, 480—483, 535, 536.
De la Quadra, Alvarez, Bishop of Aquila, Spanish Ambassador, letters to Philip II. II. 48 — 50, 126, 127 and «.
Devil's Advocate (Promoter of the Faith) I. xiii.
Dilati, why so called I. xv.
Dingley, Ven. Thomas, Knight of St. John I. 437 ; attainted 452, 528, 529 n. ; beheaded 453.
Divorce, Henry VIII. 's first I. xxiv. — xxxiv.
Doncaster I. 313, 464, 480 n. I,
II. 113. Dorchester I. 492.
Dormer, Jane, Duchess of Feria, sister of B. Sebastian Newdigate I. 43, II. 91.
Douay Seminary, foundation of II. 205 — 207 ; first ordinations 444,
664
INDEX
445 ; transferred to Rheims 250, 464, 539, 603.
Douay University II. 462.
" Double-hood " I. 352 n. 2, 353 n.
Dover II. 282, 316, 318, 502, 542.
Downton, Wilts. II. 39.
Dublin, Campion at II. 279 — 281.
Dunstable I. xxxvi.
Durham, during the Northern Rising II. 138, 139, 144—150; City mentioned 131, 152, 159 ter., 222 ; Castle 157 ; Churches : St. Giles 145 ; St. Margaret 145 ; St. Nicholas 145 and «., 158; St. Oswald 144, 145 ; Elvet Bridge 144 n. 2 ; Palace Green 144.
Durham Cathedral, St. Cuthbert's shrine in I. xliv. xlv. ; Catholic worship restored II. 138 et seq., 144 — 146, 155 > public absolu- tion of the people 147, 155.
Dymoke, Robert, of Scrivelsby, Champion, B. Richard Kirkman tutor to sons, indicted II. 579 — 581 ; dies in Lincoln Gaol 582, 583.
East Bergholt, Benedictine Abbey
II. 182.
East Grinstead II. 39 «. i. East Hendred House relics I. 1 1 1
n. 2, 122, 244.
Edgbaston I. 44.
Eliot, George ("Judas") spy II. 429 ; betrays Payne 430 ; and Godsalve 431 ; his accusations 432, 433 ; Yeoman of the Guard 436 n. 2, 437 ; takes Campion 337» 338 5 false witness of 347, 484 ; forgiven by Campion 350.
Elizabeth, Queen, her settlement of religion II. x. xi. ; excom- municated and deposed by St. Pius V. xv. — xvii. I ; kindness to Mrs. Felton 12 ; irreverence of 39 ; bribes the Scots 123 n. i, 128, 164, 170, 172 ; signs death-warrant at a dance 499.
Ellingham, Northumberland II.
no.
Elstow, Henry I. 278.
Eltham I. 545.
Ely, Dr. Humphrey, alias Howard II. 543 n. ; Cottam's companion 376 and «. i, 543 — 546, 562; 603, 604.
Emerson, Ralph, lay-brother S.J. II. 317, 318, 336, 365.
Empson, — , O. S. B. , martyr, wears his habit I. 265.
Englefield, Sir Francis II. 36, 91, 1 66.
Erasmus, Desiderius, friend of More and Fisher I. 133 ; testimony to Fisher's sanctity 52 > visits to More 133, 134; describes his life 131, 132, 143 — 145 ; writes Moria Encomium 134 ; letters from More's daughters 145, 146;
237.
Erdington Abbey, relic at II. 222.
Esh Hall, Durham II. 160.
Esher I. 543.
Essex (Henry Bourchier, fifteenth Earl of) tries Beche I. 397 — 399 ; friend of the Fortescue family 450 and n. I.
Evingham, Richard, Douay stu- dent II. 211.
Exeter, St. Peter's Church, Mayne monument in II. 208 n. I ; city
131-
Exeter (Henry Courtenay, first Marquess) I. 371 ; sent to Tower 518 ; arraigned 520; executed 521, 530; his son Edward in Tower 521, 530, 532 n. I. ; his widow attainted 452, 528, 529 ; attainder reversed 452 n. \ .
Exmew, B. William, Carthusian, I.
39 ; discussions with Bedyll 37, 38 ; his great humility 39, 40 ; in Marshalsea and Tower, trial
40 and n. ; indictment, martyr- dom at Tyburn, 41, 221.
Eyemouth II. 171.
Eynon, B. John, probably Bene- dictine, priest of St. Giles', Reading I. 371, 384; copies Aske's proclamation 369, 371 ; abused by "the Libeller" 378
INDEX
665
w. i. ; martyred 384, 386; last | words 387.
Faringdon (or Cook), B. Hugh, O.S.B., Life I. 358—387; sometime partizanof Henry VIII. . 359 ; qualified subscription to i Oath of Supremacy 338, 367 ; charged with reporting the King's death, pardoned 372 ; loyalty to the Pope 366 ; seized at Reading, sent to the Tower 382, 384 ; examined by Cromwell 350, 351, 384 ; tried at Reading with Eynon and Rugge 384 ; their loyalty to Pope and King 385 ; : all hanged before Abbey gates 386, 405 «., 406 — 408 ; Faring- don's last words 386.
Farm Street Church, London, relics II. 356, 357.
Fast Castle, near Dunbar II. 160, 162.
Feckenham, John, O.S.B., Abbot of Westminster, intercedes for heretics II. 34, 90 ; at Eliza- beth's crowning 39 ; speech of 41 ; in Tower 46 ; with Storey 83 ; in Wisbeach Castle 322.
Felton, B. John, Life II. 1—13 ; publishes Bull, 3, 4, 7, 8 and n. i, 10, 281 ; seized, thrice racked 5 ; order for torture 5,6; three months in prison 5 ; Newgate and Tower 6 and n. l ; condemned on religious grounds 6, 7 ; his faith in the Pope's supremacy 8, 9 ; martyrdom 8 — 1 1 ; tormented by heretical • preachers 8, 9 ; recites Peniten- \ tial Psalms 9 ; scaffold in St. Paul's Churchyard 8 n. I, 9, IO ; his momentary fear 10 ; sends Elizabeth a ring, last words 1 1 ; property confiscated, portrait 12 ; dies for prerogatives of the Pope xix. 13 ; indictment xix. n.
Felton, Mrs. II. 3, 5, 12.
Felton, Yen. Thomas, O.S.F., son of B. John Felton, martyred
II. 12.
Feria, Duke of II. 39.
Feron, — , priest, turns against Haile I. 18 — 20, 22, 25.
Fetherston (Featherstone, or Feder- ston), B. Richard, Life I. 496 — 501 ; probably at Cambridge 497 ; tutor to Princess Mary 471, 497, 510; one of Queen Catherine's counsel 67 n. i, 498; first attainder 494, 495 ; in the Tower 472 ; with Powell 499 ; prison charges 472 ; assisted by Wilson and Sampson 475 — 477 ; second attainder 477 — 479, 497, 500 ; condemned without trial 481 ; hanged 479, 480, 500.
Filby, B. William, Life II. 491— 499 ; birth, college 491 ; with Campion, arrested 492 ; dreams of martyrdom 492, 493 ; indict- ment, trial and sentence 447 n. 2, 493 ; cruelly treated 493 ; answers to the six articles 494 ; martyrdom 495 — 498 ; worried by ministers 495, 496 ; shaves tonsure and makes small wooden cross 495 ; professes Catholic Faith and loyalty to Elizabeth
496 ; denies Royal Supremacy
497 «. i ; last prayers, not cut down alive 498 ; buried under the gallows, relics 499, 560.
Fish, Simon I. 162, 163 and n. 2.
Fisher, Elizabeth, Dominican nun I. 90.
Fisher, B. John, Life I. 47 — 122 ; birth, parentage, school 47 ; university career 47 — 52 ; con- fessor to the Lady Margaret 48 and ». 2 ; advises her to found Christ's College, Cambridge 49 ; Bishop of Rochester 50, 52, 53. 60, 6 1 ; sanctity and virtues 52, 54 — 61 ; writes to Henry against divorce 66 and n. ; counsel to Queen Catherine 67 and n. i, 486, 487 ; at Legatine Court, speaks and writes against the divorce xxxiii. 67, 68, and «., 487 ; opposes schismatical novel- ties 69 ; summoned by the King
666
INDEX
70, 72 ; appeals to Rome, arrested 75 n. ; address to Con- vocation 73 ; qualified accept- ance of King's supremacy xxxiv. j 74 ; life twice attempted 76, 77 : ! second arrest 79 ; appeals to j Charles V. against the King 80; matter of "Holy Maid of Kent" 80 — 82; attainted, penalty commuted 82, 83 and ;/. ; last Easter at Rochester 83 ; bequest to Cambridge, last journey to London 84, 85 ; before Commission at Lambeth 85, 200 ; refuses Oath of Succes- sion 86 and «. 2, 205, 440 ; in Tower 87 — 109, 206, 440 ; hard- ships 88, 89 ; illness, writings, succoured by Bonvisi 90; receives Bishops 92; treachery of enemies 93» 94> 99 n- '•> finally refuses Oath of Supremacy 94, 99 «. ; writes to More, letter intercepted 94, 219; examinations 95, 97; created Cardinal 95 ; indictment discussed 98 and n. 2 ; trial 97, loo — 105 ; without degradation 99; sentence 98 n. 2, 102 ; com- mutation of 107 ; Via dolorosa no, in; martyrdom ill — 114; refuses conditional pardon 112 n. 2, 117; last words to the people 113, 114 «. I ; last prayers 114; first burial 115, 119; the story about Anne Boleyn 115; head set on London ] Bridge, miraculously incorrupt, i thrown into river 116; body buried with More's in the Tower 119, 120, 239; relics and portraits 122; writings 121;
II- 55-
Fisher, Robert I. 59, 89.
Fleetwood, Edmund II. 527.
Fleetwood, William II. 238, 239, 254, 262.
Ford, B. Thomas, Life II. 443 — 459 ; college 209, 443, 444 and 11. I ; warns Mayne 209, 443 ; ' at Douay 209, 444, 445 ; chaplain | at Lyford 336, 445 ; taken with ,
Campion 338, 446 ; in Tower, perhaps in Marshalsea 446 and n. 2 ; thrice examined under torture 433, 447 ; tried and sentenced 447 and «. 2 ; no evidence 447 ; questioned 450 — 453 ; execution predetermined 453 ; a month in irons 454 ; condemned with Shert and John- son 454, 467 ; absolved on way to Tyburn 454, 455 ; professes Catholic faith 455 ; rebuts charge of disloyalty 456, 457 ; prays in Latin, with Catholics, last words, not cut down alive 457 and ;/. ; appears after death, with his fellow-martyrs, to Yen. Stephen Rowsham 458 ; relics and portrait 458, 459.
Forest, B.John, O.S.F., Observant. Life I. 274 — 326; warden of Greenwich 275, 277 ; preaches at St. Paul's Cross 275, 276; Queen Catherine's confessor 276, 277 ; betrayed to Cromwell by Lyst 279; deposed 280, 281; in a London prison 281, 283 and ;/. 468 ; correspondence with Catherine, &c. 283—288, 468— 471 ; liberated 291 ; perhaps for taking Oath of Supremacy 291 — 293» 310 and ;/. 2 ; at Grey Friars' Convent, Smithfield 283, 290, 294 ; confesses Lord Mordaunt 294 ; writes in defence of Papal Authority 296 and «. ; second arrest 296 ; examination 297 — 301 ; tried for heresy 299, 301, 303, 308 ; articles of indictment 302, 303 ; discussed 303 — 308 ; trial 308 — 311 and «;/.; refuses to do penance at St. Paul's Cross 311; pronounced a relapsed heretic 312; in Newgate 312, 313; martyrdom 314 — 321 and nn.; in religious habit, preached at by Latimer 315; confutes him 316 — 318; brave confession of faith 316; hanged in chains over a fire 319, 320; statue of St. Derfel burnt with him xlv.
INDEX
667
320 ; verses set up on the gallows 305 ; last ejaculations 320 and n. 2 ; miracle 320 ; burial 321, 326; relics 326.
Forstell, Lewis I. 351.
Forster, Sir John II. 173, 174 «. 2, 176.
Fortescue, B. Adrian, Life I. 413 — 461 ; ancestry 413 ; birth and marriage 414; daughters 431, 432 ; French campaigns 416, 417, 429 — 431 ; death and burials of first wife 418 — 426 ; Dominican con/rater 423, 436 ; second marriage 433 ; children 434i 455 '•> a' Anne Boleyn's coronation 435 ; Knight of St. John 436, 437 ; summoned to London by Cromwell 439 ; arrested, examined at Woodstock 442 ; hears Mass at his inn
442, 443 ; in Marshalsea 443 ; expenses 443 — 446 ; his liberality 446, 447 ; released 448 ; loyalty to the Holy See 448, 449 ; second arrest, in Tower, sentenced 450; attainted without trial 379, 452, 528, 529 «. ; indictment 452, 453 ; beheaded on Tower Hill 453; his cnltiis Ixv. 413, 454, 455 n. 2 ; relics described 455 — 459 ; honours to his widow and children 459 ; descendants 460, 461 ; extracts from his household account books 419 — 426, 433 —
443. 446, 447-
Fortescue, Frances, B. Adrian's
second daughter, married to
Earl of Kildare I. 432. Fortescue, Sir Francis I. 460, 461. Fortescue, Sir John, B. Adrian's
elder brother I. 415 — 417, 426. Fortescue, Sir John I. 434, 460. Fortescue, Margaret I. 432, 459. Fox, Edward I. xxviii. xxxii. Fox, John, Carthusian I. 258 n.
259. Foxe, John, calumnies against More
I. 170; Bonner II. 24 — 26; and
Storey 24 — 26 and n. 36, 43 n.
47-
Frauncis, Dom John, O.S.B. I.
383, 389 and «. I. Frith, John I. 160, 164, 543, 544. Fulke, Dr, II. 93, 94. Fylalle, Jasper I. 255.
Gardiner, B. German I. 543 — 547 ; letter against Frith 543, 544 ; evidence against Cranmer 544 ; veneration for More 544, 545 ; indicted and tried 542, 545, 546; martyred at Tyburn 547 (date should be 1544, see Corrigenda}.
Gardiner, Stephen, Bishop of Winchester, Embassy to Rome I. xxviii. xxxii.; sent to Fisher in prison 92 ; 189.
Garret, or Gerard, Thomas I. 479, 480, 496.
Ghinucci, Girolamo, Bishop of Worcester, deprived I. xxxvi.
Gifford, Gilbert II. 372.
Gifford, William II. 372.
Giggs, Margaret, More's adopted daughter I. 145, 260, 261 ; dis- penses his alms 151 ; married to Dr. John Clement 145, 261 ; charity to the Carthusian martyrs in Newgate 151 n. 2, 261, 262; vision on her deathbed 262 ; 147, 227, 229, 232 n. 5, 240, 241 ; her son 261 ; her daughter Margaret 241 n. I ; 261, 262.
Gilbert, George, assists Father Persons II. 316 ; dies holding Briant's cross 419 ; I. xvi. II. 379.
Gilbert, Dr. William, O.S.B., Abbot of Bruton I. 333.
Giles, Peter I. 137.
Glastonbury Abbey I. 327 — 330, 353 5 g°od discipline in 339 ; Commissioners at 336, 338 — 345, 349 ; plunder of 351 — 354, 358; ballad on 358 n. I ; Whiting's head set over gate 357.
Glastonbury, Tor Hill. BB. Whiting, James, and Thorne, O.S.B. martyred on I. 356, 357; town I. 408, II. 600.
Gloucester II. 284.
,, Cathedral II. 292.
668
INDEX
Godsalve, George II. 426, 427 ; betrayed, tortured, and im- prisoned with Payne 427, 430 «. 466 ; exiled 427.
Godwin, Francis, Protestant Bishop of Hereford I. 339.
Golden, Cornwall II. 21 1, 214.
Goldwell, Thomas, Catholic Bishop of St. Asaph, attainted I. 452 and n, 3 ; in Rome II. I ; volun- teers return to England 364 ; stopped at Rheims by illness, death at Rome 371 and «.; 318.
Good, Father William, SJ. I. 408 and n. 3 ; II. 600, 626.
Goodrich, Thomas, Bishop of Ely, arrests and examines B. Margaret Pole I. 521, 524.
Graunger, Agnes, B. Thomas More's mother I. 124.
Gravelines I. 427.
Great Marlow I. 376, 377 «., 424.
Green (vere Greenwood), B.Thomas, Carthusian, degrees I. 267 ; refuses Oath 259 ; no trial 260 ; sufferings and death in Newgate 260—263, 264 n. I, 268.
Greenwich Observant Monastery, Church of I. 278 ; Princesses Mary and Elizabeth baptized in 281, 509.
Greenwich Palace I. 276, 418, 435. 447 5 II- 430 and n.
Greenwood, B. William, Carthu- sian, refuses Oath of Supremacy I. 259 ; sufferings and death in Newgate 260 — 263, 264 ?/. i.
Gregory XIII. Pope, sanctions cultus of English martyrs I. xvi. xvii. lix. II. 12; founds English College, Rome 360, 462 ; liberality to Douay 438 n. 3 ; and to English priests 477, 482, 567, 607.
Grenville (Greenfield), Sir Richard, High Sheriff of Cornwall, arrests Mayne, brutality of II. 212, 213 ; rewarded by knighthood 212 «., 214; intimidates Mayne's jury 216.
Grey Friars' Convent, Newgate
Street (Smithfield) I. 283, 290, 294. Grey Friars, Reading, suppressed
I. 374 ; friars sent away in secular dress 375 ; in Tower, examined 384.
Grocers' Company II. 268, 279. Grocyn, William I. 126. Gueras (or Garcias), Don Antonio de, Agent for Spain in England
II. 6 n. 3 ; letters from 2 ;/. 2. 8 n. 2, 60, 61.
Gunnell, Mr. letter to More I. 148.
Habberton (or Habberdyne), priest I. 488.
Haddon, Oxon. II. 431.
Haile, B.John, Life I. 17 — 26; Vicar of Isleworth 12, 17 ; previously Vicar of Chelmsford, Fellow of King's Hall, Cambridge, goods in college sequestrated 17 and «. i ; complaint of the King's wickedness 18 ; arrest 19 ; cause of death discussed 19 — 22 and «. ; his words against the King quoted 20 «. ; letter to the Council 23 n. I ; tried and executed in clerical dress 22 ; martyrdom 25, 26 ; first priest martyred under Henry VIII. 17 ; suffers with Reynolds and Carthusian priors 12 ; beatifi- cation xix.
Hailes, Holy Blood of, relic de- stroyed I. xlv. 307.
Hair-shirt, always worn by Car- thusians I. 2 ; worn by Fisher 58, 109 ; by More 128, 155, 214, 228, this now at Abbotsleigh, one sleeve at Stone Convent 241 n, I.
Hailing I. 54, 77.
Hammon, Elizabeth I. 283 ; corres- pondence with Forest 287, 288.
Hammond, Dr. John, inquisitor of Catholic prisoners II. 404 and n., 405, 407, 450, 453, 456, 465, 481 ; rage at Briant's constancy 406 ; present at Cottam's rack- ing 550.
INDEX
Hanse, B. Everard, Life II. 249 — 265 ; at Cambridge, takes Angli- can Orders, popular preacher, illness 250 ; instructed and reconciled by his brother, goes to Rheims 251 ; ordained 252, 263 ; comes to England 252 ; alias 253, 262 ; labours three months 254 ; taken in the Mar- shalsea 249, 254 ; before magis- trate 250 ; in Newgate 250, 254 ; harassed by Crowley 259 «., 264; rejects Royal Supremacy, beaten, hung up by the feet, tried at Old Bailey 254; examination 255, 256 ; declares Papal Infalli- bility 255, 263 ; snared 256 ; indicted 256, 257, 262 — 264 ; sentenced 257 ; Stow's account of trial 257, 258 and «. ; letter to his brother 258, 259 ; martyr- dom 258 — 261 ; prays with Catholics 260, 265 ; last words 260 ; his blood collected, relics 261 ; hostile pamphlet 261, 262.
Hanse, William, convert and priest II. 250 ; converts his brother Everard 257 ; 258, 259, 578, 635.
Harpsfield, Nicholas, retires to Louvain II. 22 ; in Fleet prison
47-.
Harrington, Ven. William, in- fluenced by Campion II. 332 and n.
Harris, John I. 145.
Harrow (Visitation Convent), relics at I. 411 ; II. 222.
Hart, John, S.J. priest, at English College, Rome II. 371 ; on English Mission 376 ; in Marshalsea and Tower 383, 406, 483, 515; writes the Diary in the Tower 406 ; received into S.J. in prison 555 n. I ; indicted, tried and sentenced 447 n. 2 ; reprieved 454 «. 2 ; banishment and death 555 «. i.
Hart, B. William, Life II. 600— 634 ; priest, birthplace, college, degrees 600 and «. ; at Douay and Rheims 601, 603 ; ill-health,
patience 602 — 604 ; operation and cure 604, 605 ; at Rome, ordination, eloquent preacher 606, 608 ; work in Yorkshire 609; charity to Catholic prisoners 569, 609, 6 10 ; at Thomas Bell's Mass in York Castle, escapes 57°> 571* 610; betrayed and taken 610, 611 ; examined by Lord Huntingdon, sent to York Castle 611 ; starved, ill-used, and doubly ironed 6 1 1, 612; dragged in chains before Dean Hutton, letter to him 612 — 614; and to Catholic friends 615, 616 ; arraigned 616 ; appeal 616, 617 ; condemned under statute of Henry VIII. 618 ; sentenced, austerities 619 ; farewell letters 620 — 627,633 ; prayer composed by him 627, 628 ; martyrdom 628 — 631 ; drawn to Knaves- mire with thieves 628 ; insulted by ministers, his meek answers 629—631 ; asks prayers of Catholics, professes loyalty, crowd prevent his being cut down alive 631 ; and secure relics 631, 632 ; head set on Ousebridge Kidcote, removed by Mary Hutton 646.
Hart, William, S.J. II. 605 «. 2, 606.
Hartlepool II. 154.
Hartley, Ven. WTilliam II. 502.
Hauton, Yorks. II. 561.
Hawick II. 163.
Haywood, Caspar, S.J. II. 567.
Henley-on-Thames I. 419, 420, 424, 425, II. 339, 492.
Henry I. I. 359.
Henry VIII., early theological training and devotion I. xxii. xxiv. ; his book against Luther xxiv. 486 ; marries Catherine of Arragon xxix. 64 ; passion for Anne Boleyn xxx. 177, 178 n. 3 ; his obstinate character xxii. xxvii. ; his divorce xxiv. — xxxiv. 65 — 69, 176, 276; " Supreme Head of the Church "
6yo
INDEX
72, 73, 78, 545, 546 bis; marries Anne Boleyn xxxv. 511 ; thrice excommunicated xxxvi. xlvi. : his cruelty to Princess Mary 498, 511, 512; suppresses English Observants 282 bis, 290 ; tries to coerce Carthusians 39, 43 ; rage against Fisher 96, 97 ; slanders More 98 n. 2, 239 ; persecutes his family 237 ; marries jane Seymour 448 ; perfidy to leaders of Pilgrimage of Grace 369 ; savage cruelty and tyranny xlviii. 372, 519, 531 and n. i ; destroys St. Thomas of Canter- bury's shrine and relics xlv. ; last days xlviii. ; death, his will set aside xlix.
Heron, Ven. Giles, ward of B. Thomas More, marries his daughter Cecily I. 145 ; (not Elizabeth, see Corrigenda) ; martyred 186 n. 3, 483.
Heywood, John, layman, indicted of high treason with BB. Larke and Gardiner and Ven. John Ireland I. 545 ; recants on the hurdle, pardoned 547.
Hindon, Wilts. II. 17.
Hodgson, Christopher II. 525, 526 and nn. , 527.
Holmes, William, priest in Durham (Nov. 1569) nicknamed the "Pope's Patriarch" II. 143; absolves conformed clergy 144,
148 ; reconciles five minor canons
149 ; sermon, public absolution, and High Mass in Durham Cathedral 146 n. 147, 155 ; escapes to Scotland 159 ; and to Louvain 160; letter to George Smythe 160, 161.
Holmside, Durham II. 114.
Holt, Nicholas, More's school- master I. 125.
Holt, William, SJ. II. 567.
Holtby, Richard, SJ. II. 400— 402.
Holy Maid of Kent, see Barton, Elizabeth.
Holyman, Dom John, O.S.B.,
monk of Reading and Fellow of New College, Oxford I. 363 ; preaches in St. Paul's against Luther 363, 364.
Home, Lord, receiver of priests, Mass in his house II. 160; shelters Countessof Northumber- land 162.
Homington, Wilts. I. 491.
Hopton, Sir Owen, Lieutenant of the Tower, prison accounts II. 65 ; judge and torturer of martyrs 262, 339, 404, 405 and n. , 436 ; his daughter converted after Campion's death 353 ; his wife's theft 436; 83, 386, 433, 484, 508, 511, 516, 517, 550.
Horn, — , Protestant Bishop of Winchester, letter to Bullinger II. 6l, 62 ; 127.
Home, B. William, Carthusian, I. 260, 313 ; refuses Oath 259 ; in Newgate 260 ; nearly starved to death 260, 264 ; three years imprisonment and sufferings 264 ; persists in wearing habit 265, 483 ; attainted and condemned 264 ; terms of attainder 477 — 479 ; hanged at Tyburn 264 and
»• 3, 313, 483-
Houghton, B. John, Carthusian, Life I. i — 16 ; proto-martyr of the persecution, birth, at Cam- bridge, priest i ; twenty years in London Charterhouse 2 ; various offices and virtues 3 — 5 ; person described 4 ». ; first imprison- ment in Tower 6 ; warning dream, prepares his monks 7 ; miracle at his Mass 8 ; again in Tower 9 ; finally refuses Oath, trial, pleads not guilty, (see Corrigenda), jury intimidated ii; sentence 12; martyrdom 12 — 14 ; refuses conditional pardon, speech to the people 13 ; last words 14; quarter set over Charterhouse gateway 37 and n. ; his monks' veneration for him 251.
Hull Blockhouses and Castle II.
INDEX
671
591 «., town 112 ; Charterhouse
1-255-
Hunsdon (Henry Carey, first Baron) questions Storey as to his allegiance II. 92 ; letters about Percy 159, 160, 164, 166, 167, 170, 171 ; Tregian's estate granted to him 220, 221 ; witness to Campion's fortitude 345.
Huntingdon (Henry Hastings, Earl of) President of Council of the North II. 564, 610, 6n, 632.
Husbands Bosworth, relics at I.
448, 449. 457—459- Hutton, Dr., Protestant Dean of
York, controversy with B.
William Hart II. 612, 614, 615 ;
examines Thirkeld 639, 640, 650,
651 ; 620. Hutton, William and Mary, York
recusants, their sufferings II.
639, 646.
Ilchester I. 357 and n. I. Infallibility of the Pope, enunciated
by More I. 164 «. I ; and by
Hanse II. 255, 263. Ingatestone Hall, Essex, property
of Petre family, chief home of
B. John Payne II. 425, 426 ;
and of B. Robert Johnson 479 ;
hiding-place described 425. Ingleby, Ven. Francis, martyr II.
633-
Ingworth, King's Visitor I. 273.
Ireland, Ven. John, priest of Eltham I. 545 ; tried and mar- tyred 542, 543, 545, 547.
Isleworth, B. John Haile, Vicar of I. 12, 17 ; Bridgettine monas- tery at 27.
James, Ven. Edward, martyr II. 491.
James, B. Roger, O.S.B. of Glas- tonbury I. 357 ; arrested 352 ; martyrdom 357-
Jenks, Roland, Catholic book- seller II. 399.
Jenny, Sir Christopher I. 398. Jerome, William, apostate, burnt
I. 479, 480, 496.
Jervaulx, Abbot of (Adam de Sed- bergh), hanged at Tyburn II.
"3-
Jewkes, Simon II. 56, 58. John XXI. Pope II. 279. Johnson, Helen II. 523. Johnson, B. Robert, priest, Life
II. 474 — 490 ; birth, enters German College, Rome 474 and n. ; at Douay 360, 475 ; ordained, makes the Exercises, three years in England, pilgrimage to Rome 475 ; Exercises 476, 477 ; at Ingatestone Hall, betrayed by Sledd 478, 479 ; taken 480 ; sent to the Counter in the Poultry, examination 481, 482 ; racked, in "the pit" 482; im- prisoned for eleven months before trial 482, 485 ; indicted with Campion and others 345, 484 ; sentenced, not then executed 484; questioned 450 — 452,485; his answer 485, 486 ; martyr- dom 454, 486 — 490 ; protests his faith and innocence of trea- son 487 ; harassed by ministers and others 487 — 490 ; refuses to pray in English, last prayers 490 ; relics 422, 459, 473, 490.
Johnson, B. Thomas, Carthusian I. 259 ; never tried 260 ; suffer- ings and death in Newgate 260 —264 and tin. I, 2.
Julius II. Pope, his Bull of dis- pensation for Henry VIII.'s first marriage I. xxxi. xxxiii. 178 n. I,
463 ; 5°. 53-
Kildare (Thomas Fitzgerald, Earl of) I. 482.
Kimbolton I. 287 n.
Kingston, Sir William I. 418.
Kirby, B. Luke, priest, Life II. 500 — 522 ; probable birthplace 500 and ;/.; reconciled at Lou- vain, at Douay, ordained 501 ; at English College, Rome 473,
672
INDEX
500, 501 ; kindness to needy Englishmen 501, 519; goes to England with Campion and Sherwin 311, 365, 502; seized on landing at Dover 502 ; in the Gatehouse and the Tower 385, 482, 503, 504 ; exami- nations 503 — 506 ; tortured by the "Scavenger's Daughter"
507 and tin. ; dragged to sermons 508 ; arraigned and tried 345,
508 ; in irons for a month 510 ; answers the " six articles " of the Council 510, 511 ; letter to friends 512 — 515; road to Tyburn 495 ; martyrdom 517 — 522 ; protests his innocence of treason 517 ; altercation with Munday 518, 519; refuses to pray with heretics, or in English 521 ; not cut down alive 522 ; head cut off 533 ; body buried under scaffold 499, 560 ; relics 522.
Kirkman, B. Richard, priest, Life II. 578 — 588 ; birthplace, educa- tion and order 578, 635 ; lives at Scrivelsby Court 579 — 581 ; escapes to the North 583 ; taken near Wakefield 583 — 585 ; tried at York Assizes, sent to the Castle, examined and sentenced 586 ; recites Te Denm, in cell with Lacey, again examined, in dungeon till martyrdom 587 ; suffers with Lacey 576, 587, 588 ; last words 588 ; his brother John imprisoned in York Castle and Ousebridge Kidcote 588 «.
Knights of St. John, suppressed I. 437 and n. I.
Knight, William I. xxxi.
Knox, John II. 123, 124.
Lacey, B. William, priest, Life II. 564 — 577 ; birth 564 ; recusancy, fined 565 ; wanderings, wife's death 566 ; goes to Rheims and to Rome, ordained 567 ; letter Uo Creswell 567 — 569; visits Catholic prisoners in York Castle
569, 570 ; at Bell's Mass 570 ; captured 571 ; examined 571, 574 ; sent to the Castle, heavily ironed, examined by Sandys 572> 573 » m underground hole at York Castle, examined and tried 573 — 575 ; martyrdom 576, 587-
Lady-Mass I. 294, 295.
Lambeth Palace, see London.
Lanchester, Durham II. 148.
Lanherne Convent, relics at II. 220, 221.
Larke, B.John I. 541 — 543; priest, Rector of Chelsea 541 ; affection for More, tried with Gardiner and Ireland, indictment 542, 545, 546 ; all condemned and hanged at Tyburn 543, 547 (date should be 1544, see Corrigenda}.
Lasborow I. 439.
Latimer,Hugh,Bishopof Worcester, heretical sermons at Bristol I. 488 ; letter to Cromwell about Forest 312 — 314; preaches at his martyrdom 315; 309, 310 n. 2, 311, 365.
Latimer, William, schoolfellow of More and Colet I. 124.
Launceston, Mayne imprisoned, tried and executed at II. 213, 214, 219 — 222.
Laurence, John, O.S.F. enemy of Forest I. 277, 278, 280, 281 ;/. 2 ; preaches in favour of the King's divorce 278 ; leaves the Order 278, 281 n. 2.
Lawrence, B. Robert I. 9 — 16 ; Carthusian, Prior of Beauvale, in Tower 9 ; martyred 14.
Layton, Dr. Richard, monastic Visitor, at Glastonbury I. 340, 341, 349, 351, 3"52, 383 5 arrests Whiting 349 ; apology to Crom- well for praise of Whiting 341 n, 2, 383 «. i ; dissolves Clerken- well Nunnery, spoils Reading Abbey 382.
Lee, John, Cecil's spy II. 54, 100, 170; conspires against Storey 56, 57 ; imprisoned by Alva,
INDEX
released at Cecil's request 99, 100.
Lee, Roland, Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry, marries Henry to Anne Boleyn I. 368 ; commis- sioned to dissolve Abbeys of Colchester and St. Osyth 391.
Lee, William, informer, foreman of Campion's jury II. 346.
Legh, Dr. Thomas, King's Visitor to Glastonbury, letter to Crom- well I. 340 n.
Leicester (Robert Dudley, Earl of), plots against Storey II. 53 ; probably at his martyrdom 93 ; patron of Campion 272, 273 ; Campion's History of Ireland dedicated to him 273 ; 65, 70, 75, 76, 274.
Leo XIII., Pope, beatifies fifty-four English martyrs (1886) I. xvii. Ixiv. ; and nine others (1895) xvi. ; signs introduction of cause of two hundred and sixty-one others xvii.
Leominster I. 368.
Lewes I. 372.
Libeller of the three Abbots com- pared with Latimer I. 365 ; quoted 338, 367 bis, 368, 372, 373, 377, 378 n. i, 385 — 387 n. I, 400, 405.
Lily, William I. 127, 129.
Linacre, Thomas I. 126.
Lincoln Cathedral I. 487 and «. 3.
Lincoln City, Plumtree, master of school in II. 153.
Lincoln Gaol, Robert Dymoke dies in II. 583.
Little Malvern I. 266.
Liverpool II. 115.
Llanderfel I. 304, 307 n.
Lochleven Castle II. 165, 171, 182 — 184.
Lollard's Tower of St. Paul's Cathedral, prison for heretics II. 62 and n. 2, 63 ; Storey imprisoned in 63.
London, Dr. John, monastic Visitor, suppresses shrine of Our Lady of Caversham, sends her RR
image to Cromwell I. 373, 374 ;
suppresses religious houses 374,
539 n. ; letters to Cromwell 374,
and n. 2, 375, 376 and «. London, Dom Nicholas, O.S.B.,
Prior of Glastonbury, takes Oath
of Supremacy I. 336. London, Dom Roger, O.S.B. ,
Monk of Reading I. 364, 365 ;
in the Tower 364 n. 2, 384. London — in Volume I.
A. Places in, Beaufort Row, Chelsea, site of More's house 144 ; Blackfriars 438, 444, 451 ; Black Friars' Church and convent 423, 444, 445 n. I ; Great Hall of xxxiii. 67, 183 ; British Museum xx. 12 n. i, 295 n. 1,411,500; Bucklers- bury 1 32 ; Charterhouse, More retires to 127 ; Royal Com- missaries at 6 ; Mass of the Holy Ghost in 8 ; one of Houghton's quarters set over gateway 37 and n. • Com- missaries harass monks in 250 — 254; house surrendered 266; Chelsea 137, 140, 144, 152, 180, 192, 307; Clerken- well 382; Crosby Place 137; Furnival's Inn 126; Grey Friars' Church and convent, Newgate Street, Smithfield, 283, 290, 293, 314 ; Hampton Court 178; Lambeth Palace and Chapel 53, 84, 85, 197, 308 ; " La Place," on Lambeth Marsh (Bishop of Rochester's Palace) 54, 77, 85 ; Lincoln's Inn 126, 137; London Bridge 116, 239, 241, 536; Milk Street, Cheapside 124; Olde- borne (Holborn) 444 n. I ; Old Swan Inn 226 ; St. Anthony's School, Thread- needle Street 124 ; St. Bartholomew's Hospital 326 ; St. Paul's Churchyard 265, 423 ; St. Paul's Cross 190,
275. 276, 3°7, 3", 440; Southwark 443 ; Stepney 41,
II.
674
INDEX
46 bis ; Wandsworth 453 ; Westminster Hall II, 41, 97, 106, 182, 185, 221, 227 «. 2, 545 ; Westminster Palace 459 ; W7est Smithfield 2 ; York Palace (near Westminster)
185-
B. Churches, All Hallows, Barking 115, 119; Chelsea Parish Church 120, 150, 152 and «. 2, 176, 186, 243, 541 ; St. Bartholomew's, Smithfield 314 ; St. Ethelburga's, Bishops- gate 541 ; St. Laurence Jewry 127 ; St. Margaret Patens 306; St. Paul's Cathedral (Old) 255, 361, 364 ; St. Saviour's, South- wark 307 ; Savoy Chapel 422 ; Westminster Abbey xxxvi. ; Chapter House 71 ; Sanctuary
5°4-
C. Prisons, Counter 355 and ». 1 , 407 ; King's Bench 446, 475 n. I ; Marshalsea 40, 43, 443, 446, 475, 496 ; Newgate 151 n. I, 260, 287, 312, 313, 315, 475 n. i, 495 ; the Tower 6, 7, 9, u, 15, 19, 30, 32,40, 43, 86, 87, 97, 98, 104, 131, 136, 155, 157, 200, 206, 214,
215, 217, 220, 225, 232, 350,
353, 364 «• 2, 382, 384, 393, 432, 450, 459, 464, 465, 472,
475, 494, 495, 499, 5°3— 506, 518, 521, 530, 531 n" *> 535, 544 '•> Beauchamp Tower 207, 465, 467, 469 n. I ; Bell Tower 88, 89, 108 ; White Tower 89, 494, 499 ; Church of St. Peter ad Vincula 120, 239, 539; Tower Gate 104, no, 207 ; Tower Wharf 226.
D. Places of Execution, East Smithfield Green, 533; St. Thomas Waterings 453 ; Smithfield xlv. 314, 479, 496 ; Tower Hill 88, 106, 107, in, I23> 453, 5°6 5 Tyburn 12, 19, 25, 34, 4i, 93, 1 86 ». i, 264, 3'3, 453, 543, 547-
London — in Volume II.
A. Places in, Aldgate 266 ; Bermondsey Abbey 3 ; Bishop of London's Palace, near Old St. Paul's 2, 4 ; British Museum 97 «. 191 n. i, 261 ; Chancery Lane 236; Christchurch (Blue- coat) School 269 ; Crosby Place 108 «. ; Guildhall 8, 196, 386 ; Holborn 465 ; Hoxton (or Hogsdon) 319, 380 ; Inner Temple Library 102 n. I ; Lawrence Lane 465 ; Lincoln's Inn 2 ; London Stone 81 ; Old Bailey 254, 257 ; St. Paul's Cross 279 ; Smithfield 479 ; Southwark 479 ; Star Inn, New Fish Street 546 ; Tothill Street 334 ; Westmin- ster 334 ; Westminster Hall 77, 113, 282, 345, 389, 418, 531 ; Court of Queen's Bench in 245 ; \Vhitefriars 334 ; Whitehall 117.
B. Churches, St. Paul's Cathe- dral 552 ; Westminster Abbey
39- .
C. Prisons, Bridewell 402 ;/. 2 ; the Counter (three prisons of the name) 402 and ;/. 3 ; Counter, in the Poultry 481 ; Counter, in Wood Street 402, 404; the Fleet 46, 47, 52, 188, 189, 195, 221 ; Gate- house, Westminster 239, 482, 503 ; Lollard's Tower (of St. Paul's Cathedral) 62 and «. 2 ; Marshalsea 47, 249, 319, 381, 383, 386, 446 n. 2, 482, 493 and n. 2, 521 n. ; Newgate 6 n. I, 197, 198, 226, 250, 254, 263, 264, 351, 455, 530; Limbo in Newgate 229 ; the Tower 6, 19, 20, 46, 65, 75, 79, 80, 82, 85, 113, 180 n. i, 197, 239, 242, 247, 267, 350, 384 — 386, 403, 404 and ;/. I, 419 and n. i, 430, 431, 433, 446, 447, 454, 458, 466, 468, 482, 483, 493, 495, 503, 511, 521;;., 531, 550; Beauchamp
INDEX
675
Tower 81 ; Little Ease 339 ; the Pit 408, 482 ; Walesboure 409 and n.i, 483; Council Chamber 341 ; Church of St. Peter ad Vincula 417, 562. D. Places of Execution, St. Paul's Churchyard 9 ; Tyburn So, 85, 95, 98, 113, 231, 234, 247, 258, 332 ». i, 334, 351, 454, 455, 468, 495.516, 531. Long Newton, Durham II. 148. Loreto II. 567 and n., 568. Louvain, English Catholic exiles at II. 51, 54, 82, 100, io6n., 108 «., 160, 168, 364, 475, 501. Augustinian Abbey, founded by Margaret Clement (fills), I. 241 n. I, II. 52.
Carthusians and Franciscans, B. John Storey's affection for II. 23, 52, 104, it»5 ; honoured by them as a martyr, his relics and pictures over their altars 98.
Louvain University, visited by More I. 134; Sander a member of II. 22 n. 2 ; and Storey 22 n. 2, 88 ; reverence for Storey's memory 98 ; sends address to Oxford in 1902, 22 n. 2. Loyalty to Elizabeth, protested by the Martyrs II. 260, 343, 348, 352> 395. 434, 457 and «., 470, 471, 486, 488, 496, 519, 533, 559, 596, 629.
Lucas, John I. 398 and n. i. Ludlow I. 498, 507, 509. Luther, Martin I. xxiv. Lyford Grange (the Mote), Berks, Mrs. Yate's house, B. Thomas Ford, chaplain II. 336, 445 ; Campion at 336, 338, 446. Lyons II. 540.
Lyst, Richard, O.S.F., traitor I. 277 — 281 and n. i (see Laurence, John).
Madrid I, 454 to. Malta I. Ixv. 413, 454, 455 n. 2. Manchester (Collegiate Church) II. 364-
Manners, Grace I. 461.
Markenfield family II. 133, 137, n. 2, 139.
Marshall, B. Thomas (j« Beche, John).
Marshall, William I. 254, 255.
Marshe, Mr., Commissioner II. 87.
Martin, George, son of Lady Tregonwell, traitor, denounces Sherwood II. 236 — 238.
Martin, Dr. Gregory, at St. John's, Oxford, with Campion and Mayne II. 208, 279 ; tutor to Ven. Philip Howard, convert 279 ; at Douay 205, 209, 444 ; letter to Campion 279, 282 ; helps to organize English College, Rome 305, 462 ; letter from Campion 305 — 307 ; 464, 615-
Martin, Richard, Sheriff of London and inquisitor II. 455 — 457, 465, 469 — 472, 487 — 490, 498, 520,
531, 558.
Martinengo, Girolamo II. 187 and n. I.
Mary, Queen of Scots II. 121, 123, 128, 129.
Mary I., Queen, birth, baptism and confirmation I. 509 ; Court at Ludlow 498, 509 and n. 4 ; her learning and high character 497) 5IQ n- J j her father's cruelty 511 — 513. Her counter- reformation II. x. ; State entry into London, Campion's oration at II. 266, 267 ; esteem for B. Thomas Percy 116, 117.
Maydwell, John, apostate friar I.
254.
Mayne, B. Cuthbert, Life II. 207 — 222 ; priest, proto-martyr of Douay, birth, baptismal register 207 and n. 4, 221 ; at Barnstaple Grammar School, Protestant minister at nineteen 208 ; at Oxford 208, 209 and nn. ; escapes arrest, goes to Douay 209, 445 ; ordained 210 ; lives with Francis Tregian 210 — 212 ; seized, examined, sent to
676
INDEX
Launceston Gaol 213 ; sufferings 213, 214 ; indictment and defence 214—216 ; jury intimidated, sentence, five months longer in prison 217 ; last days 217, 218; martyrdom 218 — 220; brutality of Justices 219 and n. I ; speech to the people, last words 219; quarters distributed, head at Wadebridge, rescued 220 ; portrait and relics, family arms 221, 222, examination (see Addenda}.
Mechlin II. 235.
Melksham (Milksame), Wilts. I. 492.
Melton, William de I. 47, 48;
Mercurian, Everard, General of S.J., letters to from Campion II. 316, 324 — 327 ; 561.
Mershe, John, spy II. 54, 56, 57, 65 ; bill of charges 65 — 69 ; 58, 70, 72—74-
Metham, Sir Thomas, recusant, many years prisoner in York Castle II. 175 «., 176; 233.
Middlemore, B. Humphrey, Life I. 37 — 46; family 44, 45 and «. 2 ; procurator and subprior of London Charterhouse 39 ; with Houghton in Tower 6, 39 ; disputation with Bedyll 37 ; tried, imprisoned, and martyred with Newdigate and Exmew 40 and «., 41, 221.
Middleton, Alice, More's second wife I. 137, 146; visits him in Tower, urges him to yield 212 — 214; twice petitions for his release 215 ; sells her clothes to help him 215, 216 ; her daughter Alice 145.
Milan II. 313, 365.
Milton Abbas, Dorset. II. 237 it. 2.
Monasteries, visitation of, calum- nies against I. xliii.; true reasons of suppression xliii. 393, 394 ; smaller suppressed (1536) xliii. 346, 34$; greater (1538) xliv. 348, 451 ; dissolution completed (I539)xlvi.
Monkwearmouth II. 148.
Montague (Henry Pole, Baron) B. Margaret Pole's eldest son I. 513 ; sent to the Tower on charge of treason 518 ; arraigned 520, 528 ; executed 520 n. 2 ; 516, 519 n.
Montague (Anthony Browne, First Viscount) II. 117, 127.
Moore, William, a blind harper, messenger between the Abbeys !• 376, 377, 383 n. i ; in Tower 384; abused by "the Libeller"
377, 378.
Mordaunt, Lord, confession to Forest I. 294 ; alms to friars 294, 297 ; his deposition 293 —
295-
More, Cecily, I. 132, 145, 228 (see Addenda).
More, Cresacre, B.Thomas's great- grandson, his Life of More quoted I. 128 — 131, 150 n. I, 151,219, 542, 545 ; 229 n. 4.
More, Elizabeth (Daunce) I. 132, 145, 228, 229.
More, Sir John, B. Thomas's father I. 124; in Tower, fined 136; lives with his son at Chelsea 144 ; judge of the King's Bench 185.
More, John, the martyr's son, birth I. 132 ; imprisoned 229 n. 3 ; his children 229 n. 4 ; 145, 147, 229.
More, Margaret (see Roper, Margaret.)
More, B. Thomas, Life I. 123 — 248 ; birth, parentage, school 124; page to Cardinal Morton, life at Oxford 125 n. i ; study of law and the Fathers 1 26 ; lectures in St. Laurence Jewry, friendships with Lily and Colet 127 ; uncertainty as to vocation 127, 129; austerities 128, 129; Con/rater O.S.B. 332 ;/. ; devo- tion to Holy Mass 130, 152, 153; religious exercises 130; marries Joan Colte 131 ; their life described by Erasmus 131, 132 ; children 132, 144, 145 ;
INDEX
677
his wife's death, second marriage I 132, 137 ; home in Bucklersbury 132 ; visits Trom Erasmus 133, 134; incurs the displeasure of Henry VII. 136; bencher and reader of Lincoln's Inn, Under- Sheriff, moves to Crosby Place, embassy to Flanders 137 ; re- presses "Evil May-day" riot 139 ; knighted, Privy Councillor, Henry VIII. 's love for him 140 ; honours 141, 143, 159; foreign embassies 141, 143, 176 ; Court life 143, 144 ; home life at Chelsea 144 — 151 ; household and private devotions 150 and «.,I5I, 153; charity to the poor 151, 152; turns W. Roper from heresy 153, 154; Bouge's witness to More's sanctity 155 ; his conduct towards heretics dis- cussed 167—173 ; visits Fisher at Rochester, signs treaty of Cambray 176; Lord Chancellor 181, 182; his filial piety 185; diligence and integrity 185, 186 ; horror of Royal Supremacy 75 11. ; opposes schismatical bills 185 ; resigns office xxxv. 185 — 187; poverty 187, 188 ; tried formisprision of treason 191, 192 ; his views on Papal Supremacy 194 — 196 and itn. • before Com- mission at Lambeth 197 — 205 ; refuses Oath of Succession 199, 201, 206; sent to Tower 206, 207, 440 ; visited by his wife 212 — 214; and daughter Mar- garet 15, 208, 219 11. • sickness and privations, austerities 214 ; attainted of misprision of treason 215 ; examined 94, 217, 218 and 11. I, 220, 221 ; books taken away 219, 220; indicted of high treason 221 ; his defence 222 — 225 ; sentence 223 ; com- muted to beheading 230; last meeting with Margaret 226 ; last morning 230 — 232 ; martyr- dom 232 — 235 ; protests his faith and loyalty, last prayers
234 ; head on London Bridge 1 16, 239 ; bought by his daughter, buried at Canterbury 241 — 243 ; body buried in St. Peter ad Vincula 120, 139 ; relics 241 — 244 and nn. ; portraits 248. Letters to Colet 127 ; to Crom- well 190, 194; to Gunnell 148;. to his children 146 — 149, 209, 219, 228, 229. Writings, early 126; controversial 134, 160 — 166 and mi. ; devotional 131, 156, 157 — 159, 218, 235 and «. I, 245 ; Translation of Picus' life and writings 131 ; Utopia
1.37, 138- Moritz Encomium, by Erasmus I.
134, 135-
Morlaix, sack of I. 429. Moroni, Cardinal II. 463, 606. Morton, Cardinal I. 125 and n. Morton, Dr. Nicholas II. xv. I, 133,
364-
Moyle, Thomas, Cromwell's Com- missary at Glastonbury I. 349; 382, 383 ; at Reading 382 and n- 3, 383 and nn. ; at Colchester
399; 351-
Munday, Government spy and false witness II. 432, 449, 454, 455 n. 456, 457 and «., 468 n. 469, 471 n., 472 n. I, 487, 488, 495, 497 n. i, 502, 513, 518, 519 n., 521, 558 n., 559 and nn.
Murray (James Stuart), Earl of, Regent of Scotland, hunts down refugees of Northern Rising II. 162 ; sells Percy to Elizabeth 170.
Mush, John, priest II. 463.
Namur II. 182, 603, 604.
Nelson, B. John, priest, Life II. 223 — 233 ; birth 223 ; studies and ordination 224 ; work in England and exorcisms 225, 226 ; arrest 226 ; examination 226, 227 ; refuses Oath of Supremacy 226, 228 ; last Mass 227, 228 ; in Limbo 228, 229 ; last hours 229 ; farewell to his brothers 230 ;
678
INDEX
harassed by ministers 230, 231 ; martyrdom, prays with Catholics, words to the people 231, 232 and n. ; name in Jesuit Office and Martyrology 202 ; 450.
Nelson family II. 224 and it. 2.
Nevill, Amphelys I. 42.
Nevill, Christopher and Cuthbert II. 137 n. 2, 139, 144.
Nevill, Sir Edmund, in Tower I. 518; arraigned 520; executed52i.
Nevill, Isabel I. 502.
Nevill, Sir John I. 532.
Nevill's Cross, Battle of II. 141.
Newburn, Northumberland II. 1 1 1.
Newcastle II. 155, 174.
Newdigate, John I. 42.
Newdigate, B. Sebastian, Carthu- sian, birth, at Cambridge I. 42 ; in the King's household 40 ; Privy Councillor, marriage, daughter, life at Court 42 ; cautioned by his sister, retires to Charterhouse 43 ; arrested, in Marshalsea and Tower, treat- ment in prison 40 and «. ; visited and threatened by the King 43, 44 ; trial, indictment, martyr- dom 41, 221.
New Hall, Essex, built by Henry VIII. I. 428 ; Princess Mary at 512; now a convent of Sepul- chrine nuns 512 n, 2.
Nicholas, Mr. I. 147.
Nichols, John, pervert and in- former, his career II. $08, 511 — 517; heretical sermons in the Tower 508, 551, 563.
Nicholson, Mr. II. 448.
Nieuport Charterhouse I. 266.
Nonsuch Palace II. 547.
Norfolk (Thomas Howard, Ninth Duke), tries More I. 191, 221 ; and BB. Rochester andWalworth 255 ; at martyrdom of Carthu- sian Priors 12 ;/. 2; and Forest 314, 319; 182, 194, 224.
Norfolk (Tenth Duke) II. 1 13, 1 14.
Norton, Francis II. 137 «. 2, 139.
Norton, Richard (the elder) II. 137 n. 2, 139; bears standard
of Five Wounds 152; flies to Antwerp, friend of Storey 55, 76,
77, 89; 133-
Norton, Thomas, Rack -master of the Tower, examines and tortures Briant II. 404 and «., 405 ; his brutality 409, 416, 417 ; short nominal imprisonment for it 415 ; examines Johnson 481 ; 465.
Northumberland, Countess of, wife of B. Thomas Percy II. 118; rides with the troops in the Northern Rising 156, 161 ; escapes to Scotland, adventures 162, 167 ; vain efforts for her husband's release 164, 165, 167, 168 and n. 170; lives in Flanders 55, 118, 128, 167; letter to her husband 168 n.
Nostell Priory, Vorks. I. 248.
Nottingham II. 234, 235.
Nuthake, Thomas I. 394, 395.
Oatlands Palace II. 547.
Observant Friars (English), fervour in religion, reject the Royal Supremacy I. 274 ; support Queen Catherine 277 ; sup- pressed by Henry VIII. 282 bis, 290 ; houses emptied, two hundred imprisoned, fiftydie from hardships 274, 282 ; one hanged
453-
Ortiz, Dr., Charles V.'s agent at
Rome, pleads for B. Thomas
Abel I. 463 ; letters to the
Empress 98 «. 2, 104 n. I, 472.
Orton, Henry, goes to Rome II.
475 ; in Tower 476, 483, 548 :
tried and condemned 345, 476;
banished 476 ; 478, 481.
Oxford, City of I. 438, 439, 442.
Bodleian Library, MS. book by
Fortescue in, described and
quoted 434, 455—457. H. 22
n. 2. Congregation House (in St.
Mary's Churchyard) I. 484. St. Mary's Church, Campion's
Decem Rationes distributed in
II. 334-
INDEX
679
Oxford University, martyrs who were members of I. 125, 266, 267, 275, 387, 462, 484, 510; II. 15, 1 6, 153, 208, 235, 269, 400, 444, 445, 460, 491, 524, 536, 600, 635. Colleges, All Souls' II. 424; Balliol II. 358, 401 ; Brasenose II. 445, 460, 524, 536, 543 11. ; Broadgates Hall (Pembroke) II. 15 ; Can- terbury (Christ Church) I. 125 and n. ; Corpus Christi I. 408 ; II. 153, 445; Exeter II. 358, 445 ; Gloucester Hall, or St. Benedict's (Worcester) I. 388 ; Hert Hall (Hertford College) II. 400 and n. 2. ; Hinksey Hall II. 15; Lincoln II. 491, 600, 601 ; Martin College II. 274 ; New II. 462 ; Oriel I. 484; II. 205; Peckwater or Vine Hall II. 424 ; Queen's II. 635 ; St. Alban's Hall II. 208 ; St. John's II. 208, 269, 279, 445, 543 n. ; St. Mary's Hall II. 205 ; Trinity II. 209, 443, 445.
Pace, Mr. II. 629 — 631.
Padua I. 510.
Palmer, Mr., Protestant minister, vexes Percy II. 177, 178, 179; and Hart 615.
Paris I. 134.
Parker, William, brother to Matthew Parker II. 53 and n. ; entraps Storey 53, 54, 56-59, 65, 77, 98, 99
Park Hall, Lanes. II. 525 and «. I.
Parkminster, Carthusian Monas- tery, relic II. 222.
Parliament, abolishes Annates (25 Henry VIII. c. 20) I. xxxv. xxxvi. 185 and n. I ; forbids appeals to Rome (24 Henry VIII. c. 12) xxxvi. 79 ; abolishes Peter's Pence, annuls Heresy Act of Henry IV. (25 Henry VIII. c. 21) xxxvi. ; passes Act of Succession (25 Henry VIII. c. 22) xxxvii. 83, 196, 439, 440 ;
of the Royal Supremacy (26 Henry VIII. c. i) xxxvii. 440, 447 ; of the Six Articles (31 Henry VIII. c. 14) xlviii. 379, 451 ; of Attainder xlviii. 379, 451 ; the greater monasteries (31 Henry VIII. c. 14) 347 n. 4, 348, 451 ; suppresses all religious houses 379, 451 ; (1549): passes -first Act of Uniformity (2 and 3 Edward vi. c. l) II. 17—19; (1559) = called the " Beardless," only ten members Catholic II. 39 ; passes new Act of Supremacy (i Eliz. c. i.) 41, 119; and second Act of Uniformity (i Eliz. c. 2) 119; its treatment of Catholic bishops 119, 120, 122; (1563): Act for " assurance " of the new religion (5 Eliz. c. 1)11.48, 1265(1566): Act to remedy defective con- secration of first Protestant bishops II. 127; (1571): Acts against bringing in Bulls, &c. (13 Eliz. c. 2) II. 206; (1581): makes reconciliation to Rome high treason II. 256 ; Statute of Recusancy (23 Eliz. c. 2) 387, 3975 (I585): the return of priests to England made treason (27 Eliz.) II. 438 n. i, 574, 641.
Parpaglia (Abbate) II. 188.
Paschal, John, Sherwin's pupil at Rome II. 365 — 373 ; passes as Campion's master 367, 368 ; in Marshalsea 383 ; and Tower, terrified by Hopton into apostacy 386 ; 378, 548.
Patenson, Henry, More's jester I. 145, 151, 187.
Paul III., Pope I. xlv. xlvi. lix. 95, 118, 119, 236, 515—517, 530 n. 2.
Payne, B. John, Life II. 424 — 442 ; birth II. 425 ; at Douay 210, 425 ; CEconomus of College, ordained 426 ; goes to England with Mayne 210, 426 ; works in Essex and London 426 ; taken at Ingatestone Hall 428 ; short
68o
INDEX
imprisonment, returns to Douay, back at Ingatestone 429 ; betrayed by Eliot, arrested, tried 430 and n. ; in Tower 430, 466; for eight months 433) 435 5 accused of plotting Elizabeth's death 432, 433 ; twice racked 433 ; Hopton's letter to Payne 433, 434 ; his answer 434, 435 ; sent to Chelmsford 436 ; trial 436 — 438 ; sentence 439 ; harassed by ministers 439 — 442 ; martyr- dom 440 — 442 ; protests his faith and innocence, forgives Eliot 440 ; refuses to pray in English 441 ; 484.
Penizon, Sir William I. 382 «. 2.
Percy, Eleanor Lady, mother of B. Thomas Percy, her children taken from her II. 114 ; removes to Preston Tower 115 n. 2, 118.
Percy, Elizabeth Lady, eldest daughter of B. Thomas II. 182.
Percy, Henry (eighth Earl of North- umberland), younger brother of B.Thomas II. 114, 115, 117; apostatizes 123, 124 ; against his brother in Northern Rising 163 ; returns to the Catholic faith, persecuted, and murdered in the Tower 180 n.
Percy, Mary Lady, O.S.B. II. 182 and n. 2.
Percy, Sir Thomas, father of B. Thomas, a leader of Pilgrimage of Grace, hanged at Tyburn II. 113; his children 114.
Percy, B. Thomas (seventh Earl of Northumberland) Life II. in — 186 ; birth and parentage, ! early home in, 113 ; restored, and knighted 115; takes Scar- borough Castle, created Earl of Northumberland 116; Warden- General of the Marches, conquers Scots 117; marriage 118; con- [ eludes treaty with the Queen of ' Scots 121 ; nominally ordered to , repress Scottish insurgents 122, 123 ; resigns Wardenship of the
Marches, suspect on account of his religion 124, 125 ; speaks against new Supremacy Act (1563) 126; sympathy with Mary, Queen of Scots 128 ; heads Rising of the North with Earl of Westmoreland 132 ; loyalty to Elizabeth 135 and ;/. 2 ; conference at Brancepeth 137 and 11. 2 ; restores Catholic worship in Durham 138, 139; holds council of war, advises submission 1 56 ; escapes to Scotland 156, 161 ; betrayed and taken 162, 163 ; imprisoned at Lochleven 165 ; patience, gen- tleness, austerities, constancy against heretics 165, 166 ; his MS. prayer-book 166, 183 — 185 ; twice refuses conditional pardon 166, 167, 176 and ;/. I ; delivered to Lord Hunsdon 171 ; examined, imprisoned in Berwick 172 ; illness 173; taken to York for execution 173 — 175: interview with Methain in the Castle 175, 176; harassed by ministers, prays throughout last night 177 ; martyrdom 177 — 181 ; speech to people 178 — 180; repudiates the Church of England 120, 178 ; buried in St. Crux Church, head set on Micklegate Bar 181 ; portraits 186 ; Beatification I. xviii. ; his cause II. xviii.; his chaplain (see Addenda).
Persons, Robert, S.J., Briant's tutor II. 401 and n. i ; his father reconciled by Briant 402 ; his defence of Storey 42 n. 2, 43, 44 ; sent from Rome to England with Campion 308, 365 ; dis- guise 316 ; labours and converts 323 ; books 344 ;/. 397 ; defends Catholic loyalty 344 n. ; escapes arrest 399 — 440 ; returns to Rome 419 n. I ; his Life of Campion 267 ; dies wearing Campion's halter 352, 353, 356 ; 316, 497, 512 and ;/.
Peto, William (Cardinal), Obser-
INDEX
68 r
vant, Guardian of Greenwich Monastery I. 275 ; sermon before Henry VIII., imprisoned 278 and n. ; attainted 452.
Petre, Sir William, of Ingatestone, his career II. 424 ; widow a fervent Catholic, and receiver of priests 425 ; Payne taken at her house 428.
Petworth, Sussex II. 124, 186.
Philip II. II. 48—51, 52, 54, 83, 84, 96, 97, 167.
Pickering, John II. 113.
Picus, John (Count of Mirandula)
I.I3I-
Pierson, John, Minor Canon of Durham II. 143 ; dies in prison
159-
Pierson, Robert, priest of Brance- peth II. 143 ; sings High Mass in Durham Cathedral 146.
Pierson, B. Walter, Carthusian lay brother, refuses Oath of Supremacy I. 259; net tried 260 ; sufferings and death in Newgate 260, 263, 264 «. I.
Pigotte II. 56, 71, 72.
Pilgrimage of Grace, its objects, banners II. 112; suppressed I. xliv. 369, II. 112, 113.
Pilkington, Dr., Protestant Bishop of Durham II. 131, 141 ; his blasphemous words 141.
Pishull, Oxon. I. 440.
Pius IV., sends envoys to Elizabeth II. xvi. 188.
Pius V., St., his Bull against Elizabeth II. xv. — xvii. I, 2, 4, 8, 10, 281 ; 82, 205, 342, 344, 351, 358, 388, 395, 420, 451. 453, 482, 494, 504 ;/., 629.
Plantagenet, Arthur (sixth Viscount Lisle) I. 360, 450, 529 n.
Plantagenet. Edward (nineteenth Earl of Warwick) only brother of B. Margaret Pole I. 502, 503 ; proclaimed heir to the throne, then set aside, in Tower 505 ; executed 506.
Plantagenet, George (third Duke of Clarence), father of B.
Margaret Pole I. 502 ; put to death in the Tower 503 and //. 2.
Plummer, Christopher I. 494, 495.
Plumtree, B. Thomas (? John) II. 152 — 159; priest, college and degree, rector of Stubton, master of a school in Lincoln 153 ; chaplain to Northern insurgents 152 — 155 ; taken, imprisoned in Durham Castle 157 ; refuses conditional pardon, martyrdom 158, 159 ; quarters left on the gibbet for ten days, grave under present market-place, portrait 159 ; old ballad on his death 153 n. i (see Addenda).
Pole, Sir Geoffrey I. 518, 520 and n. 2.
Pole, Henry, B. Margaret Pole's grandson, sent to the Tower when a child I. 521, 530, 532 n. i ; more closely imprisoned
535-
Pole, B. Margaret, Life I. 502 — 540 ; birth, parents, and brother 502 ; childhood at Shene 503 ; and Warwick 504 ; probably in ward at Sheriff Hutton Castle 505 ; marriage, her five children, widowhood 507 ; styled Countess of Salisbury 508 ; sponsor and governess to Princess Mary 509 and n. 3, 510; dismissed for siding with the Queen 51 r, 512 ; lives at Bisham 513, 514; arrested at Warblington, taken to Cowdray Park, twice examined, her goods seized 521 — 524 j ill-treatment by Lord Southampton 526, 527; attainted of high treason 379, 451, 528, 529 n. ; never brought to trial 533 ; removed from Cowdray to the Tower 530; sufferings 531 and «. i ; two years in prison, excepted from general pardon 532 n. I ; martyrdom 533—53° and n. ; burial, chantry 539 and «. ; portrait 540 ; descend- ants 538, 540, II. 564.
Pole, Reginald (Cardinal) I. 506 ; at
682
INDEX
Oxford and Padua 510; bene- fices,sides with Queen Catherine, leaves England 511; grief for M ore's death 231 n. ; rebukes the King xlvii. 519, 520 «. ; Defence of the Church's Unity 515; created Cardinal, his assassination attempted 516 and n. 2 ; proclaimed traitor, price set on his head 518 ; persecution of his family xlviii. 518, 520, 521 ; attainted without trial 451, 452; abused by "the Libeller " 385, 386 ; heroic de- tachment and charity 536 — 538 ; letters from 105, 530 ; 35, 36,
517.
Pole, Sir Richard, husband of B. Margaret Plantagenet I. 507 and «. 4.
Pollard, Richard, monastic visitor, his doings at Glastonbury, Read- ing, and Colchester, 349, 351, 354 and «. I, 383 and //. i,
399-
Pont-a-Mousson II. 543 «., 567.
Pope, Sir Thomas I. 230, II. 3 «. i.
Pound, Thomas, layman, in prison over thirty years, thrice tortured, converts Cottam II. 537 ; ad- mitted in prison into S.J. 233 ;
319, 544-
Powell, B. Edward, Life I. 484— 496 ; priest, native of Wales, at Oxford 484 ; benefices 484, 494 ; his first book 484 — 486 ; counsel and advocate of Queen Catherine 67 n. i, 462, 463, 486, 487 ; answers Latimer at Bristol 488, 489 ; summoned before Crom- well 490 — 492 ; treatment in Dorchester Gaol 492, 493 ; in Tower 472, 494 ; attainted, con- demned to forfeit life and goods 494 ; terms of attainder 495 ; assisted by Sampson and Wilson j 475 — 477 ; released on bail by j his keeper 474, 475, 476 ; second I attainder and condemnation | 477 — 479, 496 ; hanged at i
Smithfiehl 479, 480, 496 ;
rhyming pamphlet on 500, 501. Prague II. 293, 298, 353, 356. Prestall, John, spy upon Catholics
II. 97 n. ; indicted with Storey
77 5 95 «• Preston Tower, Northumberland
II. 115 n. 2. Price, Ellis, Iconoclast I. 304,
310 n. i. Prudhoe Castle, Northumberland
II. ill, 113, 116. Psalms, recited by the Martyrs I.
13, 14, 114, 130, 150, 208, 234.
320 M.2; II. 9, u, 231, 406,
420, 560. Pyrton Church, Oxon. I. 418 —
423, 440.
Quent, Dr. I. 311.
Ramsden, Roger, kidnaps Storey, II. 56, 59, 69 ; whining letter to Cecil 70 — 75.
Rastell, William, nephew of B. Thomas More, his book in defence of the Pope I. 189 ; 543 ; II. 22, 108 n.
Reading, Pilgrimage of Grace pro- claimed in 1.369 — 371 ; 372 bis; Gaol 372 bis ; Abbey, founda- tion and burial-place of Henry I. 359; pillaged by Dr. London 373 —376 ; relics in 375 — 377 and n. ; visited by Commissioners, seized and given to Sir William Penizon 382 ; BB. Faringdon, Eynon, and Rugg hanged before the gateway 386 ; Grey Friars' Con- vent suppressed by Dr. London 374 ; St. Giles's Church, B. John Eynon, priest of 371,
384.
Rede, Anne, B. Adrian Fortescue's second wife I. 433 ; joins her husband in Marshalsea 445, 446 ; pleads for him with the King 447 ; in favour with Queen Mary 459 ; second marriage 460.
Redyng, Dom John, O.S.B. I. 368.
INDEX
683
Redyng, B. Thomas, Carthusian lay-brother, refuses Oath of Supremacy 1. 259 ; never brought to trial 260 ; sufferings and death in Newgate 260, 263, 264 ;/. i.
Relics, destroyed, Holy Blood of Hailes I. xlv. 307 ; bones of St. Thomas of Canterbury xlv. Hand of St. James the Great 359, 375—3775 hand of St. Anastasius 376, 377 n. 385.
Relics of English Martyrs (existing), of BB. Fisher I. in «. 2, 122 ; More 241 and n. i, 242, 244; Forest 326 ; Fortescue 434, 448, 455—459; Whiting 411, 412; Beche 399, 400, 412 ; Percy II. 183 ; Mayne 222 ; Hanse 261 ; Campion 352, 353, 356, 357, 419 ; Sherwin 396 ; Briant 415, 418, 419, 422, 423 ; Ford 458 ; Ford, Shert, and R. Johnson 422, 459, 473, 490 ; Filby 498 ; Kirby 522 ; Cottam 563 ; Thirkeld 652.
Reynolds, B. Richard, monk of Syon, Life I. 27 — 36 ; at Cam- bridge 29 ; arrested, examined, and tried 30 — 32 ; martyred 12, 34 ; asks the people's prayers for the King's amendment 34,
35-
Rheims, Benedictine Abbey, Kirk- man's first Mass in II. 579 ; Cathedral, Hanse and Filby ordained in 252, 263, 492 ; Seminary, Douay students trans- ferred to 250, 464, 539.
Riche, Hugh, O.S.F. I. 277; arraigned and hanged with the Holy Maid of Kent 281 «. 2 ;
465-
Rich, Mr. (afterwards Baron) I. 220, 222 and n. 2 ; II. 440, 441 n.
Richardson, B. Lawrence (vere Johnson), priest, Life II. 523 — 535 ; family 523 ; at Oxford and Douay 445, 524 and n. ; ordained 524 ; work in Lancashire 525 and n. i — 527 ; slandered 528 ;
betrayed, arrested, imprisoned 529 ; in Newgate 530 ; arraigned 447 and n. 2, 531 ; tried and sentenced 447 n. 2, 531 ; possi- bly condemned on mistaken identity 532 ; martyrdom 532 — 535) 55^ and n" 5 protests his innocence 533 > asks prayers of Catholics 535 ; his head cut off 559 ; body buried under the scaffold 499, 560.
Richmond, Yorks. II. 154, 50x5.
Ridley, Dr. Robert I. 487.
Ridolfi II. 7 and n.
Ripon, Cathedral, Mass said in, November, 1569 II. 154 ; 133.
Risby, Richard, O.S.F., of Green- wich, arraigned and hanged I. 281 n. 2.
Rishton, Edward, priest, at Brase- nose II. 445, 524 ; at Douay 445 ; ordained 524 ; at Rome, sent to England with Campion 365 ; searched at Dover, released 542 ; seized in London 398 ; tried with Campion 345 ; 375.
Robsart, Amy, her body removed from Cumnor to Oxford for burial, funeral oration by Campion II. 271, 272.
Robson, John II. 144.
Rochester, B. John, Carthusian I. 249 — 256 ; examined 254 ; burns Marshall's heretical book, carried by force to St. Paul's Cathedral, sent to Hull Charter- house, tried and condemned at York 255 ; hung in chains 256.
Rochester I. 53, 84, 85, 176.
Rodesley, Derbyshire II. 359.
Roehampton, relics of English Martyrs at I. 244, II. 222, 356, 357-
Rome, churches, Gesu II. 357, 422, 563 ; S. Stefano Rotondo I. xvi. Ix. ; English College xvi. Ix., II. 12, 98, 159, 305, 361, 362, 419, 462 — 464; frescoes of the Martyrs I. xvi. Ix. 408 n. 3, II. 12, 98, 159; German College II. 474 and n., 539.
684
INDEX
Roods, destroyed (in 1538), Boxley
I. xlv. 304, 307 ; St. Margaret Patens 306 bis ; St. Saviour's, Southwark 307.
Roper, Margaret, More's eldest daughter I. 15, 120, 132, 144, 147, 148, 154, 199, 207 — 210, 219 «. I, 226, 239 — 242; letter to her father 211, 212 ; buried in Chelsea Church 243.
Roper, William, Margaret More's husband I. 140, 144, 145 ; turned from Lutheranism 153, 154 ; con- versations with B. Thomas More 140, 179 — 181, 192, 193 ; house and grave at Canterbury 243,
II. 108 ;/. ; his son's kindness to Sherwood in the Tower 243 and »., 244.
Roscarrock, Nicholas, Catholic layman, receiver of priests, Sherwin taken at his house II. 380, 381 ; in Tower, racked
385.
Rossall Grange, Lanes. II. S27-
Rouen II. 277, 391, 419 n. i.
Rowsham, Ven. Stephen, his vision in the Tower II. 458.
Royal Supremacy, acknowledged under condition by clergy I. 75 ; treated as a dogma of faith by Cranmer xlii. ; rejected by the martyrs and others xlii. II, 15, 19, 21, 26, 41, 75 «., 92, 94, 98 and «. 2, 103, 221, 224, 255, 259. 273, 274, 296, 351, 352
"• i, 379, 385, 394, 395, 405, 407, 408, 447, 449, 478, 500, 5 14, 515, 528,542,545,546,11. 8,9,
82, 113, 119, 122, 184, 196,218,
226, 235, 254, 388, 457, 471, 488, 494, 497 ». i, 559, 575, 592, 640.
Royal Supremacy, Act of, passed (November 18, 1534) I. xxxvii. 19, 440, 447 ; comes into opera- tion (February I, 1535) 93, 216 ; Second Act passed (1559), II. 41, 119, 126.
Royal Supremacy, Oath of, pro- posed to Religious in specially
offensive form I. 334, 335 and ;/. ; perpetuated in Anglican Article xxxvii. 336 ;/. ; Oath taken for a time by the Abbot, Prior and fifty monks of Glastonbury 336, 338 and ;/. ; by the Abbot and Prior of Colchester 402 ; docu- ments bearing their signatures described 401 — 404; Oath taken by Storey II. 16 ; imposed afresh under Elizabeth, penalties for refusal of 48, 126.
Rugg, B. John, O.S.B., preben- dary of Chichester, retires to Reading Abbey, probably monk I. 384; indictment 377 n., 385 ; martyrdom 384, 386 ; scholar of Winchester, and New College, Oxford, his benefices (see Addenda}.
Russell, Sir John (created first Baron Russell) I. 355, 356 and
Sadler, Sir Ralph II. 122, 123 and n. i, 131, 132.
St. Alban's II. 58.
St. Bede, relics scattered II. 141.
St. Charles Borromeo II. 313, 608.
St. Cuthbert, relics burnt, his corporal-cloth burnt II. 141.
St. Derfel, image of I. xlv. 304 — 307 and ;/. 318, 320.
St. Francis Borgia, S.J. II. 356.
St. John the Almoner, anecdote of I. 198 n.
St. Omers College II. 316.
St. Osyth's Abbey, Essex I. 391.
St. Thomas of Canterbury, his shrine I. xliv. ; its destruction, and bones burnt xlv. 298 ; mar- tyrdom compared with Fisher's, &c. 298 — 300, 400 ; More's de- votion to 229 and n. I, 350, 441 n. ; Whiting's 349 ; his feast 440 and n. 2.
Salden (Souldern), Oxon. I. 414, 460, 461.
Salford Gaol II. 523.
Salisbury I. 484, 490, 491.
INDEX
685
Salisbury, Frances, daughter of B. John Felton, her Relation quoted II. 4 and «. i, II, 12.
Salt, B. Robert, Carthusian lay- ! brother, imprisoned for a year i I. 260 ; refuses Oath of Supre- macy 259 ; never brought to trial 260 ; sufferings and death in Newgate 260, 263, 264 n. I.
Saltanstall, Cecil's spy II. 54, 56, 72.
Sampson, Richard, Bishop of Chichester I. 475, 477.
Sander, NicholasII.xxv. 22«. 2,51. 165, 168, 169, 451, 498, 506.
Sandys, Dr. II. 573, 620.
Scarborough Castle II. 116.
' ' Scarborough's Warning," pro- verb quoted by Storey on his trial II. 79 and n.
"Scavenger's Daughter," the, de- scribed, used for torture of Kirby and Cottam II. 507 and nn., 55°.
Scott, Dr. Cuthbert, last Catholic Bishop of Chester, sent to the Fleet by Elizabeth II. 47.
Scrivelsby Court II. 579.
Scryven, B. Thomas, Carthusian lay - brother, refuses Oath of Supremacy, never brought to trial I. 259, 260 ; sufferings and death in Newgate 260, 263, 264 n. i.
Sedgefield, Durham II. 148.
Seton, Lord, kindness to the Countess of Northumberland II. 167.
Seyncler, Sir John, treachery to Abbot Beche I. 389, 391, 392; on special commission to try him 398.
Shakespeare, John, the poet's father, converted by Persons
II- 323.
Sharpham (Park), Somerset I. 349. Shaw, Henry II. 207, 209, 445. Shaxton, Nicholas, interferes at
Reading Abbey I. 364 ; rebuked
by Cromwell 365. Shene Charterhouse, B. Augustine
Webster, monk of I. 9 ; Chauncy
elected prior 266. Shene Palace, B. Margaret Plan-
tagenet and her brother here in
childhood I. 503, 505 ; 506. Sheprey, William II. 445, 463. Sherborne II. 288. Sheriff Hutton Castle, Yorks. I.
505-
Shert, B. John, Life II. 460—473 ; birth, at Oxford, schoolmaster in London, exile 460 and «. ; at Douay 460, 461 ; at English College, Rome 462, 463 ; in England 464, 465 ; taken 465 ; in Tower 466 ; indicted and sentenced 447 n. 2, 466, 467 ; respited and questioned 450 — 452, 467 ; refuses to answer 485 ; imprisoned, racked 467 ; martyred with Ford and Johnson 454, 468 — 472 ; prays to Ford 468 ; denies treason 469 ; and Royal Supremacy 47 1 ; profession of faith 470; words to the people, last prayers 472 and n. ; relics 422, 459, 473.
Sherwin, B. Ralph, priest, Life II- 359 — 39°; birth, at Oxford 359 and nn. ; at Douay 360, 445 ; at English College, Rome 360 — 363, 605 ; its first martyr 360 ; sent to England 311, 364, 365, 502 ; preaches before St. Charles Borromeo 365 ; his letters de- scribing the journey 366 — 379 ; work in England 379 and n. 2. ; taken 380 ; in Marshalsea 381 ; joy in sufferings 381, 382 ; trans- ferred to Tower 384, 482 ; twice racked, laid in snow, offered Pro- testant Bishopric 385, 386 ; dragged to sermons, indicted for recusancy, a year in prison, austerities 387 ; confers with heretics 341 ; indicted 345, 388, 417 ; examination 388, 389 ; sentence- 390 ; letters 390 — 393 ; martyrdom 393 — 395 ; kisses Campion's blood on executioner's hand 393 ; profession of faith,
686
INDEX
last prayers, 394, 395 ; his parents' conversion 395 ; relics 396.
Sherwood, B. Thomas, Life II. 234 — 248 ; his parents 234, 235 and n. ; his devout life, visits Douay, arrested in London 236 ; in Gatehouse and Tower, ex- amined under torture 238 — 240 ; amongst the rats 240, 241 ; nakedness, cold and hunger, repeatedly racked, his money stolen 241 — 244 ; his holy life in prison, his fortitude 244, 245 ; trial, indictment, pleads not guilty, sentenced 245 — 247 ; writs for execution extant, martyrdom, cut down alive 247 and n. ; his age 245 and n. I ; 450.
Shirburn, Oxon. I. 420, 434, 437, 442, 444-
Shirwell Church, Devon II. 207 «. 4.
Shooter's Hill I. 85.
bilva, Guzman de II. 125 and n. I.
Six Articles, Act of the, passed in 1539 I. xlvi. 308, 379, 451 ; its intention and scope xlvi.
Six Articles, devised by Elizabeth's Council to fix charge of treason on Catholics II. 450 — 452 ; pro- posed to the seven martyrs of May, 1582, 450, 452, 453, 485, 486, 493, 494, 497, 498, 510,
5", Si?, 534, 555- Skelton, Yorks. II. 223. Sledd, apostate, Government spy
at Rheims and Rome, reproved
by Robert Johnson II. 478 ;
betrays him from revenge 479 ;
false witness against Kirby 508,
509; 449, 479 w. I, 513, 541. Smithfield, relics and images burnt
I. xlv. ; Forest burnt xlv. 314;
three Beati hanged at 479, 480,
496.
Soissons II. 542, 590. Southampton, Earl of, illtreats B.
Margaret Pole I. 521, 524, 526 ;
his letters to Cromwell 522 — 526,
527-
Southwell, Sir Richard, I. 207, 220.
Southwell, Sir Robert I. 539 «. ; II. 3 n. I.
Southwell, Ven. Robert, his suffer- ings in Limbo (Newgate) II. 229.
Spes, Don Guerau de, Spanish Ambassador in England II. 6 ; letters about Storey 64, 65, 75, 84 and n. 2, 85 ; 7, 95 «., 97.
Spetchley Park, Worcester, relic at II. 423.
Staindrop, Durham II. 149, 153.
Standeven, High Sheriff of York, Hart and Thirkeld brought to his house II. 611, 638 ; robs the latter and William Hutton 638,
639- Standish, servant to B. Margaret
Pole I. 522 — 525. Standish, Bishop, O.S.F. I. 275,
487.
Standish, Ralph II. 606, 608. Stanihurst, James II. 280. Starkey, Thomas I. 33, 34, 249,
5I5-
Sterne, Edmund, Yicar of London Charterhouse, signs Oath of Supremacy I. 259.
Stockton, Durham II. 148.
Stokesley, John I. 92, 314, 386.
Stone, Staffs, relics at I. 241 ;/. i.
Stone, B. John I. 269 — 273 ; Austin friar of Canterbury 270, 271 ; persecuted by Ingworth 273 ; long imprisonment 270, 273 ; austerities, encouraged by supernatural voice 270, 271 ; expenses of execution 271, 272 ; hanged on the Dane John, Can- terbury 272 ; date of martyrdom uncertain 272, 273 and n. I.
Stonor, Anne, B. Adrian For- tescue's first wife I. 414 ; her death 418 ; her three burials 419—425.
Stonor Park, B. Adrian Fortescue s property through first wife, chapel never used by Protestants
INDEX
687
I. 414 ; Campion's Decent Rationes printed at 414, 415,
II. 334 ; printing-press seized 419 ;z. I ; I. 422, II. 336.
Stonor, Sir Walter, disputes Stonor property I. 414, 432, 433, 441 ; examines B. Hugh Cook at Reading 372.
Stonyhurst College, relics at I. 122, 244, 411, II. 181, 182, 356> 396, 415, 422, 423, 498, 522, 563, 633.
Storey, Ellen II. 38, 52, 91, 104, 1 06 n.
Storey, B. John, Life II. 14 — no ; birth 14; Franciscan Tertiary 14, 15 and n. I ; at Oxford 15 ; marriage 16; takes Oath of Supremacy, life-long repentance 16, 92, 103 ; in Parliament 17 ; opposition to first Act of Uniformity, punishment for 18 — 20 ; goes to Louvain 22 and n. 2 ; friend of Bonvisi 22, 106 — 108 and nn. ; returns to Eng- land,appointments 23; slandered byFoxe24 — 26 and n. ; attitude towards heretics 26, 27, 31, 32, 34, 42, 89—91 ; Proctor for Cranmer's trial 34 ; defends Papal Supremacy 35, 36 ; on commission for suppression of heresy 36, 89 ; opposes new Supremacy Bill 42 and n. 2 ;
visited by Feckenham 83 ; not supported by Philip II. 83, 84; martyrdom 85, 94; pro- testation 86 — 92 ; new gallows 85 ; treated with special bar- barity 85, 93, 94 ; his will 22, 23, io2andw., 109; letters from 31) S2, 37, 57, 58, 82 ; portrait 98 ; slandered after death 93 — 97 ; his parents 14, 104, 105 ; his son 100 ; his nephew 106, 107 n. ; his cause and record of his trial xxi. xxii. and n.
Stubton, Lines. II. 153.
Succession, Act of (March 30, 1534) I. xxxvii. 83, 196, 439, 440 ; its object xxxvii. 19, 83 ; preamble refused by More and Fisher 86 n. 2, 205.
Succession, Oath of, proposed to all subjects of lawful age I. xxxvii. 83, 197, 439 ; terms of the Oath, penalty for refusal 83 ; refused by More and Fisher 86 and n. 2, 199, 205, 206, 440 ; exacted from Religious 9 1 ; taken with reservation by London Carthusians 6 ; refused by Car- thusian Priors 9 — II.
Suffolk, Charles Brandon (Fourth Duke) I. 182, 217, 221, 314,
431-
Surrey, Thomas Howard (Four- teenth Earl) I. 429, 430.
sent to the Fleet for recusancy j Sussex, Robert Ratcliffe (Eighth 46; escapes, retaken, in Marshal- j Earl) I. 314.
sea 47 ; escapes to Belgium 49, 50; life at Louvain 51 — 53; naturalized as Spanish subject 54, 77, 78, 87, 88 ; kidnapped by Cecil's contrivance, brought to England 53 — 57 ; imprison- ments 59 n. 2, 63, 65 ; examined under torture before trial 75, 76 ; grounds of indictment 55, 76, 77 ; arraigned 77 ; refuses to plead 77, 78, 82, 83 ; con- demned 79 ; sent back to Tower, insults on the way 79 — 81 ; in Beauchamp Tower 81, 82 ; refuses Oath of Supremacy 82 ;
Sussex, Robert Ratcliffe (Tenth Earl), President of the Council of the North II. 134; sent against the Northern insurgents 154 — 156; his cruelty 157, 158; letters to Cecil 134, 135, 150; letter to, from Sir George Bowes 139, 140.
Sutton Place, reliquary II. 222.
Swift, Protestant Vicar - General of Durham II. 141, 142; tries Northern insurgents 146 «.
Syon Monastery, Isleworth I. 27 — 29, 190, 257, 258 «. ; ejected nuns of, at Lyford II. 336, 445.
688
INDEX
Tadcaster II. 154, 585.
Tarbes, Bishop of I. xxx. 176 n. i,
177-
Tarnaker, Lanes. II. 536.
Teddington I. 1 8.
Teignmouth, St. Scholastica's Abbey, relics at II. 261.
Tempest, Sir Thomas II. 114.
Temple Church, London, Mass privately said here in 1569 II. 358.
Thame, Bucks. I. 442 fa's, 443.
Therkell, Henry II. 636 n. i.
Thirkeld, B. Richard, priest, Life II. 635 — 652 ; birthplace, at Oxford, ordained at Douay, or Rheims, sent to England 635 and n. ; in York 636 ; compiles Acts of York Martyrs 576, 634, 636 ; confessor to Margaret Clitherow, taken in the Kidcote 637 ; robbed by the High Sheriff
638, 639 ; in Kidcote dungeon 639 ; examined by Dean Iliitton
639, 650, 651 ; wears cassock at his trial 640 ; indictment and condemnation, amongst the felons in York Castle 641, 642 ; brought up for sentence, his joy, touching incidents 642 — 644 ; martyrdom ; butchered alive 645 ; head set on Ouse- bridge prison 646 ; letters 640, 647—652 ; Latin poem, relic 652.
Thompson, B. James, priest, Life II. 589 — 599; birth, at Rheims, illness 589 ; ordained 590 ; confessor to Margaret Clitherow 637 ; arrested at York 590 ; examined 591 — 593 ; denies Royal Supremacy 592 ; doubly ironed, imprisoned, tried and condemned, joy at the sentence 593 ; converts felons 594 ; martyrdom 594 — 597 ; speaks to the people, professes his faith and innocence of treason 595, 596; not quartered, buried under gallows, place visited by Margaret Clitherow 597 ;
Sarnelli's epigram on him ^98,
599-
Thome, B. John, O.S.B., monk and treasurer of Glastonbury Abbey I. 357 ; arrested and imprisoned 352 ; martyred 357.
Throckmorton, Edward II. 378 and «. 379.
Tindale, William, his heresy I. 134, i6oand n. 2, 161 ; abuse of the Catholic Church 165.
Topcliffe, Yorks. II. 128, 133,
175-
Topcliffe, Richard (torturer), at martyrdom of Filby, Kirby, and Richardson II. 496, 519, 534.
Trafford, William I. 259 and n. i .
Tregian, Elizabeth, sister of Francis Tregian, mother of B. Thomas Sherwood II. 235 and ;/.
Tregian, Francis, of Golden, receives Mayne II. 211 ; arrested with him, released on bail 213; recusancy 221 n. i ; property confiscated, thirty years in prison
220, 221.
Tregonwell, Sir John II. 237 and
n. 2. Tregony, Cornwall, one of Mayne's
quarters set up here II. 220 n. Tresham, Sir Thomas, of Rushton,
Northants, converted by Campion
11.323.
Troutbeck, Kendal II. 183.
Truro II. 211, 212, 213.
Tunstall, Cuthbert (last Catholic Bishop of Durham) I. 76, 92, 137. 159, !74, 176, 179, 189, 515, II. 114, 115, 117, 121 ; protests against Elizabeth's new religion, refuses Oath of Supre- macy, confined and dies in house of Matthew Parker 122.
Tutbury Castle II. 129, 152.
Tyburn (see London).
Tyfeld, Oxon. I. 424, 425.
Tynbigh, William, Prior of London Charterhouse I. 127, 250; holy life, supernatural visitations 250, 251.
INDEX
689
Tyrrel , Warder of the Fleet
II. 188. Tyrrell, Margaret, attainted I. 477
— 479 ; not executed 478 n.
Uniformity, Act of, First Act, passed January 21, 1549, establishes the Anglican Liturgy II. 19; Second Act, 1559; abolishes the Mass and orders use of Common Prayer-book, penalties for breach of 1 19; makes over the English cathe- drals and churches to the Establishment 119, 129.
Upsatlington II. 121.
Urban VIII., Pope, his Bull pre- scribing process of canonization I. xii. — xvii. Ixiii.
Ushaw College, relics at II. 222.
Uxbridge I. 443.
Uxenden Hall, Campion at II. 334-
Vachell, Thomas I. 370, 372, 382 and n. 2.
Van Eycke, Cornelius II. 56, 65 and n. I, 67.
Vaux, Laurence, deprived Warden of Manchester II. 364 ; probably reconciles Kirby, with him in Gatehouse 503 and ;/. 2 ; dies in prison 365.
Vaux of Harrowden (Lord), con- verted by Campion II. 323.
Venerable Servants of God, only privately invoked I. xii.
Venice I. 249, 516.
Veysey (Vasty) John, Bishop of Exeter I. 174 and ;/.
Verona I. 516.
Viterbo I. 536.
Wadebridge II. 220.
Waferer , I. 295, 296, 300.
Waire , O.S.F., Observant,
hanged for denying Royal
Supremacy I. 453. Wallingford I. 372. Walpole, Ven. Henry II. 353. Walsingham, Sir Edmund, Lieut. SS
of the Tower I. 41, 107 — 109, 207, 214, 219, 232.
Walsingham, Sir Francis, his spies in the seminaries II. 254 ; daughter converted 353 ; employs Eliot as spy 430 ; letter from 430 «.,43i ; letter to 409; 514, 515, 516 ; his policy xxiii.
\Valsingham, Our Lady of, Prince Henry Tudor's pilgrimage to I. xxiv. ; her image burnt xlv. 307-
Walworth, B. James, Carthusian, fellow-martyr of B. John Rochester, q.-v. I. 249 — 256.
Warblington I. 521 and n. z.
\Varford, Father, his account of Ford II. 444—446.
Warham, Archbishop I. xxx. 67, 74 n. 2, 79, 81, 176, 361, 362, 486 ; his loyalty to Rome 386.
Warwick Castle 1. 504.
Watlington, Oxon. 1.420, 421, 442.
Watson, Thomas (last Catholic Bishop of Lincoln) in Tower II. 46 ; summoned to take new Oath 48, 49 ; sent to Wisbeach Castle 322.
Watts, Dr. II. 62—64, 88.
Watts, Joan, wife of Storey II. 16 ; petitions Parliament on his behalf 19, 20; joins him at Louvain 51, 91 ; commended by him on the scaffold to Catholic charity 91 ; remains abroad 100 ; by his desire 23, 105—107 »., 108, 109 ; pensioned by King Philip 97.
Webb, Dr. Laurence II. 4 and n. 2.
Webster, B. Augustine I. 9 — 16 ; Carthusian, prior of Axholme, visits London Charterhouse, in Tower 9 ; martyred at Tyburn 14.
Wells, Whiting priested at I. 332 ; his mock trial in the Bishop's Hall 355 and n. ; one of his quarters sent to 357 and n. I ; B. William Hart born at II. 600.
Wentworth, Sir Thomas I. 445, 446.
II.
6go
IXDEX
West, Nicholas, Bishop of Ely, one of Queen Catherine's counsel I. 67.
Westmoreland, Charles Nevill (sixth Earl) see Percy, Thomas II. 132 — 156; escapes to Flanders 156; in exile 55; falsely accused by Eliot 432.
Weston, Robert, assistant to Storey at Oxford II. 16 ; marries his daughter 16, 52 ; sent to the Fleet 52.
Weston, Sir William, I. 437.
Weston, William, S.J. II. 445-
Whalley, John, I. 250 n., 260.
Wharton, Lord, II. 117.
White, Sir Thomas, Lord Mayor of London II. 266 ; staunch Catholic, founds St. John's, Oxford 269 ; his funeral oration pronounced by Campion 271.
White, Dr. II. 462.
Whiting, B. Richard, O.S.B., Life
I. 327 — 358 ; family, education i 331 ; degrees 331, 332; ordained, j Camerarius and last Abbot of : Glastonbury 332; takes Oath of Supremacy 336 ; arrested 349 ; • grounds of accusation 350 and «. ; j sent to the Tower, his constancy 350; examined, no formal trial, secretly condemned 350, 351 ; charged with sacrilege and treason 353 and n. i ; arraigned in the Counter, mock trial at Wells 355 and «.; martyred at Glastonbury with two of his , monks 356, 357,405 «., 406, 407; head set on Abbey gate, quarters distributed 357 and n. i ; secon- dary relics 411, 412; still reverenced at Glastonbury, local ballad on his fate 358 and «.
Whittingham, , rifles shrines at
Durham II. 141.
Whitton, Thomas I. 425, 434, 444. Whyte, George II. 147, 148.
,, John, Bishop of Winchester
II. 45, 46, and ;;. I. Wilbraham, Thomas II. 87. Wilkinson, Alice II. 145.
Willen, Miles I. 494, 495.
Willesden, Our Lady of, her image burnt at Smithfield I. xlv.
Williams, Joseph I. 266.
Wilson, Dr. Nicholas, Henry VIII. 's confessor, sent to Tower for refusing Oath of Succession
I. 200, 494 ; three years in prison, conforms, is released 476 ; again in Tower 475 ; letter to Cromwell 476, 477 ; pardoned on Cromwell's death 476.
Wiltshire, Thomas Boleyn (sixth Earl of) suspected of attempting Fisher's life I. 77 and ;/. ; on commission to try More 221 ; 12 «• 2, 217, 491.
Windsor, St. George's Chapel I. 371.
\\isbeach Castle, Catholic pri- soners in II. 322, 323.
Wiseman, Nicholas (Cardinal) I. Ixi.
Witton Gilbert Church, Durham
II. 149.
Woburn, Cistercian Abbot of I. xliv. 337. 34.8 «.
Wolsey (Cardinal) Chancellor of Cambridge I. 52 ; foreign em- bassies 141, 176; encourages the King's divorce 177, i"S; intrigues xxviii. xxx. xxxii. 66, 176 and ;/. ; holds Legatine Court xxxiii. 67 ; disgrace and death xxxiv. 70, 181 ; 275, 276, 332, 4J8.
Wood, John a I. 208.
Woodford, Essex, B. John Larke, Rector of I. 541.
Wood house, B. Thomas, priest, Life II. 188—203 ! taken while saying Mass 189 ; in the P'leet twelve years 188 — 190 ; probably Jesuit 199—202, 233 ; Mas.s and Office, fearlessness 189, 190 ; desire of martyrdom 190, 191 ; zeal for conversions 192, 195 ; letter to Cecil 191 — 193 and 11., 201 ; brought before Cecil 193 — 195 ; before the Council 195, 196 ; examined, arraigned
INDEX
691
and condemned 196 ; sent to Newgate 197 ; ill-treatment on the way 197, 198 ; confutes ministers 198 ; martyrdom 198,
199 ; ] rays with Catholics only, brave speech 198, 199; butchered whilst fully conscious 199 ; first j riest mat tyred under Elizabeth
200 ; his cause xx. Woodstock I. 442, 443, 445 ; II.
274, 275- Woodwaid. John II. 377, 391 —
393-
Worcester, Our Lady of, her image
burnt at Smithfield I. xlv. Worthington, Dr. Thomas II. 445. Wortley, Justice, arrests Kirkman
II. 583 ; examines and abuses
him 586.
Wrington, Somerset I. 331. Wroth, Sir Thomas II. 5, 6 and
n. 2, 87.
Wyatt, Sir Thomas, plots Cardinal Pole's assassination I. 516 «. 2.
Yarmouth, Norfolk II. 57 ; Toll House 59 n. 2.
York, Bootham Bar II. 591 ; Church of St. Crux 181, and n. 3; Micklegate Bar 181, 628; Palace of the Abbots of St. Mary's 591 ; The Pavement 178, 181 ; Prisons, The Castle 175 and n. I ; 569, 570, 572, 585. 588 «., 59i» 593, 610, 611, 639, 641, 645 ; Ousebridge Kidcote 571 «., 588 «., 591 and «., 593, 637, 639, 646 ; St. Peter's prison 593 ; ' ' The Tyburn " at Knavesmire, martyrs executed at I. 256 ; II. 576, 588, 594, 631, 645; City I. 255; II. 112, 154, 175, 564, 585. 589. 590, 610, 636.
Youlston, Devon II. 207.
./v
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