repine or complain some of those Nations might have done written and spoken as it had pleased them It little became either Master Saunders otherwise an excellent man or Master Parsons or any other of our own Nation to have intermedled with those matters or to write as they have very offensively done in divers of their Books and Treatises to what purpose we know not except it were to shew their malice to dishonour their own Country as much as lay in them and to move a greater dislike in the State of all that be Catholicks than before they had Kings ever have had and will have their plots and practices for their own safeties it being as inconvenient to their Policy for one Prince by his Might to over-top another as it is amongst the principal members of our natural bodies for one member to swell or grow too great above his due proportion Happy had we Catholicks been at this day if these men being Priests had never troubled themselves with State-matters which they have managed as Phaeton did his Fathers Chariot very greatly to our prejudice Let them pretend never so great skill in their disposing of Kingdoms ordine ad Deum they have certainly dealt with ours ordine ad Gehennam But this is not all which the State may justly challenge us for In the time of our said Peace and upon the coming into England of the Queen of Scots whilst her Majesty of England and the State were busied as partly you have heard before it pitieth our hearts to see and read what hath been printed and published out of Italy in the life of Pius Quintus concerning his Holiness endeavors stirred up by false suggestions to joyn with the King of Spain for the utter ruine and overthrow both of our Prince and Country Would to God such things had never been enterprised and most of all that they had never been printed We that have some skill with our Pens presume too much a great deal upon our own Wits What good the mentioning of these points can bring to the Church we see not but sure we are it hath done much hurt and given our common Enemies very great advantage against us For now it is usually objected unto us by every one of any reach when we complain of some hard dealings towards us Yea say they very well good Masters were you not in quiet Who then gave the cause that you were troubled When her Majesty used you kindly how treacherously was she dealt with by you Did not Pius Quintus practise her Majesties subversion she good Lady never dreaming of any such mischief Was not one Robert Ridolphi a Gentleman of Florence sent hither by the Pope under colour of Merchandize to sollicite a Rebellion Did not Pius Quintus move the King of Spain to joyn in this Exploit for the better securing of his own Dominions in the Low Countries Was not the Bull denounced against her Majesty that carrieth so fair a Preface of zeal and pastoral duty devised purposely to further the intended Rebellion for the depriving of her Majesty from her Kingdom Had not the Pope and King of Spain assigned the Duke of Norfolk to be the Head of this Rebellion Did not the Pope give order to Ridolphi to take 150000 Crowns to set forward this attempt Was not some of that Money sent for Scotland and some delivered to the said Duke Did not King Philip at the Popes instance determine to send the Duke of Alva into England with all his Forces in the Low Countries to assist the Duke of Norfolk Are all these things true and were they not then in hand whilst her Majesty dealt so mercifully with you How can you excuse these designments so unchristian so unpriestly so treacherous and therefore so un-prince-like When we first heard these particulars we did not believe them but would have laid our lives they had been false but when we saw the Book and found them there God is our witness we were much amazed and can say no more but that his Holiness was misinformed and indirectly drawn to these courses But to proceed it being unknown to the State what secret matters were in hand against them both at home and beyond the Seas the Catholicks here continued in sort as before you have heard till the said Rebellion brake forth in the North 1569. a little before Christmas and that it was known that the Pope had excommunicated the Queen and thereby freed her Subjects as the Bull importeth from their subjection And then there followed a great restraint of the said Prisoners but none of them were put to death upon that occasion the Sword being then only drawn against such Catholicks as had risen up actually into open Rebellion Wherein we cannot see what her Majesty did that any Prince in Christendom in such a case would not have done And as touching the said Bull many both Priests and Lay Catholicks have greatly wished that it had never been decreed denounced published or heard of For we are perswaded that the Pope was drawn thereunto by false suggestions of certain undiscreet turbulent persons who pretending to him one thing had another drift in their heads for their own advancement And therefore we have ever accounted of it as a sentence procured by surreption knowing it to be no unusual thing with the Pope through indirect means and factious heads to be often deceived in matters of Fact as we now find it in the setting up of our new Arch-Priest Now upon all these occasions her Majesty being moved with great displeasure called a Parliament in the thirteenth year of her Reign 1571. wherein a Law was made containing many branches against the bringing into this Land after that time of any Bulls from Rome any Agnus Dei Crosses or Pardons and against all manner of persons that should procure them to be so brought hither with many other particularities thereunto appertaining Which Law although we hold it to be too rigorous and that the pretended remedy exceeded the measure of the offence either undutifully given or in justice to have been taken yet we cannot but confess as reasonable men that the State had great cause to make some Laws against us except they should have shewed themselves careless for the continuance of it But be the Law as any would have it never so extreme yet surely it must be granted that the occasions of it were most outragious and likewise that the execution of it was not so tragical as many since have written and reported of it For whatsoever was done against us either upon the pretence of that Law or of any other would never we think have been attempted had not divers other preposterous occasions besides the causes of that Law daily fallen out amongst us which procured matters to be urged more severely against us In the year 1572. out cometh Master Saunders Book de visibili Monarchia wherein he taketh upon him to set down how the Pope had
spared nor mercy yielded and wherein neither the Vanqueror nor the vanquished have cause of triumph And forasmuch as these are the most evident perils that necessarily should follow if these kind of Vermine were suffered to creep by stealth into the Realm and to spread their poyson within the same howsoever when they are taken like Hypocrites they colour and counterfeit the same with profession of devotion in Religion it is of all persons to be yielded in reason that her Majesty and all her Governours and Magistrates of Justice having care to maintain the peace of the Realm which God hath given in her time to continue longer than ever in any time of her Progenitors ought of duty to Almighty God the Author of Peace and according to the natural love and charge due to their Country and for avoiding of the Floods of blood which in Civil Wars are seen to run and flow by all lawful means possible as well by the Sword as by Law in their several seasons to impeach and repel these so manifest and dangerous colourable practices and works of Sedition and Rebellion And though there are many Subjects known in the Realm that differ in some opinions of Religion from the Church of England and that do also not forbear to profess the same yet in that they do also profess Loyalty and Obedience to her Majesty and offer readily in her Majesties defence to impugn and resist any Foreign Force though it should come or be procured from the Pope himself none of these sort are for their contrary opinions in Religion prosecuted or charged with any crimes or pains of Treason nor yet willingly searched in their Consciences for their contrary opinions that savour not of Treason And of these sorts there are a number of persons not of such base and vulgar note as those were which of late have been executed as in particular some by name are well known and not unfit to be remembred The first and chiefest by Office was Dr. Heth that was Archbishop of York and Lord Chancellor of England in Queen Maries time who at the first coming of her Majesty to the Crown shewing himself a faithful and quiet Subject continued in both the said Offices though in Religion then manifestly differing and yet was he not restrained of his liberty nor deprived of his proper lands and goods but leaving willingly both his Offices lived in his own House and injoyed all his purchased Lands during all his natural life until by very age he departed this World and then left his House and living to his Friends an example of gentleness never matched in Queen Maries time The like did one Dr. Pool that had been Bishop of Peterborough an ancient grave person and a very quiet Subject There were also others that had been Bishops and in great estimation as Dr. Tunstal Bishop of Duresm a person also of very quiet behaviour There were also other Dr. White and Dr. Oglethorp one of Winchester the other of Carlisle Bishops and Dr. Thurleby and Dr. Watson yet living one of Ely the other of Lincoln Bishops not pressed with any capital pain though they maintained the Popes Authority against the Laws of the Realm and some Abbots as Mr. Fecknam yet living a person also of quiet and courteous behaviour for a great time Some also were Deans as Dr. Boxall Dean of Windsore a person of great modesty and knowledge Dr. Cole Dean of Pauls a person more earnest than wise Dr. Reynolds Dean of Exeter and many such others having born Office and Dignities in the Church and had made profession against the Pope which they began in Queen Maries time to change yet were they never to this day burdened with capital pains nor yet deprived of any their goods or proper livelyhoods but only removed from their Ecclesiastical Offices which they would not exercise according to the Laws And most of them for a great time were retained in Bishops Houses in very civil and courteous manner without charge to themselves or their friends until the time that the Pope began by his Bulls and Messages to offer trouble to the Realm by stirring of Rebellion about which time only some of these aforenamed being found busier in matters of state tending to stir troubles than was meet for the common quiet of the Realm were removed to other more private places where such other wanderers as were men known to move sedition might be restrained from common resorting to them to increase trouble as the Popes Bull gave manifest occasion and yet without charging them in their Consciences or otherwise by any inquisition to bring them into danger of any capital Law so as no one was called to any capital or bloody question upon matters of Religion but have all injoyed their life as the course of nature would and such of them as yet remain may if they will not be Authors or Instruments of Rebellion or Sedition injoy the time that God and nature shall yield them without danger of life or member And yet it is worthy to be well marked that the chiefest of all these and the most of them had in the time of King Henry the Eight and King Edward the Sixth either by Preaching Writing reading or arguing taught all people to condemn and abhor the Authority of the Pope yea they had many times given their Oaths publickly against the Popes Authority and had also yielded to both the said Kings the Title of supream head of the Church of England next under Christ which title the Adversaries do most falsly write and affirm that the Queens Majesty doth now use a manifest lie and untruth And for proof that these foresaid Bishops and learned men had so long time disavowed the Popes Authority many of their Books and Sermons against the Popes Authority remain printed to be seen in these times to their great shame and reproof to change so often and specially in persecuting such as themselves have taught and established to hold the contrary There were also and yet be a great number of others being Lay-men of good possessions and Lands men of good credit in their Countries manifestly of late times seduced to hold contrary opinions in Religion for the Popes Authority and yet none of them have been sought hitherto to be impeached in any point or quarrel of Treason or of loss of Life Member or Inheritance so as it may plainly appear that it is not nor hath been for contrarious opinions in Religion or for the Popes Authority as the Adversaries do boldly and falsly publish that any persons have suffered Death since her Majesties Reign and yet some of these sort are well known to hold opinion that the Pope ought by Authority of Gods word to be Supream and only Head of the Catholick Church and only to rule in all causes Ecclesiastical and that the Queens Majesty ought not to be the Governour over all her Subjects in her Realm being persons
Pamphlet set out shortly after saying Where are now the old Tyrants of the World Nero Decius Dioclesian Maxentius and the rest of the great persecutors of the Christians Where is Genserick and Hunricus with their Arrian Hereticks alluding to the State here we think both him and divers others that have written to the same effect very greatly to blame Sure we are that the general cause of Religion for the which both we and they contend as oft we have said getteth no good but hurt by it and contrary to the old saying be he never so bad yet let him have justice though some hard courses have been taken by the State against us yet hath it not by many degrees been so extreme as the Jesuits and that crew have falsely written and reported of it But to return to Father Parsons in Spain and to proceed in the course of things which have happened since 1590. The said Father Parsons so managed the said Seminary erected in Valledolyd as within three years viz. 1591. twelve or thirteen Priests were sent hither from thence Also he procured some other Seminaries to be erected in Spain and furnished them with such Students as he thought fit which for our parts we greatly commend in him if he took this pains and imployed his favour with the King to a good end whereof we have some doubt knowing the Jesuits fetches but the State here did utterly condemn him for it finding that both he and some others were plotting and labouring by all the means they could for a new Invasion Whereupon a Proclamation was set out 1591. as well for an inquiry or search for all such Seminary Priests as either were or should hereafter come from Spain as also from any other Seminaries beyond the Seas upon suspicion that they were sent hither for no other end but to prepare a way for the said Invasion Whereas we are verily perswaded in our consciences and do know it for many that the Priests themselves had no such intention whatsoever the Jesuits had that sent them Against the said Proclamation three or four have whet their Pens but still whilst they seek to disgrace and gall the State they have ever thereby wounded and beaten us being themselves in the mean time void of all danger One of them Mr. Parsons by name as we suppose writing in his said Pamphlet of the new intended Invasion mentioned in the said Proclamation telleth us That the King hath just cause to attempt again that enterprise And again he saith That the King is so interessed together with the Pope to seck as he termeth it her Majesties reformation that he the said King is bound in Justice to do it and cannot without prejudice of his high estimation and greatness refuse at the soonest opportunity to attempt it Marry withal to comfort us he writeth That the King intendeth no rigorous dealing with our Nation in the prosecution of his Invasion when he cometh hither Which great favour of the King towards us we are to ascribe to good Father Parsons if we may believe his dutiful Subject Mr. Southwell the Jesuit For thus he telleth us If ever saith he the King should prevail in that designment of his new Invasion Father Parsons assisted with Cardinal Alanes Authority hath done that in our Countries behalf for which his most bitter enemies and generally all her Majesties Subjects shall have cause to thank him for his serviceable endeavours so far hath he inclined fury to clemency and rage to compassion Sure we are greatly beholding to this good Father that hath had so kind a remembrance of us But we wish that he had rather imployed himself as a religious man in the service of God and his private meditations than thus to have busied himself in setting forward and qualifying it when he hath done so outragious a designment and do pray with all our hearts that neither we nor this Kingdom do ever fall into the hands of the Spaniards whose unspeakable cruelties in other Countries a worthy Catholick Bishop hath notably described to all posterity The same Mr. Parsons also together with his fellow Jesuit Mr. Creswell as men that pretend extraordinary love to their Country have written a large Volume against the said Proclamation wherein what malice and contempt can devise that might provoke her Majesty to indignation against us is there set out very skilfully they themselves well knowing that no other fruit or benefit could come unto us by that discourse except it were still to plague us Whilst the said Invasion was thus talked of and in preparation in Spain a shorter course was thought of if it might have had success Mr. Hesket was set on by the Jesuits 1592. or thereabouts with Father Parsons consent or knowledge to have stirred up the Earl of Derby to rebellion against her Highness Not long after good Father Holt and others with him perswaded an Irish man one Patrick Collen as he himself confessed to attempt the laying of his violent and villanous hands upon her Majesty Shortly after in the year 1593. that notable Stratagem was plotted the whole State knoweth by whom for Doctor Lopez the Queens Physician to have poysoned her for the which he was executed the year after This wicked designment being thus prevented by Gods providence the said traiterous Jesuit Holt and others did allure and animate one Yorke and Williams to have accomplished that with their bloody hands that the other purposed to have done with his poyson we mean her Majesties destruction Hereunto we might add the late villanous attempt 1599. of Edward Squire animated and drawn thereunto as he confessed by Walpole that pernicious Jesuit But we must turn again to Father Parsons whose turnings and doublings are such as would trouble a right good Hound to trace him For in the mean time that the said Traiters one after another were plotting and studying how best they might compass her Majesties death they cared not how nor by what means he the said Father Parsons so prevailed with the King as he attempted twice in two sundry years his new Invasion meaning to have proceeded therein not with such great preparation as he did at the first but only to have begun the same by taking some Port Westward toward which he came so far onward as Silley with his Fleet. At both which times God who still hath fought for her Majesty and this Realm did notably prevent him by such winds and tempests as the most of his Ships and men perished in the Sea as they were coming hitherward Furthermore the said good Father in the midst of all the said traiterous enterprises both at home and abroad devised and set forward by him and his Companions was plodding amongst his Papers and playing the Herald how if all his said wicked designments failed he might at the least intitle the King of Spain and consequently the Infanta his Daughter to the Crown and Kingdom of England To which purpose he framed and afterwards published
Christendom with their noise and clamours of the dreadful Persecutions in England that Great man thought it not below him to write this Apology for the Execution of Justice here and to shew how reasonable just and moderate the Proceedings of the State were considering the height and insolence of the provocations and this was published in several Languages and dispersed in the Courts of Princes to undeceive them as to all the false reports of the Romish Emissaries who have taken upon them that publick Character of the Popes Ambassadors to lye abroad for his and their own advantage 2. But after that by the means of Cardinal Allen and others they had endeavoured to blast the reputation of that Apology and after the death of that great Minister of State the Secular Priests did publish their Important Considerations wherein they assert the Truth of what was said in the Apologie and vindicate the Honour and Justice of the Penal Laws which is the second Treatise here published and printed according to their own Copy and which hath been so much concealed or bought up by those of that Religion that it hath been heard of by sew and seen by fewer Protestants 3. And lest any should say that all those dangerous Principles to Government are since his Majesties happy Restauration utterly disowned by them I have added a third Treatise printed by one of their own Religion 1662. which charges the Jesuitical Party so deep with those Principles and Practices as to make them uncapable of any Favour If other persons will pursue the same method in retrieving such considerable Treatises as these are they may do more service to our Church and Nation than by writing Histories themselves and I shall desire the late Apologist to set these Authors of his own Church against the petty Historians he so punctually quotes on all occasions And we have so much the more reason to consider these things since in a very late Treatise called the Bleeding Iphigenia the Irish Rebellion is defended by one of the Titular Bishops to be a just and holy War and seeing they still think it lawful what can we imagine then that they want but another occasion to do the same things THE EXECVTION OF JUSTICE IN ENGLAND For maintenance of Publick and Christian Peace c. IT hath been in all Ages and in all Countries a common usage of all offenders for the most part both great and small to make defence of their lewd and unlawful facts by untruths and by colouring and covering their deeds were they never so vile with pretences of some other causes of contrary operations or effects to the intent not only to avoid punishment or shame but to continue uphold and prosecute their wicked attempts to the full satisfaction of their disordered and malicious appetites And though such hath been the use of all Offenders yet of none with more danger than of Rebels and Traytors to their lawful Princes Kings and Countries Of which sort of late years are specially to be noted certain persons naturally born Subjects in the Realm of England and Ireland who having for some good time professed outwardly their obedience to their Soveraign Lady Queen Elizabeth have nevertheless afterward been stirred up and seduced by wicked Spirits first in England sundry years past and secondly and of latter time in Ireland to enter into open Rebellion taking Arms and coming into the Field against her Majesty and her Lieutenants with their Forces under Banners displayed inducing by notable untruths many simple people to follow and assist them in their Traitorous actions And though it is very well known that both their intentions and manifest actions were bent to have deposed the Queens Majesty from her Crown and to have traiterously set in her place some other whom they liked whereby if they had not been speedily resisted they would have committed great bloodsheds and slaughters of her Majesties faithful Subjects and ruined their native Country Yet by Gods power given unto her Majesty they were so speedily vanquished as some few of them suffered by order of Law according to their deserts many and the greatest part upon Confession of their faults were pardoned the rest but they not many of the principal escaped into Foreign Countries and there because in none or few places Rebels and Traitors to their natural Princes and Countries dare for their Treasons challenge at their first muster open comfort or succour these notable Traitors and Rebels have falsly informed many Kings Princes and States and specially the Bishop of Rome commonly called the Pope from whom they all had secretly their first comfort to Rebell that the cause of their flying from their Countries was for the Religion of Rome and for maintenance of the said Popes Authority Whereas divers of them before their Rebellion lived so notoriously the most part of their lives out of all good rule either for honest manners or for any sense in Religion as they might have been rather familiar with Catalin or Favourers to Sardanapalus than accounted good Subjects under any Christian Princes As for some examples of the heads of these Rebellions out of England fled Charles Nevill Earl of Westmerland a person utterly wasted by looseness of life and by Gods punishment even in the time of his Rebellion bereaved of his Children that should have succeeded him in the Earldom and how his Body is now eaten with Ulcers of lewd causes all his Companions do see that no Enemy he had can wish him a viler punishment And out of Ireland ran away one Thomas Stukeley a defamed person almost through all Christendom and a faithless Beast rather than a Man fleeing first out of England for notable Piracies and out of Ireland for treacheries not pardonable which two were the first Ringleaders of the rest of the Rebels the one for England the other for Ireland But notwithstanding the notorious evil and wicked lives of these and others their Confederates void of all Christian Religion it liked the Bishop of Rome as in favour of their Treasons not to colour their offences as themselves openly pretend to do for avoiding of common shame of the World but flatly to animate them to continue their former wicked purposes that is to take Arms against their lawful Queen to invade her Realm with Foreign Forces to pursue all her good Subjects and their Native Countries with Fire and Sword for maintenance whereof there had some years before at sundry times proceeded in a thundring sort Bulls Excommunications and other publick Writings denouncing her Majesty being the lawful Queen and Gods anointed Servant not to be the Queen of the Realm charging and upon pains of Excommunication commanding all her Subjects to depart from their natural Allegiances whereto by birth and by Oath they were bound Provoking also and authorising all persons of all degrees within both the Realms to Rebell and upon this Antichristian Warrant being contrary to all
the World at the length may bear us witness how much we detest them from our hearts and abhor them Whilst we had any hope that these Political Fathers as they joy to be termed would at the last have reclaimed themselves and grown more tractable and moderate in their designments against our Soveraign and Native Country we were silent in respect of the common Cause and very well content to undergo many inconveniences and miseries which we might have avoided as we are perswaded if we had sooner opened our selves and professed our said detestation of such their no way Priestly but very irreligious courses whereby the State hath been most justly irritated and provoked against us For when we consider on the one side what we know our selves concerning the Laws made of later years with the occasions of them and likewise as touching the proceedings of the State here since the beginning of her Majesties Reign as well against us that are Priests as also against other Catholicks of the Laity and do find on the other side what practices under the pretence of Religion have been set on foot for the utter subversion both of the Queen and of her Kingdom and therewith further call to mind what sundry Jesuits and men wholly for the time or altogether addicted to Jesuitism have written and published to the World in sundry Treatises not only against the said Laws and course of Justice but in like sort against her chief Counsellors and which exceedeth all the rest against the Royal person of her Majesty her Honour Crown and most Princely Scepter it may in our opinions be rather wondred that so many Catholicks of both sorts are left alive in the Realm to speak of the Catholick Faith than that the State hath proceeded with us from time to time as it hath done It may seem strange to some that these things should proceed from us that are Priests but divers of you can bear us witness that they are no new conceits bred in us by reason of the opposition we have with the Jesuits and besides no small number of Catholicks as we are perswaded have long expected this duty at your hands that thereby our Allegiance and Fidelity to our Queen and Country might be the better testified the hard opinion of us mitigated our actions and profession of duty better credited the cause we stand for more regarded and we our selves for our plain dealing and for the good of the Church might be the better reputed of and esteemed or at the least in some sort born with and tolerated as men that do distinguish between Religion and Treason We wish with all our hearts and groan every day at the contrary that her Majesty had continued in her obedience to the See Apostolick as Queen Mary her Sister of famous memory had left her a worthy Example but seeing that God for our sins would have it otherwise we ought to have carried our selves in another manner of course towards her our true and lawful Queen and towards our Country than hath been taken and pursued by many Catholicks but especially by the Jesuits And therefore as well to discharge our own consciences as to satisfie many of you of the moderater sort of Catholicks according to the old saying Better late than never we have thought it our parts being her Highness natural born Subjects to acknowledge the truth of the carriage of matters against us and the apparent causes of it that the blame may indeed from point to point light and lie where it ought to do and both sides bear no other than their own burthens as the Laws both of God and man do require If hereby her Majesty may in any sort be appeased and the State satisfied our own former courses bettered and the Realm secured that the like shall never hereafter be attempted or favoured by any of us but be revealed if we know them and withstood if they be enterprised with all our goods and our lives even to our uttermost ability be their pretences never so fair for Religion or what else can be devised we shall think our selves happy and will not regard what all the malice and spite of the Jesuits can work or effect against us It cannot be denied but that for the first ten years of her Majesties Reign the state of Catholicks in England was tolerable and after a sort in some good quietness Such as for their consciences were imprisoned in the beginning of her coming to the Crown were very kindly and mercifully used the state of things then considered Some of them were appointed to remain with such their friends as they themselves made choice of Others were placed some with Bishops some with Deans and had their diet at their Tables with such convenient Lodgings and Walks for their recreation as did well content them They that were in the ordinary Prisons had such liberty and other commodities as the places would afford not inconvenient for men that were in their cases But that our Brethren of the more fiery and Jesuitical humour may not snuff hereat we have thought it meet to cool their heat with some of Master Parsons and his Fellow Master Creswels more gentle delays than are usual with them who in one of their Books do confess as much in effect as here we have set down if not more thus these great Emperour-like Jesuits do speak to her Majesty In the beginning of thy Kingdom thou didst deal somthing more gently with Catholicks none were then urged by thee or pressed either to thy Sect or to the denial of their Faith All things indeed did seem to proceed in a far milder course no great complaints were heard of there were seen no extraordinary contentions or repugnancies Some there were that to please and gratifie you went to your Churches But when afterwards thou didst begin to wrong them c. And when was that our great Monseigneurs Surely whensoever it was to answer for you we our selves certain Catholicks of all sorts were the true causes of it For whilst her Majesty and the State dealt with the Catholicks as you have heard which was full eleven years no one Catholick being called in question of his life for his conscience all that time consider with us how some of our profession proceeded with them Her Highness had scarcely felt the Crown warm upon her head but it was challenged from her by some of her Neighbours as Master Saunders noteth The French were sent into Scotland to do somewhat you may be sure which concerned her Majesty the circumstances consisidered to look unto Afterwards certain matters were undertaken by her Majesty in France and the Affairs in Scotland did so proceed as that the Queen there was compelled 1567. to flie into England where for a great time she was very honourably entertained her liberty only excepted But with these matters what had we to do that were either Priests or private men If either France or Scotland had cause to
Christendom would like or tolerate any such Subjects within their Dominions if possibly they could be rid of them The duty we owe to our Soveraigns doth not consist in taciturnity or keeping close within our selves such Allegiance as we think sufficient to afford them but we are especially when we are required thereunto to make open profession of it that we may appear unto them to be such Subjects as we ought to be and as they may rely upon if either their Kingdoms or safeties be in hazard or danger And we greatly marvel that any Jesuits should be so hard laced concerning the performance of their duties towards the Fathers and Kings of those Countries where they were born and whose Vassals they are considering unto what obedience they tye themselves toward their own general provincial and other Governors unto whom they were no way tied but by their own consents and for that it hath pleased them voluntarily to submit themselves unto them If a quarrel should fall out for example betwixt the Jesuits and the Dominicans it would seem a very strange matter to the Provincial or General of that Society to be driven to be demanded of a Jesuit which part he would take But therewith we have not to intermeddle only we wish that whilst they look for so great subjection at those mens hands that be under them they do not forget their own Allegiance towards their Soveraigns or at the least so demean themselves as we poor men every way their equals and as sound Catholicks as themselves that we go no further may not be brought into hatred with her Majesty unto whom we profess all duty and true allegiance let other men qualifie the same as they list About the time of the overthrow of the Popes Forces in Ireland his Holiness by the false instigations of the Jesuits plotted with the King of Spain for the assistance of the Duke of Guise to enterprise upon the sudden a very desperate designment against her Majesty and for the delivery and advancement to the Crown of the Queen of Scotland For the better effecting whereof Mendoza the Jesuit and Ledger for the King of Spain in England set on work a worthy Gentleman otherwise one Mr. Francis Throckmorton and divers others And whilst the same was in contriving as afterwards Mr. Throckmorton himself confessed 1584. the said Jesuitical humor had so possessed the hearts of sundry Catholicks as we do unfeignedly rue in our hearts the remembrance of it and are greatly ashamed that any person so intituled should ever have been so extremely bewitched Two Gentlemen about that time also viz. Anno 1583. Mr. Arden and Mr. Somervile were convicted by the Laws of the Realm to have purposed and contrived how they might have laid violent hands upon her Majesties sacred person Mr. Somerviles confession therein was so notorious as it may not be either qualified or denied And Doctor Parry the very same year was plotting with Jesuits beyond the Seas how he might have effected the like villany How the worthy Earl of Northumberland was about this time brought into the said Plot of the Duke of Guise then still in hand we will pretermit Mr. Parsons that was an Actor in it could tell the story very roundly at Rome It wrought the noble Earls overthrow 1585. which may justly be ascribed to the Jesuitical practices of the Jesuit Mendoza and others of that crew Hereunto we might add the notable Treasons of Mr. Anthony Babington and his Complices in the year 1586. which were so apparent as we were greatly abashed at the shameless boldness of a young Jesuit who to excuse the said Traiters and qualifie their offences presumed in a kind of supplication to her Majesty to ascribe the plotting of all that mischief to Mr. Secretary Walsingham The treachery also of Sir William Standley the year following 1587. in falsifying his faith to her Majesty and in betraying the trust committed unto him by the Earl of Leicester who had given him the honourable Title of Knighthood as it was greatly prejudicial to us that were Catholicks at home so was the defence of that disloyalty made by a worthy man but by the perswasions as they think of Parsons greatly disliked of many both wise and learned And especially it was wondred at a while until the drift thereof appeared more manifestly in the year 1588. that the said worthy person by the said lewd Jesuits laid down this for a ground in justifying of the said Standley viz. That in all Wars which may happen for Religion every Catholick man is bound in conscience to imploy his person and forces by the Popes direction viz. How far when and where either at home or abroad he may and must break with his temporal Soveraign These things we would not have touched had they not been known in effect to this part of the World and that we thought it our duties to shew our own dislike of them and to clear her Majesty so far as we may from such imputations of more than barbarous cruelty towards us as the Jesuits in their writings have cast by heaps upon her they themselves as we still think in our consciences and before God having been from time to time the very causes of all the calamities which any of us have endured in England since her Majesties reign Which we do not write simply to excuse her Highness although we must confess we can be contented to endure much rather than to seek her dishonour but for that we think few Princes living being perswaded in Religion as her Majesty is and so provoked as she hath been would have dealt more mildly with such their Subjects all circumstances considered than she hath done with us But now we are come to the year 1588. and to that most bloody attempt not only against her Majesty and our common Enemies but against our selves all Catholicks nay against this flourishing Kingdom and our own native Country The memory of which attempt will be as we trust an everlasting Monument of Jesuitical Treason and Cruelty For it is apparent in a Treatise penned by the advice of Father Parsons altogether as we do verily think that the King of Spain was especially moved and drawn to that intended mischief against us by the long and daily solicitations of the Jesuits and other English Catholicks beyond the Seas affected and altogether given to Jesuitism And whereas it is well known that the Duke of Medina Sidonia had given it out directly that if once he might land in England both Catholicks and Hereticks that came in his way should be all one to him his Sword could not discern them so he might make way for his Master all was one to him yet the said Father Parsons for so we will ever charge him though another man by his crafty perswasion took upon him to be the Author of that Book did labour with all the Rhetorick he had to have perswaded us upon the supposed arrival of the
disloyalty be purged out My sixth To offer even your selves an advantage if your courage and cause will stretch to improve it For the following Doubts are many of them such as Protestants themselves urge against your Reasons and are communicated here to you partly on purpose that you may provide better satisfaction My last to satisfie even the passionate too is Because your unchristian spirit of Calumny is still as unquiet as ever having of late most unjustly aspersed Principal Persons of almost every Body but your own which comportment of yours makes it but fit if Truth and the Common Good favour you not neither should I. To think and declare thus much satisfies me if it do not others I cannot help it Only I wish your favourers to beware of doing any thing that may be interpreted an abetment of you till you approve your selves heartily loyal lest they discover themselves too deeply tainted with your Principles and temper The Jesuits Reasons Vnreasonable DOVBTS 1. TO begin then My first Doubt shall be Whether you Jesuits have ground to hope the same favour with others For if you by your unjust and wicked practices provoked the Magistrates to enact those Laws if the rest of Priests and Catholicks were by you plunged in such miseries upon discovery of your Negotiations which were imputed to the whole Body of them how can you be thought to deserve remission whose seditious Principles are too deeply guilty of the Blood of Priests and Catholicks shed in the Kingdom ever since you first came into it Those who know your practices in the Countries where you by the means ordinarily of deluded Wives govern the Great Ones know this to be your Maxime to manage Religion not by perswasion but by command and force This Principle did your chief Apostle of England Robert Parsons bring in with him His first endeavours were to make a List of Catholicks which under the conduct of the Duke of Guise should have changed the state of the Kingdom using for it the pretence of the Title of Queen Mary of Scotland But her Council at Paris which understood business better were so sensible of his boldness that they took from him the Queens Cypher which he had purloyned and commanded him never more to meddle in Her affairs Poor Edmund Campian who is generally accounted an innocent and learned man and others suffered for such practices of his Parson's endeavours being suppressed by this Queen he turned himself to the Spaniard and with all his might fostered the Invasion of Eighty eight which is known to have been another occasion of Sanguinary Laws He wrote on that occasion his Dolman to justifie the Spaniards Title to England degrading the Scottish succession and Title of our Soveraign He wrote also Leicester's Common-wealth at that time called commonly Blewcoat because it was sent into England bound in blew paper which extremely exasperated the State and augmented its indignation against Catholicks The same man at Queen Elizabeths death procured a Bull from the Pope to the Catholicks in England against King James to hinder his coming to the Crown unless he would give liberty of Conscience and as his friends gave out had twenty thousand men listed for that effect had not his Majesty prevented the danger with sweet words Next followed that detestable Machination of blowing up that Royal Race and the whole Nobility with the House of Commons which was the occasion of the Oath of Allegiance and all the Persecution of Catholicks following upon it King James professing not to persecute for Religion but for Treason This you alledge not to be originally your Invention but is it no guilt to follow another mans wickedness when it leads to so horrid a crime For without doubt both by prayers before-hand and by publick testifications after the Fact was discovered you were highly accessary to it nay many years after you did and peradventure to this very day still do pertinaciously adhere to it I could urge great and manifest instances of this were it not to lose time That monstrous Straw of which all Christendom rung so long and the Pictures of Garnet and Oldcorne cannot be denied nor want they evidence of your inward minds After these came out the ridiculous and satyrical Books against King James the Corona Regia and the Quaeries And yet your so well affected spirits could not be at rest till your Patriarch Parsons was shamefully turned out of Rome by Monsieur Bethunes the French Ambassador and order from the King of France being discovered to plot a new Treason against his Country to introduce the Duke of Parma Thus you followed King James to his death Direct Treason against King Charles of glorious memory before the Wars I cannot accuse you of but how refractory you were to the Queens desires and orders at Rome for his late Majesties assistance is well known and what you have done since the beginning of the Wars and how you have behaved your selves both in and out of England is fitter for me to remit to his Majesty and the Courts Informations than to eâ—gage my pen in far fewer and weaker which I could produce Only I shall add this word If Colonel Hutchinson were well examined and pressed he would perhaps discover â—â—â—ange secrets about your treating with Cromwel no doubt much to his Majesties advantage So that leaving you this Doubt to ruminate upon whether the condition of them who have guiltily provoked and deserved the Sanguinary Laws be the same with theirs who have suffered for being mistaken to be their Fellows I proceed to 2. My Second Doubt about your first Reason That the Jesuits are free-born Subjects as well as others In which methinks I find one of your usual sleights of Equivocation For a Jesuit may signifie the man who is a Jesuit and may signifie with the complexion of being a Jesuit In the former sense there is no difference between any other Priest Regular or Secular and a Jesuit as to free-born but in the second there 's a wide one For the others have nothing against them but such Laws as had their beginning from difference in Religion their degrees and communities having been accepted by the Laws of the Kingdom in virtue of which they are free-born Subjects and parts of the Common-wealth as far as difference of Religion permits Now it being the Law of England that no Ecclesiastical Community may settle here unless admitted by the Civil Power as we see in proportion practised in all Catholick Estates and Jesuits never having participated of this favour all your practices of usurping Jurisdiction making Colledges and Provinces in or for England possessing your selves of great sums of monies for such ends and the like actions have been hitherto all usurpations unlawful both in respect of the Donors and Acceptors 'T is unlawful for any man even according to the sense and practice of Catholick times by virtue of your priviledges to live or preach in England or any of his Majesties
have added that Clause that None in the Church but you were bound under pain of Damnation not to teach that Doctrine whereas all good Christians think it damnable to teach any wicked Doctrine such as this is declared to be by all France I wish to God you would instance in what Sermons or serious Discourses any of you have argued against this Doctrine out of which it might be gathered that in your hearts you dislike it I hear you and yours have much exclaimed against some even late Pamphlets that touch the Oath of Allegiance though none of those Books as far as I understand press the taking of the Oath it self in its present terms but only oppose this King-dethroning Doctrine Surely unless you declare your selves farther this must cause a main suspicion that you dislike the Oath not as Moderate Catholicks do for the ambiguity of the expression but because the Doctrine of Deposition pleases you And why should the Peace of Kingdoms and the quiet of all Christendom depend upon your Generals Order for that 's all the security I can find your Paper gives us who will assure us your Generals Order may not alter to morrow and that which you call now a mortal sin to do becomes then as mortal a sin not to do and has not then the World reason to fear that where and when the interest of your Body will either dispense with your obedience to your General or prevail so far with him as to revoke the Prohibition you speak of you will be ready again to maintain the same Deposing Power with as much fierceness as those few whom you now seem to disowne For who are those few Bellarmine of whom one of your Society though in Prison when he spake it said King James was no more to be compared to Bellarmine than Balaams Ass to Balaam Suarez whom you esteem the Master of the World Lessius under the name of Singleton Fitzherbert the chief in his time of your English Writers Patriarch Parsons Mariana Salmeron Becanus Vasquez Omnes Capita alta ferentes and of whom you will renounce none for less than being frightned to lose a Province as when in France you were threatned to be put out if you had not condemned Suarez and Santarellus With these deserves to be ranked for his Merits in the same kind F. Symonds of a far later date who procured to be condemned at Rome those three Propositions expressed in the Christian Moderator of which the first was expresly made to disclaim the Popes power in absolving Subjects from their Obedience to the Civil Government Are all these but four or five Nay I could reckon above four or five besides all these so that there is no farther security of your not preaching this Doctrine than until the Pope please to attempt again the Deposition of some King of England for then no doubt but your Generals Decree will be released and the Interest of your Order to preach this Doctrine again As to that perverse and unseasonable insinuation that Others too have defended the Popes deposing power as well as you I answer perhaps Flattery or Errours may have prevailed so far with some others besides Jesuits yet with this difference in the point we now treat some persons of other Communities have written for that exorbitant power in the Pope and very many and far more against it not only the faculties of Paris and Sorbonne but seven or eight whole Universities in France have unanimously and solemnly condemned it All this while what single Jesuit has spoken one unkind word against it though both particularly suspected and highly concerned to clear themselves Cry you mercy you there subscribed also their Condemnation of it But why find I not that alledged here if there be not some juggle in 't Sure you would not have waved urging it among your best Reasons did not your hearts disavow that forced compliance then and so hate the Medium for the Conclusions sake Your Generals Prohibition as your Reasons seem to express it is Not to teach c. that Doctrine and then you are free at least to teach c. the contrary which who of you ever did so much as in a private Conference Nor will it help you if your Generals Prohibition be to speak either for or against that Opinion which I believe is the truth though your Reasons craftily dissemble it since then you neither have hitherto given nor can hereafter give the least satisfaction to Princes without disobeying your General Let any one but cast his eye upon F. Lloyd or Fisher a famous man in his generation and consider what he writes in his Answer to the Nine Points That he omitted the discussion of the Ninth Point about the Pope's Authority to depose Kings for being bound by the command of his General given to the whole Order not to publish any thing of that Argument without sending the same first to Rome to be reviewed and approved his Answer to that Point could not have been performed without very long expectation and delay And so goes on referring His Majesty and the Reader in general to the Treatises lately written on that Subject to which said he ' T is not needful any thing should be added And I ask first is not this Jesuits proceeding with his King extremely both uncivil and disloyal too his Majesty commands an English Jesuit to write concerning the Opinion of deposing Kings and giving away their Kingdoms by Papal power whether directly or indirectly What says the Jesuit to this important question wherein all Princes and particularly his Majesty was so nearly concerned He could not answer it without sending it first to Rome to be approved c. and so excused himself and made no answer at all which now of these two will you guess was the Jesuits supreme Soveraign the King or his General Nor should I have stayed so long upon the example of one particular Jesuit though never so eminent among them but that by these their Reasons I see they all cleave to the same Principle of not meddling with this point whatever it costs them without leave of their General Secondly I ask concerning those late Treatises here mentioned by the Jesuit were they not those very Books which Paris and so many whole Universities of France publickly condemned I have this motive to think so F. Fisher wrote this Book 1626. these Treatises were that very year condemned and some of them as Santarellus printed but the year before But that F. Fisher adhered to the affirmative of the Popes deposing power is clearly evident by his other excuse that commonly Kings are not willing to hear the proofs of coercive Authority over them c. As also when his Adversary objected that Suarez's Book was burnt by the Hangman he answers far from disliking his Brother Jesuit in these peremptory words I likewise demand of you says Fisher if Jesuit Suarez his Book be prejudicial to Princely Authority why is the same
Dignities by which the Pope may win the affection of other Church-men Concerning which I first inquire whether this be roundly true I doubt you 'd be loth to reject all the Abbeys and Benefices annexed to your Colledges to verifie this Vow as you have set it down in your Paper and therefore the effect of your Vow is only that private men may not be alienated from your Order with hope of quiet lives in such Benefices and not the contempt of the Power and Honour following it as is sufficiently testified by another Vow of yours which is that if any of yours for special reasons be made Bishop he shall be bound to be subject to the Provincial or Rector of the place of his Residence and to take their advice in the government of his Church which you extend as far as to Cardinals to a capacity of which Eminent Dignity notwithstanding your special Vow your Dispensations easily reach So that your Vow is no Religious one of despising Honours but a politick abuse mask'd under the veil of Religion that the abler men of your Order may not be separated from it and so the Body may remain the stronger and your General more potent to resist the Pope himself Neither does this any way diminish but increase your dependence on the Pope both because 't is by him your Houses are furnisht with Benefices and those never to return to the Popes Donation as because you oblige your Friends by procuring others for them you being at his elbow to suggest this or that friend on whom all his Benefices may be conferred by which means you get the endearment due to the Pope from those Friends to the increase of your own power and riches and your selves still find out new pretended necessities to beg more So that this Holy Vow of yours no ways makes you less subject to the Pope but to suck his paps the harder as those know who have seen what passed in France and Flanders these late years especially under the Archduke Leopold 10. Yet have I another Doubt concerning this Vow of yours viz. Whether it does not make you as refractory to Kings and Princes as to the Pope For to speak truth whatever the Right is in other Countries in England where the Canons and Concordates with the Pope have been out of use a hundred years and by consequence have no force even in your own Doctors opinions and therefore things are to be governed by Nature and Reason at least in England I say all such Benefices and Collations belong more to the King than to the Pope For it being clear that the Offices to which Benefices are annexed are to be provided of able men and who are able men none can tell that understand not the Office 't is plain that Secular Clergy-men ought to be the chusers of Officers of their kind Regulars of Regular Superiors and by consequence the Donors of such Benefices But the people first got an influence on the chusing of Bishops because 't was rationally believed those would be able to do most good who were in the peoples good liking But when Bishops grew to have great Revenues and to be esteemed men of so high Quality in the Common-wealth the Emperors and Kings began to cast an eye on their Election and not without reason for it concerns them that none be in eminent places but such as they are secured of will breed no disturbance in the Common-wealth After this if any Clergy-man had done the King service he found it the best way of recompence to cause him to be chosen into a place of Authority and Eminency The Popes title to the giving of Benefices began by his Office of Patriach of the West which since the Council of Nice he more narrowly looked to the government of exhorting and correcting by Letters such Bishops and Churches there as did not their duties And this held till Pepin found how efficacious the reverence of the Pope was to make him obeyed and accepted for King of France Since which time whether for Ambition or for security sake men began to think no Act firm unless it were ratified at Rome In times following the Popes began to have need of Christian Princes and these found it the sweetest way to help the Popes by granting imposition upon the Clergy So came the first-fruits to the Popes and to assure those Incomes the custom of having Bulls from Rome to confirm the Elections of the Clergy was likewise introduced So that this Authority of the Popes comes from the Princes Agreements with them and not from any Superiority or Power of the Popes Wherefore these Agreements being by time and essential changes annulled all giving of Benefices belong to the Chusers and the King I come now to the close If your renouncing of Benefices make you less subject to the Pope as you pretend it makes you in England less subject to the King And if it makes you more hardly rewardable and more pressing on the Pope it will make you the like to Kings As in Leopold's time you were so wholly the means for coming to Benefices that hardly a command from Spain could take place for any that was not your Confident 11. My Eleventh Doubt is how you answer your banishment out of France and Venice viz. that Both these States have repealed their Acts. Which answer makes nothing to this that you either did not deserve the sentence or deserved to have it released one of which any judicious man would have expected at your hands Now to come to particulars the Venetians were so resolute against you that they made it Treason for any of their State so much as to motion your return and refused divers Princes intercessions for you Till their case reducing them to fear the slavery of the Turk if they had not the Popes assistance promised them largely if they would re-admit you they rather chose to struggle with your Treasons at home than admit the Barbarians conquest of their Dominions Whether they have cause to repent or not I know not But the current news at this present is that the Pope who procured your admittance has having found you so unfaithful to him notwithstanding all his love to you insomuch that he 's about question you by what means you are so suddenly raised to so great wealth wherein I fear he 'l not find obedience so ready as he found flattery when he was to pleasure you Your measure in France was indeed hard the fault being not proved to be universal but particular and so in divers places was never executed and easie to be repealed having proceeded more out of presumption than proof But your case in England is far different your whole English Congregation following their Head Parsons and maintaining his Acts even since his Death 12. My Twelfth Doubt is concerning your conclusion Whether you intend to mend what hitherto you have done amiss or rather to persist in your Equivocations and Dissimulations
bethink your selves well of this Dilemma If your solicitings stop the progress of the Act how will you be hated as guilty of the continuance of those Sanguinary Laws if your endeavours do not stop it how will you be both hated for attempting it and scorned for miscarrying in 't FINIS All Offenders cover their faults with contrary causes Rebels do most dangerously cover their faults Rebellion in England and Ireland The Rebels vanquished by the Queens Power Some of the Rebels fled into other Countries Rebels pretend Religion for their defence Ringleaders of Rebels Charls Nevill Earl of Westmer land and Thomas Stukeley The effect of the Popes Bull against the Queen of England The practises of the Traitors Rebels and Fugitives to execute the Bull. Seminaries erected to nurse seditious Fugitives The Seminary Fugitives come secretly into the Realm to induce the people to obey the Popes Bull. Sowers of sedition taken convented and executed for Treason The seditious Traitors Condemned by the antient Laws of the Realm made 200. years past Persons Condemned spared from Execution upon refusal of their treasonable opinions The Foreign Traitors continue sending of persons to move sedition in the Realm The Seditious Fugitives labour to bring the Realm into a War external and domestical The duty of the Queen and all her Governours to God and their Country is to repel practices of Rebellion None charged with capital Crimes being of a contrary Religion and professing to withstand Foreign Forces Names of divers Ecclesiastical persons professing contrary Religion never charged with capital Crimes The late Favourers of the Popes Authority were the chief Adversaries of the same by their Doctrines and Writings A great number of Lay persons of livelyhood being of a contrary Religion never charged with capital Crime No person charged with capital Crime for the only maintenance of the Popes Supremacy Such Condemned only for Treason as maintain the effects of the Popes Bull against her Majesty and the Realm Dr. Sanders maintenance of the Popes Bull. The persons that suffered Death were Condemned for Treason and not for Religion A full proof that the maintainers of the Bull are directly guilty of Treason Dr. Mortons secret Ambassage from Rome to stir the Rebellion in the North. Persons and Campion are offenders as Dr. Sanders is for allowance of the Bull. Faculties granted to Persons and Campion by Pope Gregory 13. Anno 1580. Harts Confession of the interpretation of the Bull of Pius Quintus A Conclusion that all the infamous Books against the Queen and the Realm are false Difference of the small numbers that have been executed in the space of five and twenty years from the great numbers in five years of Queen Maries Reign An Advertisement to all princes of Countries abroad The Authority claimed by the Pope not warranted by Christ or by the two Apostles Peter and Paul Pope Hildebrand the first that made War against the Emperor An. Dom. 1074. The Judgement of God against the Popes false erected Emperour Pope Gregory the Seventh deposed by Henry IV. Henry 5. Frederick 1. Frederick 2. Lewis of Banar Emperours Whatsoever is alwful for other Princes Soveraigns is lawful for the Queen and Crown of England The Title of universal Bishop is a Preamble of Antichrist Rome sacked and the Pope Clement taken Prisoner by the Emperors Army 1550. King Henry the Second of France his Edicts against the Pope and his Courts of Rome The besieging of Rome and the Pope by the Duke of Alva with King Philips Army Queen Mary and Cardinal Pool resisted the Pope D. Peyto a begging Fryer The Kings of Christendom never suffer the Popes to abridge their Titles or Rights though they suffer them to have rule over their People The Queen of England may not suffer the Pope by any means to make Rebellions in her Realm Additaments to the Popes Martyrologe The strange ends of James Earl of Desmond D. Saunders James Fitzmorice John of Desmond John Somervile The prosperity of England during the Popes curses Reasons to perswade by reason the Favourers of the Pope that none hath bin executed for Religion but for Treason The first reason The second reason The 〈◊〉 Pius Qâ—â—â—â—â—… set up at Pauls The first punishment for the Bull. The third reason Rebellion in the North. The fourth reason The Invasion of Ireland by the Pope The Popes Forces vanquished in Ireland The Politick Adversaries satisfied Objection of the Papists that the persons executed are but Scholars and unarmed Many are Traiters though they have no Armor nor Weapon The Application of the Scholastical Traiters to others that are Traiters without Armor Six Questions to try Traiters from Scholars The offenders executed for Treason not for Religion Unreasonable and obstinate persons are left to Gods Judgment Saunders Morton Web c.