so much about and of which he glories so much up and down his Writings These Seminaries were the Nurseries of the Conspiracies and Treasons which were from time to time set on foot and carried on against the Queen and Realm of England and Father Parson 's whole Life from his leaving the Mission in England appears to me to have been one continued Act of Treason against his Natural Queen and Native Country To mention some of his Treasons that are come to light he was very grateful to the Duke of Guise whom he had perswaded to set up a Seminary in France for the English that should come thither for with him he conspires against his own Queen how to depose her and set up in her room Popery and the Queen of Scots He endeavoured for this purpose as we are told 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 that her Council at Paris which understood business better were so sensible of his boldness that they took from him the Queen's Cypher which he had purloyned and commanded him never more to meddle in her affairs But notwithstanding these People would not let our Father Parsons have any thing further to do in those treasons which were really carried on at that time for the Queen of Scots yet he pretended to mighty merit upon her and her Son's Account in his Letter to Father Chreyton the Jesuit telling him how many long and tedious journeys he had taken for their sakes and how much Mony he had procured for them at one time twenty four thousand Crowns from the King of Spain at another time the same summ and from Pope Gregory XIII four thousand Crowns he confesses indeed that things had not succeeded for them as he had wished but wonders that any body should make him to be an Enemy to the King of Scots who had been so very serviceable to him and his Mother I suppose Father Parsons was disgusted at this sleighting of his faithful services to the Queen of Scots by her Ministers and to be revenged of her and them betakes himself wholly into the Spanish Interest which he espoused so far as not only to sollicite and encourage their open attempts by Invasion against England but after the ill success of that to set up their sham Title to the Kingdom of England He and Cardinal Allen whom Parsons had by his Interest with the King of Spain procured to be made a Cardinal two Brethren in iniquity were mighty forward for the famous Spanish Invasion in 1588. and to make it more successful wrote in defence of it a Tract which Allen was perswaded to own though Parsons had as great if not a greater hand in it than himself In this Admonition to the Nobility and People of England the Queen's Government is called impious and unjust her self an Usurper obstinate and impentinent and it is affirmed that for this reason Pope Sixtus Quintus moved by his own and his Predecessors zeal and the vehement desire of some principal Englishmen had used great diligence with divers Princes especially with the Spanish King to use all his force that she might be turned out of her Dominions and her Adherents punished for a great many Reasons there laid together after which it proceeds thus Wherefore seeing these Offences some of them rendring her uncapable of the Kingdom others unworthy to live his Holiness by the power of God and the Apostles reneweth the Censures of Pius V. and Gregory XIII against her excommunicates and deprives her of all Royal Dignity Titles Rights and Pretences to England and Ireland declares her Illegitimate and an Usurper of the Kingdoms and absolves all her Subjects from their Obedience and Oaths of Allegiance due to her And expressly commands All under pain and penalty of God's Wrath to yield her no obedience aid or favour whatsoever but to employ all their power against her and to joyn themselves with the Spanish Forces who will not hurt the Nation nor alter their Laws or Priviledges only punish the wicked Hereticks And by the same Presents it was declared not only lawful but commendable to lay hands on the said Usurper and other her Adherents for doing of which they should be well rewarded And lastly to all these Roman Assistants is liberally granted a plenary Indulgence and Remission of all their Sins But this unerring Thunderbolt as well as the Spanish Invincible Armado did very shamefully miscarry to the no small disappointment of our good Father Parsons who was not discouraged at that defeat though a worse Man than himself if any such could be would have seen the Finger of God plainly in it but labours with the King of Spain a while after for a second Invasion and after that for a third plotting and devising all ways to bring the King of Spain to it and the Papists of England both those at home and the fugitives abroad to joyn and assist the King of Spain in it but all his pains was lost about these Invasions from abroad and therefore he next sets himself to raise a Rebellion in England it self and deals with Ferdinand Earl of Derby to appear in and â—ead it which because he declined to do he was poysoned by Father Hesketh's procurement who had been sent to him by Father Parsons But failing here also of the desired success the poor Father was now at a loss what to do with this Kingdom of England and since he saw all miscarried that he had plotted against Queen Elizabeth who descended to her Grave full of years and honour his next business was to keep out King James who was a Protestant also from succeding her For this purpose he wrote his Doleman or Conference about the next Succession to the Crown of England the chief design of which was to exclude the Scotch Title as well the Lady Arabella's as King James's and to set up the Spanish Infanta I know Mr. Camden will have Cardinal Allen and Sir Francis Inglefield to have their shares in this Book but Cardinal d'Ossat who had far better opportunities of finding out the Author makes it to be Parson's own and in one of his Letters to the King of France gives that King an account of it wherein he gives our Jesuit the true Character he deserved of being a fellow that regarded neither truth nor reason One thing I cannot but remark here that though this Jesuit had the Impudence to meddle in these matters and to set up forged Titles against the Royal Line of Scotland yet when King James contrary to their Popish designs as well as Expectations did quietly succeed to the Crown of England he had the greater Impudence to deny his ever intending to exclude that King this is in the Preface to his Three Conversions of England added upon the news of the Queens Death and
Succession of the King of Scotland to the Crown of England And as for the person says he to the English Catholicks now advanced I know most certainly that there was never any doubt or difference among you but that ever you desired his advancement above all others as the only Heir of that renowned Mother for whom your fervent zeal is known to the World and how much you have suffered by her adversaries for the same Yet do I confess that touching the disposition of the person for the place and manner of his advancement all zealous Catholicks have both wished and prayed that he might first be a Catholick and then our King this being our bounded duty to wish and his greatest good to be obtained for him And to this end and no other I assure my self hath been directed whatsoever may have been said written or done by any Catholick which with some others might breed disgust Thus the Jesuit thought to pacifie King James's Court by a piece of Impudence to be met with only in a Jesuit whoever will be at the pains to compare Parson's Doleman with this Preface cannot but declare him to be the greatest Villain that ever set Pen to Paper and to have lost all sense of Modesty Truth and Justice Amidst these his Projects for the Spanish Interest he had hopes upon the death of Cardinal Allen to be made by the Spanish Interest a Cardinal for England and there was set about in Flanders by Holt the Jesuit and Worthington a Petition to the King of Spain for that purpose subscribed by the Common Soldiers Labourers Artizans and Pensioners nay Scullions and Laundresses as well as by those of better rank and quality Upon this Father Parsons makes haste out of Spain to Rome to hinder it as the Jesuits say for him when he came thither upon a day set him he waited on the Pope and acquainted him how the City was full of the discourse of his being shortly to be made a Cardinal and that Spain and Flanders rung with it too and therefore begged of him that he would not think of making him a Cardinal who might be more serviceable in the condition he was now in to the affairs of England The Pope told him That the King of Spain had not written a syllable to him about any such thing and that he must not mind foolish Reports and bid him go and mind his studies I cannot but think that this neglect in the King of Spain lost him Father Parsons who soon after though he could not leave of plotting went on other designs four of which he seems to have had on foot together for the Exclusion of King James from the Crown of England The most improbable one was that of the Peoples rising and setting up a popular Government he had furnished them with Principles in several of his Books for this purpose In the Second and Third he dealt with the Pope either about making if his Purse and Interest were large enough his Kinsman the Duke of Parma King or in joyning with the Lady Arabella's Interest and marrying her to the Duke's Brother the Cardinal Farnese whom he had made upon the death of Cardinal Cajetan Protector of England thereby to ingratiate him with the Clergy and Laity of this Kingdom Cardinal d'Ossat gives a very large account of both these Projects in the Letter whcih I have already quoted to the King of France And in another of his Letters he gives an account of the fourth Project wherein he himself had been dealt with by Parsons then Rector of the College of Jesuits at Rome which was that the Pope the King of France and King of Spain should agree among themselves of a Successor for England that should be a Catholick and that they should joyn their Forces to settle him in the Throne of England Thus we see how Plotting and Treason was the whole business of this Jesuit's Life in which he was so notorious that Pasquin set him forth thus at Rome If there be any Man that will buy the Kingdom of England let him repair to a Merchant in a black square Cap in the City and he shall have a very good penniworth thereof While he thus filled his head with designs and hopes of a Popish Prince to be set up in England by some of these foreign Princes it was that he drew up the following Memorial for that his Prince his Directions to whom are like his other Counsels and Actions I will trouble the Reader with no more of his History As I take the Jesuits to be the very worst of Men so I think the preceeding accounts have proved Father Parsons to be the very worst of Jesuits A MEMORIAL OF THE REFORMATION of ENGLAND CONTAINING Certain Notes and Advertisements which seem might be proposed in the First Parliament and National Council of our Country after God of his mercy shall restore it to the Catholick Faith for the better Establishment and Preservation of the said Religion Gathered and set-down by R.P. 1596. THE PREFACE OF THE AUTHOR SHEWING How and why these Notes were gathered and the principal Parts to be treated THE Notes and Observations of this Memorative following were gathered and laid together in time of Persecution when there was no place to execute or put them in ure and it is no more than seventeen or eighteen Years past that the Gatherer began first to put some of them in writing and having had the experience of the Years which have ensued since and his part also in the Catholic affairs of his Country and the Practice of divers other Catholic Nations abroad he was desirous in case that himself should not live to see the desired day of the Reduction of England yet some of his Cogitations and Intentions for the publick good thereof might work some effect after his Death and that thereby other Men might be the sooner moved to enter into more mature Considerations of these and such like Points yea and also to descend unto many more particulars than here are set down For that the Gatherer's meaning was only to open the way and to insinuate certain general and principal Heads that might serve for an awaking and remembrance at that happy day of the Conversion of our Country unto such Persons as shall be then able and desirous to further the common good and to advance Almighty God's Glory with a Holy Zeal of perfect Reformation who perhaps may be so entangled with multitudes of other business and Cogitations at that time as they will not so easily enter into these except they be put in mind thereof by some such Memorials and Advertisements as here are touched And what is said in this Treatise for the Kingdom of England is meant also for Ireland so far as it may do good seeing the Author desireth as much benefit for God's Service and the good of that Nation to the one Country as to the other And for that the principal
began to be Christians and to subject themselves also to this Spiritual Government and Jurisdiction of Souls and to be Sheep of these Spiritual Pastors among the rest they were admitted without detriment or diminution of their Temporal State and Government so far forth as it concerned the Temporal good of the Commonwealth which is Peace Wealth Justice and the like but yet so as they should not meddle or challenge power in the Spiritual Jurisdiction of Souls but be subject therein and leave that Government to Clergy-men and Spiritual Governors appointed by Christ and put in authority for that purpose long before Temporal Princes came to be converted as hath been declared And therefore came the distinction of Spiritual Governors and Temporal Governors of Clergy-men and Lay-men of Christian Pastors and Christian Sheep in which number of Christian Sheep and Subjects all Princes of the World are to be accounted in respect of their Souls and in all points appertaining thereunto and in respect of their Spiritual Pastors And albeit here in this life among Flesh and Blood where matters of this World and Life present are more respected commonly being present and the object to our Senses than Spiritual matters are of the life to come which are not seen but believed only though I say the external shew power and terror of Temporal Princes be much more respected reverenced and feared than is the authority of Priesthood or Jurisdiction of Spiritual Governors yet in themselves there is no comparison as by the reasons before alledged doth evidently appear but that the authority of Priesthood is much more great high and worthy and more principal and ancient in the Church of Christ for that it was before the other many Years and is over and above the other and that so far forth as St. Paul in his first Epistle and fourth Chapter to the Corinthians hath these words If you have secular Judgments among you appoint for Judges the contemptible that be in the Church of Christ for that function which yet I speak saith he to your shame for that none of the wiser sort among you do end or take up these temporal strifes but one Christian accuseth another and that before secular Tribunals even of Infidel Princes Christ himself when he was requested to judge between two Brothers in a Temporal matter he refused the same as also fled when the People would have made him a Temporal King and finally he said his Kingdom was not of this World which was not to disallow or contemn Judgment or Temporal authority of this World or that he was not in truth most lawful King also of this World being the Judge Author and Creator thereof but all this was to shew the small account he made of all this Temporal power in respect of the power Spiritual over Souls which properly he came to exercise and to plant and settle in the Church after him unto which all Kings and Emperors that would be saved should subject themselves and their Sceptres as we read that our Great Constantine before named and first Christian Emperor of the World did and after him the most renouned of the rest as Valentinian the two Theodosius's Justinian Charles the great and others in the occasions that were offered did humble themselves unto their Pastors and Governors of Christ's Church shewing themselves thereby to be the true Nurses and Foster-Fathers of Christ's Church which Isaiah the Prophet had foretold should come and succeed in Temporal Christian Kingdoms and Monarchies And yet by this did they not lose or diminish one jot of Temporal authority height or Majesty but rather did greatly confirm and increase the same for that Spiritual Pastors and Governors of Souls do teach and command all due reverence and obedience to be done in Temporal matters to Temporal Princes and do exhibit the same also themselves and do punish the contrary by Spiritual and everlasting punishments as well as by the Temporal upon such as are wicked or rebellious therein so as both these Governments joyned together in a Christian Commonwealth and one not disdaining or emulating the other but honouring rather respecting and assisting the same all goeth well both for the Temporal and everlasting felicity of all And such as do set division betwixt these two States are very Instruments of Sathan such as are the Hereticks Politicks Atheists and other seditious People of our days And for that in no other Country of the World whilest ours flourished hath there been more union love honour and respect born betwixt these two Orders of Spiritual and Temporal Men than in England as may appear even to this day by the many Temporal Honours Prerogatives and Dignities given to our Clergy in the Parliament and other Temporal affairs and that the Emulation and breach between the same enkindled and set on by the Devil and wicked Men hath been a principal cause of the ruine both to Country and both Parts that were Catholick in times past as hath been said and seen for this cause I thought it not amiss to speak somewhat more largely of the matter in this place and by this occasion having mentioned the same in divers other places of this Memorial before as a matter of no small importance to be throughly remedied and reformed at the next change if God say Amen which remedy will be if the Clergy considering their high Vocation and Estate be not proud thereof nor ambitious but endeavour to conform their lives to so great worthiness of their Profession And if Lay-men on the other side considering the very same to wit the dignity and reverence due to such as have Jurisdiction and Government over their Souls and must open and shut the Gates of Heaven unto them do not malign and envy their Estate as miserable Chore Dathan and Abiron did but do seek rather to profit themselves thereby and willingly joyn with them to the procuring their own and other Men's Salvations And this is so much as is needful to be spoken in this place of the Laity or Temporalty in general for that afterward there will be place to speak of all particularities that shall occur in the several Chapters that shall ensue CHAP. II. Of the Prince and his Council and matters belonging to them AS the Prince in every Commonwealth is the Head and Heart from whence all life and vigour principally cometh unto the same so above all other things is it of importance that he be well affected and disposed and so much the more in England above other Countries by how much greater and eminent his authority is and power with the People more than in divers other places by which means it hath come to pass that England having had more store of holy Kings in ancient times than many other Countries together came to have Religion and Piety more abundantly settled by their means than divers Realms about them and on the contrary side her Kings and Princes of later years having
been perverted by dissolution of Life and Heresie they have brought her into more misery infamy and confusion within the compass of few years than all other Christian Kingdoms round about us together Wherefore the principal help and hope next under God which our poor afflicted Country hath or may have of her redress is by means of her good Catholick Prince that God of his Mercy shall vouchsafe to give us who also considering the great work whereunto he is called shall in no wise be able better to satisfie his Obligation and Duty to God and the Expectation of all good Men and to assure his own Possession and Estate than to make account that the security of himself his Crown and Successor dependeth principally of the assurance and good establishment of the Catholick Roman Religion within his Kingdom and whatsoever is done or permitted against this Religion is not only against Jesus Christ our Saviour and his Spouse his Catholick Church but also against every Catholick Prince as his supream Minister and much more against the King of England as things do now stand both for Religion and Estate First of all then is to be recommended with all humility and earnest suit unto his Majesty that shall be established the singular care and holy zeal of restoring perfectly the Catholick Religion in our Realm and to employ his whole endeavour and authority therein and to concur and assist with his Princely favour and special Protection all such Men as principally shall labour therein and above other the Council of Reformation the Prelates Preachers and Clergy of his Realm and by example of his own Royal Person in frequenting the Holy Sacraments and other pious Actions of Religion and Devotion to animate all other his Subjects and foreign Princes also and Countries about him to whom he will in these our times be a remarkable mirrour to imitate the same and this for his own Person But concerning his Majesty's Council both in Spiritual and Temporal affairs it will import also exceeding much that he make choice of fit and worthy persons And for the first which is in matters concerning conscience the pious custom of some Catholick Kings and namely those of Portugal in times past is greatly to be commended who besides their Temporal Council had also another of learned Spiritual Men named the Table of Conscience in taking any thing in hand and execution of the same And for this Council they were wont to make choice as I have said of some number of eminent and learned Men and also notorious for their Piety and good Consciences whether they were of Religious Orders or no and the head or chief of these commonly the King 's own Confessor who might with more security by council and assistance of these able Men direct the King's mind with safety of Conscience And whatsoever Prince shall take this course no doubt but he shall find great help light comfort security and quietness of Mind thereby And as for the World abroad it must needs be a singular great justification of all his acts intention and attempts in the eyes and tongues of all Men seeing he doth them by the direction of so irreprehensible a Consultation His Temporal Council shall be needful to be made with great choice and deliberation especially at the beginning in England for that if any one person thereof should be either infected with Heresie or justly suspected or not fervent nor forward in the Catholick Religion and in the Reformation necessary to be made for good establishment of the same it would be to the great prejudice of the cause and of his Majesty and Realm And seeing Heresie and Hereticks could be so vigilant for overthrowing of true Religion at the beginning of this Queen's Reign as they admitted no one Man to govern whom they might suspect to favour true-Religion how much more zealous and jealous ought our new Catholick Prince to be in excluding from his Privy Council and other places of chief charge and government not only Men known or justly feared to be favourers of Heresie and Hereticks that will never be secure to God or his Majesty but also â—old and doubtful professors of Catholick Religion until they be proved by long tract of time And seeing that his Majesty shall have so great choice at that day of approved constant Catholicks within the Realm as never was seen the like since our first Conversion who have suffered so constantly at the hands of Hereticks in these Persecutions it is to be hoped and expected that his Majesty will serve himself first and chiefly of these men above all others according to their merits and after these of such other known Catholicks as albeit God gave them not fortitude and constancy to suffer so much as the others did for Religion yet were they ever secret favourers and never Persecutors or open Enemies to the truth It is to be commended with like submission and instance to his Majesty that after he shall have taken the Crown upon him and embraced this Realm as his loving Spouse he will confirm first of all the Laws Customs Priviledges Dignities and Liberties of the same and to take away all such burdens servitudes and unjust oppressions as have been any way laid upon us in former times but since the entrance of Heresie And as this is to be done to all the Realm as to the Nobility and to the Commonalty so principally and above others it is reason that it should be performed to the Church and Clergy-men who beyond all others have been injured in these latter times so that at the least it will be just that the Church of England be restored to the same state of Priviledges Possessions Dignities and Exemptions wherein it was when King Henry the Eighth began to Reign And for that the external face and material part of our Churches hath been so much defaced spoiled and broken down by King Henry the Eighth and his Children as all the World seeth it will be one principal part of our new King's Piety and Religion to concur effectually to the rebuilding and restoring of the same again by the means touched by me before of that moderate and temperate manner of restitution whereof I have spoken largely in the First Part of this Memorial And it is to be hoped that his Majesty will be the first and most fervent fartherer of the same according to the Holy Obligation Vow and Offer that he will make to Almighty God for that Heroical enterprise to his eternal honour and infinite benefit and beautifying of our Commonwealth Which sound Foundation of Religion and Piety being once laid it may be suggested to his Majesty with like sollicitude touching the execution of Justice to all Men with indifferency which is the principal point of a true Catholick Prince's Office next after God and Religion and is so much the more necessarily to be looked to now in England after so long