satisfie the only Scope Design and End of this Discourse A Brief Account of the several Plots Contriv'd and Rebellions Rais'd by the Papists against the Lives and Dignities of Sovereign Princes since the Reformation IN the year 1520. Anno 1520 about three years after Luther began to preach was that almost universal Rebellion in Spain against the Emperour Charles the Fifth which lasted four years Three years after Anno 1523 the Earl of Desmond entred into a Conspiracy against our King Henry the Eighth and had procur'd a promise of assistance from King Francis the First of France the Articles of which Agreement are yet extant whereby it appears that the Design was to make the Duke of Suffolk then in France King but King Francis being taken Prisoner at the Battel of Pavia the year following Anno 1524 and the Duke of Suffolk slain the Design fell The next year the Irish rebell'd Anno 1525 and murther'd many of the English Inhabitants But Ten years after Anno 1535 the Pope drew up his Bull against K. Henry though he did not publish it till 1538. Anno 1538 wherein he asserts his Authority over Kings to plant and destroy as he sees good and then proceeds with the Advice of his Cardinals to summon the King and all his Adherents to appear before him at Rome on a day appointed threatening them with the greater Excommunication in case of Non-appearance and declaring Him and his Posterity incapable of any Honours Possessions or even of being Witnesses absolves all his Subjects from their Oaths of Fidelity and commands them upon pain of Excommunication not to obey him or his Officers enjoyning all Christians to have no Commerce with him all Ecclesiasticks to leave the Land and all Dukes Marquesses c. under the same penalty to drive him out of his Kingdom declares all Leagues made with him by any Princes void exhorting them to endeavour his Ruine with their whole power bestowing all the Goods of his Adherents upon such as would seize them commanding all Bishops to declare the King and his Followers Excommunicate and denouncing the same Censures against whosoever should hinder the publication of this Bull. This piece of prodigious Impudence and Vanity would not satisfie the Pope but he immediately set his Instruments to work to prosecute the design of his thundering Bull so that the beginning of the next year this Letter was written from Paris to one Fryar Forrest Anno 1536 Brother WE behold how the King is changed from a Christian to an Heretick and how he hath robb'd Christ's Vicar of his Rights and Privileges by placing himself in his Holiness's Seat there as Supreme over the Catholick Church within the Realm It was the late damn'd Assembly of Lords and Commons furthered his Pride otherwise he could not nor durst not assume it to himself We have thought of these passages and do agree That there is no way to break this Tyrant's Neck but one Puff him up in his Pride and let our Friends say unto him That it is beneath so mighty a Monarch as he to advise with Parliaments but to act all in Person and that it behooveth his Majesty to be chief Actor himself If he assumes this it will take off great Blemishes from the Nation which the Church holds them guilty of and doe our Business For then the People it being contrary to their Laws will fall from him also the Catholick Party of his Council will be too strong for the Hereticks and then the Common sort will be the abler to declare his Tyranny This is to be contriv'd with the Church's Members and cautiously because it is observed that the Parliaments of England have hindred the Church in most of the Kings Reigns otherwise She had held her Party better than She does now You have our Convent's hearty Prayers for your Guide From St. Francis at Paris primâ— Id. Jan. 1536. Thomas Powell This Letter was found two years after among Father Forrest's Papers together with an account of vast Summes which he had expended for the Church of Rome and her Designs But this Design not being sufficient the Pope offered England to James the Fifth King of Scots and presented him with a Cap and consecrated Sword When that Offer of what was none of his succeeded not according to his Desires the same Pope Paul the 3d. by his Bull of the year following absolv'd in general Anno 1537 all Subjects from their Oaths of Allegiance unto Heretical Kings Princes and States as they be Enemies unto the Holy See of St. Peter all Men from the tye of their Heretical Wives Wives from their Heretical Husbands c. which was accompanied with a Rebellion in Lincolnshire under the Conduct of one Mackarel a Monk to the number of Twenty thousand against whom the King prepar'd to march in Person but their first Fury being over they embraced the King's Pardon and returned home But this Commotion was succeeded by another more dangerous led by the Lord Lumley several Knights and Gentlemen with most of the Clergy this Army in the North consisted of 40000 Men well Armed who call'd themselves the Holy Pilgrimage and the Pilgrimage of Grace they had the Five Wounds of our Lord the Chalice and the Host painted in their Standard and the Name of Jesus upon their Sleeves their whole pretence was for Religion in their March they took Pontefract Castle but were at length appeas'd But soon after the same Persons raised another Insurrection in which several Monks came armed into the Field as Souldiers who were taken and with the Ring-leaders of the Rebellion Executed Two years after if not the next year to the last Rebellion Anno 1539 for some place it in the year 1538. the Marquess of Exceter the Lord Montacute and his Brother Sir Edward Nevill and others enter'd into a Conspiracy to depose the King and advance Reynold Pool then Dean of Exceter and afterwards Cardinal to the Throne for which the Marquess Lord Montacute and Sir Edward Nevill were Beheaded upon Tower-Hill In the year 1546. Anno 1546 Pope Paul the Third not content with his shewing his pretended Authority over Kings in the two Bulls mention'd before published another in favour of the Jesuits whereby he exempts them and their Goods from the Power of any but himself and commands all Princes to swear not to molest the Society or invade their Privileges and pronounces an Anathema against all who will not obey the Bull. Two years after this Anno 1548 King Edward the Sixth being settled in the Throne one Body a Commissioner pulling down Images by the King's Order was stabbed by a Priest and a Rebellion was rais'd in Cornwall Humphrey Arundell Governour of the Mount with other Gentlemen gathering together Ten thousand Men besieged Exceter and reduc'd it to very great Extremity declaring they would have Popery and the Six Articles restor'd They fought four several Battels with the
privately in the Habit of a Sailer to sound the Ports Rodolpho was furnished with plenty of Money from the Pope which he distributed to make a Party into which they drew the Earls of Northumberland and Westmorland with others who perceiving their Plot discovered submitted and begged Pardon This Design the Pope was so zealous for that he assured the Spaniards he would go along with them himself if need were and engage all his Goods and Treasure in the Service Nor was this the only Design of the Pope at this time for in pursuit of his Predecessour's Bull against her he advised the Queen-Mother of France to seize on the Dominions of the Queen of Navarre because she was an Heretick offering if she approved of it by his Papal Authority to appoint one of the House of Valois to be King of those Territories which if she did not like he was resolved to give them to the King of Spain but that Prince knowing they must be won by the Sword declined accepting the Pope's Bounty Hitherto the Members of the Church of Rome made no scruple to resort to the Protestant Churches Anno 1569 both for Prayer and Preaching but this Year Pope Pius Quintus published his Bull against the Queen upon which they all withdrew from any such Communion with us In this Bull the Pope calls the Queen the pretended Queen of England a Servant of Wickedness affirms that her Council consisted of obscure heretical Fellows declares her an Heretick and cut off from the Unity of Christ's Body that she is deprived of her Title to her Kingdoms and of all Dominion Dignity and Privilege whatsoever and her Subjects absolved from all manner of Duty and Obedience to her and that by the Authority of this Bull he doth absolve Them and depose Her and forbidding all her Subjects under pain of Anathema to obey her With this Bull he sends Morton a Priest into England to spread this Censure and persuade the People to back it with an Insurrection upon which as Surius tells us out of Sanders many Persons of Quality resolved to execute it Accordingly the Earls of Northumberland and Westmorland who were pardoned but the year before took Arms in the North trampled under feet the English Bible and Service-Book bearing in their Standard the Cross and five Wounds of our Saviour and being betwixt five and six thousand men they grew so insolent that they would give the Queen no better Title than the Pretended Queen but the Pope being too slow in sending the hundred thousand Crowns he promised them and they at length finding their numbers too small to cope with the Queens Army dispersed and every one shifted for himself The Earl of Westmorland escaped into Flanders where he dyed miserably but Northumberland being taken was beheaded at York who was nevertheless looked upon by the Romanists as a glorious Martyr and the drops of his bloud kept by them as holy Relicks That this Rebellion had no better success Sanders and from him Surius give this Reason Because the Catholicks had not timely notice of the Pope's Bull And the same Person informs us That those that were executed for this Treason refused to the very last to acknowledge the Queens Authority Among which Sanders mentions Plumtree and others as well as the two Earls who are termed glorious Martyrs of the Catholicks by Bristow in his Motives and several others To correspond with the Pope's Intentions in his Bull Ireland puts in for a share this year where Jame Fitz-Morice of the House of Desmond and two of the Botelers raised a Rebellion but the latter being drawn to a submission by the loyal Earl of Ormond Fitz-Morice after many shifts followed their Example and was pardoned But though the two Earls and their Accomplices had sped so ill yet Leonard Dacres renew'd the Rebellion in the North Anno 1570 and fought a bloudy Battel against the Queens Forces with great obstinacy though in the end he was forced to fly into Scotland And now that the Catholicks might no longer remain in ignorance of the Queens being deprived of the Kingdoms by the Pope one Felton this year had the hardiness to fix the Bull at the Bishop of London's Gates for which being apprehended he confessed the Fact and gloried in it at his death affirming the Queen had no right to the Throne being deposed by the Sentence of the Pope Yet doth Surius affirm that he dyed a Martyr for the Catholick Faith justifying the Action as done out of Zeal for the Church and in Obedience to the lawfull Commands of the Pope The fame is affirmed by Parsons Spondanus and Hilarion de Coste who styles him the valiant Soldier of Jesus Christ commends his invincible Courage and Zeal for the Faith and affirms that his Martyrdom is one of England's most glorious Trophies though the same Person can afford the Queen no better a Title than the Impious and wicked Queen the true Jezebel of our days And that all the World may see what they thought of him at Rome no sooner could Thuanus affirm that it was a very rash Action but the Index Expurgatorius commands that passage to be blotted out so jealous are they of the Honour of this grand Traitor With as great Encomiums do we find the Memory of Dr. Story celebrated by the Writers of that Church This man was one of the most violent Persecutours in Queen Mary's days Anno 1571 for which cruelties being questioned in Parliament in the beginning of Queen Elizabeth's Reign he answered that he knew no Fault he was guilty of but only that he busied himself in cutting off the Branches while he neglected to pull up the Root it self which if he had done Heresie had not got up again For this being imprisoned he found means to escape into Flanders but being apprehended and brought into England this year he rejoiced that he should suffer Martyrdom Upon his Tryall he declined the Jurisdiction of the Court affirming that he was a Subject to the King of Spain and acknowledged no lawfull Judge in England for which he gave this Reason That seeing the Pope had declared the Queen deprived of her Right he durst not acknowledge her Authority left he should fall under the Censures of that Bull And at the moment of his Execution being asked by an Earl whether the Queen was his Sovereign he replied She was not yet is he reckoned among the Martyrs for the Romish Faith The next Year was that bloudy Massacre of Paris Anno 1572 though contrived two years before wherein it being carried over all France above 100000 Protestants were butchered in cold bloud the Duke of Guise and his Party did all they could to have the King of Navarre and Prince of Conde slaughtered with the rest but they being preserved by the King the chief Design of the Papalins in that bloudy Action was prevented
But four years after was that desperate Confederacy entred into by that Duke and his Adherents in France Anno 1576 which they and the Pope afterwards termed the Holy League which had all the parts of a most desperate Rebellion and continued for so many years to the Destruction of one Prince and infinite vexation of another It was first begun at Peronne and afterwards formed into a more strict Union by which under a shew of maintaining the King they took from him all his Authority to confer it upon the Head of their Conspiracy Nay the zeal for this rebellious Association was so great that they subscribed it with their Bloud and in order to the prosecution of what they had there promised they sent Nicolas David an Advocate of the Parliament of Paris to Rome but he being slain by the way on his return Cardinal de Pellive afterwards managed their business with the Pope But among the Memoirs of that Advocate there was found an Account of the Transaction between the Pope and the Duke of Guise wherein the Design laid down is to pull down the House of Valois then reigning from the Throne and set up the Duke of Guise In this Transaction the Liberties of the Gallican Church are called a damnable Errour nothing else but the shift of the Waldenses Lutheranes and Calvinists and it is affirmed that France shall never prosper as long as the Crown continues in that line The whole Platform of the Design is there laid down and the Pope is to advance that Duke to the Crown of France as the Successour of Charlemagne in consideration whereof the Duke is bound to cause the See of Rome to be plainly acknowledge by the States of the Kingdom without Restriction or Modification abolishing the Privileges and Liberties of the Gallican Church Thus do we find the Pope promoting the most rebellious Designs to advance his own usurped Greatness And his Missionaries not desiring a better example than that of their holy Father Anno 1577 in prosecution of his Designs Cuthbert Mayne came into England dispersing Libells to maintain the Pope's Authority over the Queen and he confessed under his own Hand that he brought with him several holy grains to distribute among the Catholicks which they should keep as so many Preservatives by the producing of which they should be safe when the Protestants were to be destroyed In the same business several others were employed and one Hemford sent over with a Dispensation of the Pope's Bull whereby the Romanists had liberty to yield outward Obedience till an opportunity offered itself for the execution of that deposing Sentence And one Haydock was employed to prepare things against such a time and to note the fittest places for landing an Army as himself wrote to Allen the Jesuite Besides these one Paine a Priest and fifty others were furnished at the Pope's Charge who undertook to kill the Queen as she went to take the Air. And yet these are the men whom Sanders in his Letter to the aforenamed Jesuite terms chosen Vessels But our Countrey was not the onely Nation afflicted with these Plots and traiterous Contrivances for about the same time was Sebastian King of Portugal betrayed by the Jesuits to the loss both of his Life and Kingdom which they had before engaged to transfer to the Spanish King in which they were as good as their word though near fifty years since it is returned to the Obedience of its lawfull Heir during which War attempting to deliver one of the Isles of the Azores to the Spaniards they were discoved and treated as their Wickedness deserved but of this more hereafter The Pope's Designs upon the Queen's Life being by the good Providence of God frustrated Anno 1578 the holy Father Anno 1579 Gregory the 13th carried on the projects of his Predecessour who had willingly lent an Ear to the advice of Thomas Stukely an English Fugitive and in hopes of getting the Kingdom of Ireland for his own Son the Marquess of Vineola where we find though Popes do not marry yet they can get Children created Stukely Marquess of Leinster adding several other Titles and assisting him with Forces and a plenary Indulgence dispatcht him away for Ireland but by the way being persuaded by the King of Portugal to join with him against the Moors he was slain in the Battel together with that King But though Ireland was delivered from this Danger yet soon after James Fitz-Morice who was pardoned in the Year 1569. went over into France where he desired Assistance to beat the English out of Ireland and reduce that Nation to the French Obedience but King Henry the Third then reigning having sufficient Employment for his Forces at home Fitz-Morice addressed himself to the Pope and the King of Spain the former embraced this opportunity and sent Sanders with him as his Nuncio with a consecrated Banner and the latter assisted them with Men and Money the Pope in the mean while raising Souldiers in his Countrey for their Assistance and Relief Fitz-Morice and Sanders with the Spaniards landed in Kerry in Ireland Anno 1580 and committedall manner of Outrages in one of which Fitz-Morice was killed by the Sons of William a Burgh soon after made Baron of Castleconnel in his place succeeded his Brother John E. of Desmond to whom the Pope sent an Indulgence dated May 13. 1580. wherein he highly magnifies the Piety of James laments his Death and exhorts all the Nobility Clergy and People of the Land to follow this John in fighting against the Hereticks for the Catholick Cause and to encourage them in that good work he grants a Plenary Indulgence and Remission of all their sins in the same extent as was granted to those who were engaged in the Holy War And when the Spaniards were required by the Lord Gray then Deputy of Ireland to express their Intention in thus invading her Majesties Dominions they returned Answer That they were sent from the Pope and King of Spain to whom his Holiness had given Ireland for that Elizabeth had justly forfeited her Title to the Kingdom by Heresie that they would keep what they had got and get more if they could But in a small time after they were glad to surrender upon Mercy the Earl of Desmond having been routed before and Allen the Priest who came with the Legate Sanders slain This ill success put a stop to the Recruits the Pope was preparing to send after them Sanders dyed of hunger in the Woods and the Earl of Desmond was slain two years after by a common Soldier And to encourage these Rebels and to excite to more such Attempts this Pope Gregory the Thirteenth the same year renewed the Bull of Pius Quintus against the Queen There were five hundred Copies of it printed at Rome and the Bull it self dispersed over all Italy Spain and part of Germany as is attested by one
who was then in the English College at Rome who likewise assures us that one of their Readers in Divinity before above two hundred Scholars affirmed That it was lawfull for any man of Worship in England to give Authority to the vilest wretch that is to endeavour the Queen's death but that this Pope did excommunicate the Queen we find in our excellent Annalist and is acknowledged by the Romish Priests in their Important Considerations printed the last year of that Queen's Reign But though he pronounced that terrible Sentence against her yet as is observed by one who had been a great stickler for the Romish Church he dealt a great deal more subtilly and more dangerously than his Predecessour for finding the danger the Romanists were daily exposed to by their endeavouring the Destruction of the Queen whom they durst not obey or cease to hurt for fear of the Curses denounced in the Bull he qualified it in such a manner that the Jesuite Hart as the Lord Burleigh tells us acknowledg'd The Bull of Pius Quintus for so much as it is against the Queen is holden by the English Catholicks for a lawfull Sentence and a sufficient Discharge of her Subjects Fidelity and so remains in force but in some points touching the Subject it is altered by the present Pope For where in that Bull all her Subjects are commanded not to obey her and she being excommunicated and deposed all that do obey her are likewise accursed which point is perilous to the Catholicks for if they obey her they are in the Pope's Curse and if they disobey her they are in the Queen's Danger Therefore the present Pope to relieve them hath altered that part of the Bull and dispensed with them to obey and serve her without peril of Excommunication which dispensation is to endure but till it please the Pope otherwise to determine Here we have a plain Confession of that learned Gentleman who is by them termed a Noble Champion of Christ and Holy Priest one that had taken deep root in the Foundations of the Faith and of sound Learning that the Loyalty of the Romanists depends upon the Will of man except they will affirm their Pope to be more than man which is a point they have been put in mind of from Rome itself since His Majesties Restauration as we shall observe anon This Qualification of the Bull was granted to Parsons and Campion two Jesuites upon their coming into England when among other things they desired of the Pope That the Bull should always oblige Elizabeth and the Hereticks but by no means the Romanists as Affairs now stand but hereafter when the publick Execution of the Bull may be had or made Furnished with this and other Faculties those two Gentlemen repaired into England setting themselves to contrive a way how to set Her Majesties Crown upon another head at first they came in the Habits of Soldiers afterward they went about in the Garb of Gentlemen and in the North they altered their Habits into the Vestments of our Ministers preaching there and being secretly entertained by the Popish Gentry and Nobility courageously executed their Commission in discharge of which Parsons exhorted the Roman Catholicks of those parts to deprive Her Majesty of the Crown and the way being thus broken many flocked after them for the same purpose At this time Mr. Sherwin being apprehended and asked whether the Queen were his lawfull Sovereign notwithstanding any Sentence of the Pope's he desired no such questions might be demanded of him and would give no other Answer But the Pope well knowing that this Generation of sturdy blades would in time be all gone for the breeding up of more to succeed them assisted Allen in setting up the Seminary at Doway for English Romanists allowing an annual Pension for their maintenance purposely for to plot and contrive ways to expulse the Queen and demolish the Church of England in obedience to the Pope's Bulls for which end every Scholar among them at his Education took this Oath I A. B. do acknowledg the Ecclesiastical and Political Power of His Holiness and the Mother Church of Rome as the chief Head and Matron above all pretended Churches throughout the whole Earth and that my Zeal shall be for Saint Peter and his Successors as the Founder of the True and Ancient Catholick Faith against all Heretical Kings Princes States or Powers repugnant unto the same And although I may pretend in case of Persecution or otherwise to be Heretically disposed yet in Soul and Conscience I shall help aid and succour the Mother Church of Rome as the True Ancient Apostolical Church I farther do declare not to act or contrive any manner of thing prejudicial unto her or her sacred Orders Doctrines Tenents or Commands without the leave of her supreme Power or the Authority under her appointed or to be appointed and when so permitted then to act or further her Interest more than my own earthly Gain and Pleasure as she and her Head His Holiness and his Successours have or ought to have the Supremacy over all Kings Princes Estates or Powers whatsoever either to deprive them of their Crowns Sceptres Powers Privileges Realms Countreys or Governments or to set up others in lieu thereof they dissenting from the Mother Church and her Commands c. Thus by all imaginable ways did this Pope provide for the Death or Deposition of that Virgin Queen Anno 1581 in order to which he had so possess'd the Missionaries with his power to dethrone Princes that it was offer'd to be prov'd to the World That the Priests which were apprehended and executed for Treason always restrained their confession of Allegiance only to the permissive form of the Pope's Toleration as for Example if they were asked whether they did acknowledge themselves to be the Queen's Subjects and would obey her they would say Yes for so they had leave for a time to doe but being asked if they would so acknowledg and obey her any longer than the Pope would so permit them or notwithstanding such Commandment as the Pope would or might give to the contrary then they either refused to obey or denied to answer or said they could not answer to those Questions without danger And at their very Arraignment when they laboured to leave in the minds of the People and standers by an opinion that they were to dye not for Treason but for matter of Faith and Doctrine they cried out that they were true Subjects and did and would obey Her Majesty Immediately to prove whether that speech extended to a perpetuity of their Obedience or so long time as the Pope so permitted they were openly in the place of Judgment asked by the Q's learned Counsel whether they would so obey and be true Subjects if the Pope commanded the contrary they plainly disclosed themselves in Answer saying by the mouth of Campion This place meaning
the Court of Her Majesties Bench hath no Power to enquire or judge of the Holy Fathers Authority and other Answer they would not make The very same Account with some other particulars is given us by the Secular Priests themselves of the Behaviour of Mr. Campion and the rest some of whom being asked which part they would take if the Pope or any other by his appointment should invade the Realm or which part ought a good Subject to take answered when that case happened they would then consider what they had best doe others that they were not yet resolved what to doe and others positively that if such a Deprivation or Invasion should be made for any Matter of Faith they were then bound to take part with the Pope Nay so zealous was Mr. Campion in defence of that rebellious Doctrine that being visited in Prison by some Gentlemen of Oxford one of them asked him whether he thought the Queen lawfull Heir or no to this he made no Answer but when the question was put whether if the Pope invaded the Land he would take part with him or the Queen he openly replied he would join with the Pope and very earnestly demanded Pen Ink and Paper with which he signed his Resolution which Principle he was so rooted in that he affirmed in the Tower to several Persons of Quality who demanded whether he did acknowledge the Queen to be a lawfull Queen or did believe her deprived of her Right that this Question depends much on the Fact of Pope Pius the Fifth whereof he is no Judge and therefore refused to answer farther The same loyal Doctrines were vented by several other Priests the ensuing year Anno 1582 who affirmed under their Hands to the Commissioners who examined them That the Pope had power to depose Princes and that Her Majesty was not be obeyed against His Holiness's Bull who hath Authority to discharge Subjects of their Allegiance which all of them viz. Kerby Cottom Richardson Ford Shert Johnson Hart and Filbee agreed in two of them only sheltring themselves with this General Assertion That they held as the Catholick Church held Johnson particulary affirming That if the Pope invaded her Majesty upon a civil Account he would take part with Her but if upon a Matter of Faith it was his Duty to assist the Pope In which diligence to poison the Members of their Church these zealous Priests did but follow the Example of their Holy Father who this very year as Mr Gage Agent for the Spanish Match at Rome informs us out of the Records of the Dominican Convent there laid out one hundred fifty two thousand pounds and some odd money for maintaining his Designs here of which Sixty thousand was allotted to foment Disturbances in Scotland and Ireland so very desirous was the Pope to regain his usurped Power over these Nations And it was not long before the end of all that Labour and Charge was found to be the Murther of that excellent Princess which one Sommerville of Elstow in Warwickshire undertook to effect at the instigation of Hall a Priest who finding this desperate young man to waver and that his Resolution was much shaken with the horridness and danger of the attempt Anno 1583 advised him to proceed promising his prayers for good success but the design being discovered Sommerville strangled himself after condemnation But this was not the only Plot which the Enemies of England had laid for its destruction for Throgmorton one of Sommerville's accomplices was the same year discovered having been employed to sound the Havens and procure a list of such Gentlemen in the several Counties as were disposed to joyn the Spanish Forces who were to land under the conduct of the Duke of Guise all which was confessed by Throgmorton before his death Thus we find how vast summs were expended by the Pope which had the same influence in Ireland where Desmond continued so desperately in rebellion that he swore he would rather forsake God than forsake his Men but neither the Pope's blessing nor purse could protect him from that deserved death which after long wandring in a miserable condition he suffered the latter end of this year But though the Pope could not preserve his rebellious instruments from the just punishment of their Treasons yet he would for the encouragement of others doe honour to their memories thus the Rector of the English College of Jesuits at Rome in presence of all the Students sung a Collect of Martyrs in honour of Campion of whose Treasons we gave an account before and his relicks with Sherwin's and others executed for Treason were kept and worshipped by our English Papists And because those positions which were found so usefull for the propagating Sedition Anno 1584 might if trusted only to the Missionaries to instill them into the People by their Sermons and Discourses be in time forgotten and neither believed nor obeyed the Romish Factors considering that Litera scripta manet to provide against the ill consequences which the fearfulness of the Priests or diligence of the State might produce by hindring the preaching of the former caused Gregory Martin's Treatise of Schism to be reprinted this year in which he exhorted the Ladies of the Court to deal with the Queen as Judith did with Holofernes for the Printing of which Carter the Romish Printer was executed and is reckoned among their Martyrs At the same time there was one Harper in Norwich a great Friend of Throgmorton's who was executed the year before who though pretending to be a zealous Puritan preaching with great diligence and fervour kept a constant correspondence with that Traitor among whose Papers was found a Letter in which he desired Throgmorton to let him know how their Friends in Spain and London did correspond and whether that King continued in his purpose that the Engagers might be satisfied and have notice upon this Discovery a Pursuvant was sent to apprehend him but he escaped just as the Officer arrived at Norwich And now was discovered a Design in which the Pope was particularly engag'd if we may believe Parrie's own Confession who in his Travels falling into acquaintance with Palmio a Jesuite told him that he had a great desire to doe something for the Romish Cause in England by whom he was encouraged his Zeal commended and the Lawfulness of Assassinating Her Majesty was maintained but being somewhat dissatisfied the Jesuite recommended him to Campeggio his Holiness's Nuncio at Venice by this means he wrote to Pope Gregory informing him of his Design and desiring a Passport that he might confer of it with his Holiness at Rome in the mean while he went to Paris where he was animated by Thomas Morgan who sollicited the Queen of Scots Affairs when receiving such a Passport as he desired he resolved to kill the Queen if it were warranted by some learned Divines and he could procure a
full Pardon for it from the Pope That the first might not be wanting Cedretto a noted Jesuit and Provincial of Guyenne approv'd his Resolution and Ragazzani the Nuncio recommended him to the Pope promising that his Prayers should not be wanting for the success of the Attempt with which encouragement he came to London where he received a Letter from Cardinal Como wherein the Cardinal informs him That His Holiness did exhort him to persevere and bring that to effect which he had promised and that he might be the better assisted by that good Spirit which moved him thereto His Holiness granted him his Blessing a plenary Indulgence and Remission of all his sins assuring him that he should merit highly by the Action which he terms holy and honourable to which the Cardinal added his Prayers and Wishes for its success This he confessed confirmed his Resolution to kill his Sovereign and made it clear to his Conscience that it was lawfull and meritorious which redounding so highly to the Dishonour of that bloudy Church the whole Relation is by the Index Expurgatorius commanded to be left out of Thuanus's History And well they might for as it shewed the Pope's Inclination to Bloud and Treason so it was one of the greatest instances of Ingratitude imaginable Parry owing his life to the Mercy of this Princess who had four years before pardoned him when he was tried and condemned for Burglary But though the Divine Goodness was so conspicuous in the many wonderfull preservations of that great Queen yet it pleased the all-wise Providence to permit the devilish Designs of the Jesuites to be attended with success in Holland where the renowned Prince William of Nassaw was this year murthered by Balthasar Gerard a Burgundian who confessed that a Jesuite Regent of the College of Trers told him that he had conferred with three of his Brethren who took the Design to be from God assuring him that if he dyed in that quarrel he should be enrolled in the Kalendar of Martyrs This Method of satisfying their Consciences with their Confessour's Authority was so generally taken by the zealous Assassins of those times that the Leaguers in France kept several Priests in pay who daily preached and asserted That Princes ought to be deposed who do not sufficiently perform their Duty and a Bachelour in Divinity of the Sorbonne maintained in a publick Disputation That it was lawfull for any private man to depose or kill any Prince who is a wicked man or an Heretick which opinion had so entirely possest the Cardinal of Bourbon that because the King of Navarre was an Heretick he had the Confidence to tell King Henry the Third that if his Majesty should dye the Crown would belong to him and he was resolved not to lose his Right But because these Doctrines without force to practise them would prove but empty speculations the Duke of Guise had the latter end of this year a Conference with the King of Spain's Commissioners whereby he associated himself with the Spaniards against his Sovereign obliging his party to maintain War against the Kings as long as the King of Spain pleased To promote which Design Cardinal Pellevee sollicited the Pope for his approbation of it Anno 1585 and when the Duke of Nevers declared his Resolutions to have nothing to doe with them unless he had the Opinion both of Eminent Divines and the Pope too in favour of the Undertaking his Confessour and Monsieur Faber told him that he ought to take up Arms with the Leaguers by which he would be so far from sinning that he would merit highly and perform an Action very acceptable to God and the aforesaid Cardinal with other Divines assured him that the Pope approved of it declaring it lawfull to fight against Hereticks and such as favour or adhere to them though it were the King himself he indeed advised them not to attempt his Life but to seize his Person and force him to promote their Ends In obedience to which the Cardinal of Bourbon published a Declaration dated March 31. 1585. justifying his Arms but professing great Respect to the Royal Person This Pope dying his Successour Sixtus the Fifth was more open in avowing the Leaguers Cause and therefore published his Bull against the King of Navarre declaring him an Heretick depriving him and his Posterity of all their Rights absolving his Subjects from their Allegiance and excommunicating all such as should obey him While this Pope was making Tryall of his Thunderbolts in France he had his Agents privily endeavouring to execute the Commands of his Predecessour in this Nation for which Henry Piercy Earl of Northumberland being apprehended shot himself through the heart during his Imprisonment he had been pardoned for a former Rebellion and being found a prosecutour of Throgmorton's Design became this year his own Executioner But a more formidable Anno 1586 because more threacherous and secret Design was managed by some English Seminaries at Rhemes who thought it meritorious to destroy the Queen where one Savage was so wrought upon by the Persuasions of Dr. Gifford the Rectour and two other Priests that he vowed to murther her to whom Ballard another Priest joining treated with Mendoza the Spanish Embassadour in France about an Invasion after which he drew in Mr. Babington a rich and well accomplish'd Gentleman who desired that five more might be joined to Savage to make sure work Babington affirmed that several Counties in England were ready and being assured of Assistance from Spain they resolved that the Usurper so they termed the Queen should be sent to the other World assoon as the Invaders landed but Ballard being taken Babington resolved to effect her death immediately though Divine Providence prevented it by his apprehension who with the rest of his Companions freely confessed the Fact for which sixteen of them suffered death Yet did not this deter Mr. William Stafford at the Sollicitation of the French Ambassadour from engaging in an Enterprise of the same horrid nature which though he refused to act himself yet he directed them to one Moody who willingly embraced the motion upon Promise of Preferment from the Duke of Guise but while he was contriving a way to effect it Stafford discovered all and justified it to the Ambassadour's Face who at first denied any knowledge of it With the same diligence were the Romanists in France driving on their treasonable Designs for at a Council held by the chief Conspiratours at the Jesuites College near St. Pauls in Paris they resolved to surprise Boloign there to receive the Spaniards who should land to their Assistance A Plot was laid to secure the King as he returned from hunting and another to seize the Bastile assault the Louvre and put the King into a Convent during which Action their word was to be Let the Mass flourish and the King of Navarre
undertook the same Exploit to whom the Pope's Agent added Clement Odin another Son of St. Dominick but God defeated all their Designs and preserv'd that great King's Life some years longer In the mean while Tir Oen continued his Rebellion in Ireland Anno 1599 having received Assistance from the Spaniard and a Plume of Phoenix Feathers from the Pope and the new Earl of Desmond wrote two Letters to the King of Spain begging his Assistance to drive the English out of Ireland and to advance the Catholick Cause which he was resolved to maintain What effect these and other Addresses had we shall see presently But Tir Oen not resting wholly on the Spaniard Anno 1600 wrote a very earnest Letter to the Pope subscribed by himself Desmond and others Desiring his Holiness to issue out a Bull against the Queen as Pius the Fifth and Gregory the Thirteenth had done which they press him to doe because the Kingdom belonged to his Holiness and next under God depended solely on him In the mean while the Rebellion went on and daily conflicts happen'd but lest the tediousness or danger of the War should discourage them Pope Clement the Eighth sent a Letter directed to all the Prelates Noblemen and People of Ireland wherein he owns That they had taken up Arms by his advice for recovering their Liberty and opposing the Hereticks commends the Fitz-Geralds who headed former Insurrections highly extolls Tyrone and grants a full remission of all Sins to him and his Assistants Yet could not this Concurrence and Benediction of the Pope preserve their strength from being broken by the Lord Mountjoy who this year arrived Lord Deputy in Ireland insomuch that several of the chief Rebels submitted but at the same time sent to Rome to crave Pardon for their outward compliance but Tyrone continued obstinate which forced the Lord-Deputy to proclaim him Traitor setting a Reward of Two thousand Marks upon his Head however the Spaniard sent a Ship to his Relief laden with Arms and Monies as an earnest of more Supplies It is certain from the Confession of the Traitors themselves that the foundation of the Gun-power Treason was laid the following year but it is very probable that there was a rough draught of it made in this as appears by the Case resolv'd by Delrio the Jesuite whether if one discover in Confession that he hath laid Gun-powder under an House by which the House is to be blown up and the Prince destroyed the Priest ought to reveal it upon which he concludes that he ought not it was a Case that had never happened before and so not likely to have been thought of by a Person not cautious of such a Design and this Resolution Garnet after served himself of alledging That all the Knowledge he had of the Treason was communicated to him in Confession which he was bound not to disclose upon any Account whatsoever Soon after his last Letter in Tyrone's behalf Anno 1601 the same Pope sent his Breves into England commanding all the Roman Catholicks not to admit after the Queen's death any Prince whatsoever unless he would bind himself by Oath to promote the Roman Catholick Religion to his utmost Power In prosecution of which knowing that King James the next Successour was a firm Protestant several Designs were formed against his Life Hay and Hamilton two Papists were sent into Scotland to stir up the Jesuites there who were received and cherished notwithstanding the King had by his Proclamation forbidden any to harbour them affirming that if any did he would look upon them as Designers against his Life But while these Jesuites and others of the same stamp were endeavouring to prepare matters for a Rebellion one Mowbray Son to a Scotch Nobleman undertook to destroy the King but was apprehended at London and sent Prisoner into Scotland by the Queen and about the same time the Duke of Tuseany by some Letters he had intercepted discovered another Design against his Life which was to be effected by Poison an Account of which he sent immediately to the King by Sir Henry Wotton then in his Court with several Antidotes against the Poison if it should be given him notwithstanding all his diligence to prevent it During these Designs in Scotland the Pope sent a Letter to Tyrone calling his Rebellion an Holy League assuring him that he was exceedingly pleased at their Courage and Zeal extolling his Piety exhorting him to go on as he had begun and praying that God would fight for him promising to write to all Catholick Princes to assist him and to send a Nuncio to reside with him and giving his Blessing to him and all his Followers who should hazard themselves for the Catholick Cause Besides which he sent a Breve to the whole Body of the Irish Nation requiring them to join with Tyr-Oen against the Queen and if we may believe Don Juan de Aquila General of the War in Ireland for defence of the Faith he went farther than this and excommunicated and as far as in him lay deposed Her Majesty This Spanish Commander arrived at Kings all with a great Fleet and began to fortifie the Town and published a Declaration affirming That the War made against Queen Elizabeth by his Master in Conjunction with Tyr-Oen was just She having been excommunicated and her Subjects absolved from their Fidelity by several Popes exhorting them that now Christ's Vicar commanded them they would in obedience to him take Arms protesting that if any continued in obedience to the English they should be prosecuted as Hereticks and hatefull Enemies of the Church Soon after Don Alonso del Campo landed with a Supply of Soldiers but suddenly after his arrival was taken Prisoner the Army of the Spaniards and Rebells in conjunction routed and the former glad to be permitted to return home Yet were the English Papists as diligent as ever to introduce the Spaniards and therefore dispatched away Thomas Winter to trie what could be done for their assistance who were ready to sacrifice their Lives for the Catholick Cause and to assure the King of Spain that if he would send over an Army they would have in a readiness Fifteen hundred or two thousand Horses for the Service being introduced by the means of the Jesuite Creswell the Duke of Lerma assured him of Assistance and the Count de Miranda told him that his Master would bestow two hundred thousand Crowns for that use and would have an Army in England by the next Spring With this gratefull Account of the posture of Affairs he returned Anno 1602 and great preparations were made that they might be ready against the arrival of the Forces but all their measures were broken by the Queen's death yet was Mr. Wright sent into Spain and Guy Faux after him but the King refused to meddle having sent his Ambassadour to conclude a
Peace with King James upon which disappointment the entertained new Designs which we shall have account of in a little time While these Matters were transacting in Spain and England Tyr-Oen and Osulevan continued their Insurrection in Ireland the latter keeping the Castle of Dunboy for the King of Spain to whom he sent to desire him to accept it which he did and sent Osulevan twelve thousand pounds with a supply of Arms and Ammunition and the rest of the Rebells received Encouragement from their Correspondents in Spain who assured them his Catholick Majesty would not omit the winning of Ireland if it cost him the most part of Spain and that an Army of fourteen thousand men with a Nuncio from the Pope were set Sail for their Relief which News rendered them so obstinate that they endured all Extremities but the taking of Dunboy by the Lord Deputy put a stop to those succours there being no place for to receive them at their landing yet did Mac Eggan the Apostolical Vicar revive the fury of the Rebells but he was slain the latter end of this year fighting at the head of his Men with a Sword drawn in one hand and his Breviary and Beads in the other We have seen the Pope approving this Rebellion so that the Divines of his Church could doe no less than follow the Dictates of their Supreme Head which the Jesuites of Salamanca did this year by a Declaration of theirs in which they resolve That we must hold for certain that the Pope hath power to bridle and suppress those who forsake the Faith And having farther stated the Question they proceed to affirm That it is lawfull for any Catholick to assist Tyr-Oen and that with great Merit and good Hope of eternal Reward because it is by the Pope's Authority that all such Romanists as take part with the English sin mortally and cannot be saved or receive Absolution till they forsake the English Army and those are in the same condition who give the English any Tribute except such as the Pope hath given them leave to pay so that they are to be Subjects no longer than the Pope pleases And then they proceed to shew That the Bull in favour of the Rebells was not procured by surreption but proceeded from the Pope's own Inclination to them and that the permission given to the Roman Catholicks to obey her extended only to such Obedience as doth not oppugn the Catholick Religion which the assisting Her against Tyrone doth And this Declaration is dated the seventh of March 1602. And it could be nothing less than such an extraordinary encouragement that could render the Irish so audacious as they were upon the Queen's Death in Limrick they seized the Churches and set up Mass in them the same they did at Waterford in the Cathedral and at the Sessions House they pulled down the Seats of Justice in Cork they refused to proclaim the King and by Force opposed the Commissioners they went in a solemn Procession took the Sacrament to spend their Lives in defence of the Roman Catholick Religion wrote to several Cities to assist them seized upon the King's stores and assaulted his Forces alledging that he could not be lawfull King because he was not appointed by the Pope And for their farther satisfaction the University of Salamanca Anno 1603 subscribed the Declaration which the Jesuites made the year before and the Divines of Valedolid did the same About this time the Jesuites laboured to get the Sentence of their Banishment out of France reversed the Pope interposing his Mediation in their Favours upon which the Parliament of Paris attempted to dissuade the King from consenting to it by a long Oration alledging That it was their avowed Doctrine That the Pope hath a Power of Excommunicating Kings that a King so Excommunicated by his Holiness is no other than a Tyrant whom the People may oppose that Clergy-men are exempt from the Prince's Power are none of his Subjects and cannot be punish'd by him for any Crimes And having enumerated several of their Treasons they affirm That it is absolutely necessary for them to renounce these Doctrines or else France cannot with safety admit them to return But though they were very desirous of Admission they would not renounce those Positions for it however by importunity and the solicitation of the Pope and others they were at length received but upon Conditions Two of which were That they should build no Colleges without express Permission from the King and that one of their number should be always near the King to be accountable for the Actions of the Society Thus were they admitted but marks of Distrust set upon them though they have by their Address turn'd the latter of these Conditions which was at first design'd for their Disgrace into a mark of Honour the King's Confessour being ever since a Jesuite Though the Gun-powder Plot was not ripe for Execution till two years after yet they were consulting about it at this time when after a long complaint of their Grievances Mr. Percy told Mr. Catesby that there was no way but to kill the King and he was resolv'd to doe it But that Gentleman desired him not to be so rash for he had laid a surer Design which would certainly effect it without any danger to themselves and then imparted to him the Contrivance of blowing up the King and Parliament Which Design in May the following year Anno 1604 the Conspiratours obliged themselves by Oath upon the Holy Sacrament to keep secret Catesby justifying the Action by the Breves which the Pope had sent to exclude King James it being as lawfull to cast him out as to oppose his Entrance and Bates another of the Conspiratours was assured by the Jesuite Greenwell that the Cause and Action were good and therefore it was his Duty to conceal it Upon the approaching of the Parliament they began to work endeavouring to make a Mine under the Parliament-house but soon after Percy hired a Cellar in which they stowed the Gun-powder with Billets heap'd upon it to hide it in case of search The May before the Plot was to be executed there was an Insurrection of the Romanists in Wales but it was soon supprest Anno 1605 yet all things went on in order to the fatal blow when about a week before the Parliament was to sit the Design was discovered and so prevented upon which the Conspiratours flew into Rebellion but were all either killed or taken by the Sheriff of Worcestershire The King in his Speech to the Parliament soon after told them that Faux confessed that they had no other cause moving them to the Design but merely and only Religion which was acknowledged by Sir Everard Digby at his Tryall to be the chief Motive which enduced him to make one among them and which he resolved to hazard his Life his Estate and all to
introduce protesting that if he had thought there had been the least sin in the Plot he would not have been of it for all the World and the Reason why he kept it secret was because those who were best able to judge of the Lawfulness of it had been acquainted with it and given way unto it and therefore afterwards he calls it the best Cause The Persons upon whose Authority he so much relied were the Jesuites who asserted the holiness of the Action for Garnet their Superiour had affirmed that it was lawfull and Father Hammond absolved them all after the Discovery when they were in open Rebellion and Greenwell the Jesuite rode about the Countrey to excite as many as he could to joyn with them nay Garnet confessed that Catesby in his name did satisfie the rest of the Lawfulness of the Fact Parsons had kept a Correspondency with that Jesuite to promote it and at the same time not willing to discover it to them and yet desirous of their Prayers ordered the Students of his College at Rome to pray for the Intention of their Father Rectour And after the Discovery Father Hall encouraged some of the Traitors who began to doubt that the Action was unlawfull seeing God had defeated it in so providential a manner telling them that we must not judge of the Cause by the Event that this was no more than what happened to the Eleven Tribes when they went up at first to fight against Benjamin and that the Christians were often defeated by the Turks nay so highly was it approv'd by that Order that not to mention here the Honours done to the Conspiratours since their Deaths several Jesuites gloried in and bragg'd of it for a little before the Discovery Father Flood caused the Jesuites at Lisbon to spend a great deal of Money in Powder on a Festival day to try the force of it and persuaded one John How a Merchant and other Catholicks to go over into England and expect their Redemption there And Father Thompson was wont afterwards to boast to his Scholars at Rome how oft his Shirt was wetted with digging under the Parliament House And that the Pope himself was concerned in the Design is more than probable for it is confessed by a Jesuite that there were three Bulls granted by him which should have been published if the Conspiracy had succeeded and Sir Everard Digby hath left it under his hand that it was not the Pope's mind that any Stirs should be hindered which were undertaken for the Catholick Cause The Pope's carriage after the Discovery is another shrewd Argument that he was privy to the Plot for he not only made no Declaration either by Word or Writing in abhorrence of it but when Greenway one of the Conspirators escaped to Rome he advanced him to the Dignity of Penitentiary and †Gerard another was a Confessour at St. Peters in the same City This execrable Conspiracy appeared so horrid and unworthy not only of religious Men but contrary to humane Nature that sixteen of the Students under the Jesuites at Rome forsook the College and some of them renounced the Roman Church and Mr. Copley who had been a Priest some years as appears by his Reasons one of sound Learning and judgment assures us that it was one of the Causes of his Conversion Yet were there many found among the Romanists who justified the Design hardly any condemning it Thus the same Gentleman professes that though some termed it an inconsiderate Act yet he could never meet with any one Jesuite who blamed it The Conspiratours justified themselves and even at their deaths would acknowledge no fault And when Faux and Winter were admitted to discourse together in the Tower they affirmed they were sorry that no body set forth a Defence or Apology for the Action but yet they would maintain the Cause at their Deaths nay there was one who had the hardiness to attempt to justifie the Design from the imputation of Cruelty because both Seeds and Root of an evil Herb must be destroyed And when some of the Plotters escaped to Callis the Governour assured them of the King's Favour and that though they lost their Country they should be received there they replyed That the loss of their Country was the least part of their Grief but their sorrow was that they could not bring so brave a Design to perfection And notwithstanding Garnet was so deep in the Conspiracy yet Mr. Wilson placed him among the Martyrs in his English Martyrology and it is affirmed by one who liv'd among them that he and Campion are beatified by the Pope which is the next degree to Canonization and that every one of them is painted in the Jesuites Churches with the Title of Blessed Father and we are assured that Garnet's Picture was set up in their Church at Rome among their Martyrs several years after and St. Amour a Doctour of Sorbon found his Pictures commonly sold at Rome in the year 1651. with this Inscription Father Henry Garnet hang'd and quarter'd at London for the Catholick Faith by which they shew themselves either Approvers of the Design to that degree as to count it a point of their Faith or else they must appear Deceivers of the People and Slanderers of the English Nation in affirming that he dyed for his Religion when he justly suffered for the most hellish Conspiracy that was ever laid yet Delrio and Gordon two Jesuites went farther the first in Prosecution of his Determination in the point which we mentioned before compares him to Dionysius the Areopagite the latter placing him in Heaven desires him to intercede there for the conversion of England and it was once publickly prayed in Louvain O holy Henry Intercede for us But they had designs elsewhere at the same time that this their holy Martyr was promoting their Cause in England King Henry of France his Life was so burthensome to the Jesuites that they were impatient so that Father Coton the King's Confessour or rather Hostage for his Society to be satisfied in the point wrote down several questions which he had propounded to a Maid said to be possessed one of which was how long the King should live which is a capital Crime in itself For as Tertullian long since argued who hath any business to make such an Enquiry except he hath designs against his Prince or hath some hopes of advancement by his death And as busie was the Pope Paul the Fifth for the advancement of the Roman Cause he fell out with the Duke of Savoy this Year for presenting an Abbey to Cardinal Pio and to shew his Authority over Princes and States which is a kind of deposing them and clear Evidence of Popish Principles when the Commonwealth of Luca made an Edict against the Protestants though he liked the thing yet he pretended they
that they might be exempt from His Majesty's jurisdiction so very diligent he was in catching at any shadow which might seem to favour the Exemption of the Clergy Three Years after this Sanctarellus his Book was printed at Rome Anno 1625 wherein the Deposing Power was asserted in its utmost latitude and though Father Coto and two other Jesuites were required to answer it yet no reply appeared the former affirming before the Parliament that though he disapproved the Doctrine in France yet he would assent to it if he were at Rome The Oath of Allegiance being vigorously press'd in England Anno 1626 the Pope sent a Bull to the Romanists exhorting them to continue firm and let their Tongue rather cleave to the Roof of their Mouth then permit the Authority of St. Peter to be diminished by that Oath and commanding them strictly to observe the Breves of Pope Paul the Fifth and Father Fisher justified Suarez and the Doctrine of his Book asking what could be found prejudicial in it to Princely Authority and affirming that if it contained any such thing it would not be permitted in Catholick Kindoms We have mention'd that the exemption of the Clergy was desired by the Pope in the Treaty for Anno 1627 the Spanish Match and now his Emissaries in this Nation affirmed that the King could have nothing to doe with her Majesties Chaplains because he was an Heretick and his Holiness threatned to declare those to be Apostates who should seek their Establishment in the Queens Family from the King But though these were plain Indications of what they desired Anno 1628 yet they kept their Designs so secret that they were not discovered till some time after but there was a Conspiracy detected at Genoa which if it had not been prevented would have ended in the Murther of the Nobility and Alteration of the Government And the next Year a Plot was detected in Mantua against the Life of the Prince Anno 1629 and some Officers apprehended who would have betray'd Viadana to the Governour of Millan In Ireland the Papists assaulted the Archbishop of Dublin wounded several of his Followers and forced him to fly for his Life following him in a tumultuous manner along the streets and that they had several seditious Designs in hand at the same time Anno 1620 is evident from the Confession of Mac-Enerry a Dominican who for this very reason left the Church of Rome because of her rebellious Doctrines and the many Conspiracies he had taken an Oath of Secresie to conceal which he observed inviolably and though he informed the Bishop of Limrick that there were many Plots then contriving against his Majesty's Government yet for his Oaths sake he would not name any Persons who were concerned in them The Duke of Orleance had retired in disgust from Court some years since and was received by the Duke of Lorrain Anno 1632 but being forced this year to leave that retreat he went to Brussells from whence aided by the Spaniards he marched at the head of an Army into France but was defeated and several of his Adherents executed While France was thus almost continually pestered with Rebellions Anno 1633 the Designs of the Papists ripened apace in Ireland they had erected Friaries in the Countrey instead of those which were dissolved in the Dublin and even in that City they had a College of Students whereof Father Paul Harris was Dean and at a Synodical meeting of their Clergy they decreed that it was not lawfull to take the Oath of Allegiance If it were not that all the Designs of that Party from the Year 1630. to 1640. Anno 1640 were summed up and perfected in the Rebellion in Ireland and the execrable Civil Wars of England I should wonder how they came to be so still and that no more Conspiracies were discovered besides that great one which Andreas ab Habernsfield was informed of in Holland and of which he sent the King an Account under the hand of the Discoverer who affirms that one Maxfield was sent into Scotland to stir up a Rebellion there and that the King was to be poisoned for which end they kept a strong Poison in an Indian Nut which he had often seen They had likewise another Design if they could prevail upon the Scots or discontented English to rebell that thereby the King should be straitened and forced to depend on the Papists for assistance and then they would make their own Terms and secure to themselves a publick Liberty which if he refused to consent to they would not only desert him but dispatch him with the Indian Nut which they reserved on purpose He gives also an Account of the Persons concerned in the Plot among whom were several Ladies of Quality for whose Encouragement the Pope sent a Breve to Sir Toby Mathews one of the principal Conspiratours wherein he exhorts him and the Women engaged with him to proceed with diligence in the Design assuring them That he did not despair to see the Authority of the Holy See which was subverted in England by a Woman again restored in a very little time by the Endeavours of those Heroick Ladies This Breve is an unanswerable Evidence that the succeeding Troubles derived their original from the insatiate Lust of Rule which possessed the Pope Anno 1641 who herein approves of those very Methods which afterwards proved the Ruine of that excellent Prince and so miserably distracted these poor Nations But he appeared more publickly an Abbettor of the Irish Massacre and Rebellion wherein so many thousand Protestants were murthered in cold bloud sending his Nuncio to assist and affording them all the aid that he was able to give a Design laid with so much secresie and executed with so much cruelty that nothing but the very Spirit of Popery could be barbarous enough to engage in it in prosecution of which they did all they could totally to beat the English out of the Kingdom The same year the Marquess de Villa Real the Duke de Camina and the Marquess d' Armamar who by the Instigation of the Archbishop of Braga had undertaken to kill the King of Portugal Father to Her Majesty the Queen Dowager of England and to fire the Ships and the City in several places that they might have the better opportunity to promote the Interest of the Spaniards were put to death Nor did France yet enjoy any more quiet where the Count de Soissons and the Duke of Guise and others raised a Rebellion and routed the King's Army but the Count being slain with his own Pistol the Confederacy was soon broken Yet the very next Year the Duke of Orleance combined with the Spaniards Anno 1642 who were to assist him with Forces for a new Rebellion The Pope had involved Ireland in Bloud the former year and in this the Wars began in England where
several Priests were found among the dead at Edghill Battle but the Endeavours of his Holiness to encrease those miserable Confusions were managed with all imaginable Secresie while the Irish were openly commended by him and assured of his Prayers for their success in his Breve to Owen O Neal dated Octob. 8. 1642. and so willing was he to lay hold on all occasions for the exercising his Deposing Power that because the Prince of Parma offended him he declared him to have incurred the greater Excommunication and deprived him of all his Dominions and Dignities But not content with sending the forementioned Breve to O Neal Anno 1643 his Holiness granted a Bull of plenary Indulgence May 25. 1643. to all the Catholicks in Ireland Anno 1644 who joined in the Rebellion which was prosecuted as fiercely as the Pope could desire and a defence of it set forth by an Irish Jesuite in Portugal Anno 1645 though the Title-page mentions Franckfort who asserts That the English Kings have no Title or Right to Ireland that if they had yet it is the Duty of the Irish to deprive them of their Rights seeing they are declared Hereticks Anno 1607 and Tyrants that this Power of deposing such Princes is inherent in every State but if the Authority of the Holy See be added to that Power none but a Fool or an Heretick will deny what the Doctours of Divinity and of the Civil and Canon Law do generally teach and which is confirmed by Reasons and Examples And so far did the Pope approve of the Contents of this Book that when soon after its publication the Irish had submitted to the King and promised to assist him in his Wars His Holiness by his Nuncio took upon him to be their General absolved them from their Oaths and imprisoned and threatened the Lives of those who had promoted the peace and desired to return to the King's Subjection which renewed the Rebellion again and brought infinite Miseries on that bigotted Nation At the same time above an hundred of the Romish Clergy were sent into England by Order from Rome who the better to promote the Divisions there were instructed in several Trades both handicraft and others these upon their arrival were ordered to disperse themselves and give Intelligence every month to their Superiours abroad accordingly they listed themselves in the Parliament Army and kept a constant correspondence with their Brethren Anno 1609 who for the same end served under the King The next year many of these Missioners were in consultation with those in the King's Army to whom they shewed their Bulls and Licenses for taking part with the Parliament about the best methods to advance their Cause Anno 1647 and having concluded that there was no way so effectual as to dispatch the King some were sent to Paris to consult the Faculty of Sorbonne about it who return'd this Answer That it is lawfull for Roman Catholicks to work Changes in Governments for the Mother Church's advancement and chiefly in an Heretical Kingdom and so they might lawfully make away the King which Sentence was confirmed to the same Persons by the Pope and his Council upon their going to Rome to have his Holiness's Resolution in the Point And now those of them who had before followed the King after his flight from Oxford agreed to desert the Royal Cause and as one of them inform us to ingratiate themselves with the Enemy by acting some notorious piece of Treachery and Father Carr who went by the name of Quarter-Master Laurence declared that he could with a safer Conscience join with and fight for the Round-heads than the Cavaliers in prosecution of which Resolve they dispersed themselves into all the Garisons of the King's Party to endeavour the Revolt of the Soldiers to the Parliament in which they succeeded as they had projected my Authour being one of those who seduced the Wallingford Horse from their Obedience and in Scotland the Lord Sinclare a pretended Presbyterian but a real Papist commanded a Regiment of his own Religion and it being a Maxim receiv'd among them That the surest way to promote the Catholick Cause was to weaken the Royal Party and advance the other they bent all their Endeavours to expedite and accelerate the King's Death and His Majesty having in the Treaty of the Isle of Wight consented to pass five strict Bills against Popery the Jesuites in France at a general meeting there presently resolved to take off his Head and this His Majesty had notice of by an Express from thence but two days before his removal from the Isle of Wight This Year Mr. Cressey published the Reasons of his leaving the Church of England and turning Romanist wherein obviating the Objection so often made against the Romanists about their rebellious Principles and Practices he sets down a Declaration which he affirms that they were all ready to subscribe and which differs but little from our Oath of Allegiance But here we may see what Credit can be given to the representations of their Doctrines which their Writers study to make as favourable as possible For though Mr. Cressy thought himself a good Representer in this point yet his Superiours were of another mind and therefore that Edition was soon bought up and in the next the Profession of Obedience quite left out and that this was not an omission of the Printer but the action of his Superiours we are assured by an honourable Person from Mr. Cressy's own mouth and we shall find in a little time that the same form hath been condembed by the Pope himself But the ensuing year Anno 1648 as it was dolefull to the English Nation so it brought great disturbances to the most potent Princes of Europe in France the Parisians rose in Arms shot at the Lord Chancellour Sequier and wounded his Daughter barricadoed the Streets and forced the King to set the Counsellour Broussell and other factious Persons at Liberty And at the Treaty at Osnebrugh when by several Articles of the Peace the possession of Church Lands were assured to the Protestant Princes the Pope displeased with it took upon him to make void the Peace by a special Bull declaring all those Articles unjust and of no Force and commanding the Princes concerned to observe his Bull in which he renews his Claim to the superiority over Princes and particularly the Emperour not only by the Bull in general but by asserting that ‖ the Electours of the Empire were established by the Authority of the Bishop of Rome But to come to their Contrivances in England where when several Papists had subscribed to some Propositions importing the unlawfulness of murthering Princes and breaking Faith with Hereticks and that the Pope hath no power to absolve Subjects from their Allegiance the very same with the Declaration published the year before by Mr. Cressy this Action was condemned at Rome