of the Irish only stripping the English Protestants and turning them out of Doors naked in the cold and snow others cruelly Murdering man woman and child without the least compassion but they all resolved upon this point that by all manner of ways and means they would universally destroy and root the English out of Ireland Nay the Irish were so inveterately malicious against them that they would not endure the very sound of their Language but punished those that spake English and the names of English places they changed into Old Irish In some places they killed the Cows and Sheep meerly because they were English and sometimes they cut off their Legs or a piece out of their Buttocks and so left them to live in pain and in other places those English Cattel that they could not devour they kill'd them and left them in great multitudes stinking upon the Ground The Popish Priests gave the Sacrament to divers of the Irish upon Condition that they should neither spare Man Woman nor Child of the Protestants saying That it did them a great deal of good to wash their hands in their Blood Some of their Priests Excommunicated all that should from thenceforth relieve or harbour any English Scotch or Welshman or give them Alms at their Doors whereby many were Famished to Death Yea the Popish Monks and Fryers exhorted them with Tears not to spare the English but utterly to destroy them nay they boasted that when they had made an end of them in Ireland they would go over into England and would not leave the memorial of an Englishman under Heaven and their Priests told them It was as lawful to kill an English man as to kill a Sheep or a Dog and that it was no more Pity or Conscience to take their Estates from them than to take a Bone out of a Dogs mouth The day before this Horrid Massacre began the Priests gave the people a dismission at Mass with full liberty to go out and take Possession of all their Lands which they pretended weâ—â— unjustly detained from them by the English aâ—though they were justly forfeited by their repeated Rebellions and Treasons against the Government They further told them that they might lawfully strip rob and despoil them of all their Goods and Chattels The Protestants being as they said worse than Dogs for their were Devils and worshiped the Devil and therefore that the Killing of such was meritorious and an Excellent Preservative against the Pains of Purgatory since the Bodies of such Catholicks as should die in this Quarrel would not be cold before their Souls should ascend up into Heaven so that they need not fear the Pains of Purgatory which occasioned some of these Murthering Villains to boast after they had massacred many of the English That if they should die presently they should go straight to Heaven When this Horrid Rebellion first began several Irish Gentlemen pretended great kindness to some of their Protestant Neighbours and perswaded them to put their Goods and Cattel into their hands engaging that they would secure them from the rage of the Rabble which made the Protestants so confident because of former familiarity that they gave them Inventories of all they had nay they digged up some of their best things which they had hidden in the grounds and put them into their hands whereby they got vast quantities of Goods into their hands and yet like True Papists they cheated them of it all nay which was more barbarous they promised the English that if they would be contented to lose their Goods they and their Wives and Children should peaceably depart the Country and yet when they had got all they had they inhumanely â—â—urthered them In one place there was no less than Twenty two Widdows who were first robbed and then stript stark naked and when in a house they had covered themselves with Straw the bloody Papists threw in burning Straw among them on purpose to burn them together And in a while after they brake forth into such abominable Cruelties bloody Massacres and Murders as would make the heart of any Christian to ake and his Ears to tingle at the Relation of them In the Castle of Lisgol above an hundred and twenty Men Women and Children were burnt together Another Castle was delivered to one of the Popish Commanders upon condition their lives should be saved but as soon as he entred he cruelly murdered and destroyed them all without mercy At Portendown Bridge a thousand Men. Women and Children were drowned in the River and it was testified upon Oath that nine days after there was the Apparition of a Man bolt upright in the Water breast-high with his hands lifted up to Heaven and that he was seen several times in that posture from December to the end of Lent at which time some of the English Army passing that way saw it likewise after which it vanished away One Elizabeth Price made Oath that she with other Women whose Husbands and Children were drowned in that place hearing of those Apparitions went thither one Evening at which time they saw a Woman rise out of the River breast-high her hair hanging down which was as white as Snow and so was her skin and that she often cryed out Revenge Revenge Revenge which so affrighted them that they went away In Queens County an English-man his Wife five Children and a Maid were all hanged together and then cut down and put into a hole the youngest Child though it was hanged was not quite dead when it was put in but put up its hands and cryed Mammy Mammy and yet these Villains without mercy buried it alive They stripped a Scotch-man and knocked him down for dead but he afterwards recovering went into the Town naked whereupon they hewed him all to pieces They also ript up his Wifes belly so that the Child dropped out They likewise hanged up divers other Women with Child and ripping them up they gave their Infants to be devoured by Dogs and Swine In one place they set a Castle on fire wherein were many Protestants and then rejoycingly said among themselves Oh how sweetly do they fry In one place they burnt two English Bibles and said it was Hell-fire they burnt they cut other Bibles to pieces and burnt them threatning to do the like to all English Bibles And in one place they took a Bible and laid it in a â—uddle of Water and then stamping on it said A Plague on it this Bible hath bred all the Quarrel A Papist would have perswaded a man and his Wife to have joyned with them in the Massacre but they protested That rather than they would forsake their Religion they would die upon the Swords point then he would have had the Woman burn her Bible but she told him Rather than she would burn her Bible she would die the Death whereupon they were both cruelly murthered These barbarous Villains caused some Children to carry their Aged Parents to the River
the Cruelties which were executed would exceed the belief of man but that they are so fully proved by the Attestations oâ— Eye-witnesses by the woful cryes of so many poor desolate Wretches who have been miserably robbed and despoiled of their Relations Friends Lands and Houses yea one of the chief Commanders of their own Army that acted these cruelties made a formal Oath of the reality thereof and Signed it with his own hand before two sufficient Witnesses and likewise the voluntary confession of one of the Souldiers who told some of his Fellows that during the heat of the Massacre he had divers times surfeited with eating the boiled Brains of Protestants The barbarous cruelties following which were exercised upon those poor people are likewise attested by divers Persons of Honour and Integrity who were for the most part eye or ear-witnesses of the same One Sarah Vâ—gues about threescore years of age was commanded to say her prayers and because she refused to say Ave Maria they ript her up alive by putting a Sickle into her privy parts and so slit up her Belly after which they dragged her about and at last cut off her Head Other Women had their Breasts Noses Privities and Hands cut off and so left to perish miserably another they stab'd in the soles of his feet then cut off his Privities and fry'd them giving them their Comrades to eat as a delicate Dish then they seared his Wounds with flaming Candles cut off his Ears and tore off his Nails with burning Pincers to make him renounce his Religion but he still continuing constant they tyed one of his Legs to a Mule and so drag'd him about the Streets till he was almost dead and after all this they bound a Cord about his Head and twisted it with a Stick till his eyes and brains burst out and then cast his body into a River One Peter Simond of Angrogna they bound hand and foot and then flung him down a dreadful Rock or Precipice but he happened in his fall to hang upon the stump of an old Tree where he continued alive several days in a miserable languishing condition before he died not being able to help himself and the Precipice being so high that no other could come at him They cut the body of an old man of ninety years of age into small pieces and then cut off his head Others had their bodies torn and cut in pieces and their limbs strowed in the High-ways and hung upon Hedges An old Woman had her Hands and Nose cut off and so was left alive The body of another Woman was found in a Cave with all the flesh sliced from the bones and chopt like minced meat These bloody Papists took many little children and tender Infants and threw them down the steep Rocks whereby they were dashed to pieces They took a Gentlemans Daughter and put a long Stake in her body and then carried her upon their shoulders till at last being weary they struck the Stake into the ground and so left her as a miserable Spectacle Andrea Michalin being taken Prisoner 〈…〉 strangely having first seâ—◠〈…〉 Children torn limb from limb and the fourth and youngest had its brains beaten out against the Rocks They wofully tormented others by fleying off their skins alive in long slices of which they made Points The Daughter of one Peter Fontana a beautiful Girl of about ten years of age being surprized by some of these lecherous Bruits because they could not ravish her in an ordinary way they so inhumanely abused her that they left her for dead The Daughter of one Moses Long they spitted upon a Pike and roasted her alive with a fire made upon a broad stone One Jacob Michelino they took and binding his hands to his Privities hanged him upon a gate and there left him in exquisite torments in that shameful manner as they likewise did by many others in the same kind Four Brothers and a man and his Wife all at one time had their mouths crammed full of Gunpowder and so being fired their heads were torn to pieces The Schoolmaster of Roras being stript naked after they had torn off his Nails with Pincers and made a thousand holes in his hands with their Daggers they dragg'd him through the Town of Lucerna and at every turn one Souldier cut off a Collop of his flesh from one side and another from another crying What saist thou wilt thou go to Mass thou Dog To which with admirable constancy he answered Much rather death than the Mass dispatch me quickly for thâ— love of God At last they cut off his head and flung him into the River One Giovanni with his Wife and Child were thrown down from a very high Rock the Mother holding the Child in her arms and three days after they were found dead only the Child was alive and clasped so fast in the dead Mothers arms that they could hardly get it out They took another at the same place and put out his eyes and then cut off his Privities and thrusting them in his mouth exposed him some time as a miserable Spectacle and he being yet alive they flead off his skin and hung it in the Windows of four principal houses in Lucerna after they had divided it into four pieces They took out the Brains of Daniel Cardon and frying them in a Pan eat them up like Canibals and then cut open his breast also that they might eat his Heart but were frighted by some Protestant Troops that were marching that way They burned four Women of between eighty and ninety years old alive they cut divers to pieces and gave their flesh to Dogs In another place having taken eleven Protestants they heated a Furnace and forced them to throw one another into it till it came to the last man whom they threw in themselves They stabbed some with impoysoned Knives in the legs and feet and so left them in torment till they died One Gros a Ministers Son being taken by them they cut off his Flesh in small Gobbets while he was alive and in the presence of his Wife and Children whom they murdered likewise before his eyes A Woman with seven Children were all barbarously murdered in their Beds one Daniel Rambout because he refused to say Jesu Maria or pray to the Virgin Mary they first cut off one finger then another till they had cut them all off then they cut off his hands and arms till after this manner they had cruelly manged him to death Others they shut up between two Stone walls and starved them to death And to conclude there was no manner of death no kind of cruelty or torment that these First-born of Hell could invent or devise but they were exercised with the utmost severity upon the poor miserable Protestants and it would be almost endless to give a particular account of all that were murdered drowned burnt shot starved smothered knocâ—â— on the head and cut in pieces by these Barbarous
Beasts and so were turned out into the Woods where they were ravished and abused and then had their Hair and Ears cut off and disfigured In Pomeren they forced the people to eat their own Excrements and if they refused them they thrust them down their Throats till they were choaked They cram'd the secret parts of several women with Gunpowder and so setting fire to it most barbarously tore their Bellies and Wombs Divers were hung up by the privy parts they plained the faces of others with Chisels others they caused to draw on Boots filled with scalding Oyl and so roasted their legs over the fire some men they gelt in the presence of their wives and children others had their bodies hung up by Cords and by tying great weights to their limbs all the joynts of their body were put out of joynt some had Gags put in their mouths and had stinking water and piss poured down their Throats through a Tunnel till their bellies swelled like a Tun whereby they died in most cruel torment They sawed off the legs of some alive and one Minister they bound upon a Table and placing a great Cat upon his belly so provoked the Cat that she scratcht his guts out of his belly withher Teeth and Nails till he miserably died At Magdenburg they ravished the Wife and Daughter of a famous Minister before his face and then violently snatcht a sucking Infant from its Mothers breast and stuck it on the top of a Lance and when they had tormented his Eyes and Heart with these horrid Spectacles they brought the Minister into the Street and burnt him with his own Books Yea such was their abominable filthiness in Pomeren that they ravished the fairest Virgins before their Parents faces forcing them to sing Psalms the while one beautiful young woman they ravished and then cut to pieces hanging up her quarters in the Church Girls of ten years old and under they ravished and abused till they killed them nay so monstrous beastly were they that they committed filthiness with the dead Corps of those women whom they had murdered At Bastl and Friburg they did the like neither pitying old nor young men women nor innocent Babes whom sometimes they most barbarously used to eat even when other meat might be had yea such inhumane cruelty they used that in many places they left none remaining alive to relate the sufferings of those that were murdered Thus these Massacres and bloody murders defiled the whole Land and Germany groaned under the oppression till the peace of Munster and Osnaburg in the year 1648. which put a stop to this cruel Persecution the Papists being compelled thereto by Gods bringing in the King of Sweden who over-ran Germany in a short time and thereby revived the Protestant Cause which was almost over-born and dâ—stroyed by so many thousand violences and miseries as it had lain under for many years These bloody Tyrants vented their rage and fury not only in Germany but also in Hungary and other Countries for they committed the same Villanies in all places where they had power the Ministers were generally banished and put to death and the same Picture of their cruelties which has been represented to you in Germany was acted over again in this Kingdom which we have not room to insert only a new sort of death was invented there they tyed Hens Geese Ducks and Hares to the naked Body of a worthy Minister in that Countrey and then set the Dogs upon him who tore and rent his Flesh till he dyed You have beheld many sad and doleful Spectacles and Reader if thou art a Christian thy heart must almost bleed at the relation of them we will therefore Epitomize the bloody cruelties of the Papists in POLAND All the same things or worse if it be possible which we have related to be done in other places were likewise acted in Poland many thousand Protestants and good Christians have been destroyed in that Kingdom and especially at Karmin Dumbuick Shochy Carienzin and Lesna all which Cities and Towns were destroyed and burnt to the ground for the cause of Religion The City of Lesna was one of the most ancient and flourishing Cities in all the Kingdom of Poland which was wholly laid in ashes being three whole days in flames ere it was consumed in which there perished many hundred Protestants besides inestimable wealth and treasure no man resisting or opposing the fire Here they pulled off the Noses of some and put out the Eyes of others and cut off the Tongues Hands and Feet of divers giving Quarter to none but killing and destroying all that came in their way They cut off the Hands of a pious Matron of Lesna and then murdered three of her Children before her Face cutting off their Heads and laying one at each Breast and the other by her side Another Woman having her Hands and Feet cut off and her Tongue cut out they sowed up in a Sack and so left her for two days in which she lived making a most miserable lamentation In the Lower Poland a multitude suffered whole Families were butchered and Men and Women Young and Old murdered without distinction And in the year 1654. there was an horrible slaughter amongst them the Papists putting to death all the Protestants they could meet with by most exquisite tortures One Mr. Samuel Cardus a Minister they used with extream cruelties first putting out his Eyes and leading him about as a miserable Spectacle then they pull'd of his Fingers with Pincers and poured melted Lead down his Throat and while he was yet half alive they put his Neck between two folding doors and so violently severed his Head from his Body They used the Minister of Dembnick and another Minister very barbarously for after they had several ways tormented them they cut their Throats with a Razor and while they were breathing flung them into a Pit and covered them with filth and dung The same Cruelties the barbarous and bloudy Papists acted against the Protestants in LITHUANIA in the year 1648. slaughtering all that were not Roman Catholicks without distinction of Age or Sex Here many had their Skins flead off while they were alive others their Hands and Feet cut off some their Bowels taken out alive others had their Shin-bones bored through they poured melted Lead into the wounds of some whom they had cut in the Head and other parts of their Bodies Some had their Eyes pulled out and those that were hanged up in all places were such a multitude that they are hard to be numbred It was counted a great mercy and kindness to be shot beheaded or killed outright without any other torment The Wives and Daughters of the Protestants were every where ravished their Houses and Goods burnt and destroyed and their Countrey and their Churches laid waste so that there was nothing to be seen in every place but Murders and Massacres and the Blood of the poor Suffering Protestants ran like Streams through
of admirable wisdom and understanding who when the King came one time into his Parliament at Paris made a bold speech before him wherein he gave thanks to Almighty God for moving the Kings Heart to be prefent at such a weighty matter as that of Religion which it seems was then to be debated humbly intreating him to consider well thereof it being the Cause of Christ himself which of good Right ought to be maintained by Princes but the King was so far from bearkening to him that being in raged he commanded him to be committed to Prison and protested to him in these very words These Eyes of mine shall see thee burnt And a while after he was condemned to die In the mean time great Triumphs were preparing for the Marriage of the Kings Sister Daughter the day being come he spent all the morning in Examining matters against Du Bourg and some others charged with the same Doctrines intending to glut his Eyes with their Execution and then went to Dinner After Dinner the King ran at Tilt near the Prison where Du Bourg was and brake many Spears against the Count Montgomery and others and all thinking he had done enough desired him to give over with praise But the King being inflamed with their Commendations would needs run another course with Count Montgomery who upon his knees begg'd his Majesty pardon but the King being resolved commanded him to do it upon his Allegiance Montgomery being compel'd addrest himself to it and the King and he meeting broke their Spears and the Kings Helmet falling down at the same Instant one of the Splinters of Montgomeries Spear entred just into his right eye and so pierced his head that his brains were perished which wound being incurable he died thereof within Eleven days after whereby his great hopes of seeing the Death of Du Bourg were frustrated And the Execution of Du Bourg was deferr'd for six Months longer all which time persevering constantly in the truth he was first degraded and then accompanied with six or seven hundred Horse and Foot well arm'd he was guarded to Execution being first hang'd and then burnt to Ashes At Amiens in France all the Bibles Testaments and â—salm Books were burnt the Ministers Pulpit and several Men and Women At Abbeville they slew the Lord of Harcourt and dragg'd some along the Streets with their their faces in the Kennel At Meux above Four hundred Religious Citizens were slain the Women and Maids were openly ravished in the Streets and Market-places Men Women and Children were Massacred the very Popish Priests themselves slaying divers with their own hands At a place called Bar the same if not worse Villanies were committed for the Papists pull'd out the hearts of these poor Protestants and most barbarously gnawed them with their Teeth rejoycing that they tasted of an Hugâ—nots heart At another place seven Hundred Protestants were inhumanely massacred and their naked Bodies thrown into the River Their Houses and Church being likewise plundered and Burnt At Angies they murthered a Godly Minister and many others and finding a Fair Bible gilt they hung it upon an Halbert and carried it in procession blasphemously crying Behold Truth hang'd the Truth of the Hugonots The Truth of all the Devils behold the Mighty God behold the Everlasting God will speak and when they came to the Bridge they threw it into the River crying louder Behold the Truth of all the Devils drown'd At Tours an hundred and forty were murdered and cast into the River and neither Man Woman nor Child spared nay the President of the City being only suspected to be a Favourer of the Protestants was first beaten with Staves then stript to his shirt hang'd up by one Foot his Head in the Water up to the Breast and whilst he was yet alive they ript up his Belly pluckt out his Guts threw them into the River and sticking his heart on a Lance they carried it about saying This is the Heart of the President of the Hugonots A Poor Woman whose Husband was a while before drown'd having a young Infant sucking at her Breasts and a beautiful Daughter of about sixteen years old in her hand these bloody Villains drove them to a River and taking the Daughter aside some of the Rascals endeavoured to seduce her to Popery and one of them who was finer than the rest promised to marry her so that the poor Maid began to doubt which her Mother who was just going to be thrown into the River perceiving she earnestly exhorted her Daughter to persist in the Truth whereupon the Daughter cryed out I will live and die with my Mother whom I know to beâ—d Virtuous Woman and as for your Threats and Promises I regard them not do with me what you please Before the Mother was quite drowned the Daughter was likewise thrown in who making toward her Mother they mutually embraced each other and so yielded up their Souls into the hands of God In the same City of Tours there was a very Religious Woman who being brought before the Captain she there gave an Account of her Faith which she confirmed by Scripture insomuch that the Fryers who discoursed with her could not return any answer but only told her That she was in a damnable condition It seems so indeed said she being in your hands And being then committed to prison she declared her mind freely and comforted the other Protestant Prisoners she was afterward condemn'd to be hang'd and the Rope being put about her neck she kneeled down praising and magnifying the name of God in shewing her so much mercy as by that death to deliver her out of this wretched world and that she was so far honoured as to die for the Truth and to wear Gods Livery as she reckoned the halter to be she then brake her fast with the rest of the Company and exhorted them to be of good courage and to trust in the free mercy of God to the end As she went to Execution one of her kindred brought her own little Children to see her and perswaded her to recant and save her life to provide for these Innocent Babes This was a very great Temptation and wrought so upon her Motherly affection as drew plenty of Tears from her Eyes But a while after resuming her former Courage and Constancy she said I love my Children dearly yet neither for love to them nor for any thing else in this World will I renounce my God or his Truth God will be a Father to these my Children and will provide better for them than I could have done and therefore to his providence and protection I commend and leave them After which she went cheerfully to the place of Execution and having there prayed to and praised God she quietly resigned up her Spirit to him A while after the City of Roan was besieged and two of the Forts taken wherein they put all the Protestants to the Sword and the Queen Mother being at