No Threats Could Persuade Mr Mole To Renounce His Heresy, And Though
Many Attempts Were Made To Exchange Him For Some Jesuits Caught In
England, He Lay For Thirty Years In The Prison Of The Inquisition, And
Died There, At The Age Of Eighty-One.
It was part of the policy of the Jesuits, according to Sir Henry Wotton,
to thus separate their tutors from young men, and then ply the pupils
with attentions and flattery, with a view to persuading them into the
Church of Rome.
Not long after the capture of Mole, Wotton writes to
Salisbury of another case of the same sort.
"My Lord Wentworthe[159] on the 18th of May coming towards Venice ...
accompanied with his brother-in-law Mr Henry Crafts, one Edward
Lichefeld, their governor, and some two or three other English, through
Bologna, as they were there together at supper the very night of their
arrival, came up two Dominican Friars, with the sergeants of the town,
and carried thence the foresaid Lichefeld, with all his papers, into the
prison of the Inquisition where he yet remaineth.[160] Thus standeth
this accident in the bare circumstances thereof, not different, save
only in place, from that of Mr Mole at Rome. And doubtlessly (as we
collect now upon the matter) if Sir John Harington[161] had either gone
the Roman Journey, or taken the ordinary way in his remove thitherwards
out of Tuscany, the like would have befallen his director also, a
gentleman of singular sufficiency;[162] for it appeareth a new piece of
council (infused into the Pope by his artisans the Jesuits) to separate
by some device their guides from our young noblemen (about whom they are
busiest) and afterwards to use themselves (for aught I can yet hear)
with much kindness and security, but yet with restraint (when they come
to Rome) of departing thence without leave; which form was held both
with the Lords Rosse and St Jhons, and with this Lord Wentworthe and his
brother-in-law at their being there. And we have at the present also a
like example or two in Barons of the Almaign nation of our religion,
whose governors are imprisoned, at Rome and Ferrara; so as the matter
seemeth to pass into a rule. And albeit thitherto those before named of
our own be escaped out of that Babylon (as far as I can penetrate)
without any bad impressions, yet surely it appeareth very dangerous to
leave our travellers in this contingency; especially being dispersed in
the middle towns of Italy (whither the language doth most draw them)
certain nimble pleasant wits in quality of interceptors, who deliver
over to their correspondents at Rome the dispositions of gentlemen
before they arrive, and so subject them both to attraction by argument,
and attraction by humour."[163]
Wotton did not overrate the persuasiveness of the Jesuits. Lord Roos
became a papist.[164]
Wotton's own nephew, Pickering, had been converted in Spain, on his
death-bed, although he had been, according to the Jesuit records, "most
tenacious of the corrupt religion which from his tender youth he had
imbibed."[165] In his travels "through the greater part of France,
Italy, Spain and Germany for the purpose of learning both the languages
and the manners, an ancient custom among northern nations, ... he
conferred much upon matters of faith with many persons, led either by
inclination or curiosity, and being a clever man would omit no
opportunity of gaining information."[166] Through this curiosity he made
friends with Father Walpole of the Jesuit College at Valladolid, and
falling into a mortal sickness in that city, Walpole had come to comfort
him.
Another conversion of the same sort had been made by Father Walpole at
Valladolid, the year before. Sir Thomas Palmer came to Spain both for
the purpose of learning the language and seeing the country. "Visiting
the English College, he treated familiarly with the Fathers, and began
to entertain thoughts in his heart of the Catholic religion." While
cogitating, he was "overtaken by a sudden and mortal sickness.
Therefore, perceiving himself to be in danger of death, he set to work
to reconcile himself with the Catholic Church. Having received all the
last Sacraments he died, and was honourably interred with Catholic
rites, to the great amazement also of the English Protestants, who in
great numbers were in the city, and attended the funeral."[167]
There is nothing surprising in these death-bed conversions, when we
think of the pressure brought to bear on a traveller in a strange land.
As soon as he fell sick, the host of his inn sent for a priest, and if
the invalid refused to see a ghostly comforter that fact discovered his
Protestantism. Whereupon the physician and apothecary, the very kitchen
servants, were forbidden by the priest to help him, unless he renounced
his odious Reformed Religion and accepted Confession, the Sacrament, and
Extreme Unction. If he died without these his body was not allowed in
consecrated ground, but was buried in the highway like a very dog. It is
no wonder if sometimes there was a conversion of an Englishman, lonely
and dying, with no one to cling to.[168]
We must remember, also, how many reputed Protestants had only outwardly
conformed to the Church of England for worldly reasons. They could not
enter any profession or hold any public office unless they did. But
their hearts were still in the old faith, and they counted on returning
to it at the very end.[169] Sometimes the most sincere of Protestants in
sickness "relapsed into papistry." For the Protestant religion was new,
but the Roman Church was the Church of their fathers. In the hour of
death men turn to old affections. And so in several ways one can account
for Sir Francis Cottington, Ambassador to Spain, who fell ill, confessed
himself a Catholic; and when he recovered, once more became a
Protestant.[170]
The mere force of environment, according to Sir Charles Cornwallis,
Ambassador to Spain from 1605-9, was enough to change the religion of
impressionable spirits.
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