[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] SIR, — Mr. Rowse says that
it was a pity that Catholics " should have insisted upon dying " during the times of religious persecution. Also that they were divided among themselves as to what they died for. ,
Surely there is no necessity for historical research to solve any problem here. The facts cannot be disputed. The practice of the Catholic religion was at that time against the law, and the majority of those who died were priests who came to England and secretly ministered to the scattered few who remained loyal to the old faith of the country before the time of the Reformation, in spite of the laws forbidding them to do so.
These priests were very much the same kind of men as those to be found today in the Colleges where candidates for Holy Orders are -sent for training by the Catholic Bishops. Some of them converted Church of England clergymen, some converted Oxford and Cambridge undergraduates, some sons of stalwart old Catholic families—all of them typical
Englishmen differing in no way from the rest of their country.. men except in their devotion to Catholicism.
These men had been well educated, and their training had lasted a number of years, they knew quite well when they went abroad to engage in these studies that they were preparing themselves for life of service to the most outcast class in their country and that they must always expect that at any time they might have to suffer imprisonment and a terrible death.
Their object was plain to them all. They wished to keep alive their religion in this their country and they were united in this purpose. They certainly did not insist upon dying, but were willing to die doing what they considered to be their duty. It was bravery such as that exhibited by these men that was largely responsible for the spread of ideas of religious liberty and toleration, from which so many of other creeds than theirs benefit today.—Yours, &c., EDWARD BOWRON.
Beach Road, St.- Heliers, Jersey.
[This correspondence is now closed.—En. The Spectator.]
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