Blessed Sebastian Newdigate. By Dom Bede Camm, O.S.B. (Art and
Book Company. 2s. 6d. net.)—Sebastian Newdigate came of a family which belonged, so to speak, to the "nobility of the robe." His father was a Serjeant-at-Law, and he was one of seventeen children (the seventh of ten sons). He became a monk at the Cbarterhouse, and was executed on June 19th, 1535, a genuine martyr, whatever we may think of the principles to which he bore witness. If Dom Bede Camm had been content to claim this honour for his hero and his companions—good. But we cannot admit that the execution of the Carthusians was a "sight never seen before in • England," and was "the prelude of bloody persecution that was to last a hundred and fifty years." What about the victims of the statute "Do Heretico Com- burendo " ? Surely Dom Bede Camm cannot think that it was right to burn a Lollard, but wrong to hang, draw, and quarter an orthodox Carthusian. As for the hundred and fifty years, not a few of the " martyrs " between 1535 and 1685 were scarcely distinguishable from traitors and murderers.
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