A.D. 1606.

along felt at the tribulations and calamities to which you settle the have been so unrelentingly subjected in consequence matter, of your firm adherence to the Catholic faith: but now that we have heard how bitterly all your troubles are aggravated at the present time, our distress has increased to an extraordinary degree. For we have been given to understand that you are compelled, under the sanction of the heaviest penalties, to go to the temples of the heretics, frequent their services, and be present at their preachings. We are firmly persuaded that men who have heretofore undergone with so much constancy persecutions the most atrocious, miseries almost infinite, that they might walk without spot in the law of the Lord, will undoubtedly never allow themselves to be contaminated by communion with deserters from the divine law. Nevertheless, influenced as we are by the zeal that His impertibelongs to our pastoral office, and considering the pater- nenn nal solicitude for the salvation of your souls by which we Church and are ever actuated, we cannot but warn and beseech of worship of you that you never on any account enter the churches of England. those heretics, or listen to their preachings, or communicate with them in religious rites, lest you incur the anger of God. For these are acts which you cannot commit without injury to the worship of God and to your own souls.

nent notice

condemn

'As also you cannot without a most evident and most He takes awful dishonouring of God, bind yourselves by the oath, upon him to which, with similar feelings of deepest heart-sorrow we the king's have heard of as having been proposed for your acceptance; of the tenor here subjoined, viz :

[The oath is then recited, in Latin of course, as well as the rest of this brief; but agreeing exactly with the English form in the preceding article; after which the pontiff immediately thus proceeds:]

Oath;

'Such being the nature of this document, it should be telling his clear to you from the very words of it, that an oath of disciples

they must be ready to than take it

die, rather

the kind cannot be taken with safety to the Catholic faith and to the welfare of your own souls, containing, as it does, much that is openly opposed to the faith and to salvation. Wherefore we admonish you carefully to abstain from taking this or other such oaths; a caution which we are the more strict in urging upon you, because that having had experience of the constancy of your faith, which has been tried, as gold, in the furnace of unremitting tribulation, we feel assured that you will be ready cheerfully to submit to any still more atrocious tortures, and even to feel an earnest longing for death itself, rather than to do ought which might be injurious to the majesty of God. And our confidence is strengthened by those acts of YOUR MARTYRS which glitter even in these last days with a splendour not inferior to that which shed a glory round the CHURCH'S EARLIEST DAYS. [sic.]

'Stand therefore having your loins girt about with truth, and put on you the breastplate of righteousness: taking the shield of faith: Be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might; and let nothing stay you in your onward course: and He who beholds from heaven the struggles in which you are engaged, and is ready to confer on you the crown, will finish the good work which He hath begun in you. You know that He has made promise to his disciples that he would never leave them orphans; and faithful is He that hath promised. Maintain therefore His discipline, that is, rooted and grounded in charity, whatever be your circumstances, whatever your aims, act unanimously together, in simplicity of heart, in unity of spirit, without murmuring or hesitation. Seeing that herein shall all men know that we are Christ's disciples, if we shall have love one to another. Which charity, as it is indeed most highly to be desired among all Christ's faithful people, so for you at least, children most dearly beloved, it is absolutely ne

cessary. For such charity among you has the effect of crushing that power of the devil which at present rises against you in such fury, and which depends mainly for its support on the disputes and contentions of our children.

calling on

Clement

We exhort you therefore by the bowels of the Lord and conJesus Christ, by whose charity we have been rescued cludes by from the jaws of eternal death, that above all things ye them to atmaintain mutual charity among yourselves. Precepts of tend to the special utility, relative to the exercise of brotherly cha- directions of rity towards one other, have been addressed to you by VIII. to G. Pope Clement VIII. of happy memory, in his letter, in Blackwell. the form of a brief, to our beloved son George, arch-presbyter of the realm of England, dated on the 5th day of the month of October, 1603. Attend therefore diligently to those instructions, and lest you may be impeded by any difficulty or ambiguity, we command you to observe strictly to the letter the words of that communication, and to receive and understand them simply as they sound and lie therein, without taking any liberty of interpreting them otherwise. Meanwhile we shall never cease to beseech God, the Father of mercies, to regard with pity your troubles and afflictions, and to vouchsafe to you the defence and safeguard of his continual protection; of our clemency bestowing on you also at the same time our apostolical benediction.

Given at Rome at St. Mark's, under the Ring of the Fisherman, the Tenth of the Calends of October, [Sep. 22,] 1606, in the second year of our Pontificate.'"

(Given in O'Daly, Relat. Gir., 255-261; Foulis, Hist. &c., 527. Mr. Phelan gives as the whole a mutilated version of a portion of the document.)

No. LXI.

To remove a

on the au

thority of the last

brief, Paul V. issues a

fresh one. A.D. 1607.

SECOND BRIEF OF POPE PAUL V., CONFIRMATORY OF THE PRECEDING.

Immediately in connection with the matter of the extracts from the Hibernia Dominicana comprised in the preceding article, De Burgo continues his narrative in the manner following:

"XII. But inasmuch as there were some persons who doubt cast (from a desire possibly to deceive the Catholics, lest they should take occasion hereupon to refuse the oath) were spreading rumours in England of a tendency to throw suspicions on the credit of the above letter apostolic, saying that it was a Brief written not according to the na tural sentiments and proper will of the pontiff himself, but rather at the instance and by the design of others, the abovenamed pope Paul V. took occasion therefore in the following year, and on the 22nd of September once again, to write a second letter, from which the truth of the former might more plainly appear. Of which moreover the contents are as follows;[from O'Daly, Relat. Ger. 262-265. Also in Foulis, 528]

Second Apostolic Brief of Pope Paul the Fifth. 'Beloved children, health and apostolical benediction. Tidings have reached us, that there are found certain among you, who, after our having declared with sufficient clearness, in our letter given in the form of a brief, of the 10th of the Kalends of October of last year, that you could not with a safe conscience take the oath which was then required of you, and after our having also strictly commanded you not to take that oath on any account,

are now presuming to say that such a letter prohibitory of the oath in question was not written of our own natural accord and proper will, but at the instance, and in pursuance of the designs, of others; And are on this ground endeavouring to persuade the parties concerned, that our commands in the said letter need not be attended to. These tidings have certainly occasioned considerable uneasiness on our part, and the more on this account, that having had experience of your obedience, our children singularly beloved, who to maintain your allegiance to this holy See, have PIOUSLY AND GENEROUSLY DISREGARDED [sic.] riches, wealth, dignity, liberty, in fine life itself, we never should have suspected that the authority of our letters apostolic could have been called in question among you, as a pretext for securing an exemption from the obligation of our commands. But we recognise herein the craft and scheming of the enemy of man's salvation, to whom, rather than to your will, we are disposed to attribute the origin of this opposition. On these grounds To amend we have determined to write to you again, and once which, he more to intimate to you, that our Letter apostolic prohibitory of the oath, bearing date the 10th of the Kalends of October of last year, was written, not only of our own motion and certain knowledge, but also after long and grave deliberation on all matters therein contained; and that you are therefore bound strictly to observe its injunctions, rejecting every interpretation which tends to dissuade you from so doing. This we (who in our solicitude for your salvation do always adopt such views as are favourable to your interests,) declare to be our mere, pure, and full pleasure. And that He who hath been pleased to appoint our lowliness to the guardianship of the Christian flock, may ever illuminate our views and consultations, we do unceasingly desire in our prayers. To whom also we offer our continual supplication, that to you, our children most exceedingly teloved, He may give

writes this confirmatory brief.