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herself down to the block, she recited that psalm, In thee O, Lord, do I, trust, let me never be confounded.' Then stretching forth her body, and repeating many times, Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend ny spirit, her head was stricken off at two strokes: the dean crying out, So let the queen Elizabeth's enemies perish;' the earl of Kent answering, Amen;' and the multitude sighing and sorrowing."

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Thus fell, by the axe of the executioner, and the warrant of a remorseless and bloody tyrant, the most accomplished woman of the age, and the most unfortunate queen that ever graced a throne, in the 46th year of her age. "A lady," writes Camden, "fixed and constant in her religion, of singular piety towards God, invincible magnanimity of mind, wisdom above her sex, and admirable beauty.'

THE DEPOSING DOCTRINE.

We must here be allowed to say a few words on the charge brought against Catholics that they teach the doctrine of deposing princes for religion sake, than which nothing can be more false. This doctrine had its origin in what is called the Reformation, and to cover the deformity of it, the authors basely imputed it to the Catholics, while they openly taught and practised it themselves. The Catholic church never taught that the pope, as head of the church, had any power over the temporal rights of kings or states, and if there are instances of popes exercising a sort of authority in the disposal of crowns, the authority originated in a concession of the sovereign princes, and not in any right conferred by the divine Founder of the Catholic church, or granted by any council of bishops. Kings may have been deposed in Catholic times, but it was not for their religious virtues, but for their worldly vices, by which they had become odious and hateful to the people and to Christendom at large, and public opinion called for the removal of the scandal occasioned by their irreligious deeds. But this was not the

case when Luther and the swarm of pretended reformers of the sixteenth century set up for menders of religion. They had to combat against Truth; to establish absurd opinions against common sense; to make fools of rational beings; in fine, to break the main link of society, UNITY OF BELIEF, and let loose the torrent of mental infatuation. When this friar and his associates began their mad and wicked career, the sovereigns of Europe were all Catholies, and consequently opposed to the dangerous notions of these men; reason and argument could not be expected to advantage their cause, it being against truth-there was consequently no other resource than brute force, and when they could not prevail upon the sovereign of a state to enter into their views, they preached sedition and rebellion against his authority. Thus history proves that the reformers strove hard to depose Charles V. emperor of Germany. France was a long time the scene of contention between the Calvinistic reformers of that country and their Catholic kings. Brabant followed the example of the French reformers and wrested a great part of that -country from the Catholic king of Spain, who had long ruled it; the Swedish reformers caused the reigning queen Christiana to flee her throne; the Scotch reformers deposed the queen regent of that kingdom, and afterwards the queen herself, whose tragic end we have just related. In England the change of religion was introduced by the royal power and civil sword; but when the crown descended on Mary, the daughter of Henry the eighth, the abettors of the new creed set about deposing the rightful heir because she was a Catholic. They were, however, frustrated in their vile plans, and met the reward which awaited their traiterous designs. The hapless Mary of Scotland, unable to withstand the turbulent and rebellious conduct of her reforming subjects, fled to England and claimed the protection of Elizabeth, the first she pope of the Church of England as by law established. Here we might have supposed she would have rested in security, and reposed in the honour of that country which, while Catholic, was proverbial for its high integrity and sanctimonious adherence to its engagements. Bnt Mary was a Catholic, and though the professors of that faith are eternally but unjustly reproached with not keeping faith with heretics, no faith was to be kept with this Catholic queen by a Protestant tyrant and her ministers, and the axe of a rival sovereign completed the deposition of traiterous subjects. Eliza beth attempted to justify her conduct by a reference to particular instances in history, but they were not in point with the case of the queen of Scotland, whose chief offence was an inflexible attachment to the ancient faith of her forefathers. But the deposing power of Protestantism did not end here. The grandson of this virtuous queen, Charles I. was deposed and beheaded by his Protestant subjects; and her great-grandson, James II. who became a Catholic after he came to the age of maturity, was deposed by his Protestant subjects too, because he wished to grant liberty of conscience to all his people; and not wishing to share the fate of his father he ended his days an exile in a foreign land. After these examples recorded in history of the actual effect of Protestant dethronements, and the solemn disavowal of any such doctrine being taught by the Catholic church, we think it is high time that the objection raised against the claims of the Catholics to be restored to their civil rights, of the deposing power of the pope, should be laid upon the shelf,

for no one in future can bring it forward without a violation of common sense and common justice.

11. Francis Levison, Priest and Jesuit.

This confessor of the Catholic faith was thrown into prison where he suffered much from confinement. The justice who committed him endeavoured to bribe witnesses to swear against him, but could not prevail with them. After fourteen month's imprisonment he yielded up his soul to God, on the 11th of February, 1680, aged 34 years, and the 16th as a religious.

12. George Haydock, Priest.

George Haydock was son Evan Win Haydock, esq. of Cottam-hall, near Preston, in Lancashire. He was educated first at Douay, from whence he went to Rome, but the climate not agreeing with his health, he was sent to Rheims, whence he was ordained priest, and soon after ordered on the English mission. He had scarcely arrived in London, when he was arrested on the 6th of February, 1585, in St. Paul's churchyard, and taken into the church, when he was offered his liberty if he would renounce the pope. This Mr. Haydock refused to do, and he was taken with a Mr. Arthur Pitts (who was also apprehended) before Popham, the attorney-general, who strictly examined the prisoners; and they underwent another examination, the day following, by Cecil, the lord treasurer, who committed them both to the Tower. Here, between Norris, the pursuivant, and sir Owen Hopton, lieutenant of the Tower, Mr. Haydock had all his money juggled away; and that the matter might not be discovered, the honest lieutenant placed his prisoner in a remote cell, and would not suffer his friends to come near him. Here he lay for a year and three months, deprived of all human comfort and assistance. A short time before his end he was removed to another place where he was not so strictly watched, and some friends were allowed to see him, by which means he had the opportunity of receiving the blessed sacrament frequently. Previous to his trial he was brought before Mr. Fleetwood, the recorder of the city, and others, to be examined; and the usual trepanning questions about the power of the pope and the queen in spirituals were put to him. Mr. Haydock readily answered, that he believed the bishop of Rome was, under Christ, chief head of the church upon earth; and that this dignity and authority could not belong to the queen or any other woman. This was sufficient for the new doctrine gentlemen, but to render Mr. Haydock more odious, they pressed him with further interrogatories till they got him to say, against his will, that the queen was a heretic, and, without repentance would be eternally lost. On the 6th of February, he and four other missioners were taken from the Tower to Westminster-hall, and there arraigned for high treason, found guilty, and sentenced to death. The cause for which they condemned him is thus set down by Stow in his Chronicle, 1584. "The 7th of Feb. John Fenn (he should have said James) George Haydock, John Munden, John Nutter, and Thomas Hemerford, were all five found guilty of high treason, in being made priests beyond the seas, and by the pope's authority, since a statute made in anno primo of her majesty's reign; and had judgment to be hanged, bowelled, and quartered; who were all executed at Tyburn on the 12th

of February." Can any thing be made plainer that religion and religion only was the treason these martyrs had committed. The law under which they were condemned was a law of Elizabeth's making, and would have convicted St. Augustin, to whom England was indebted for the knowledge of Christianity, had he landed in the time of this she pope of the English church, instead of the time of Ethelbert, a pagan king. Mr. Haydock and his companions received the sentence of death with incredible joy, and each of them prepared for death with the utmost fervour. On the day of execution, Mr. Haydock, though the youngest of them all, was first ordered up into the cart, which he ascended with great alacrity. The reader will here observe, that it was the fashion in these days of enlightened evangelical puritanism and hatred of Catholicism, to execute only one prisoner at a time, the others being witnesses of the butchery that was going on before their eyes. The rope being fixed about the neck of Mr. Haydock, he was called upon by the sheriff, and the ministers or parsons in attendance, to confess his treason against tlie queen and ask her pardon. He answered, “I call God to witness, upon my soul, that I am innocent of the pretended treason; and therefore I have no occasion to ask her pardon.' He further said that he acknowledged her for his queen, and wished her all happiness, and had offered up several prayers to God for her that very day; and that such was his disposition, in regard to her majesty, that if he were alone with her in a wilderness where he might without danger do to her what he pleased, he would not hurt her with the prick of a pin, though he might have the whole world for so doing. This declaration did not evince a traitorous feeling, nor one deserving the death of a traitor. The sheriff shewed himself a bitter enemy to Mr. Haydock, and the busy parsons wanted to interfere with his religious devotions, but the holy martyr heeded them not, telling them to retire, for he had nothing to say to them. When the cart was driven away the sheriff ordered the rope to be cut, though the victim was alive, and the whole butchery was performed while he was alive and sensible.

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James Fenn, Priest.

James Fenn was born at Montacute, in Somersetshire, and brought up in Oxford; first in New college, where his two elder brothers, John and Robert, studied at that time, and afterwards in Corpus Christi college; but being about to be received fellow of the college, he hesitated at the oath of supremacy, which was tendered to him on the occasion, and refusing to take it, he was expelled.-From Oxford he went to his native county, where he was entertained by a gentleman of fortune, who engaged him as tutor to his son. Here Mr. Fenn married a wife, by whom he had two children; he also suffered much on account of his religion. Having lost his wife, he entered the service of sir Nicholas Pointz, a Catholic gentleman, as steward, and the whole tenour of his life in this station was a perpetual sermon. He was here advised, by a pious priest, to quit the world and go over to the English college at Rheims, lately translated there from Douay, to receive holy orders and qualify himself for the mission. Mr. Fenn took the advice, and after being ordained returned to his native soil and county, where he reconciled many persons to the Catholic church. It was not long, however,

before he was apprehended by the persecutors of the old religion, and lodged in Ilchester gaol, from whence he was removed to London, and after being examined by secretary Walsingham, was sent prisoner to the Marshalsea.-Mr. Fenn was kept confined during two years, when the ministry deeming it necessary to pick out some victims from among the many priests they had then in prison, to make an example of them for the terror of the Catholics, Mr. Fenn was one selected for that purpose.-Accordingly he was summoned to undergo a preparatory exa-. mination, and had the usual butchering questions put to him concerning the supremacy; to which he answered in such a manner as to profess all due obedience to the queen in temporals and the pope in spirituals; declaring at the same time, "that he was a Catholic, and that there was not any one article of the Catholic religion for which he was not willing to lay down his life.'

When his trial came on, though they wanted not matter sufficient for his condemnation, on account of his priesthood, and the answers he had given to the examiners; yet to make the proceedings against him more plausible in the indictment, they affirmed that James Fenn and George Haydock, in such a year, month and day (which were all named) had conspired together at Rome to kill the queen, and had returned into England in order to perpetrate their wickedness. Mr. Fenn being called upon by the judges to answer for himself, called God and all the court of heaven to witness, that this accusation was most notoriously false; that, in fact, he had never been at Rome in his life, nor ever any nearer it than Rheims: that he had never seen Mr. Haydock till he met him at the bar, and that at the very time when he was pretended to have been plotting at Rome, he was actually in England, as he could demonstrate; and that he believed he could make it appear, that he was then prisoner in the Marshalsea; that he had never entertained so much as the first thought of any treason against the queen, and that he would not, for the whole kingdom of England, have done her the least hurt, though he could be sure of doing it with impunity. The judge told him, that although there might be some error in the circumstances of time, place, &c. yet that he had been sufficiently convicted of treason, and therefore was to look for nothing else but to die; and so neither witness nor any evidence whatsoever being produced to prove the pretended plot, to the astonishment of all that were there, he directed the jury to find him guilty of the indictment, and accordingly pronounced sentence upon him, as in cases of high treason; which barefaced infquity convinced all, that the true cause of Mr. Fenn's condemnation and death was no other than his character and religion. Having received séntence, he was carried to the Tower, and there kept in a dungeon, loaded with irons, from Friday, the day of his condemnation, till Wednesday following, which was the day of his execution. In the mean time, Mr. Popham, the attorney, and a doctor of the civil law, formerly school-fellow to Mr. Fenn, came to him, to exhort him to comply and acknowledge the queen's authority, and obey the laws; promising, that if he would, they would use their best endeavours to save his life. The confessor told them, he willingly acknowledged the queen's authority in all temporal matters; but that he neither could nor would acknowledge her supreme head of the church, but only as one of the sheep sub

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