Edmund Campion: A Biography (1896)

P R E F A C E TO THE ORIGINAL EDITION. THE first eight chapters of the following Life were printed off from time to time, as they appeared in theRa77zblerin the years 1861 and 1862. When the BUJJI c Z ha n P ge - d into the Home and ibre n Rtview this work was dropped, and was only resumed in Noveniber 1S66. Canlpion has had so many biographers that a nelv one may be expected to state his reasons for telling again a tale so often told. They are very simple. In the course of my researches among different archives, I found a quantity of unpublished matter that had never been seen by the former biographers and in reading over the earliest and most authentic memoirs I found so Inany points obacurerl by phrase - making, misunderstood through ignorance of England, or misre resenledth rough thc one-sidedness of those whose iuformation was depended upon, that there seemed ample room for another book on the same subject. I have to express my obligations to the Jesuit Fathers at Stonyhurst, who had the kindness to send the RISS. relating to Campion to London for my convenieuce to Charles Weld, Esq. who look the trouble to copy from a nrs. at the GesG in Rome the whole of Bombinus unpublished additions and corrections for his biography and lastly, to Father Victor de Buck, Bollandist, of Brussels, for several references to rare books, and for encouragement, without mhich the work would never have been resumed. Thc Bibliographical Appendix and the references in the notes will be a sufficient indication of the authorities which I have followed. Clapham, Dec. 21, 1866, the protomartyr of the English Je suits, was born in London on St. Pauls day, January 25, 152, the thirtieth year of Henry VIII., ayear marked by the suppression of the great religious houses in Eng-Iand, and the inauguration of a persecution of which, forty years after, Campion was to be a victim, as well as by the solemn papal approval of the Society of Jesus, of which he was to be an ornament. His father was also Edmund Campion, citizen and bookseller of London. His parents were not wealthy in the riches of this world, but very honest and Catholic, says Father Parsons. Campion himself was not so certain of this he onIy bLhopes that they died in the faith. They had four children, a girl and three boys, of whom Edmund was either eldest or second. He and his youngest brother took to books the other preferred adventure, and took a wife, who was occasionally left to herself while her husband served in the wars. See Note A at end. When Edmund was come to years of discretion, hat is, he itras nine or ten, his parents wished to apprentice him to some merchant but some rnenibers of one of the London companies-Parsons thinks that of the, erchant adventurers, but I think the grocers-having become acquainted with the LLsharp a nd pregnant wit that he had shown from his childhood, induced their guild to undertake to maintain him at their common charges to the study of learning. He was sent first to some London grammar-school, and afterwards to the new foundation of Edlvard VI. at Christ Church, Newgate Street, -if we may call it his foundation but a new religion had brought in new notions of nerit and re paration it was amplc satisfaction for the theft of a hog to bestow its feet in alms. just three weeks before he died, Henry VIII. not only atoned for his whoIesalc pil lage of the Church, but acquired the honours of afounder and benefactor, by restoring St...