Showing posts with label relics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label relics. Show all posts

Wednesday, 5 November 2014

The Life Of Fr John Gerard S.J. (A Hunted Priest) Part 38.

Fr Garnet

FATHER GARNET'S STRAW.
I. A fuller account of Father Garnet's straw is given by Father Gerard in his history of the Powder Plot. 1 "The first sign," he there says, " by which it pleased God to show the merit and glory of this His martyr was concerning his relics, which were eagerly sought for by many Catholics at the very time of his martyrdom. Amongst which there was one young man [John Wilkinson] who stood by the block where the martyr's body was cut up, with great desire at least to get some drop of his holy blood. And whilst he had these thoughts, not daring to take where he desired for fear of being espied, it fortuned that the hangman having cut off the martyr's head and showed it to the people (as the custom is), he cast it into a basket standing there of purpose, full of straw, to hold the head and quarters when they were divided. Out of this basket did leap a straw or ear void of corn in strange manner into the hand of this young man, which he beholding and seeing some blood on it, kept it with great care, and no little joy that he had obtained his desire. He carried it away safely and delivered it unto a Catholic gentlewoman of his acquaintance [Mrs. Griffin], who kept it in a reliquary with great devotion; and after three or four days [two or three months interlined in orig. MS.], a devout Catholic gentleman coming thither, she showed him the bloody straw, which he was also glad to see and reverence; but beholding the same more curiously than the others had done, he saw a perfect face, as if it had been painted, upon one of the husks of the empty ear, and showed the same unto the company, which they did plainly behold, and with no small wonder, but. with much greater joy did acknowledge the mighty hand of God, Who can and doth often use the meanest creatures to set forth His glory, and is able both out of stones and straws to raise a sufficient defence for His faithful servants.

"They put up the straw again with great admiration, and kept it now with much more reverence and devotion than before. This was quickly published to many of the chiefest Catholics about London, who much desiring to see this wonder, it was carried unto divers, who are all witnesses of this truth. At length it came to the Council's ear, and some of them desiring much to see it, it was granted, being now in the keeping of a great person, 2 but with promise to have it safely restored; so that some of them did see it, and did much admire it, affirming that it must needs be more than natural. Others after desired to see it and to seize upon it, because now the fame did grow so great of this image of Father Garnet drawn by the hand of God, whose image and memory they sought to deface in all they could, that they feared the evidence of the miracle would plead against their proceedings and prove him innocent whom they had punished as guilty. Therefore the Bishop of Canterbury [Archbishop Richard Bancroft] sought to have the miraculous straw into his hands, but it was denied, and none would acknowledge where it was to be found. He learned out the party to whom the keeping of it was first committed, and sent for her husband, who was a known Catholic and a virtuous man. He examined him strictly how it came to pass, and where the straw was. The Catholic affirmed the truth of the thing and described it unto him in words; but said it was not now in his keeping, and he knew not where to find it. And when they could get no other answer of him, they committed him to prison; but afterwards, having sundry and great friends in the Court, he got out upon bonds to appear again at certain days' warning.

" In the meantime it happened that two were miraculously cured by application of the same straw. One was a gentlewoman in great peril of her life by danger of childbirth, who, when she had sustained long and painful travail and could not be delivered of her burthen, and now was out of hope of life, unless she might obtain some help from God, some of her friends made earnest means to get this holy straw to bring unto her; which being obtained, and the straw brought and applied with great reverence, presently she received help, and was delivered by the mighty hand of God and merits of the martyr, whom no midwife's skill or endeavour could help before.

"Another was the gentlewoman herself who first had this miraculous relic delivered her to keep. For she being very much subject to sickness, and sometimes in such extremity therewith that you would not think she could be able to live an hour, it happened that in one of her extremest fits, when she could find no medicine or means that could bring her any ease, she earnestly desired a special friend to make suit for the straw to be returned unto her for a small time, which was granted; and as soon as it came (she receiving it with great devotion and reverence) she presently found ease, and within half an hour was so perfectly well that she rose from her bed, and went to entertain some strangers that then were in the house, and erat una ex discumbentibus —['was one of them that were at table.' St. John xii. 2].

" This sudden and strange cure of hers being spoken of by divers Catholics, it came out to be known unto the Council, who sent again for the husband of the gentlewoman, and took this new occasion to commit him the second time to prison.

"The Council afterwards understanding that this miraculous picture in the straw had been shown to divers painters in London, they sent for the painters and willed them to make the like portrait to that which they had seen in a like empty ear of corn; but they all answered that it was not possible for them to do it, neither could the draught of that face, in so little a room and so loose a groundwork as that empty ear, be otherwise drawn than by supernatural power. And this testimony they gave of it that had both skill to judge and no will to favour the Catholic cause (being in opinion heretics), but only convinced in their understanding by the evidence of the miracle."

II. The Archbishop of Canterbury [Bancroft] to the Lord Chief Justice [Sir John Popham] on the apprehension of Barret [Barnes] and the miracle of Garnet's straw: from the original letter in the Archives of the See of Westminster, vol. viii. p. 41.

" My Lord, I gave a warrant to Mr. Skidmore for the apprehending of one Barret, who went up and down with a miracle of Garnet's head supposed to be upon a straw that was on the hurdle whereupon he was drawn to his execution. This warrant was signed with my Lord Chancellor's hand, my Lord Treasurer's, my Lord of London and mine. Upon the serving of the warrant, the said Barret drew his rapier and hath hurt Skidmore, and is likewise thrust through the thigh by*him. This Barret is at a barber's shop in Fleet street not far from the Temple gate. I heartily pray your lordship to send for the stay of him that he may be forthcoming. He is a notable villain. And so I commit your lordship to God. At Lambeth, this 25th day of November 1606.

Your lordship's most assured,
                                                    R. Cant. 

" To-morrow I will acquaint you with some other particulars." Addressed " To the Right Honourable the Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench, one of his Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council."

     Endorsed 3 "The dispersers, Griffin's wife, Mrs. Anne Vaux, sent to her by a gentleman, Mrs. Gage of Bentley."

III. Robert Barnes' examination, from a contemporary copy in the same authority, p. 43.

"The examination of Robert Barnes of Harleton in the County of Cambridge gent, taken by the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury the 27th of November 1606.

" He saith that about the 13th of November, being Thursday, he went to Hugh Griffin's, a tailor, to see if his, this examinate% gown were made: that until that very time he had never heard of the wheat ear whereupon a visage is supposed to be seen : that Griffin's wife was the first who then told him of it: that she said there was a straw besmeared with Garnet's blood at his execution which had upon it the form of a face : that it was a very strange thing, but was not then at home with her: that she promised him when he came again, to show it him : that accordingly, he going unto her two days after, viz. upon the Saturday, she showed it
him : that he, this examinate, looking upon it through the crystal, first saw a white thing: that she bade him look wistly upon it, and that then he imagined he saw two eyes closed, then a face pale, as he thought: after, a short chin: then a forehead somewhat high: then a perfect face: that he, being of the age of 56, and having endured 10 years' imprisonment, hath a dim sight: that he saw the said face through the crystal and his spectacles by candlelight: that he espied the face, as is before mentioned, within the time that a man would go 40 steps : that after he had discerned the face, he saw (as he thought) two locks of hair standing upright in the midst of the top of the forehead: that having so seen it, he only said to Mrs. Griffin that it was a strange and wonderful sight, and that he hath not told any of it but one or two in Poules [St. Paul's] whose names he remembereth not, and that he told them he made no great account of it: that he maketh no great account of it, because it may be drawn by the art of some painter: that the colour of the cheeks differed from the colour of the eyebrows, and that the parts of the face were distinguished from one another, as it were, with the draught of some hair or of some very small thing, and that the beard was somewhat reddish: that he saw not Garnet for the space of 20 years past, before he came through Cheapside upon the hurdle : that his beard was then whitish, but had been in colour betwixt yellow and red.

" Being demanded why he hath not since that time laboured to satisfy himself whether the said face were made by art or by some extraordinary means, he saith that his business hath been such, as he hath had no time to think of it.

" Being demanded why he did not ask Mrs. Griffin whether it were a face indeed made by art or otherwise, he saith that he made so small account of it, as he asked her no questions about it.

"Thirdly, being demanded how his words concerning the small account he made of it, can agree with his former speeches, where he said it was a very strange and wonderful thing, he answereth that though it were made with art, it is strange and wonderful in his opinion to have so perfect a face made in so little a room."

    Endorsed "The copy of the Examination of Robert Barnes taken before the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury 27 0 Novem. 1606."

IV. Francis Bowen's examination. Ibid. p. 47.

" The examination of Francis Bowen of London gent, but useth limning, 4 taken by the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury on the 27th of November 1606.

" He saith that betwixt three weeks and a fortnight since one Anser servant to Sir William Wiseman 5 of Essex told this examinate that he had seen an ear of corn with a face upon it, and said that if he, this examinate, would, he could bring him where he might see it: that accordingly he brought this examinate to a house in Clerkenwell where Mrs. Anne Vaux was, and one Mr. Dolman who hath a knight to his brother: that when Anser and this examinate came into the house, the said Dolman and Mrs. Anne Vaux were looking upon the ear, being in a crystal: that upon the said Anser's motion they let him, this examinate, see it: that Mr. Dolman bade this examinate look whether he could espie the face : that he espied it in the while that the Ave Maria may be repeated : that upon his espying of it, he perceived it to be a perfect face : that the proportion of the face was in the blade that lay upon the husk of a corn, the corn being out, or rather, the blood made the proportion of the face: that upon the top of his forehead stood up certain hairs: that the forehead was something high, and had as it were two wrinkles overthwart it: that there was then a little stroke went down resembling a nose : the mouth was not well discerned because the hair of the upper lip did hang over it: the beard seemed to be somewhat long and bloody: that the compass of the face seemed to be, either the extremity of the husk, or else some little brown blackish small strokes which he conceived to be of blood congealed of that colour: that the hair above the forehead seemed to be likewise little streaks of blood, and so were the two wrinkles, the two little strokes for the eyebrows, the stroke that was made down for the nose, two small streaks resembling the eyes, and the hairs of the beard were like the hairs on the top of the forehead, saving that they were (as is aforesaid) somewhat more of the colour of blood : that there was no more to be seen but the head, as neither the arms, shoulders nor neck : that the face was much like to this in the margent, saving that it was drawn in a better proportion: that all the rest of the face, saving the said streaks, was the husk itself: that he verily thinketh the face upon the ear which he saw in the glass, might have been made as skilfully or more skilfully by a cunning workman : that he verily believeth if the said straw came first into a dishonest man's hand, the face upon the ear might have been counterfeited : that he first heard of the said face about a week before he saw it, but remembereth not by whom : that before he saw it and since he hath heard many Catholics talk of it, and some of them to affirm that the face was like to Garnet's : that one Mr. Martin who taught the children upon the virginals that played in the Blackfriars did ask this examinate whether it were not like Garnet's face."

    Endorsed " The copy of the examination of Francis Bowen, taken before the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury 27 0 Nov. 1606."

V. Hugh Griffin's first examination, from a contemporary copy in the Archives of the Old Chapter.

"The confession of Hugh Griffin, of St. Clement's without Temple Bar, tailor:—taken by the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury, November 27, 1606. 

He saith that the same day that Garnet was executed [May 3, 1606], one John Wilks [sic], a silkman, being come out of his prenticeship two years since, and living now amongst his friends in Yorkshire, brought to this examinate's house a straw with an ear upon it, which he said was one of the straws whereupon Garnet was laid when he was executed; that the straw and ear were bloody; that this examinate and his wife desired to have the straw; that he promised they should have it at his going into the country; that they advised with the said Wilks to have the straw put into a crystal for the better preserving of it; that within three or four days or a week (as he remembereth) the straw was set in crystal, according to the former resolution; that about nine weeks since [about the 25th of September] and not before, he, this examinate, looking earnestly through the crystal upon the said straw, with his wife, and one Thomas (who once served, as he thinketh, the Lady Beeston, wife to Sir Hugh Beeston) they all together at once discovered a thing like a face upon the ear of the said straw; that this examinate did first say to the other two (as he thinketh), ' Do you not discern a thing upon the ear like a face?' and they answered that they did; that thereupon he then (as he thinketh) opened the crystal, and then, upon their earnest looking upon it, they imagined they saw a face; that this examinate thereupon said to the rest, ' This may chance to proceed from our fancies,' and therefore desired them to make no words of it until it were better decided; that he kept it in his house about a fortnight, and in the meantime looked upon it forty times (as he thinketh) and sometimes half an hour or an hour together, until he saw the visage so perfectly as he is sure he could not be deceived; that the face is so perfectly apparent, being once found, viz. the forehead, the eyes, the cheek, the nose, the mouth, the beard, and the neck, as he supposeth no man living is able to draw the like thing upon the like subject; that the said Wilks, when he left the straw in the crystal with this examinate, did not (as he thinketh) ever imagine that there was any face upon it; that he doth not remember that any but himself and his wife did see the said face during the said fortnight, or that himself did acquaint any with it; that peradventure his wife might tell somebody of it, but whom he knoweth not, that after the said fortnight ended, when he was assured as aforesaid, he showed it to Lord William Howard; 8 that Dr. Taylor being present (as he remembereth) desired to have had it, to have been showed to the Ambassador of Spain; that the Lord William kept the said straw, and showed it to such as he thought fit; that about ten days after, this examinate received it again from the said Lord William; that he thereupon delivered it unto Dr. Taylor, in the hope of some good reward to be given unto him; that he delivered it as he did never expect to have it again, except it were to borrow it, with the Ambassador's liking, to show it to some of his friends that would desire to see it; that his lordship kept it some two or three days; that he, this examinate, received it again and showed it to some, but he doth not remember to whom; that he delivered it back again to Dr. Taylor within a day or two after he had received it from the Lord William; that Dr. Taylor told him how the Lord Ambassador made great account of it, had sent it to be seen by the Ambassador of Venice, and that he was very loth to part with it; that he delivered the said straw to Dr. Taylor, as aforesaid; that the Lord William first had it for about five days before he, this examinate, gave it to Dr. Taylor as aforesaid; that this examinate did show it to Mrs. Anne Vaux, when he had it from the Lord William and before he returned it back again to Dr. Taylor after he had borrowed it; that this examinate lent it at that time to the said Mrs. Anne Vaux; that she had it with her a day and a half or two days; that he supposeth she showed it unto divers; that this examinate was much troubled before he could get it again from Mrs. Anne Vaux; that if any affirm that there is any light or beams about the said face, he affirmeth that which is not true; that for aught this examinate knoweth, the said face is no more like Garnet's face than any other man's that hath a beard; that he imagineth, the face being so little, no man is able to say it is like Garnet; that this examinate never did see Mr. Garnet but when he was brought to the Tower; that he remembereth that Mr. Garnet was a well-set man, and had a big face, according to his proportion ; that though the face seem but little at the first view, yet upon diligent looking upon it, it seemeth still to increase in perfectness and to be bigger, but that when it is perfectly discerned with the eye, it continueth in one and the same bigness; that he verily thinketh, except one be told in which husk the face is, he will very hardly find it; that all the said perfect visage, to be seen as is aforesaid, is contained in the length and breadth of the husk of one corn. He also saith upon occasion of further speech that the crystal wherein the straw is set was his own before, and that he gave it to the said Wilks that the straw might be put into it, and took order with him that the crystal should be set in gold or silver and gilt; that it is about the breadth of a shilling, but made in the form of a heart; that it is about a quarter of an inch thick; that the straw is nipped off, and the whole ear lieth round in it."

VI. Hugh Griffin's second examination, from the Archives of Westminster, vol. viii. p. 51.

" The second examination of Hugh Griffin of St. Clement's without Temple Bar, tailor, taken by the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury 27 Novemb. 1606.

" He saith that within 8 or 10 days of Garnet's death the ear wherein the face is seen was put in crystal, which must fall out to be about the eleventh or twelfth of May : that about Midsummer John Wilks went into Yorkshire, returned a little before Michaelmas, and went back again into Yorkshire about a week after Michaelmas : that about 8 or 10 weeks since, he first discerned the face in the said ear: that from about the nth or 12th of May he had the said crystal and ear in his house, before he espied the said visage till about the 18th of September, which was 19 weeks : that all this time of 19 weeks he never looked upon the said crystal: that before the said 19 weeks ended, he had no time to look upon it: that when he first looked upon it about 10 weeks since, he saw a glimmering of a face.

" He saith that when the crystal with the ear was first brought unto him by Wilks, he looked upon it, but did not then espy any visage : that he looked a good while earnestly upon it about 10 weeks since, before he saw the glimmering of a face. And being demanded why he viewed the same longer and more earnestly at this time than he did when it was first brought unto him in the said crystal, he answereth, because he had not leisure when it first was brought unto him, so to view it.

" Being demanded how it came to pass that he never looked upon it for the space of the said 19 weeks, but when his wife and one Thomas were present, he answereth that then he was best at leisure.

" That he thinketh it was never seen, after it was brought unto him first in crystal, until about the 10 weeks before mentioned."

    Endorsed " Copy of the second examination of Hugh Griffin, 27  Nov. 1606."

VII. Hugh Griffin's third examination: ibid. p. 55.

" The examination of Hugh Griffith [sic] taken by the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury 3 December [sic] 1606.

" He saith that it was a month or 5 weeks after Michaelmas when he saw John Wilkinson [sic] last: that he so thinketh because he used the said John his advice in letting a house of Mr. Preston's to the Count Arundell about the first wee[k] as he thinketh after Michaelmas: that the said John h[as] a brother dwelling at the upper end of Cheapside: that [about] 8 days since the said John's mother sent a letter to this examinate] signifying unto him that she heard her son wa[s gone] beyond seas, and desiring of him, this examinate, that if he [were] not gone, he would stay him : that it was not John his said brother who brought the said letter but one out of the country: that he knew not of his going beyond seas, if he be gone, nor did ever advise him thereunto.

"Being demanded where the said Thomas is to be found, whom he mentioned in his first examination, he desireth to be foreborne therein, for that being a Catholic he would not bring him into trouble : that he did not see the said Thomas since about 10 days past, as he remembereth.

"Being demanded unto how many he had lent the crystal with the straw, besides the Lord William, and Mrs. Anne Vaux, he desireth to be foreborne, for that he had received blame for that he hath done already : that it might be that the said John did see the face in the crystal, having lain for the most part seven weeks at this examinate's house at his last being at London.

" Being demanded unto whom he imparted the effect of his confession before the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury at his first examination, he desireth to be foreborne the answering of it; only he saith that he thinketh he told the Lord Chief Justice's man somewhat of it.

"He further saith that he mistook something in his first examination which now he amendeth, saying that John Wilkinson bringing the straw from Garnet's execution, this examinate willed his wife that it might be put into something, for else it would moulde[r] away : that thereupon the same day the said John and this examinate's wife did put it into a little vase of crystal, which his wife had ready made, and that for aught he knoweth it was so laid up and not seen for 19 weeks after: that he knoweth not whether he lent the glass with the straw unto the said John Wilkinson or unto this said Thomas."

    Endorsed " Copy of . . . examination . . . December."

VIII. Thomas Laithwaite's examination : ibid. p. 59.

"The second 9 examination of Thomas Laithwaite, servant to the Lady Katharine Gray, taken by the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury 3 December 1606.

" He saith that Hugh Griffith. did not send for him upon the Friday morning after he had been first examined before the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury, which was the Tuesday before, viz. on the 27th of November: that no person man or woman came unto him in Hugh Griffith's name for his, this examinate's, repair unto him : that nobody was present when the said Hugh Griffith told him what he had confessed : that what he told him was in Griffith's shop: that he received the crystal with the straw from Griffith about Sunday was a fortnight: that he received it upon one day and brought it back to Griffith the day following : that whilst he had it. he showed it to Sir Hugh Beeston 10 and one Mr. Fortescue : that he re-delivered the said crystal with the straw to Griffith in his chamber, nobody being present: that he never borrowed nor had the said straw from Griffith but once as aforesaid : that the Lady Katharine Gray had seen the said straw, but by whose means he knoweth not; but afterwards he said, he knoweth not whether ever she saw it or no, nor whether he hath ever hear[d] her acknowledge that she saw it: that he will not tell anything that may bring others in trouble, though it cost him his life.

" He further saith that he knoweth Dr. Taylor and was with him at the Embassador's house of Spain on Friday or Saturday last: that he had no business with him but only was there to see his wife : that he had been acquainted with Dr. Taylor since the beginning of summer : that he never saw the said crystal with the straw either in the Lord Embassador's or in Dr. Taylor's house."

Endorsed " Copy of Thomas Laithwaite's second examination 3 Decem. 1606."

IX. The account given by John Wilkinson, when dying at St. Omers, translated from Father More's Historia Provincial Anglicanӕ, lib. vii., n. 35.

" I, John Wilkinson, stricken by a grievous malady, and my life being despaired of by the physicians, that I may acquit myself of an obligation by which I am bounden to God and His saints, will now declare how I found the ear of corn on which the likeness of blessed Father Garnet is to be seen.

"The day previous to Father Garnet's execution, I was taken with a vehement desire of beholding his death, and of carrying away something of his relics. I was filled with an assurance of satisfying my desire so great that I did not doubt but that I should see something whereby God would testify to the innocence of His holy servant. When this thought kept continually recurring to me I endeavoured to drive it from my mind, lest by expecting a miracle where there was no need of one, I might tempt God and offend Him. On the following day very early I betook myself to the place of execution and took up a position as near the scaffold as possible, remaining in the same spot until Garnet came. So great, however, was the concourse of horsemen on the arrival of the Father, and such a crowd of people pressed round that I could not keep my position, nor hear distinctly what was said. I remarked nevertheless many things which caused me no slight consolation. In the first place, the careful arrangement of his shirt that it might not be raised by the wind, which gave me a great idea of his modesty and purity. Again when the ladder was removed, his hands placed over his breast in the form of a cross, although they dropped somewhat, yet retained the same form of the cross over his heart until he expired. This furnished me with greater reason for wonder, as if it had been a sign sent from Heaven, for whilst dying he had prayed that God would not allow the Cross of his Lord to be torn from his heart. I also perceived that when his head was cut off and held up for the view of the spectators, that his countenance was the same and retained the same colour as in life; and at the same time I remarked that I did not hear any one cry out ' Long live the King !' as is the custom on such an occasion. This was a proof to me that even then the people were convinced of his innocence. After his body had been cut up into four parts and together with the head thrown into a basket and placed in a cart, as the crowd by degrees retired I advanced into the space between the scaffold and the cart, still with the same eager desire of carrying off some of his relics. Whilst I was looking round, this ear of corn, concerning which there is now so much talk, somehow or other came into my hands. Straw was thrown from the scaffold into the basket containing the head and members, but whether this ear came from the scaffold or the basket I cannot say, I am certain however that it did not touch the ground. I handed over this ear the same day to Mrs. Griffin, and she placed it in a crystal case, which being rather small caused the ear to be bent round. A few days afterwards in my presence she showed it to one of our acquaintance a very good man. When he had looked at it with much attention he said, ' I do not see anything except a man's face.' Astonished at this remark, we ran to the case and both of us beheld the face which we had not remarked before. Others also being summoned perceived it at the same time. And this is the most true account of the ear which I found, as God knows, and I considered that for His glory I was bound to narrate it."

X. Father Richard Blount, in.a letter dated November 8, 1606, says, "A Catholic person in London having kept, since the execution of Mr. Garnet, a straw that was embued in his blood, now these days past being viewed again by the party and others, they espy in the ear of the straw a perfect face of a man dead, his eyes, nose, beard, and neck so lively representing Mr. Garnet as not only in my eyes but in the eyes of others which knew him, it doth lively represent him. This hath been seen by Catholics and Protestants of the best sort and divers others who much admire it &c. This you may boldly report, for besides ourselves a thousand others are witnesses of it."

And in another letter dated March, 1607, "It cannot be a thing natural or artificial. The sprinkling of blood hath made so plain a face, so well proportioned, so lively shadowed, as no art in such a manner is able to counterfeit the like." Stonyhurst MSS., Father Grene's Collectan. M.

XI. Father Henry More, whose history was published in 1660, says that the straw was kept in the English College of the Society at Liege. The last mention we have met of it is by the Abbe Feller, in the article "Garnett" in his Dictionnaire Historique, which was published at Liege in 1797, and therefore after the suppression of the Society. His words are, " L'epi est aujourdhui entre les mains d'un de mes amis, qui le conserve soigneusement." These words are omitted in the later editions of the Dictionary.

1 Condition of Catholics, p. 301.

Father More says that this was the Spanish Ambassador, which is in accordance with Griffin's deposition. He gives an attestation of the Baron de Hobocque, dated in 1625, attesting that he had seen the straw in 1606, when he was in London as Ambassador of the Archdukes of the Low Countries. Hist, Prov, AngL lib. vii. n. 35.

3 This letter has another endorsement, which is not easily decipherable.

4 That is to say that, " though a gentleman, he practises painting."

5 We thus learn that Father Gerard's friend was knighted early in James' reign. Sir William Wiseman published a book in 1619 called "The Christian Knight."

That is, "whose brother is a knight."

7 There is no face given in the margin of the copy.

8 Lord William Howard of Naworth, third son of Thomas fourth Duke of Norfolk, half-brother of Philip Earl of Arundel.

9 The copy of the first examination does not seem to have been preserved. Father Gerard has said, supra, p. 387, that they could not prove Thomas Laithwaite to be a priest, and in these examinations there is nothing to show that he was suspected of being one. It is noteworthy that Hugh Griffin is asked "where the said Thomas is to be found," at the very time when he was in Archbishop Bancroft's custody. Father Gerard adds that "his brother was allowed to buy his freedom." This would seem to be a confusion with a former imprisonment, for Thomas Laithwaite was one of the 47 priests who were banished in 1606. He had been arrested on his landing at Plymouth in 1604 and condemned to death for his priesthood at the Lammas Assizes at Exeter, and he was then the means of converting his brother Edward, who had come to see him in prison in the hope of reclaiming him to Protestantism. There were five of the family in the Society, three priests who were known by the name of Kensington, Father Thomas whose alias was Scott, and the eldest who was a lay-brother (More, Hist. Prov. lib. ix. n. 1).

10 Sir Hugh Beeston, son of Sir George Beeston, who distinguished himself against the Armada and died in September 1601, married Margaret, daughter of Laurence Downes of Worthe, and widow of Philip Worthe of Tydrington.

Sunday, 12 October 2014

The Life Of Fr John Gerard S.J. (A Hunted Priest) Part 15.

RELICS.

"During my stay in this third residence, I gave the Spiritual Exercises to several persons. Among them were two gentlemen, who still stand to the good purposes they then made. They are our staunchest friends in the districts where they live. One of them, Mr. John Lee, lately-defended philosophy at Rome: he is always ready to entertain ours and furnish them with money. The other has shown himself worthy of trust in many matters of moment. After five or six years each of them made another retreat with the most consoling result.

" I sent also some young men abroad to study, with the view of entering on a more perfect state. One died at Douay, after great advancement in his studies, and with a wide-spread reputation for holiness. He had been a comrade of the blessed martyr Father Francis Page, S.J. They were both in an office in London. It was through his means that the blessed Father was first brought to me, to his no small profit, as I shall show hereafter. Some are now Fathers of the Society; for instance, Father Silvester and Father Clare, now living I think at the Seminary of Valladolid. Others of my sending are now serving God in divers places and divers conditions : among whom is Father John Bolt. Great talent for music had won him the warmest love of a very powerful man. He spurned this love, however, and all worldly hopes with it, to attach himself to me; and lent his ear to the counsels of Christ in the Spiritual Exercises."

Father Thomas Silvester was Minister of the College of Valladolid when Father Weston was Rector. 1 Father John Clare must not be confounded with Sir John Warner who took the name of Clare.

Father John Bolt was not a Jesuit, but died a secular priest in 1640, having been chaplain and organist to St Monica's Convent for twenty-eight years. 2 He was arrested in March 159(3/4), with William Wiseman, in a house hired by Father Gerard in Golding-lane, and those then taken were called by Father Garnet "our friends and chiefest instruments." We have his examinations on that occasion, and they will be given when we come to that stormy period in Father Gerard's life. Before that however our autobiographer had an interval of comparative calm, and he has time to think of holy relics.

Thorn from Jesus’ crown


"At this time I had given me some very fine relics, which my friends set for me very richly. Among them was an entire thorn of the holy Crown of our Lord, which the Queen of Scots had brought with her from France (where the whole Crown is kept), and had given to the Earl of Northumberland, who was afterwards martyred. He always used to carry it in a golden cross about his neck as long as he lived, and at his death made it over to his daughter, who gave it to me. It was enclosed in a golden case set with pearls: it is now in the hands of my Superior, along with three other cases made of silver with glass in front. Two of them are old relics, rescued from the pillage of a monastery. They came to me from a source that I could trust. The third contains the forefinger of the martyr, Father Robert Sutton, brother of him whom I mentioned in the first chapter. By a wonderful providence of God, this finger, along with the thumb, was kept from decay, though the whole arm had been set up to be eaten by the birds of heaven. It was taken away secretly by the Catholics after it had been there a year, and was found quite bare. The only parts that were covered with skin and flesh were the thumb and finger, which had been anointed at his ordination with the holy oil, and made still more holy by the touch of the Blessed Sacrament. So his brother, another pious priest, kept the thumb himself and gave the finger to me."

The relics mentioned thus far by Father Gerard were, he tells us, in the hands of his Superior: those that he afterwards describes were left in the care of various private persons "in trust for the Society." The latter, as far as is known, have all perished ; but the account of the former is of great interest to us, as these relics have come down safe to our times, and are all at Stonyhurst.

The two "old relics, rescued from the pillage of a monastery," are there. They have labels in a fourteenth century handwriting, but they are not easily decipherable, and probably Father Gerard could not read them, as he gives no names to the relics.

Statue of Bl. Robert Sutton at
Our Lady of Victories Church,
Lutterworth, where his relics are
now housed in the altar.
The thumb of Robert Sutton, priest and martyr-Father Gerard is wrong in calling it the forefinger—is there also, in a small gilt upright cylindrical reliquary. With it there is enclosed a paper in Father Gerard's handwriting, 3 giving the same account of the relic that he has given above.

There were two martyrs of the name of Robert Sutton. One was a layman, a schoolmaster, who was put to death at Clerkenwell, October 5, 1588. 5 The other, whose relic this is, suffered at Stafford, 6 according to some on the 27th of July, according to others on the 3rd of March, 1587. The brother, who gave this relic to Father Gerard, was Abraham Sutton, who was ordained with Robert at Douay February 23, 157(7/8). They were sent together upon the English mission on the 19th of March, when they had been just a year at the College, and having both been imprisoned, they were banished together in 1585. Abraham, who was at one time tutor to two of the young Fitzherberts, 7 was again banished in 1606. The martyr had two other brothers, William and John, both Jesuits, of whom the elder was Father Gerard's tutor.

The relic of the Crown of Thorns has a curious history. The relics previously mentioned were brought from Liege to Stonyhurst on the transfer of the College in the year 1794, and the thumb of Robert Sutton is mentioned in a letter from Father William Strickland to Father Marmaduke Stone, dated April 7, 1806. The relic of the Crown of Thorns was never at Liege. It was taken to St. Omers about the middle of the seventeenth century, probably in December 1665, as the permission for it to be exposed for public veneration was given by the Bishop of St. Omers on the 8th of January, 1666. This permission was countersigned, after the arrival of the relic in England, by the Vicar Apostolic of the Western District, Charles Walmesley, O.S.B., Bishop of Rama, on the nth of December, 1790, at which time the relic belonged to Mr. Weld of Lulworth, and by the Vicar Apostolic of the Northern District, William Gibson, Bishop of Acanthos, on the 4th of November, 1803, when the relic had been given to Stonyhurst College.

Father Charles Plowden, in his account of the suppression of the English College at Bruges, to which city the College that had existed for two centuries at St. Omers had been transferred a few years before, says that " some young gentlemen of the College chanced to get into their, possession the beautiful and precious reliquary of the Holy Thorn which Queen Mary of Scotland brought away with her from the Royal Chapel of Holyrood House; and knowing that other valuable deposits were in the Carthusian Convent, one. of them in his journey to England left the Holy Thorn there, as in a place of security, consigned to the hands of Father Norris. Father Mann, Prior of the Carthusians, leaving them, voluntarily surrendered the treasures he had received to the Government, taking Father Norris with him to Bruges for that purpose. The Holy Thorn fell into the hands of a scrivener named Van de Steine, who sold it in 1781 to Mr. Thomas Weld for seven guineas, the value of the gold, and under promise to restore it if redemanded by the Government of Maria Teresa. In 1803 Mr. Weld gave it to the Reverend Marmaduke Stone for Stonyhurst."

This account of the purchase by Mr. Weld is perfectly accurate, but the rest of the story as told by Father Plowden is imperfect and incorrect. The facts are these. On the suppression of the Society, not unnaturally, the English boys at the Grand College at Bruges became very unruly and unmanageable on the loss of their masters, and the Government, which had desired to preserve the College for the benefit of the city of Bruges, was obliged to send them away. Some went to Liege and others to their own homes. Among the boys there was the Hon. Hugh Edward Henry Clifford, afterwards the sixth Lord Clifford, then a boy of seventeen. The property of the Jesuits had been seized, and the cupboards were sealed by the Commissaries of Maria Teresa. Mr. Clifford, knowing how the relic of the Holy Thorn was prized by the Jesuit Fathers, broke open the cupboard in which it was, and gave it to a scholastic of the name of Jameson, who was then starting for England in charge of the two sons of Sir James Haggerstone, Bart. Their way lay through Nieuport, where existed the last remains of the famous Carthusian house of Sheen, which had kept up its continuity in the Low Countries all through the times of the persecution in England, to perish in the French Revolution. Father Augustus Mann, better known afterwards as the Abbe Mann, was then Prior, and on learning from Mr. Jameson that he had this treasure with him, he induced him, by fear of excommunication for stealing a relic and by threats of the indignation of Maria Teresa's Government, to leave the relic at Nieuport. The Prior then sent it to the Bishop of Bruges, with a letter dated the 16th of October, 1773 ; but when it reached the Bishop, the Commissaries had left Bruges, and the reliquary was handed over to their notary, Van de Steine, who kept it, and ultimately sold it, as Father Plowden says, to Mr. Weld of Lulworth.

The reliquary is very light and graceful, of the renaissance period, made in gold with little enamels inlaid. Under the foot is the following inscription : " + Hӕc spina de Corona Doi. sancta, fuit primo Mariӕ Reg. Scot. Mart, ab ea data Comiti Northumb. Mart, qui in morte misit illam filiӕ suae Elizӕ, quӕ dedit Soc, hancq. I. Wis. ornavit auro." "My friends set it for me very richly," says Father Gerard. Who can doubt that the " I. Wis." of the inscription is "Jane Wiseman ?"

Father Gerard speaks only of one reliquary, and that one in which the relic is " set with pearls." Several spiral strings of pearls surround the relic at Stonyhurst. But there is another reliquary in existence the very counterpart of it, of exactly the same form and materials, with precisely the same inscription under its foot, containing also a little relic of one of the Holy Thorns. It is clear that, though he has not recorded it, Father Gerard divided into two parts the relic which he received from Lady Elizabeth Woodroff, and Jane Wiseman had two reliquaries made by the same artist. The second differs from the first only in having no strings of pearls. At the time that the first was taken to St. Omers, the second was taken to the English Jesuit Novitiate at Watten by Father John Clerk, the Provincial, who, at the request of Father Martin Grene the Rector, wrote an authentication dated the 17th of January 1666, which was approved by the Bishop of St. Omers on the 5th of February. The inscription, being under the foot, was never read by Father Clerk, who could only attest that it had been kept in the Provincial's room in London, and always venerated by his predecessors as a true relic of the Crown of Thorns. On the expulsion of the Society from France a few years before the suppression, the College of St. Omers became the Grand College at Bruges, and the school at Watten the Petit College in the same city; but though the relics and archives of St. Omers were taken to Bruges, those of Watten were deposited in the Tertianship at Ghent, and there they were seized at the time of the suppression. By some means the Watten relics passed into the possession of Maximilian Macharius de Meulenaere, Dean of the Chapter of St. Bavon and Vicar General of Ghent, who kept them for some years, obtaining for the Holy Thorn the approbation of the Bishop of Ghent, Govardus Gerardus van Eersel on the 23rd of March 1774. Besides the relic of the Holy Thorn, the Dean had the magnificent relic which bears the inscription " A peece of the stump of the crosse of or Savior which was once in the Tower of London with the crown jewels of James I. The Holy Cross the Dean ultimately gave to the Bishop of Ghent, and it is now preserved in the Treasury of the Cathedral of St. Bavon. The Holy Thorn he gave to the confraternity of the Holy Cross in the Church of St. Michael at Ghent on the 24th of April 1808, and in the sacristy of that Church it now is.

We may now let Father Gerard finish what he has to say about the relics that came into his possession, and then we accompany him into scenes of danger.

" I had given me about the same time a silver head of St. Thomas of Canterbury; also his mitre set with precious stones. The head, though neither large nor costly, is very precious from having in it a piece of the skull of the same Saint, which we think was the piece that was cut off when he was so wickedly slain. It is of the breadth of two gold crowns. The silver head was old and had lost some stones, so the gentleman, in whose house I was, had it repaired and better ornamented. On this account, the Superior afterwards let him keep it in his private chapel in trust for the Society.

" In like manner another Catholic gentleman in that county has by the same permission a large piece of the arm of St. Vita, virgin, daughter of a king in the west of England. Many churches in England are dedicated in her honour under the name of Whitchurch. This relic reached me by God's will in this manner. The parson of the place where the whole or great part of her body used to be kept in olden times with due honour, began to be troubled in his rest, insomuch that he could not sleep. The annoyance had lasted for some time, when one day the thought struck him that his troubles came from his not paying proper respect to these bones which he had in his keeping, and that he ought to give them to the Catholics, the rightful owners. He did so, and his rest was never again broken. A good priest told me this story, and gave me a large bone, which a pious Catholic is keeping at present for the Society.

" There was also given me some beautiful altar furniture, which I used to the great comfort and increase of devotion as well of the Catholics of the house as of visitors."

1 Troubles, Second Series, p. 282.

2 Troubles, First Series, p. 297, where the name is in the first instance misprinted "Best."

3 "Pollex Dni. Roberti Suttoni Sacerdotis, qui Staffordӕ vinctus, nocte ante passionem in carcere magna luce circumfusus orare visus est. Partes autem corporis, postquam volatilibus cӕli per annum expositӕ fuissent, a Catholicis sublatӕ, hoc pollice et indice intactis, cӕteris ad ossa usque consumptis, invents sunt."

4 Dr. Oliver has confounded the two; he says that Robert Sutton was " formerly Rector of Lutterworth," but he quotes no authority for so saying.

Challoner, Missionary Priests , vol. i. p. 245.

6 Ibid. vol. i. p. 206.

7 P.R.O., Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. ccxxxv. n. 88.

8 The writer's best thanks are due to W. H. James Weale, Esq., of Bruges, for the reference to the Abbe Mann's letter and for information respecting the relic at Ghent.