ARTICLE V. COLLEGES AND MONASTERIES ERECTED ABROAD.-ENGLISH BENEDICTINE JESUITESSES-THEIR CONDUCT IS IMPEACHED-THEIR NEGOCIATIONS AT I HAVE formerly given an account of the several colleges established at Douay, Rome, Valladolid, &c., for the use of the secular clergy, who were the main body that supported the catholic cause in England, during the greatest part of queen Elizabeth's reign. By degrees, several religious orders engaged in the same labour, and found means to procure establishments for that purpose. The first, I shall make mention of, were the benedictine monks; according as their affairs and economy are described by a late author in the following words :' [The disputed question, as to the origin of the benedictine order in England, has been alluded to in a preceding volume of this history (i. 28, 29, note). "About the latter end of the sixteenth century, some English scholars, who studied in Italy and in Spain, becoming religious men in the congregations of MonteCassino and Valladolid,' Don Alfonso Coral, general of the congregation of Valladolid, and some other superiors of the same congregation, in the year 1603, made application to pope Clement VIII., to obtain leave to. erect an English mission, of the English religious men who had professed in their congregation. The fathers of the congregation of Monte-Cassino joined with those of Valladolid, to pray the same favour for the English of their congregation; which the pope granted them, on the twentieth of March, the same year. Accordingly, religious men of those two congregations, of Monte-Cassino and Valladolid, were sent into England to act in concert, though they were of different congregations. They made a sort of union among themselves, and engaged to act indifferently, under the orders of the superiors of the two congregations. Some time after, father Augustin of St. John, first vicargeneral of the Spanish mission, procured the establishment of two houses for those English missioners; the one at Douay, in the Low-countries, and the other at Dieulewart, in Lorrain. The first of them was founded by Philip Caverel, regular abbot of St. Vedast of Arras, with the consent of his monks; upon condition that the said house should return to the abbey of Arras, whensoever it should please God to restore the catholic faith in England. That of Dieulewart was given by the 3 The reader, however, who is interested in the subject, would do well to compare, with the authorities there cited, the article inserted by Reyner in the "Apostolatus Benedictinorum," i. 204.-T.] 1 [The first of those, who joined the congregation of Monte-Cassino, were Robert Sayers, Thomas Preston, father Anselm of Manchester, and Anthony Martin, afterwards known as father Athanasius: those who entered the Spanish congregation were father Augustin of St. John, whose secular name was Bradshaw, and the four martyrs, John Roberts, known in religion as father John of Mervinia, Mark Lambert, William Scot, and George Gervaise. Reyner, Tract. i. 242.-T.] [Those from Spain were sent under the charge of father Bradshaw; those from Italy under that of father Thomas Preston. Reyner, Tract. ii. 16.—T.] [Weldon is more circumstantial in his account of this foundation. Alarmed at the temper of the government, and fearful of the persecution likely to follow 3 cardinal Charles of Lorrain, in the year 1606, or rather the church, which before was collegiate (whence that the discovery of the gunpowder plot, father Bradshaw, the vicar-general of his order in England, had withdrawn from the country, and had taken up his abode at Douay. Hitherto the benedictine missioners had been exclusively educated either in Italy or in Spain: but the difficulty of communicating with those countries, and the want of a place of refuge nearer home, had long been felt by their superior; and he now resolved to employ himself, during the period of his exile, in establishing a convent and seminary in the neighbourhood of his present residence. His first step was, to procure a few sleeping apartments in Anchienne college: hence, however, he was soon enabled to remove to a more commodious dwelling, which he hired of the trinitarians; and, with a few fathers whom he had collected from the Spanish congregation, he at once began to lay the foundation of a regular community. At length, chance brought the monks to the notice of Philip Cavarel, abbot of St. Vedast. "This charitable and munificent prelate", says Weldon," was busy, at this time, in building a college for the jesuits in Arras. As he went, one day, to see how the building advanced, he met there an old Welshman, John Ishel, chaplain of our Lady's, who was very seriously gazing upon the work. The abbot asked him what he thought of it? The chaplain replied, it was a stately fabric, and not misapplied; yet it was his opinion, that his lordship would do better to begin his charity towards his own order, and that there were at Douay a considerable number of English benedictines, that had not a house to put their heads in, nor wherewithal to subsist. This news", adds the writer, "made some impression on the abbot's mind:" it was followed, before the close of the year 1606, by letters of recommendation from the archduke Albert and the nuncio at Brussels; and, in a short time, the friendship and protection of the good prelate were permanently secured to the community. His first act of benevolence was, to purchase ground for the erection of a suitable residence: his next, to lay the foundations of that noble convent and college, which", Weldon tells us, "the fathers now inhabit." Before the autumn of 1611, the building was completed; and, on the fifteenth of October in that year, the community, having removed from its hired habitation, solemnly opened its new church for divine service. During Still it remained to provide for the permanence of the institution. the progress of the late works, and even up to the present period, the fathers had been able to support themselves by giving lessons in the college of Marchienne. But the jealousies, which will be mentioned in the succeeding note, already threatened to deprive them of this resource: at the same time, the pension allowed by Cavarel amounted to little more than the annual sum of twenty pounds; while the aid, which they had more than once been compelled to seek at the hands of their Spanish brethren, was too distant and too precarious, to be regarded as a means of subsistence. It was on this account that, on the fourteenth of September, 1616, the fathers presented a petition to Cavarel, explaining their situation, and entreating him to grant them an increased and settled allowance. In reply, the abbot engaged at once to attend to their request. For the next year, he assigned to them a sum of twelve hundred florins: this he subsequently (1619) converted into a permanent revenue, payable, in equal parts, at each of the four quarters of the year; and, having drawn up and adjusted the terms of the foundation, he finally obtained a confirmation of the whole, in a bull issued by pope Urban VIII., on the third of June, 1626. In this instrument, the conditions of the donation, and the intentions of the founder are carefully described. It is provided that the community shall consist of not more than twelve, nor less than nine, monks, who are for ever to be dependent on the abbot and convent of prince had drawn out the canons, to put them in possession of the cathedral of Nancy, which was erected in 1602); for the monastery was built at the cost of Mr. Gifford, who had been disciple to the cardinal William Allen, and who resigned the dignity of dean of Lisle, to take upon him the habit of the order of St. Benedict, in that monastery, under the name of father Gabriel of St. Mary.1 St. Vedast. Besides the usual vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, they are to take a fourth, to the effect that they will serve the English mission: they are to supply a certain number of theological and other professors, to be at the absolute disposal of the abbot: they are to say a certain number of masses annually for the founder and his successors; and, when England shall have been converted, and themselves restored to their possessions, they are to receive in their college at Oxford any students sent from the abbey of St. Vedast. In the meantime, the convent is to be governed by a prior, who, on his appointment, is to present to the abbot a written declaration of the submission and dependence of the house: all nominations to vacancies among the brethren are to be made by the prior, but confirmed by the abbot: all persons admitted to join the body, beyond the allotted number of twelve, are to pay a sufficient pension; and all bequests and donations, with all property brought by the novices, except from England, are to go to the foundation, and, on the conversion of the English, to devolve, with the rest of the possessions, on the founder or his successors.-From this period, the monastery of St. Gregory at Douay became a permanent and flourishing establishment. Weldon's Collections, MS. at Downside, i. 45, 68-70, 77, 79, 250-268; Weldon's Chronological Notes, MS. in the same college, 126-134.-T.] ' [That Gifford was a considerable benefactor to the house there can be no doubt: but that it was erected at his expense is, I think, contrary to the fact. Weldon, speaking of the foundation, but omitting all allusion to Gifford, says, that, soon after the removal of the canons to Nancy, father Bradshaw applied to the patrons for the vacant college; that, through the interest of Arthur Pitts, then canon of Remiremont, a grant of the property was obtained; and that, on the twenty-sixth of December, 1606, Pitts, in the name of the English benedictines, solemnly took possession. He then adds, that "Mr. Arthur Pitts, with some fathers who came now and then, prepared, the best they could, the house of Dieulewart for the reception of the monks, who should be appointed to settle and live there but the poverty of the monks, and the hard circumstances they were under, were such, that it went on very slowly; nor could any come to settle, till the ninth of August, in the year 1608, which was the first day (as they find upon the old books of Dieulewart) of the monks' coming thither, in order to live conventually" (Weldon, Collect. i. 46-48). In another passage, however, he says, that Gifford " may be esteemed a founder of Dieulewart, for that his money gave it the form of a convent": but subsequently he qualifies or explains this declaration, and merely tells us that, on the morning of his profession (July 11, 1609), he " gave to the house a great number of books, and much household stuff" (Chronol. Notes, 48, 82). There is another subject, to which I must briefly refer in this place. 10. The erection of the English mission was not effected without considerable opposition, both in Italy and Spain. By the jesuits the very first secessions from the seminaries, over which they presided, to the ranks of a rival order, had been "The English benedictines, having got these two monasteries, began to think of the means of reviving the regarded with feelings of jealousy and alarm. In Italy, indeed, the influence of cardinal Allen, and his avowed approbation of the course adopted by the retiring students, were sufficient, during his life, to repress any violent demonstration (See his beautiful letter to Father Athanasius, in Reyner, Tract. i. 243). But, in Spain, there existed no such restraint: the spirit of opposition could there work without control; and accordingly, every method was adopted, first, to prevent the admission of the new postulants, and afterwards, to frustrate the design of establishing an English mission. It was said that the benedictines were decoying the students from the seminaries; that the employment of missioners, trained under different institutes, and formed to different views, would be productive only of animosities and discord; and that, in point of fact, the duties of the mission, to which the parties in question proposed to dedicate themselves, were incompatible with the obligations of a religious life, and a direct violation of the monastic vow. To silence the last of these objections, appeal was made to the doctors of Salamanca; and a solemn sentence of the academy soon after declared that it was unfounded. But this tended only to increase the opposition on the other points. The jesuits became more loud in their complaints. They appealed to the nuncio; they addressed the people; they called on the council of state to interfere, and prevent both the reception of the postulants and the erection of the proposed mission; and it was not until the cardinal archbishop of Toledo, after a careful examination of the several charges, had formally pronounced the allegations to be false, and the design of the new mission to be meritorious, that its opponents could be induced to suspend their hostility, and suffer the scheme to be carried into execution. 2o. But the establishment of the house at Douay-it was in the immediate neighbourhood of the English seminary, now governed by Dr. Worthington, under the influence of the jesuits-again awakened the jealousy of the society, and called forth a fresh struggle between the contending parties. Regarding the benedictines as the "adversaries " of his order (Stonyhurst MSS. Ang. A. iii. 94), father Persons hesitated not to assail them with the most unmeasured language. On the one hand, he maintained that their object was, to allure the students of the seminary to their own order: on the other, he declared that the only persons, whom they had hitherto induced to join them, were men distinguished, during their residence in the colleges, for their undutiful and turbulent behaviour. These parties, he said, had quitted the seminaries in sedition, and had embraced the religious institute without the knowledge of their superiors. They hated the jesuits: they had slandered the society; and they had sought by their letters to create division, and excite disaffection, among the students from whom they had deserted. Nor was this all. The benedictine mission had been expressly established, that its members might support the jesuits against the appellant priests: but, instead of this, they had leagued with the appellants against the jesuits: they had even countenanced them in their criminal intrigues with the heretical government of the country; and they still continued to number one member amongst them, who, though he had originally condeinned the oath of allegiance, had subsequently maintained that it might lawfully be taken. In reply to these charges, a paper was drawn up by father Anselm, the agent of the benedictines, and presented to the pope in 1608: it was followed soon after by another from the same person, written at the request of cardinal Bianchetti, and, together with its predecessor, demonstrating the memorial of Persons to have been either false in its statements, or frivolous in its grounds of accusation. It was not true that the benedictines had sought to aggrandize their |