THE instructions given to Robert Parsons and Edmund Campion upon their embarkation for England in 1580 left no doubt that, no matter what the English government might say, their tasks were the confirmation of the faith of the Catholics there and the recovery of those who, through ignorance, had lapsed. In order to attain these objectives, Father General Everard Mercurian urged the Jesuits to an exemplary life of extraordinary virtue. Amongst the more specific recommendations, the General exhorted the missionaries, in words that echoed the Society's Constitutions, to avoid ‘even the suspicion of avarice and greed.’ They were, therefore, neither to seek nor to accept any alms unless their need became extremely urgent. Even then, they should only ask one or two of their loyal friends for assistance. If the Jesuits could only turn to their friends as a last resort, if they could neither elicit nor accept alms from the people whom they served, one wonders how the General thought the mission's expenses would be met? For a document as reasonable and as thorough as the instructions, it is surprisingly naive about finances, a naiveté that would with experience give place to sophistication.

ON 6 November 1605, the earl of Salisbury wrote jubilantly to the English Ambassador in France, Sir Thomas Parry, that it had ‘pleased Almighty God, out of his singular goodness, to bring to light the most cruel and detestable practise against the person of his Majesty and the whole estate of the Realm that ever was conceived by the heart of man, at any time, or in any place whatsoever’. But, when he wrote this, Salisbury was fully aware that, though the Lord might have revealed the bare existence of the Gunpowder plot, it would be left to men to discover the details and the ramifications of a complex treason that had been long in the planning.

IN May 1622 a series of private discussions on religion was held in London between representatives of the Anglican Church and the Jesuit, John Percy, alias Fisher. The occasion was the announcement by the Countess of Buckingham, mother of King James I’s favourite, George Villiers, Marquess (later Duke) of Buckingham, of her intention to become a Catholic. The King and the Marquess arranged the discussions which occupied three successive days, the 24th, 25th and 26th of May. Two eminent Anglican divines were enlisted to debate with Percy. On the first day the Anglican case was argued by Francis White, at this time a royal chaplain and later a bishop. He was opposed by Percy, in the presence of the Countess, the Marquess and Marchioness (Lady Catherine, who had also influenced her husband's decision to hold these discussions by declaring her intention to return to the Catholic faith in which she had been brought up), Bishop John Williams, (the Lord Keeper), and—possibly—the King. On the second day the King himself took the leading part in putting the Anglican case. On the third day the chief Anglican protagonist was William Laud, at this period Bishop of St. David's, who took the place of Francis White.

As we approach Alabaster's sonnets’ our expectation is enhanced not by the promise of poetic greatness but by the prospect of exploring pure instances of the kind of poetry born in the convergence of rhetoric and meditation. We will focus first on a sequence of sonnets remarkable for their rhetorical techniques; then we will consider a group of sonnets each of which has meditation as its subject. In all the poems, however, it will be apparent that Alabaster as poet is simultaneously rhetor and meditator.

THOMAS Bullaker is one of the eighty-five martyrs who were beatified by Pope John Paul II on 22 November 1987. His biography necessarily involves an exercise in textual criticism. The most important sources for his life are two, more or less contemporary, accounts: the Certamen Seraphicum, written by his fellow Fransciscan Richard Mason, and published in 1649; and the Histoire de la Persecution presente des Catholiques en Angleterre of Le Sieur de Marsys, published in 1646. When Richard Mason wrote his account he had access to some writings of the martyr himself, which were kept in the archives of St. Bonaventure's at Douai, and were lost at the time of the French Revolution. His description of Bullaker's trials is largely based on the martyr's first hand testimony. De Marsys, a servant of the French Ambassador, who collected papers concerning sixteen of the martyrs, claimed to have been present at Bullaker's final trial and execution. A copy of a pamphlet entitled An Exact Relation of the Apprehension, Examination, Execution and Confession of Thomas Bullaker, 1642, which was sold in London on the day of Bullaker's execution, has survived among the Thomason Tracts in the British Library.

THIS article surveys the attitude of the Nonconformist, the best-known Free Church journal of the Victorian age, to the Roman Catholic Church. It was not necessarily representative of Dissenting opinion in general; indeed there is plenty of evidence that a good number of leading Nonconformists looked on it with disfavour; but clearly it represented one strand, and an important one, in the outlook of Victorian Nonconformity.

The role of religion in history is an inherently difficult topic. Historians have rightly approached it with caution. Nevertheless, excessive caution has sometimes impaired our understanding of both individuals and broad historical developments. Ignoring personal religious experiences, especially when they have followed deliberate conversions, may be more dangerous to the truth than imperfectly assessing those experiences. I am not proposing an interdisciplinary approach, although that too is needed. Rather, I am suggesting that the religious experience of individuals be more fully incorporated, where possible, into traditional historical writings. It is in this spirit that I here examine the 1896 conversion, from agnosticism to Catholicism, of the influential London banker, Bertram Wodehouse Currie.