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32. Richard Orantes (Smith) to Thomas More (31 July 1612 (NS)) (AAW A XI, no. 127, pp. 343–4.)
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 13 October 2009
Extract
My deere Syr. I hope you wi[l] have me excused that I have not my self written to you this long time for knowing that D. Champney and others have acquainted you with all things that were done at Doway or were otherwise knowne [?] [.] I perswade my self that you wold and will account a letter from ether of us as come from us both as we do your letter unto us. wherfor omitting all other complements. God be thanked we have obtained for our company four hundred crownes yearly of the Clergie of France. our good brethren opp here opposed against us what they could but especially D. Roger whome we leest doubted of and whome we most kindly used ever more. It was told the Bishops that we were Iesu[i]tted men and I in particuler a powder traiter which last sensles and unchristian calumnie is thought to have comen from D. Roger who openly professed that he would ioyne with Ies: against us and he truly ioyned with some of them in calumnies, what this calumnie may hurte me in England I knowe not but here it hath done no harme but to the Author. I was warned of him by letters from Flanders to beware of his malice, but I suspected no such thing in him by reason of his good speeches and frequent visits which now I perceave were a welsh trick. God forgive him. Here is another scruple amongst us[.] For D Bish. wold not have my Coosin Fen of our company albeit he heere [?] comen out of Engl for that purpose and hath bene admitted by oar founder and hath endured a hard years entertain [m]ent with me, And so hath left out his name in the Request to the Clergie and given it unknowne to me. me diinks this is more than needs and I having spent my money time and paines in this matter do look to be acquainted with the affaires therof and not to be wronged ether in my self or my kinsmen, long it were to discourse of all this matter and to shew what exceptions firs[t] for learning then for headines shold be taken against my Coosin.
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References
866 Anthony Champney's account of the conference at Douai in May 1612 is contained in AAW A XI, no. 81 (17 May 1612 (NS)) printed with some omissions in TD V, p. cxii, and AAW A XI, no. 94.
867 See Allison, , ‘Origins’, 12.Google Scholar
868 In September 1612 John Jackson, at Brussels, wrote to More that among the various difficulties the Paris writers' college faced was opposition from people such as Roger Smith (also John Cecil and Christopher Bagshaw) who were excluded from it, AAW A XI, no. 147. William Bishop told More in July 1613 that ‘mr d. Roger Smith’ lives ‘in this towne like a diogenes, scarse in good tearmes with any man of us’, AAW A XII, no. 227 (p. 508).
869 William Rayner.
870 Thomas Sackville.
871 Rayner had returned to the Continent from England and arrived in Paris on 2 October 1611 (NS), AAW A X, no. 131. Thanks to Thomas Sackville, rooms were prepared in the writers' college for both Smith and Rayner, AAW A X, no. 137. In May 1612 Rayner told More that Geoffrey Pole, Rayner's close friend, had solicited for him ‘to bee the queen margarets [Marguerite de Valois, first wife of Henri IV] chaplein’, AAW A XI, no. 75 (p. 215). But on 11 September 1612 (NS), John Jackson recounted that ‘mr Reyner stoode for a place [in the college] & mr doc. Smith stoode for him’ whereas Birkhead ‘& some assistants (who wear pleasd also to take me to the consultation) had named others’. A compromise was patched up to allow Rayner ‘to live with them (not as one of them)’, AAW A XI, no. 147 (p. 403). Rayner hated William Bishop, and implied in a letter to More in September 1612 that Smith hated Bishop as well, and would prefer to return to Cowdray than live in community with Bishop in the college, AAW A XI, no. 173. Bishop's objection to Rayner was not only that his ‘learning & conversation’ were insufficient, and he ‘had not either by writing or any other publick triall in England recomended himself to the good opinions of others’, but also that he favoured SJ ‘over much’, i.e. he would be a spy for SJ in the college. Rayner sympathised with Worthington and thought well of Thomas Fitzherbert who finally joined SJ in 1613. Bishop claimed that even Birkhead conceded Rayner's failings, though Birkhead was responsible for sending him over to Paris, AAW A XII, no. 8 (p. 19). Bishop eventually bowed, after the rules of the college were suitably amended, to pressure from Smith and persuasions from Champney and agreed to admit Rayner, AAW A XII, nos 106, 140, 156.
872 Thomas Sackville. According to Bishop in January 1613, it had been bruited, initially, that Thomas Sackville had recommended Rayner for the college but now Sackville denied any such thing, AAW A XII, no. 8.
873 Cardinal Edward Farnese.
874 Thomas Worthington.
875 George Birkhead.
876 Antoinette d'Orléans-Longueville, sister of Catherine Gonzaga, Duchess of Longueville, Lunn, , ‘English Cassinese’, 63–4.Google Scholar
877 Identity uncertain.
878 William (Maurus) Taylor OSB.
879 See Letter 28.
880 William Bishop.
881 Champney wrote to More on 17 July 1612 (NS) that Roger Widdrington, while at Douai to collect William Howard, brought a copy of Roland (Thomas) Preston, 's Rogeri Widdringtoni Catholici Angli Responsio ApologeticaGoogle Scholar. See ARCR I, no. 926.3. Champney remarks that ‘yt ys an answer to a certayn letter writen as some say by Doct [Edward] weston agaynst his booke whom mr widerington handlethe rowndly and roughly yf not rudely’, AAW A XI, no. 121 (p. 329); Allison, ‘Later Life’, 112. See Letters 26, 35. For Weston's anti-gallican inclinations, see Allison, ‘Richard Smith's Gallican Backers’, part I, 353–4. Robert Fisher had claimed in 1598, however, that Weston had been favourable towards his dealings on behalf of the appellants, CRS 51, 249, 260; and in 1610 Weston petitioned the cardinals of the Inquisition (though half-heartedly) in defence of Richard Smith's book against Thomas Bell which had been denounced at Rome, AAW A IX, no. 13; Allison, ‘Later Life’, 111–12. Weston left the country soon after his near arrest at Bentley, see Letters 30, 31; for Weston's own account, see Weston, , Iuris Pontificii SanctuariumGoogle Scholar (np, 1613), preface (cited in Allison, , ‘Later Life’, 112–13Google Scholar). Champney reported to More that Weston was ‘driven out by widerington his last booke which was agaynst him verie bitter and truly made yt not safe for him to stay’, AAW A XI, no. 180 (p. 525). Allison suggests that Weston's manuscript opinion on the oath was written for Lord Vaux, and that this explains why Preston had to reply to it, i.e. to satisfy Archbishop Abbot after he (Preston) had not persuaded Vaux to take the oath, Allison, , ‘Later Life’, 113.Google Scholar
882 The Protestation of Allegiance of January 1603. See Bossy, , English Catholic Community, 39–41.Google Scholar
883 Preston, , Rogeri Widdringtoni Catholici Angli Responsio ApologeticaGoogle Scholar, in section entitled ‘Praefatio ad Lectorem’, sig. b7r. Preston again named the priests who made the Protestation of Allegiance of 1603 in his Disputatio Theologica of 1613 (in a separate part entitled ‘Rogeri Widdringtoni Catholici Angli Apologeticae Responsionis…’, sig. Br-v), which was originally intended for inclusion in the Responsio Apologetica, ARCR I, nos 925.6, 926.3. In mid-1613, just as me members of the Paris writers' college were about to move into the Collège d'Arras, given them by the Benedictine abbey of St Vaast at Arras, Philippe de Caverel, the abbot of St Vaast, was informed that the priests were out of favour with the Holy See. Preston's citation of the names of Champney and William Bishop ‘in the margent’ of his Responsio Apologetica [i.e. in the section naming the priests who had signed the Protestation of Allegiance] had been shown to him ‘by some of our good frendes’, said Champney sarcastically, AAW A XII, no. 139 (p. 311). The seculars petitioned Cardinal Borghese to write to the abbot in their favour, AAW A X, no. 169.
884 Armand-Jean du Plessis, Bishop of Luçon, future Cardinal-Duc de Richelieu.
885 Pedro de Zúñiga.
886 Maurice, Prince of Nassau.
887 Edward Bennett.
888 For appointment of a bishop.
889 See Letters 28, 29.
890 See Letter 29.
891 Nicholas Fitzherbert. In November 1612 Fitzherbert was accidentally drowned near Florence. A violent quarrel began in Rome over his will, made three years before, in which he left everything, to the value of about £100, to the English Benedictines, though Richard Smith was convinced that Fitzherbert must have left him a legacy, AAW A XII, no. 30 (p. 69); Foley, II, 230Google Scholar. A quarrel erupted also over his papers, which Thomas Fitzherbert, Thomas Owen SJ and Roger Baynes conspired to obtain, but were opposed by Nicholas Fitzherbert's friends, including Robert (Anselm) Beech OSB, AAW A XII, no. 28 (p. 65). In 1625 Thomas Rant warned Thomas White (who was about to become the secular clergy's agent in Rome) ‘have alwayes yoar will & testament by yow. and name in yt, that thes writings [i.e. the agency's papers] are, as indeed they are your Clergyes, for, in any wise, theis must be left in such hands, as they may never come into the Iesuitts hands’, AAW A XIX, no. 83 (p. 252).
892 John (Augustine) Bradshaw OSB.
893 Robert (Anselm) Beech OSB.