The expense is
reckoned, the enterprise is begun; it is of God, it cannot be
withstood. So the faith was planted: so it must be restored.
ix. If these my offers be refused, and my endeavours can take no
place, and I, having run thousands of miles to do you good, shall
be rewarded with rigour, I have no more to say but to recommend
your case and mine to Almightie God, the Searcher of Hearts, who
send us His grace, and set us at accord before the day of
payment, to the end we may at last be friends in heaven, when all
injuries shall be forgotten.
* * * * *
"Direct, true, and resolute," Campion's words certainly are, and
they are calculated in a remarkable degree to reassure and
animate his fellow Catholics and their friends, and it is for
them in reality, rather than for the Lords of the Council, that
the message is composed. If the composition has a fault it is its
combativeness; and in effect, though this drawback was not felt
at the time, it was later. Subsequent missionaries found it best
to adopt a policy of far greater secrecy and silence. If,
however, we remember that Campion intended his paper to be
published under quite different circumstances, we can see that he
at least hardly deserves the reproach of being contentious, or if
he does, his failing was venial when we consider the tastes of
the age.
Pages:
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26