¹ Knox, T. F. (ed.) The Letters and Memorials of William Cardinal Allen, London 1882 [hereafter, Memorials], pp. xli, 407: Knox, T. F. (ed.) The First and Second Diaries of the English College, Douay, London 1878, [hereafter, D.D.], pp. 337–8; Von Pastor, L. F., The History of the Popes, St. Louis, 1930, [hereafter Pastor], vol. xix pp. 429–433.

² Memorials, pp. 29–30.

³ A True, Sincere, and Modest Defense of English Catholics, 1584, ed. by Kingdon, Robert M., Cornell University Press 1965, p. 127 [hereafter, Modest Defense]: An Apologie and True Declaration of the Institution and endeavours of the two English Colleges … Henault (Rheims) 1581, p. 12 verso, [hereafter, Apologie and Declaration].

⁴ Memorials, pp. 5, 181, 213: on Tudor Lancashire and its religious conservatism, see Haigh, Christopher, Reformation and Resistance in Tudor Lancashire, Cambridge 1975: for Allen's view of the state of England in the mid-1580s, see Mattingley, Garrett, ‘William Allen and Catholic Propaganda in England’, Travaux d'Humanisme et Renaissance, vol 28, 1957, pp. 325–39.

⁵ Memorials p. 213, Modest Defense p. 56.

⁶ For the role of the Halls in Tudor Oxford, McConica, James, The History of the University of Oxford vol. HI, Oxford 1986, pp. 51–5: Coban, Alan B., The Medieval English Universities: Oxford and Cambridge to c. 1500, Scolar Press 1988, pp. 145–60. They were in effect Colleges within the Colleges, many of them having been annexed to larger institutions, as St. Mary's had been acquired by Oriel, though they continued to offer teaching both for the basic Arts course and for further studies in theology and laws.

⁷ On the course of the reformation at Oxford, and Martyr's part in it, Jennifer Loach ‘Reformation Controversies’ in McConica, The History of the University of Oxford vol. III, pp. 363–74; an unsuccessful attempt was made in 1550 to impose a protestant head on Allen's own college, Oriel.

⁸ There is no adequate treatment in English of the Spanish contribution to the Marian restoration: see Ignacio, J. Idigoras, Tellechea, Fray Bartolome Carranza y el Cardenal Pole, Pamplona 1977, and the same author's Inglaterra, Flandresy Espana 1557–1559, Vitoria 1975. As professor of theology at Dillengen until 1553 De Soto had been a key figure in the German Counter-Reformation: Garcia had been instrumental in securing several of Cranmer's recantations.

⁹ Loach, op. cit. p. 378.

¹⁰ Booty, John E., John Jewel as Apologist of the Church of England, London 1963, p. 63: O'Connell, M. R., Thomas Stapleton and the Counter Reformation, New Haven 1964: Michael, Richards, ‘Thomas Stapleton’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History, vol. XVIII (1967), pp. 187–99.

¹¹ Modest Defence, p. 104.

¹² Modest Defence, pp. 95, 115.

¹³ A Defence and Declaration of the Catholike Churchies Doctrine Touching Purgatory, Antwerp 1565, [hereafter, Purgatory] p. 286.

¹⁴ Birt, H. N., The Elizabethan Religious Settlement, London 1907, p. 257.

¹⁵ D.D., pp. xxii-xxiii: on the Elizabethan Settlement and its enforcement in Oxford, Williams, Penry, ‘Elizabethan Oxford: State, Church and University’, in MacConica, op. cit., pp. 397–440.

¹⁶ Collinson, Patrick, The Birthpangs of Protestant England: Religious and Cultural Change in the Sixteenthand Seventeenth Centuries. London 1988, especially p. ix: the case is set out in my The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England 1400–1580, London and New Haven 1992, pp. 565–93 and Haigh, Christopher, English Reformations, Oxford 1993, pp. 235–50.

¹⁷ A sub-committee at the Council of Trent in 1562 considered, and refused, a request that English Catholics should be permitted to attend Book of Common Prayer services, in order to avoid persecution. The ruling, however, was not promulgated formally, and Allen seems not to have known of it: Walsham, Alexandra, Church Papists: Catholicism, Conformity and Confessional Polemic in Early Modern England, Royal Historical Society Monograph 1993, pp. 22–3.

¹⁸ D.D., pp. xxiii-xxiv. Memorials pp. 56–7.

¹⁹ D.D., pp. xxv-xxvi: Haile, Martin, An Elizabethan Cardinal: William Allen, London 1914, pp. 57, 67.

²⁰ Southern, A. C., Elizabethan Recusant Prose 1559–1582, London 1950, pp. 517–23: one such publication was A Notable Discourse, plainelye and truely discussing, who are the right Ministers of the Catholike Church, Douai 1575.

²¹ For the Jewel controversy, Southern, Recusant Prose, pp. 59–118 (Allen's contributions discussed in detail pp. 103–9): Booty, Jewel, pp. 58–82: Milward, Peter, Religious Controversies of the Elizabethan Age, London 1978, pp. 1–16.

²² Purgatory, pp. 37 verso, 282–3.

²³ Purgatory, p. 12 verso: Southern, Recusant Prose, p. 109.

²⁴ Bossy, John, The English Catholic Community 1570–1850, London 1975, p. 13, quoting Rowse, A. L., The England of Elizabeth, London 1951, p. 461. For a critique of this general view, and an assertion of Allen's ‘keen intelligence’ see Mattingly, ‘William Allen and Catholic Propaganda’ pp. 335–6.

²⁵ Lewis, C. S., English Literature in the Sixteenth Century, Oxford 1954, pp. 438–441.

²⁶ Purgatory, pp. 132–3.

²⁷ Loach, in McConica, op. cit. p. 386: Guilday, Peter, The English Catholic Refugees on the Continent 1558–1795, London 1914, pp. 1–27, 63–65 : Southern, Recusant Prose, pp. 14–30: Bossy, John, English Catholic Community, pp. 12—14.

²⁸ Pollen, J. H., ed., Memoir of Robert Parsons, S.J., Catholic Record Society, vol ii, Miscellanea, 1906, p. 62.

²⁹ Apologie and Declaration, p. 19.

³⁰ By far the most stimulating and valuable modern account is that in Bossy, op. cit., pp. 14–18 to which I am greatly indebted though, as will be seen, I dissent from some of his central contentions. A cruder and somewhat facile statement of a similar view to Bossy's will be found in Aveling, J. C. H., The Handle and the Axe, London 1976, pp. 53–6.

³¹ D.D., p. xxviii: Memorials p. 22.

³² Bossy, English Catholic Community, p. 15.

³³ Renold, P., (ed.). Letters of William Allen and Richard Barrett 1572–1598, Catholic Record Society 1967, pp. 4–5. [hereafter, Letters] The allusion is to St. Luke ch. 9, verses 52–3, Vulgate version.

³⁴ Ryan, P. (ed.) ‘Correspondence of Cardinal Allen; in Catholic Record Society Miscellanea VII, 1911, pp. 47–63, quotation p. 63 [hereafter, ‘Correspondence’].

³⁵ Pollen, J. H., The English Catholics in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth, London 1920, p. 247.

³⁶ A Treatise Made in Defence of the lauful power and authoritie of Priesthood to remitte sinnes, Louvain 1567, preface (unpaginated). He is actually quoting from St. Basil, but makes the application to England and ‘our new ministers’ explicit.

³⁷ Memorials, p. 367.

³⁸ He and Allen took their Doctorates in Divinity together in 1571.

³⁹ D.D., pp. xxvii-xxxi: Letters, pp. 8–11.

⁴⁰ McGrath, Patrick and Rowe, Joy, ‘Anstruther Analysed: the Elizabethan Seminary Priests’, Recusant History, vol. 18, 1986 pp. 1–13.

⁴¹ Apologie, p. 22 verso; ‘Correspondence’ pp. 66–67.

⁴² Printed in Simpson, Richard, Edmund Campion, London 1896, pp. 509–13.

⁴³ D.D., p. xxxviii: Memorials, pp. 61–2.

⁴⁴ For a good account of which see Deutscher, T., ‘Seminaries and the Education of Novarese Parish Priests, 1593–1627’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History, vol. 32, pp. 303–319.

⁴⁵ On the Jesuits, the Ratio Studiorum and St. Thomas, see Broderick, James, The Life and Work of Blessed Robert Francis Cardinal Bellamine, London 1928, vol. 1, pp. 374–84.

⁴⁶ Allen's own account of the syllabus is in Memorials, pp. 62–7, translated D.D., pp. xxxviii-xliii: it is helpfully expanded by Martin, Gregory in Roma Sancta (ed. Parks, G. B., ed.), Roma 1969, pp. 114–9: the cases of conscience devised for the College are edited by Holmes, P. J., Elizabethan Casuistry, Catholic Record Society 1981.

⁴⁷ D.D., pp. xxxix.

⁴⁸ Memorials, pp. 32–3.

⁴⁹ D.D., p. xxxi-xxxii: Anstruther, Godfrey, The Seminary Priests, vol. I, Ware and Durham, 1968, p. 224.

⁵⁰ Memorials, p. 17.

⁵¹ Apologie, pp. 67–8.

⁵² Memorials, p. 33.

⁵³ Letters, pp. 131–4; Memorials, p. 344.

⁵⁴ Memorials, p. 36.

⁵⁵ Apologie, pp. 109 verso-110: for Allen's own account of his advice on martyrdom to Campion, A Briefe Historie of the Glorious Martyrdom of XII Reverend Priests, 1582, sig. d. iii. verso: for the comment to Fr. Aggazari, see the preface to Pollen's, J. H. edition of the Briefe Historie, p. ix: Memorials, p. 135.

⁵⁶ Apologie, pp. 117 verso-118.

⁵⁷ D.D., p. xliii: Memorials, p. 67.

⁵⁸ Memorials, p. 35.

⁵⁹ Walsham, Church Papists, pp. 22–49.

⁶⁰ Memorials, p. 34: see Walsham, Church Papists, pp. 62–3, though I think that Ms. Walsham interprets Allen's text more permissively than he intended.

⁶¹ Letters, pp. 30–33.

⁶² Memorials, p. 354.

⁶³ Letters, pp. 194–5.

⁶⁴ D.D., pp. li-lvi.

⁶⁵ On the Bull in general, and Catholic opinion about it, Meyer, A. O., England and the Catholic Churchunder Queen Elizabeth, London 1916, pp. 37 ff., 52–55, 76–90, 138–41; Clancy, T. H., Papist Pamphleteers, Chicago 1964, pp. 46–49.

⁶⁶ Apologie, p. 17.

⁶⁷ Letters, pp. 276–284: Modest Defense, pp. 146–214.

⁶⁸ Kenny, Anthony ‘From Hospice to College 1559–1579’, The Venerabile vol 21, 1962 (Sexcentenary Issue), pp. 228–9.

⁶⁹ Letters, pp. 284–92: Pollen, The English Catholics in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth, London 1920, pp. 197–200.

⁷⁰ Memorials, p. 38.

⁷¹ Memorials, p. 131; Letters, p. 75.

⁷² Memorials, pp. 217–8; Hughes, Philip, The Reformation in England vol. III, London 1954, pp. 297–300.

⁷³ Memorials, p. 233: Mattingley, ‘William Allen’, p. 333.

⁷⁴ Mattingly, ‘William Allen’, p. 332.

⁷⁵ The most extended treatment of Allen's political involvement at this time is Knox's introduction to Memorials, pp. li-lxxi.

⁷⁶ Letters, pp. 156–66: The memorial for the Pope was identified and edited by Garret Mattingly, loc cit. The reference to the ‘promiscuous multitude’ comes from Memorials, p. Ixvii.

⁷⁷ For one of which see Memorials, pp. c-ci.

⁷⁸ Memorials, pp. cvi-cviii.

⁷⁹ Memorials, p. cxi.

⁸⁰ See especially Modest Defense, pp. 124–6: A Briefe Historie of the Glorious Martyrdom of XII Reverend Priests, Preface to the Reader, sig. c ii.

⁸¹ The evidence is assembled by Mattingly, loc. cit., pp. 336–7.

⁸² See, for example, ‘Correspondence’, p. 45, recommending Thomas Stapleton as a potentially valuable member of the invasion fleet of 1576 ‘but he knows nothing at all about the enterprise’.

⁸³ Modest Defense, p. 3 96.

⁸⁴ Modest Defense, p. 141: Clancy, T. H., Papist Pamphleteers, Chicago 1964, p. 51.

⁸⁵ The Copie of a Letter Written by M. Doctor Allen: concerning the yeelding up, of the Citie of Daventrie, unto his Catholike Maiestie, by Sir William Stanley, Antwerp 1587, pp. 17, 29.

⁸⁶ An Admonition ot the Nobility and People of England … made for the execution of his Holines Sentence, by the highe and mightie Kinge Catholike of Spain. By the Cardinal of Englande, 1588.

⁸⁷ Modest Defense, p. 224.

⁸⁸ Admonition to the Nobilitie, sig. D5.

⁸⁹ Apologie, p. 4 verso.

⁹⁰ Apologie, p. 7: Simpson, Campion, p. 134.

⁹¹ Pastor, vol. 21, p. 250; vol. 22, p. 391; vol. 23 p. 311.

⁹² See, for example, his letter to John Mush in March 1594, Memorials, pp. 357–8.

⁹³ Wernham, R. B., (ed.), Lists and Analyses of State Papers Foreign Series Elizabeth I, London HMSO, vol. 1 1964, no. 627, vol. iv, 1984, nos. 638–43, vol. v, 1989, no. 627: and see the remarkable letter to Richard Hopkins August 14 1593, Memorials, pp. 348–51, about just such a ‘reasonable toleration’— ‘I thank God I am not estranged from the place of my birth most sweet, nor so affected to foreigners that I prefer not the weal of that people above all mortal things’.

⁹⁴ Memorials, p. 37.

⁹⁵ Memorials, p. 358.

^* This paper is a lecture given in the English College, Rome in 1994 to mark the 400th anniversary of the death of Cardinal William Allen and subsequently printed in the Venerabile.