Note 110 — Chapter XXXIII

— Afterwards the great Viscount Verulam, commonly known as Lord Bacon. Bacon’s particular friend and familiar was Sir Toby Matthews, the eldest son of Dr. Tobias Matthews, in 1606 created Archbishop of York. Sir Toby translated Bacon’s “Essays” into Italian. — See Spedding’s “Life of Bacon,” and Alban Butler’s “Life of Matthews.” — Sir Toby Matthews (in the February of 1605-6, just after the Plot) was converted to popery by Father Robert Parsons, who was then at the English College, Rome; and Matthews’ was, without doubt, the most remarkable and interesting of all the conversions effected by that strong-minded and most able Jesuit. Parsons’ intellect was one of marvellous range, reach, versatility, and power. He was a spiritual or mystical man in his way, too; but his spirituality or mysticism not seldom failed to control his action in daily life. It was shut up, as it were, in a watertight compartment. This (me judice) sums up, approximately, the truth about Parsons. Of all the men in Europe, Parsons was the man Burleigh, Walsingham, and Salisbury most feared. He died in 1610. A really impartial Life of Parsons, if possible, by a learned lawyer and politician, is a desideratum. In some of his political ideas this Jesuit was a progressive born prematurely — “a man before his time.” For he believed thoroughly in the sovereignty of the People, and in the desirableness of universal education. In this latter respect he resembled “that good lady, Mary Ward,” the daughter of Marmaduke Ward, and niece of Thomas Ward (ex hypothesi). Campion, the Jesuit, who died a martyr in 1581, was much the more amiable and attractive character. But Campion was no politician. Oldcorne, I maintain, was the greatest of all the three, because of his extraordinary mental equipoise and balance.

“The History of the Jesuits in England, 1580-1773,” by the Rev. Ethelred L. Taunton, with twelve illustrations (Methuen & Co., 1901), in some sort supplies a Life of Robert Parsons. But evidently the Jesuit Society is an enigma to Father Taunton, as to so many papists. A man must be a jurist and a statesman to understand the Jesuits. For their aim (me judice), their noble aim, ever has been to make the “Kingdoms of the world the Kingdoms of God and of His Christ.”

If a delusion, surely a delusion merely, not a crime, the most puissant spirit among us must allow.

James Robert Hope-Scott, Q.C., thought that the Jesuits were the backbone of the Church of his adoption. And Dr. Christopher Wordsworth (no mean judge) thought that Hope-Scott might have become a more popular Prime Minister than even W. E. Gladstone, had he chosen a political career. Wordsworth was Hope-Scott’s tutor at Oxford. — See Dr. Christopher Wordsworth’s “Autobiography.” — He was Bishop of St. Andrews, N.B., and as a classical scholar almost without a peer.