Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 11.djvu/102

 REIGN OF ELIZABETH. [CH. 63. April 6. selves therefore to your Majesty as the pillar and defender of the faith. They ask your pity, and they ask your help : and they beseech your interest with his Holiness, if the tares of heresy are not entirely to choke the good seed which God has planted by the seminary priests, to appoint some English cardinal, such as Father Sanders or Father Allen. If they have no head or no leader, they will crumble away under these statutes. A cardinal only can help them ; and one gentleman has offered a thousand dollars annually for his support.' 1 ' God,' wrote Mendoza again, in a second letter a few weeks later, ' for our sins, permits the spirits of the Catholics to sink more and more, while with the heretics, whatever happens inspires them only with fresh courage to maintain their delusions.' 2 The confession of the Spaniard was in singular contrast to the dream of Campian that heresy was dying. During the session of Parlia- ment the latter was hiding in London, printing his ' Ten Reasons for being a Catholic,' which were to complete the conversion of England. He had a friend living on the Harrow Road, whom he often visited. His walk led him past the Tyburn gallows, 3 and instinct telling him what might one day befall him there, he touched May. 1 Mendoza to Philip, April 6, 1581 : MS 8. Simancas. 1 ' Parece que habia de hacer caso en los Catolicos. Por nuestros pecados permite Dios que les anichi- len mas los animos, viendose el cou- trario en los hereges que cualquiera novidad les da a los corage para sus- tentar su cequedad.' Mendoza to Philip, May 14 : MSS. Simancas. 3 Where Connaught Ten-ace now stands.