(Vol. iii., p. 302.)
I have never met with any satisfactory account of this singular Quaker
aggression. Perhaps it may be a contribution towards one if you can find
room for some notice of a tract in my possession. It is entitled, _A
Narrative of some of the Sufferings of J. P. in the City of Rome. London,
printed for Thomas Simmons, at the Bull and Mouth, near Aldersgate_, 1661,
4to., pp. 16. This narrative of John Perrot's does not, however, give any
particulars respecting his going to Rome, or the proceedings which led to
his captivity there, but begins with the words--
"When I was cast into Prison, because I loved the souls of my enemies,"
&c.;
and after eight pages, chiefly occupied by inflated description of his
sorrows, from which one obtains no facts, he tells us that God took pity on
him,
"And raised up his little babe, my dear Brother Thomas Hart, to set his
tender soul nearer unto my sufferings, and made him take my burdens on
his back, and the yoak of my tribulation on his neck, and made him sup
of my sore sorrows, and drink of the bleedings of my grief,'--
and so he goes on; but we do not learn what Thomas Hart did, except that he
comforted John Perrot in his confinement.
"Moreover," he says, "the everlasting mercies of my God did stir up the
bowels of other two of his tender babes, named in the tent Jane Stokes
and Charles Baylie, to come to visit me whilest I was as forsaken of
all men."
They persevered, he tells us,
"in their pilgrimage until they arrived to Rome, where C. B. offered
his life to ransom me, and both of them entered into captivity for the
love which they bore to my life."
His _Narrative_ (strictly speaking) contains no further information, but
that at the bottom of the tenth page it is dated and signed,
"Written in Rome Prison of Madmen. JOHN."
The remaining six pages of the pamphlet consist of a letter from Charles
Baylie, giving an account of his pilgrimage with Jane Stokes, from Dover to
Calais, Paris, Marseilles, Genoa, until
"Arriving," he says, "safe at Rome, we were drawn in our lives directly
to the place where the dearly beloved J. P. was, and coming to the
prison door, I enquired for him, and having answer of his being there,
I desired for to speak with him, but it would not be permitted us; So
it was said in me, _Write unto him_, which I did, the which he answered
us in the fulness of love, which refreshed us after our weary steps;
For our souls were refreshed one in another, though one another's faces
we had never seen to the outward, and then we being kept in a holy fear
not to do nor act one way nor other, but as we were moved of the Lord,
least we should add to his bonds,--I say, being thus kept, we were
delivered out of the snare of the fowler, who secretly lay in wait to
betray our innocency; And after a little time the Lord showed me I
should go to the inquisition, which I did, and enquired for the
Inquisitor, as I was showed of the Lord I should do; and when I spoke
to him I told him _I was come from England for to see my brother
J. P._; to which he answered, _I should see him_, and appointed me to
come to a certain place called _Minerva_, and there, saith he, _I will
procure you the liberty of the Cardinalls to see him_; he had me also
to the Inquisition office, where he asked many questions of me
concerning our religion, to which I answered in the simplicity of my
heart in the fear of the Lord; and at the appointed time I came to the
place aforesaid, and there I was showed what further I should do, which
was to tender my body for my brother; and so from that time I hardly
missed opportunity to speak to them as often as they met: for their
manner was thus to meet twice a-week, the one time at _Minerva_, and
the other time at _Monte-Cavallo_, where the Pope's own dwelling is,
where I also did the like, more than once, which stirred them up
against me, in great enmity," &c.
I am afraid I am trespassing on your overfilled columns; but--omitting his
account of his going to the Jews' synagogue, and of the command which he
received to fast twenty days as a testimony against those who falsely
stated that John Luffe had fasted nineteen days and died on the
twentieth--omitting this, I must give one more extract. Having been
detained in one of his visits to the _Minerva_, he says:
"From thence I was carried to the Inquisition, where I was shut up
close, and after I had been there 3 dayes the Lord said to me, _Thou
must go to the Pazzarella_, which was the Prison or Hospital of mad
men, where our dear brother was prisoner; and it was also said unto me,
_Thou shalt also speak to the Pope_; And at the 17 dayes end, I was led
from the Inquisition towards the other prison, and by the way I met the
Pope carried in great pomp; as it was the good will of the Lord that I
should speak unto him, men could not prevent it, for I met him towards
the foot of a bridge, where I was something nigh him, and when he came
against me, the people being on their knees on each side of him, I
cried to him with a loud voice in the Italian tongue, _To do the thing
that was Just, and to release the Innocent_; and whilest I was
speaking, the man which led me had not power to take me away until I
had done, and then he had me to prison where my endeared brother was,
where I fasted about 20 dayes as a witness against that bloody
generation," &c.
As to how they got out, he only says:
"Soon after my fast, the Lord, by an outstretched arm, wrought our
deliverance, being condemned to perpetual galley-slavery, if ever we
returned again unto Rome."
It appears, however, that though thus prevented from exercising his office
of a missionary in Rome, Charles Baylie did not relinquish it. In the
letter just quoted he informs his correspondent (who this was does not
appear), that since he had seen his face, he had been several times (as he
was while {336} writing) shut up in strong prisons; and the letter is dated
"The third of the sixth month, 1661. _From the Common Gaol in_ Burkdou,
_in_ France, _about thirty leagues from_ Dover, _where I am a sufferer
for speaking the Word of the Lord to two Priests, saying_, All Idols,
all Idolatries, and all Idol Priests must perish."
John Perrot seems to have considered that his mission extended over all the
world. While in Rome Prison of Madmen, he wrote an address "To all people
upon the face of the Earth," which he "sent thence the 8th of the 10th
month, 1660;" and he was, no doubt, the author of the tract which follows
it (and precedes the narrative) in my volume, entitled "Blessed openings of
a day of good things to the Turks. Written to the Heads, Rulers, Ancients,
and Elders of their Land, and whomsoever else it may concern," though it is
only signed "JOHN." To him also, I suppose, we must ascribe another tract,
_Discoveries of the Day-dawning to the Jewes. Whereby they may know in what
state they shall inherit the riches and glory of Promise_. "J. P." is all
that is given for the author's name on the title-page, but the tract is
signed [Hebrew: JWHN], that is, John. He too, I presume, was the author of
another of the tracts, _An Epistle to the Greeks, especially to those in
and about Corinth and Athens, &c. Written in Egripo in the Island of
Negroponte, by a Servant of the Lord: J. P._ He seems to have been at
Athens on the 27th day of the 7th month, in the year accounted 1657, being
the first day of the week, the day of Greek solemn worship, and to have
been "conversant" with Carlo Dessio and Gumeno Stephaci, "called Greek
doctors."