7. It was death to deny, or not to swear, if called on, that this
woman was the head of the church of Christ.
8. It was an offense (punishable by heavy fine) not to go to the
Protestant church. This fine was £20 a lunar month, or £250 a year,
and of our present money £3,250 a year. Thousands upon thousands
refused to go to the law-church; and thus the head of the church sacked
thousands upon thousands of estates! The poor conscientious Catholics
who refused to go to the 'most tolerant church,' and who had no money
to pay fines, were crammed into the jails until the counties petitioned
to be relieved from keeping them. They were then discharged, being
first publicly whipped, and having their ears bored with a red-hot
iron. But this very great 'toleration' not answering the purpose,
an act was passed to banish for life all these non-goers to church,
if they were not worth twenty pounds, and, in case of return they
were to be punished with death.
"I am, my lord, not making loose assertions here; I am all along
stating from acts of Parliament, and the above form a small sample of
the whole; and this your lordship must know well. I am not declaiming,
but relating undeniable facts; with facts of the same character, with
a bare list, made in the above manner, I could fill a considerable
volume. The names of the persons put to death merely for being
Catholics, during this long and dreary reign, would, especially if
we were to include Ireland, form a list ten times as long as that of
our army and navy, both taken together. The usual mode of inflicting
death was to hang the victim for a short time, just to benumb his or
her faculties, then cut down and instantly rip open the belly, and
tear out the heart, and hold it up, fling the bowels into the fire,
then chop off the head, and cut the body into quarters, then boil
the head and quarters, and then hang them up at the gates of cities,
or other conspicuous places. This was done, including Ireland, to
many hundreds of persons, merely for adhering to the church in which
they had been born and bred. There were one hundred and eighty-seven
ripped up and boiled in England in the years from 1577 to 1603;
that is to say, in the last twenty-six years of Elizabeth's reign;
and these might all have been spared if they would have agreed to go
to church and hear the Common Prayer! All, or nearly all of them were
racked before they were put to death; and the cruelties in prison,
and the manner of execution, were the most horrible that can be
conceived. They were flung into dungeons, kept in their filth, and
fed on bullock's liver, boiled and unwashed tripe, and such things
as dogs are fed on. Edwards Genings, a priest, detected in saying
mass in Holborn, was after sentence of death offered his pardon if he
would go to church; but having refused to do this, and having at the
place of execution boldly said that he would die a thousand deaths
rather than acknowledge the Queen to be the spiritual head of the
church, Topliffe, the attorney-general, ordered the rope to be cut
the moment the victim was turned off, 'so that' (says this historian)
'the priest being little or nothing stunned, stood on his feet casting
his eyes toward heaven, till the hangman tripped up his heels, and
flung him on the block, where he was ripped up and quartered.' He was
so much alive even after the boweling that he cried with a loud voice,
'Oh! it smarts!' And then he exclaimed, 'Sancte Gregorie, ora pro me,'
while the hangman having sworn a most wicked oath cried, 'Zounds! his
heart is in my hand, and yet Gregory is in his mouth!'"--Wm. Cobbett.
"For centuries the Irish were killed like game. We know not a few
good Englishmen who would be convulsed with the story of the murder
of Smith or Jones, but whom the killing of an O'Tool or O'Dacherty,
or any 'O'' or 'Mac' would not move in the least. That be it
remembered in 1825. The collection of tithes alone cost a million
lives. Henry VIII. aggravated all the outrages ever committed,
and was determined the faith of the Irish should undergo a radical
Protestant conversion. Raleigh butchered Limerick garrison in cold
blood after Lord Grey had selected seven hundred to be hanged. James
I. confiscated one-tenth of all the land in Ireland and destroyed
thousands of lives for religion's sake. Protestant rectors kept private
prisons for confining all who dissented from their faith. Dr. Leland,
a Protestant clergyman, wrote that the favorite object of the English
Parliament was the total extermination of all the Catholics in Ireland.
"Cromwell began by massacreing for three days the garrison of Drogheda
after quarter had been promised. Whole towns were put up and sold. The
Catholics were banished from three-fourths of Ireland and confined
to Connaught, and after a certain day every one found outside were
shot or hung. Fleetwood, the reverend, said the Lord will appear in
this work. On every wolf's scalp and priest's head a premium of £5
was offered! Young girls and boys were gathered up by the thousands
and carried to the West Indies. So by 1652 was once populous Ireland
so devastated that an occupied house was a curiosity and commented
on. Says one writer, S. W. Petry, 'There perished in 1641 over
six hundred thousand lives whose blood somebody must atone to God
for.'" (Newspaper article.)
"The sword of the church was unsheathed and the world was at the mercy
of ignorant and infuriated priests, whose eyes feasted on the agonies
they inflicted. Acting as they believed, or pretended to believe,
under the command of God; stimulated by the hope of infinite reward
in another world--hating heretics with every drop of their bestial
blood; savage beyond description; merciless beyond conception--these
infamous priests in a kind of frenzied joy, leaped upon the helpless
victims of their rage. They crushed their bones in iron boots; tore
their quivering flesh with iron hooks and pincers; cut off their
lips and eyelids; pulled out their nails, and into the bleeding
quick thrust needles; tore out their tongues; extinguished their
eyes; stretched them upon racks; flayed them alive; crucified them
with their heads downward; exposed them to wild beasts; burned them
at the stake; mocked their cries and groans; ravished their wives;
robbed their children, and then prayed God to finish the holy work
in hell. Millions upon millions were sacrificed upon the altars of
bigotry. The Catholic burned the Lutheran, the Lutheran burned the
Catholic, the Episcopalian tortured the Presbyterian, the Presbyterian
tortured the Episcopalian. Every denomination killed all it could of
every other, and each Christian felt in duty bound to exterminate every
other Christian who denied the smallest fraction of his creed.... They
have imprisoned and murdered each other, and the wives and children
of each other. In the name of God every possible crime has been
committed, every conceivable outrage has been perpetrated. Brave men,
tender and loving women, beautiful girls, and prattling babes have
been exterminated in the name of Jesus Christ. For more than fifty
generations the church has carried the black flag. Her vengeance has
been measured only by her power. During all these years of infamy
no heretic has ever been forgiven. With the heart of a fiend she has
hated; with the clutch of avarice she has grasped; with the jaws of
a dragon she has devoured; pitiless as famine; merciless as fire;
with conscience of a serpent; such is the history of the church of
God." (Ingersoll's "Heretics and Heresies.")