Excerpt from England and the Catholic Church Under Queen Elizabeth

I am indebted for a few documents which throw light on the doings of English pirates in the Mediterranean (appendix Papers in the Vatican suggested the idea of making researches in this little used collection. Among English archives, the most important are those belonging to the catholic cathedral of Westminster. No others can compare with them in value for the inner history of English catholicism. As their contents, however, are of importance only from the end of the sixteenth century, the letters, reports, and memorials of English catholics and Roman officials which they contain, are only of service for the last chapter of this volume. The rich treasures of the Public Record Office have been already largely made public in the Calendars of State Papers. However, for some series (especially Italian Sizzler), I have been able to draw upon fresh sources of information. As regards the results yielded by the Recusant Rolls, I must refer to Ch. I., §4. The British Museum and the Bodleian Library were invaluable to me on account of their original editions of royal proclamations, and, above all, for their rich store of pamphlets and broadsides. For although it was only in the seventeenth century that the classical period of political pamphleteering dawned for England, still as early as the time of Elizabeth, broadsides and pamphlets had become such a power in public life that no student of history can pass over these sources of information with impunity. This is perhaps more true for the history of English catholicism than for any other department (cf.

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