Act against Jesuits and Seminarists
The English statute of 1585 that ordered every priest ordained by Rome’s authority since 1559 to leave the realm within forty days and made it high treason for such a priest to be in England at all, and a capital felony to shelter one.
The preamble states the government’s view: Jesuits and seminary priests come into the realm “not only to withdraw her highness’s subjects from their due obedience to her majesty, but also to stir up and move sedition, rebellion, and open hostility”.
The act orders all priests ordained by authority of the see of Rome since 24 June 1559 to depart within forty days. Any such priest, being a born subject of the queen, who afterwards comes into or stays in her dominions commits high treason by that fact alone. Whoever knowingly receives or relieves him is a felon and suffers death. Subjects studying in the seminaries abroad must return within six months and take the oath of supremacy, and sending money or children to those colleges is forbidden.
The offence the act defines is the fact of being a priest of that ordination and being in the realm; it asks for no proof of any further act. The Catholic account of those who died, and the claim that they died for religion and not for treason, is found in works such as A Briefe Historie of the Glorious Martyrdom of Twelve Reverend Priests.
Cited in
- 1559, firm date