THE P RTAL


February 2011


Saint Robert Southwell


by Joanna Bogle


ON FEBRUARY 21ST, 1595, Robert Southwell was hung, drawn, and quartered for the crime of being a Catholic priest. He was a poet and a patriot; some of his poetry forms the basis of part of Benjamin Britten’s Ceremony of Carols.


Courage Southwell was a man of quite


outstanding courage: ordained at the age of 23 and arrested aſter six years of ministry as a priest, he was repeatedly tortured in an effort to extract information about Catholic activity in England but revealed nothing. Te torturer Topliffe boasted about using new forms of torture on Southwell and apparently enjoyed watching these – they included hanging him up by the wrists for hours until


controversy during his years of ministry. He himself knew that he was likely to die a barbarous death, for St Edmund Campion had already met this fate while Southwell was still a student, and Southwell, along with many others, regarded him as a hero and a saint.


Closer Union with Christ Robert Southwell’s style in


the limbs were wrenched


from their sockets, and bending him double and twisting and twisting his body. Topliffe had Southwell brought to his own home where a room was used for torture. Later, Southwell was transferred to the Tower of London and then to Newgate Prison.


His Trial At his trial, Southwell objected to being accused


of treason: he was loyal to his country, which he loved dearly, and had only sought to offer people the sacraments of the Catholic Church. He asked to be given a fair trial, but this was denied him, and no opportunity was given to him to explain his religious beliefs or the reasons why he sought to minister to people. His sentence of execution was a foregone conclusion.


Sign of the Cross On the scaffold, Southwell made the Sign of the


Cross as best he could with his bound hands. His courage made such a strong impression on the crowd that no one would join in any shout of “Traitor” as they were meant to do as he was hanged and cut open. Contemporary accounts describe people being silent and awed, with some speaking of martyrdom.


A Martyr It had long been feared that Southwell would be


revered as a martyr: he was a gentle and courteous man, who had used gentle preaching rather than any


exhorting English Catholics to courage and patience was to emphasise that they should not panic, but should unite themselves more closely to Christ, and live


their faith with a depth and passion that its great reality demanded. His poetry links the state of the Church in England with Scriptural events, and he wrote with warmth – about sin and repentance, death and mercy.


He saw man as something beautiful, created in


God’s image, and so wished to emphasise sorrow and redemption as central to the reality of man’s existence – God loves us, and wants to draw us to him. We are made for Heaven, and God offers us glorious mercy and an abundance of love, poured out from the Cross, brimming with tenderness.


Man’s soul of endless beauty image is, Drawn by the work of endless skill and might ; Tis skillful might gave many sparks of bliss And, to discern this bliss, a native light ; To frame God’s image as his worths required His might, his skill, his word and will conspired.


All that he had his image should present, All that it should present it could afford, To that he could afford his will was bent, His will was followed with performing word. Let this suffice, by this conceive the rest,— He should, he could, he would, he did, the best.


Source: Poetry of the English Renaissance 1509-1660. J. William Hebel and Hoyt H. Hudson, Eds. New York: F. S. Croſts & Co, 1941. 236


Page 7


A Recusant Martyr


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