E-text prepared by Geoff Horton
TEN REASONS PROPOSED TO HIS ADVERSARIES FOR DISPUTATION IN THE
NAME OF THE FAITH AND PRESENTED TO THE ILLUSTRIOUS MEMBERS OF OUR
UNIVERSITIES BY EDMUND CAMPION PRIEST OF THE SOCIETY OF THE NAME
OF JESUS Nihil Obstat S. GEORGIUS KIERAN HYLAND, S.T.D, CENSOR
DEPUTATUS Imprimatur + PETRUS EPUS SOUTHWARC CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION RATIONES DECEM TRANSLATION INTRODUCTION
Though Blessed Edmund Campion's Decem Rationes has passedthrough forty-seven editions,[1] printed in all parts of Europe;though it has awakened the enthusiasm of thousands; though MarkAnthony Muret, one of the chief Catholic humanists of Campion'sage, pronounced it to be "written by the finger of God," yet itis not an easy book for men of our generation to appreciate, andthis precisely because it suited a bygone generation so exactly.Before it can be esteemed at its true value, some knowledge ofthe circumstances under which it was written, is indispensable.
1. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE Decem Rationes.
The chief point to remember is that the Decem Rationes was thelast and most deliberate free utterance of Campion'sever-memorable mission. During the few months that missionlasted he succeeded in staying the full tide of victoriousProtestantism, which had hitherto been irresistible. The ancientChurch had gone down before the new religion, at Elizabeth'saccession twenty years before, with an apparently final fall,and since then the Elizabethan Settlement had triumphed in everychurch, in every school and court. The new generation had beenmoulded by it; the old order seemed to be utterly prostrate,defeated and moribund. Nor was it only at home thatProtestantism talked of victory. In every neighbouring land shehad gained or was gaining the upper hand. She had crossed theBorder and subdued Scotland, she held Ireland in an iron grip,she had set up a new throne in Holland, she had deeply dividedFrance, and had learned how to paralyze the power of Spain. Whatcould stay her progress?
Then a new figure appeared, a fugitive flying before the law. Hewas hunted backwards and forwards across the country, every man'shand seemed against him. It was impossible to hold out for longagainst such immense odds, and he was in fact soon captured,mocked, maligned, sentenced and executed with contumely. YetCampion and his handful of followers had meanwhile succeeded indoing what the whole nation, when united, had failed to do. Hehad evoked a spirit of faith and fervour, against which theviolence of Protestantism raged in vain. He had saved the beaten,shattered fragments of the ancient host, and animated them withinvincible courage; and his work endured in spite of endlessassaults and centuries of persecution. The Decem Rationes isCampion's harangue to those whom he called upon to follow him inthe heroic struggle.
2. THE MAN AND THE MISSION.
Thus much for the inspiration and general significance ofCampion's work considered as a whole. It will also repay a muchmore minute study, and to appreciate it we must enter intofurther details.
As to the man himself, suffice it to say that he was a Londoner;his father a publisher; his first school Christ's Hospital; thathe was afterwards a Fellow of St. John's, Oxford, and held at thesame time an exhibition from the Grocer's Company. At Oxford heaccepted to some extent the Elizabethan Settlement of religion,but not sufficiently to satisfy the Company of Grocers, whoeventually withdrew their exhibition. This was a sign for furtherinquisitorial proceedings, which made him leave the University,and retire to Dublin; but he was dr