84 REIGN OF ELIZABETH. [CH. 63. parish church did not prove that he had attended no church. Nor was there any definition of the words ' lawful excuse.' Should these exceptions be disallowed how- ever, the Jesuits concluded that a true Ca- tholic must confess his faith and brave the conse- quences. If he was required to say distinctly whether he would attend church or not, he must in that case, 'making protest that he spoke under compulsion, and not to impeach any law or statute,' say out plainly and honourably why he could not obey. The service was not Catholic, and he dared not, for the peril of his soul, go near it. The laws and statutes of a Christian country could not compel a man to damn his soul. 1 The Catholics were now in hard case, and they had to thank for it the fanatics who had erected the right of the Pope to depose princes into an article of faith. The letters of Mendoza to Philip throw an interesting light on the despair of the better part of them. ' The leading Catholics of this country,' he wrote on the 6th of April, 'have signified to me that, besides the troubles and miseries which they have undergone in the two last years, a persecution now awaits them of which the first was but a shadow. They must not depart from the realm ; and unless they will forget God, and profess the errors which are here established, they will not only lose lands, liberty, and perhaps life, but, through these laws now passed through Parliament, they may leave 1 Papers endorsed 'Catholics going to Protestant churches, 1581 ;' M&S. Domestic.
