A very true Report of the apprehension
and taking of that arch-Papist Edmund
Campion, the Pope his right hand; with
Three other lewd Jesuit Priests, and
divers other Lay people, most
seditious persons of like sort.
Containing also a controlment of a most untrue former
book set out by one A. M., alias Anthony Munday,
concerning the same: as is to be proved and justified
by George Elliot, one of the Ordinary
Yeomen of Her Majesty's Chamber,
Author of this Book, and chiefest cause of the
finding of the said lewd and seditious people, great
enemies to GOD, their loving Prince,
and country.
Veritas non quærit angulos.
Imprinted at London at the Three Cranes in the
Vintry by Thomas Dawson.
1581.
[The Edinburgh Review of April 1891, in an article on The Baffling of the Jesuits, states
"Until Father Parsons landed at Dover on June 11 [and Father Campion on June 25], 1580; no Jesuit had ever been seen in England. Ignatius Loyola had been dead just twenty-five years, and two of his associates in founding the Society of Jesus were still alive. Loyola during his lifetime had admitted only a single Englishman into the order, a lad of nineteen, of whom we know nothing but that his name was Thomas Lith, and that he was admitted to the novitiate in June 1555. During the next ten years, six more Englishmen entered the order, two of them being men of some mark—Jasper Heywood, formerly Fellow of All Souls'; and Thomas Darbyshire, who had been Archdeacon of Essex and a Canon of St Paul's. In the next decade, about the same number of English recruits joined the society; three, and three only, were scholars of any reputation—Parsons, Campion, and Henry Garnet. When the Jesuit Mission to England started, there were not thirty English Jesuits in the world."
At Vol. I., p. 130, is a letter written from Goa, 10 Nov. 1579, by Thomas Stevens, one of these English Jesuits.
The arrest and execution of Edmund Campion—in Latin, Edmundus Campianus—was one of the most important events in our political history during the year 1581. It made a profound impression throughout Western Europe, and occasioned the publication of many tracts in various languages. For further information on this subject, the Reader is referred to Edmund Campion, A Biography, by Richard Simpson, London, 1867-8; and also to Mr Joseph Gillow's Biographical Dictionary of the English Catholics, now in progress.
The following account of the arrest by the man who made it, is printed from a copy of the extremely rare original edition that is now in Lambeth Palace Library [Press Mark, xxx. 8. 17.]. It was printed [? privately printed] in 1581; but it was not entered at Stationers' Hall. It was clearly produced before the execution of Campion, on the 1st of December of that year; to which there is no allusion in it; but apparently not very much earlier, for the Writer says at page [217], "Some men may marvel that I would be silent so long."
By this act of patriotism; George Elliot earned the titles, among the Roman Catholics, of Judas Elliot, and of Elliot Iscariot. It is however only fair to him to state what moved him to go hunting after Priests, Jesuits, etc.
Anthony Munday, in his Discovery of Edmund Campion and his Confederates, &c., published on 29th January 1582, in giving an account of Campion's trial, states:
George Elliot, one of the Ordinary Yeomen of Her Majesty's Chamber, upon his oath, gave forth in evidence, as followeth: