Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 28.djvu/60

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
Howard
54
Howard

fostered by powerful enemies. Elizabeth's pride was hurt by Arundel's constancy, and she had no sympathy with conscientious convictions. She felt personally aggrieved that one of her nobles should venture openly to take up opinions of which she disapproved.

In the Tower Arundel was subjected to much persecution, until at last a definite charge was produced against him. In 1588 some other Romanists confined in the Tower, among whom was a priest, William Bennet, contrived to meet together secretly for mass. When the Spanish Armada was expected, Arundel suggested that they should spend twenty-four hours continuously in prayer, and this was done. Arundel was accused of praying for the success of the Spaniards, and Bennet was induced by threats of torture to confess that Arundel moved him to say a mass for that purpose. Bennet, in a letter to Arundel, afterwards said that he 'confessed everything that seemed to content their humour,' and asked pardon for his cowardice. Arundel was brought to trial for high treason on 14 April 1589, and irritated the authorities by his magnificent attire and lofty bearing. He denied the mass for the success of Spain, and explained the prayer as being for personal safety, as the rumour was that the London mob projected the murder of all Romanists. He was found guilty, and was condemned to death. The sentence, however, was not carried out, but he was allowed to linger in the Tower, not knowing that he might not be executed at any moment. He spent his time in pious exercises, and practised rigorous asceticism. He was taken ill after dinner in August 1595, and it is not surprising that his illness was attributed to poison, though there is no ground for the supposition. He begged to be allowed to see his wife and children before he died, and received an answer that if he would once go to church he should be liberated and his estates restored. But he refused the condition, and died, without the consolation of seeing his family, on 19 Oct. 1595. He was buried in the chapel of the Tower, whence his bones were conveyed to Arundel in 1624. His only son, Thomas Howard, second earl of Arundel (1586-1646), is separately noticed. His daughter Elizabeth died unmarried in 1600.

Arundel is described as 'a very tall man, somewhat swarth-coloured.' He was gifted with extraordinary power of memory, and was quick-witted. When his misfortunes began he developed all the qualities of a religious devotee. In the Tower he translated 'An Epistle of Jesus Christ to the Faithful Soule,' by Johann Justus (Antwerp, 1595; republished, London, 1871), and also left in manuscript three treatises' On the Excellence and Utility of Virtue.' There are portraits of him by Zucchero at Castle Howard, Naworth, and Greystock. An engraving is in Lodge's 'Portraits.'

[His life, and also that of his wife, written to show their religious fortitude by a contemporary, probably Lady Arundel's confessor, were edited by the Duke of Norfolk, The Lives of Philip Howard, Earl of Arundel, and of Anne Dacres his Wife, 1857; Dugdale's Baronage, ii. 276; Collins's Peerage, i. 108-12; Doyle's Official Baronage, i. 84; Camden's Annals of Elizabeth; Howell's State Trials, i. 1250, &c.; Cooper's Athenæ Cantabrigienses, ii. 187-91; Morris's Troubles of our Catholic Forefathers, ii. 83, &c.; Howard's Memorials of the Howards; Tierney's Hist. of Arundel, p. 357, &c.; Gillow's Dict. of the English Catholics, i. 65-7; Cornelius a Lapide's Preface to Commentary on St. Paul's Epistles.]


HOWARD, PHILIP THOMAS (1629–1694), the cardinal of Norfolk, born 21 Sept. 1629 at Arundel House in the parish of St. Clement Danes, London, was third son of Henry Frederick Howard, third earl of Arundel [q. v.], by Elizabeth Stuart, eldest daughter of Esme, lord d'Aubigny, afterwards Duke of Richmond and Lennox. He had several private tutors, some of whom were protestants, but he was brought up in the Roman catholic religion. On 4 July 1640 he, together with his brothers Thomas and Henry, was admitted a fellow-commoner of St. John's College, Cambridge, but their residence in the university was brief. They were sent to be educated at Utrecht, where, in 1641, their grandfather, Thomas Howard, earl of Arundel and Surrey [q. v.], visited them. They afterwards removed to Antwerp, where Philip resolved to devote his life to the service of religion. To this his grandfather, who had conformed to the English church, strongly objected, and he was sent with his brothers on a long tour through Germany, France, and Italy (cf. Evelyn, Diary, ii. 263). At Milan Philip became acquainted with John Baptist Hacket [q. v.], an Irish Dominican friar, and going with Hacket to the house of the Dominicans at Cremona received the habit 28 June 1645, assuming in religion the name of Thomas. The Earl of Arundel believed that his grandson had been unduly influenced; and begged Sir Kenelm Digby, who had just arrived in Rome, to appeal to Pope Innocent X. By the pope's order Philip was removed on 26 July to the palace of Cesare Monti, cardinal archbishop of Milan, who allowed him to be transferred to the convent of S. Maria delle Grazie in that city. The Howard family persevered in their