238 REIGN OF ELIZABETH. [CH. 59 when the confiscation project was assuming a practical shape in London. His commission was addressed to the Pope as well as to Philip. 1 Beginning with St Patrick and the first conversion of Ireland, the petitioners dwelt upon the constancy of the Irish people to the faith which their first apostle had planted among them. They said that they desired to remain, like their fathers, in union with the Church ; that they so detested heresy that they would rather for- sake their homes and emigrate to some other country than live under the rule of schismatics or acquiesce in the errors of their oppressors. In the reigns of Henry VIII. and Edward VI., t,he English had pillaged their churches, destroyed their monasteries, proscribed their bishops, expelled and persecuted the religious orders, and had thrown the whole of Ireland into confusion. The present Queen was treading in the steps of her father, imprisoning prelates, and otherwise doing evil, as he had done. She had sent over preachers of heresy ; she ha!d introduced heretical books to poison the minds of the multitude ; and now therefore, in all humility, they prayed God to have pity on their sufferings and to move the hearts of his Holiness and the Catholic King to deliver them. Long and passionately they said that they had looked to the King of Spain for assistance. To him and to the Pope the sovereignty of Ireland of 1 The signatures of the arch- bishops and bishops would decide the question of their attitude towards the Reformation, if on other ground there was the slightest reason to fee* doubtful about it.
