SOUTHWELL, Robert, Blessed. - Jesuit, poet and martyr, b. at Horsham St. Faith's (Norfolk) in 1561, d. in London on 21 Feb. 1595.
Educated as a Catholic at Douai and Paris, he entered the Order in Rome on 18 Oct. 1578. Ordained a priest in 1584, he was for a short time prefect of studies at the English College; but already in 1586 he set out with Fr. E. Garnet for England, where his arrival was reported by the government's spies from the very moment of landing. For about 6 years he devoted himself to the ministries, under the false name of Cotton, disguised in various ways, as a guest of the leading families, among them the Countess of Arundel, wife of the blessed Philip Howard, whose chaplain he was. Betrayed by the apostate Anna Bellamy in 1592, he was arrested at Uxenden Hall (Harrow), atrociously tortured in the very house of the judge Topcliffe, then thrown into the prisons of Newgate and afterwards into those of the Tower of London. After about 3 years he was tried, condemned to the punishment of traitors and hanged on the gallows at Tyburn. He was beatified on 15 Dec. 1929. Feast on 21 Feb.
His works in prose and verse met with extraordinary popularity among his contemporaries, so much so that they were sold openly and passed through everyone's hands, whether manuscript or secretly printed on loose sheets, although their author was known; they also gave occasion for forgeries. This fame was certainly aided by the lively and strong feeling of devotion lavished upon them with full hands, but also by the style, then much admired, which goes under the name of euphuism, highly artificial, all antitheses, alliterations, bold and far-fetched images, between Baroque affectation and Arcadia. There always remains, however, even now, the fragrance of the heart and the ardour of one who lived his faith intimately amid persecution, with death lying in wait. One may cite the short poems in verse: Mary Magdalen's Tears, and above all St. Peter's Complaint, imitated, but freely, from Le lacrime di S. Pietro by Luigi Tansillo, and the prose works: Triumphs over Death, Hundred meditations on the Love of God.
These works, with other brief writings, were printed in volume, the first time in 1595, the year of his martyrdom; followed, the same year, by another collection of short poems, under the title of Masconiae. The work A Fourfold meditations, which appeared as his in 1606, is, instead, by his friend the Earl of Arundel (cf. H. Thurston, Philip earl of Arundel, in The Month, 86 [1896], pp. 32-50).
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