Campian, Edmund

Campian, Edmund, an English apostate and Jesuit, was born in London in 1540, and was educated at Christ's Hospital. He took his degrees at Oxford, where he made an oration before Queen Elizabeth on her visit to that University. Afterward he passed over into Ireland, and about 1571 proceeded to Douai, where he openly renounced the Reformed faith. He went to Rome, and was admitted a Jesuit in 1573. He was sent by Gregory XIII, along with the Jesuit Parsons, into England, in June, 1580. Here he performed all the duties of a zealous provincial, and diligently propagated his opinions. In 1581 he printed Rationes 10 oblati certaminis in cause fidei reddita Academicis Anglie. It was afterward printed in English, and ably refuted by Whitaker. His activity at length drew upon him the attention of Walsingham, the Secretary of State, and he was arrested, carried to the Tower, and put cruelly to the torture, which he bore courageously. On the 1st of December, 1581, he,' together with several other Romish priests, was hanged at Tyburn on the charge of high treason. Other works of Campian are Narratio de Divortio Henrici VIII (Douai. 1622); Epistolce ad Mercurianum (the general of the Jesuits; Antwerp, 1631); a History of Ireland (Dublin, 1633, fol.). A volume of Orationes, Epistolbe and his treatise De Imitatione Rhetorica, were published in one volume at Ingolstadt (1602). His life was written by Paul Bombino, a Jesuit (best edition, Mantua, 1620, 8vo). — Hume, History of England, ch. xli; Hook, Eccl. Biog. 3:428.