Gage, Thomas

Gage, Thomas an English divine, noted especially for his conversion from Roman Catholicism, was born in Haling, in Surrey, about 1597. He entered into the Dominican order in Spain, after which he was sent as a missionary to the Philippine Islands; but instead of going thither, he went to Mexico, and then to Guatemala, where he spent ten years in missionary labors among the Indians. He returned to England is 1637, after an absence of twenty- four years, during which he had forgotten his native language. On examining into his domestic affairs, he found himself unnoticed in his father's will, forgotten by some of his relations, and with difficulty acknowledged by others. While abroad be had imbibed doubts of Romanism, and now he resolved to take another journey to Italy, to "try what better satisfaction he could find for his conscience at Rome in that religion." At Loretto his conversion from Popery was completed by his observation of the false miracles attributed to the picture of the Virgin there, and on his return home he preached a recantation sermon at St. Paul's, by order of the bishop of London. He continued above a year in London, but soon received from the parliamentary party the living of Deal, in Kent. His accounts of the West Indies and Spanish America gave rise to the expedition of admiral Penn against Jamaica in 1655. Paige accompanied the fleet, and died of dysentery at Jamaica (1655). He published his Recantalion Sermon (1642); a piece entitled A Duel fought between a Jesuit and a Dominican (4to); and Survey of the West Indies (1648, and again in 1655, fol.). This work was greatly admired, and was soon translated into most European languages. See Hook, Eccles. Biogr. 5:243; Echard. Script. Ord. Praedicatorum, volume 2; Hoefer, Nouv. Biog Generale, 19:151.