Talbot, Peter

Talbot, Peter a Roman Catholic divine, was the son of sir William Talbot, and was born in the county of Dublin in 1620. He entered the society of Jesuits in Portugal in 1635; and after studying philosophy and divinity, went into holy orders at Rome, whence he returned to Portugal, and afterwards to Antwerp, where he read lectures on moral theology. He is supposed to be the person who, in 1656, reconciled Charles II, then at Cologne, to the popish religion; and Charles is reported to have sent him to Madrid to inform the court of Spain of his conversion. Sent to England in the interest of the Romish Church, he paid court to Cromwell, whose funeral he attended as a mourner. In 1669 pope Clement IX dispensed with his vows as Jesuit, and advanced him to the titular archbishopric of Dublin. He immediately began to persecute those, of his order who had signified their loyalty to the king, quarreled with Plunket, the titular primate; and when the popish plot was discovered in England in 1678, he was imprisoned in Dublin Castle on suspicion of being concerned in it, and died there in 1680. He was a man of ability and learning, but vain, ambitious, and turbulent. Among his publications are, De Natura- Fidei et. ficeresis, Tractatus de Religione: — A Treatise of Religion and Government (1670, 4to): — Letters to the Roman Catholics in Ireland (Paris, 1674, 4to). See Allibone, Dict. of Brit. and Amer. Authors, s.v.; Chalmers, Biog. Dict. s.v.