The English-American : a new survey of the West Indies, 1648 / Thomas Gage ; edited with an introduction by A.P. Newton.

  • Gage, Thomas, 1603?-1656.
Date:
1928
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The English-American : a new survey of the West Indies, 1648 / Thomas Gage ; edited with an introduction by A.P. Newton. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    foremost of the apostles for the conversion of England. He reproached Thomas in unmeasured terms. “ My father’s angry and harsh letter,” Gage tells us,1 “ signified unto me the displeasure of modi of my friends and kindred, and his own grievous indignation against me, for that having spent so much money in training me up to learning, I had not only refused to be of the Jesuits’ Order (which was his only hopes), but had proved in my affediions a deadly foe and enemy unto them. He said that if I should prove a General of the Order of Dominicans, that I should never think to be welcome to my brothers nor kindred in England nor to him, that I should not expedt ever more to hear from him, nor dare to see him if ever I returned to England, but expedt that he would set upon me even the Jesuits whom I had deserted and opposed to chase me out of my country, that Haling House, though he had lodl it with much more means for his religion during his life, yet with the consent of my eldedl brother he would sell it away,2 that neither from the edlate or money made of it I might enjoy a child’s part due unto me.” These remonstrances and threats were of no effedt, and early in 1625 we find Thomas fully received into the Dominicans and resident in one of their convents at Jeres. Thither there came at the end of May 1625 a commissary of the Pope with licence to recruit prieSts to serve as missionaries for the conversion of the natives of the Philippine Islands. Among those already recruited was one Antonio Melendez, a near acquaintance of Gage’s from Valla¬ dolid. Although the passage of Englishmen to the Spanish Indies was dlridlly forbidden, Gage yielded to his persuasion and resolved to accept service with the mission. He planned to journey through Mexico 1 English American, p. 8. 2 The reversion was sold by John Gage and his son Henry in 1626 to Christopher Gardiner. V.C.H., Surrey, iv., 222, note 61.