SIR,—It is interesting to see that the time- honoured addiction
of religious and political groups to the denigration of one another's martyrs is still going strong. First Mr. Evelyn Waugh sneers at the Marian martyrs for heretic cranks, then a Protestant shoots down poor virtuous Southwell for a traitor. Was Southwell in fact involved in the Jesuit pro- Spanish plots for the conquest of England? If not, was he a traitor merely because he prac- tised his religion in defiance of unjust and per- secuting laws? If that was all, then the Marian Protestants were traitors too. And is this such a bad thing to be, when the laws of one's country are manifestly immoral? After all, we approved those Germans who worked against the Hitler regime. Treason to a government is a legal crime, but not necessarily wicked. And it is often courageous and, unselfish, and so were the deaths of all the martyrs, which should be beyond taking sides about. Or so, anyhow, it appears to an impartial observer.
London, W I
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