Nicholas Sander [a.k.a. Robert Parsons] about 1530-1581 so this title PUBLISHED POSTHUMOUSLY & edited by Rishton, Parsons & Allen. Became Church of Rome agent, Jesuit, historian, polemicist. Born Charlwood, Surrey [father once Sheriff of Surrey]. Educated Winchester & New Colege Oxford -elected Fellow 1548, graduated B.C.L. 1551. Family devout members of Church of Rome - 2 elder sisters nuns at Sion convent before its dissolution. 1557 on the occasion of Cardinal Pole's visitors being welcomed to the University, NS selected to deliver the oration. After the modest religious changes under Henry VIII & the more 'Protestant' oriented changes in the reign of Edward VI people like Sander welcomed the succession of Queen Mary I whose devout papalism enforced an attempt to restore Romanism [even at the price of instituting a religious reign of terror, re-enacting the statute for burning 'heretics', so that over 300 died at the stake in flames & many more perished due to the effects of torture & harsh prison conditions.]

After Mary's death in 1558, NS refused to take the Oath of Supremacy [recognising Queen Elizabeth I as "supreme head of the Church in England"] & so had to leave (flee?) England for Catholic Europe. In Rome he was befriended by the 1558 deceased Cardinal Pole's close associate Cardinal Morone, & he also owed much to Sir Francis Englefield. In Rome, NS was ordained a priest [Jesuit] & was considered on the "fast track" for promotion. Over the next few years he was employed by Cardinal Hosius, the learned Polish prelate who was Prince-Bishop of Ermeland, & also 1 of the 5 papal legates to the renewed sessions of the Council of Trent [until it closed in the early 1560s.] Hosius was especially concerned to counter the spread of "Protestantism's heresies" [Lutherism, Calvinism, Anabaptism....] in Poland, Lithuania & Prussia.

Like many other English exiles NS next made his HQ at Louvain where he was made professor of Theology. 1556 saw him visiting the Imperial Diet at Augsburg attending upon Commendone [who during the reign of Mary I had helped England's "reconciliation" with the Papacy.] NS also engaged in enthusiastic polemics, attacking the Anglican bishop John Jewel's publications which sought to justify the position of the Church of England. NS in his 1571 "De visibili Monarchia Ecclesiae" gave the first narrative account of the sufferings of the English Catholic laity : it's extreme papalism & strong defence of Pius V's bull "Regnans in Excelsis" of 1570? excommunicating & deposing Queen Elizabeth I as a usurper marked NS out for the enmity of the English government to which he retaliated with life-long attempts to procure the deposition of Elizabeth (by assassination, revolt or invasion) to obtain the restoration of the religious monopoly of the the Church of Rome into England.[