Allen

Allen, WILLIAM, Cardinal, was born of gentle parentage at Rossall, Lancashire, in 1532, and in 1547 entered Oriel College, Oxford, of which, in 1550, he was elected fellow. In 1556 he became principal of St Mary's Hall, and Catholic though he was, he retained this office till 1560; nor was it till the following year that he had to seek refuge in Flanders. Even then he stole back home in 1562, that his native air might cure a wasting sickness; but when, in 1565, he landed once more in the Low Countries, it was never to return to England. He received priest's orders at Mechlin, in 1567 made a pilgrimage to Rome, in 1568 founded the English college at Douay (q.v.), and in 1587 was created a cardinal during his fourth visit to Rome. He never afterwards quitted the imperial city, dying there on 16th October 1594. At the time of the Armada, Allen signed, if he did not pen, the Admonition to the People of England, in which he declared Elizabeth to be deposed, and urged the Catholics to take up arms against her. He possessed, in addition to moral and intellectual gifts of a high order, a remarkable personal influence, which made him as long as he lived the unrivalled leader of his co-religionists. The decadence of the Catholic cause dates from his death. But his college at Douay was perhaps the chief means of preserving the Catholic faith from being so utterly destroyed in England as it was in the northern kingdoms of the Continent. He wrote several works on the religions and political controversies of his time, the chief of which are his Apology for the Seminaries (1581), described by Bolton as 'a princely, grave, and flourishing piece of natural and exquisite English,' and a Modest Defence of English Catholics, in answer to Cecil's Execution of Justice. His Letters and Memorials have been edited by Fathers of the Oratory, with an historical introduction by Dr Knox (1882).