Edmund Campion's Forgiveness

Edmund Campion’s Forgiveness own life to be in hourly peril from the rage of old friends who had learned of his part in the arrest, staggered into Campion’s cell, behind a jailer, and begged to be forgiven. The con- demned man was weak from torture, and anticipating Ty- burn, but he did not hesitate.

He fully and freely forgave him. Still the traitor lingered. Would the gracious father do more? Would he help him escape from the fury of his pur- suers?

Even this the betrayed man was ready to do. Without a word of rebuke, he promised him a letter of introduction to a German nobleman who would accept his service, and on a rainy December morning he was tied to a hurdle and dragged from the Tower to Tyburn, through the filth and garbage of the London gutters. No hate, no bitterness, no lust for revenge. He went up the cart at the place of execution as though he were going to a wedding.

In that last dread hour; poise and equanimity marked all that he did, and they were the fine fruit of his faith, his clear conscience, and his magnan- imous forgiveness.”