''Pseudo-Martyr'' is a 1610 polemical prose tract in English by

John Donne John Donne ( ; 1571 or 1572 – 31 March 1631) was an English poet, scholar, soldier and secretary born into a recusant family, who later became a clergy, cleric in the Church of England. Under Royal Patronage, he was made Dean of St Paul's, D ...

. It contributed to the religious pamphlet war of the time, and was Donne's first appearance in print. It argued that English

Roman Catholics The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institut ...

should take the

Oath of Allegiance of James I of England The Oath of Allegiance of 1606 was an oath requiring English Catholics to swear allegiance to James I over the Pope. It was adopted by Parliament the year after the Gunpowder Plot of 1605 (see Popish Recusants Act 1605). The oath was proclaimed l ...

. It was printed by

William Stansby William Stansby (1572–1638) was a London printer and publisher of the Jacobean and Caroline eras, working under his own name from 1610. One of the most prolific printers of his time, Stansby is best remembered for publishing the landmark first ...

for Walter Burre.

Background

Donne had converted from Catholicism, but had not moved decisively into the Protestant camp. From 1604 he became involved in controversial theology as an onlooker, assisting his friend Thomas Morton in a reply to James Anderton, commissioned by

Richard Bancroft Richard Bancroft (1544 – 2 November 1610) was an English churchman, Archbishop of Canterbury from 1604 to 1610 and "chief overseer" of the King James Bible. Life Bancroft was born in September 1544 at Farnworth, now part of Widnes, Ch ...

The content of ''Pseudo-Martyr''

Donne entered directly into one of the major debates of the period, supporting

Sir Edward Coke Sir Edward Coke ( , formerly ; 1 February 1552 – 3 September 1634) was an English barrister, judge, and politician. He is often considered the greatest jurist of the Elizabethan and Jacobean eras. Born into an upper-class family, Coke was ...

against the Jesuit Robert Parsons. Coke in ''Fift Part of the Reports'' (1606) had made a historical argument on the powers of the King of England in church matters. Donne characterised the English mission, of Catholic priests trained to convert Protestants and sustain English Catholics, as "enemies to the dignity of all princes", and seditious because of the theories of temporal power of the Pope supported particularly by the Jesuits. Donne used a comparison with the

Circumcellions The Circumcellions, or Agonistici (as called by Donatists), were bands of Roman Christian radicals in North Africa in the early to mid-4th century. They were initially concerned with remedying social grievances. They condemned poverty and slavery ...

to denigrate Jesuit attitudes to

martyrdom A martyr (, ''mártys'', 'witness' stem , ''martyr-'') is someone who suffers persecution and death for advocating, renouncing, or refusing to renounce or advocate, a religious belief or other cause as demanded by an external party. In colloqui ...

. A more subtle side to the argument is that it recognised that the oath had closed down the option of

passive obedience Passive obedience is a religious and political doctrine, which states that people have a moral duty to obey the law, in particular accepting punishment as part of this obedience. George Berkeley The most notable publication describing this doctr ...

to the king. Donne threw the onus of swearing onto individual

conscience A conscience is a Cognition, cognitive process that elicits emotion and rational associations based on an individual's ethics, moral philosophy or value system. Conscience is not an elicited emotion or thought produced by associations based on i ...

, discounting both arguments from the state and the authority of

casuistry Casuistry ( ) is a process of reasoning that seeks to resolve moral problems by extracting or extending abstract rules from a particular case, and reapplying those rules to new instances. This method occurs in applied ethics and jurisprudence. ...

. The only acceptable basis was scripture and knowledge of nature, the duty of obedience being considered in the light of

natural law Natural law (, ) is a Philosophy, philosophical and legal theory that posits the existence of a set of inherent laws derived from nature and universal moral principles, which are discoverable through reason. In ethics, natural law theory asserts ...

Intention and reception

''Pseudo-Martyr'' launched Donne into a career as a clergyman of the

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...

, one of the reasons he wrote it. He also aimed it at English Catholics. The work influenced

Thomas James Thomas James (c. 1573 – August 1629) was an English librarian and Anglican clergyman, the first librarian of the Bodleian Library, Oxford. Life James was born about 1573 at Newport, Isle of Wight. In 1586 he was admitted a scholar of Winc ...

, who praised it.Johann P. Somerville, ''John Donne the Controversialist: The Poet as Political Thinker'', p. 94, in David Colclough (editor), ''John Donne's Professional Lives'' (2003)
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Background

The content of ''Pseudo-Martyr''

Intention and reception

Notes

Further reading