Russell and Carol - hayle and hearty

February 21 -- Feast of Saint Robert Southwell "A poet, a lover and a liar are by many reckoned but three words with one signification." Saint Robert Southwell That was the cynical admonition of the poet Robert Southwell, addressed to his cousin, W.S., believed by some to have been William Shakespeare. The two were contemporaries who indisputably read each other's works. Shakespeare, a humanist with no apparent religious zeal, admired Southwell's poetry, but Southwell, a Jesuit priest, seems to have had reservations about literature that…

2/21: Saint Robert Southwell (1561-1595) and Blessed Thomas Pormort (1560-1592) Martyrs at Tyburn, England - "The men like Topcliffe might tempt us to hope that Hell exists, but we would do well to remember that our notions of justice are imperfect, and in wishing that, we deliver ourselves to the Devil."