TEN REASONS PROPOSED TO HIS ADVERSARIES FOR DISPUTATION IN THE
NAME OF THE FAITH AND PRESENTED TO THE ILLUSTRIOUS MEMBERS OF OUR
UNIVERSITIES BY EDMUND CAMPION PRIEST OF THE SOCIETY OF THE NAME
OF JESUS Nihil Obstat S. GEORGIUS KIERAN HYLAND, S.T.D, CENSOR
DEPUTATUS Imprimatur + PETRUS EPUS SOUTHWARC CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION RATIONES DECEM TRANSLATION INTRODUCTION






Though Blessed Edmund Campion's _Decem Rationes_ has passed
through forty-seven editions,[1] printed in all parts of Europe;
though it has awakened the enthusiasm of thousands; though Mark
Anthony Muret, one of the chief Catholic humanists of Campion's
age, pronounced it to be "written by the finger of God," yet it
is not an easy book for men of our generation to appreciate, and
this precisely because it suited a bygone generation so exactly.
Before it can be esteemed at its true value, some knowledge of
the circumstances under which it was written, is indispensable.

1. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE _Decem Rationes_.

The chief point to remember is that the _Decem Rationes_ was the
last and most deliberate free utterance of Campion's
ever-memorable mission. During the few months that mission
lasted he succeeded in staying the full tide of victorious
Protestantism, which had hitherto been irresistible. The ancient
Church had gone down before the new religion, at Elizabeth's