Читать книгу Menasseh ben Israel's Mission to Oliver Cromwell. Being a reprint of the pamphlets published by Menasseh ben Israel to promote the re-admission of the Jews to England, 1649-1656 онлайн

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In pursuance of this idea Robles now addressed a fresh petition to the Protector, which reached the Council of State on the 15th April,^[146] five days after the publication of the Vindiciæ. In this document the purely legal question of nationality was dropped, and Robles confined himself to reciting how he and his kindred had been persecuted by the Inquisition in Portugal and Spain, how his father had died under torture, how his mother had been crippled for life, and other members of his family burnt or sent to the galleys because they were Jews. He related that he had sought refuge in England, “intending therein to shelter himselfe from those tiranicall Proceedings and injoy those Beneffitts and Kindnesse which this Com̄onw^th ever aforded to aflicted strangers.” He appealed to Cromwell’s notorious sympathy for “afflicted ones,” and especially “owr nation the Jews,” and skilfully suggested that a continuance of his prosecution would be tantamount to the introduction of the Inquisition into England. A week later affidavits confirming the statements in this petition were signed by all the leading Marranos and handed to Colonel Jones.^[147] Thus the Crypto-Jews threw off their disguise. In the investigations which followed, the existence of over twenty Jewish families in London was revealed, and it was given in evidence that many of them had resided for years in the country.