Irish history abound in ‘malicious representations.’
According to Barnaby Rich, Stanyhurst, while pursuing his historical researches at Antwerp, also ‘professed alchemy, and took upon him to make gold’ (Rich, Irish Hubbub). At the same time politics attracted his attention. Under the influence of the jesuits he embarked in conspiracy with other catholic exiles in Flanders against the English government, and he became an object of suspicion to English spies. His relations with the catholics grew more equivocal after a second marriage (before 1585) with Helen, daughter of William Copley of Gatton, Surrey, and granddaughter of Sir Thomas Copley [q. v.] (cf. Copley, Letters, ed. Christie, Roxburghe Club, 1897, p. xlviii). Like other members of her family, she was a fervent Roman catholic, and her sister Mary became in 1637 superioress of the abbey of Louvain. About 1590 Stanyhurst visited Spain and, it was stated, professed medicine there; but his chief occupation was the offering of political advice to the Spanish government in regard to the position of affairs in England. He was at Toledo in 1591. Writing from Madrid to Justus Lipsius on 1 Feb. 1592, he refers to an interview with Philip II, and speaks with enthusiasm of the king's kindness and affability. About 1595 it was reported that he had left the Spanish ‘court with a good provision in Flanders, and is not likely to deal more in matters of state or physic’ (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1595–7, p. 157; cf. Cal. State Papers, Dom. Eliz. ccxlvii. 3, 44). His (second) wife died about 1602, soon after the birth of a second son. Thereupon Stanyhurst took holy orders. Rich asserts that he became ‘a massing priest.’ Archduke Albert, the ruler of the Netherlands, appointed him chaplain to himself and to his wife Isabella (Philip II's daughter), and to these patrons Stanyhurst dedicated a devotional treatise: ‘Hebdomada Mariana ex Orthodoxis Catholicæ Romanæ Ecclesiæ Patribus collecta; in memoriam septem festorum Beatissianæ Virginis Mariæ,’ Antwerp, 1609, 8vo. He also appears to have acted as chaplain to the English Benedictine convent at Brussels. In 1605 he wrote commendatory verses for his friend and co-religionist Richard Verstegan's ‘Restitution of Decayed Intelligence,’ which was published at Antwerp in 1605 [see Rowlands, Richard]. In 1614 he brought out another devotional treatise, ‘Hebdomada Eucharistica,’ Douay, 1614, 8vo.
Despite differences in religion, Stanyhurst seems to have maintained an affectionate correspondence with his kinsfolk in Ireland. His nephew, James Ussher, writing to him ‘at the English College in Louvain’ about 1610, asked for a copy of his ‘Margarita,’ ‘presuming on that natural bond of love which is knit betwixt us.’ Ussher sent his mother's ‘most kind remembrance,’ and signed himself ‘your most loving nephew.’ Ussher's biographers represent Stanyhurst as making vain efforts to convert his nephew to his own faith, but there is no hint of this in the many respectful references which Ussher made in his published works to Stanyhurst's ‘Life of St. Patrick’ and others of his uncle's writings (cf. Ussher, Works, ed. Elrington, iv. 550, 562, vi. 374, 380, 447). When Ussher brought out in 1613 his treatise ‘De Successione et Statu Christianæ Ecclesiæ,’ in which he attempted to identify the pope with Antichrist, Stanyhurst replied in ‘Brevis præmunitio pro futura concertatione cum Jacobo Usserio Hiberno Dublinensi,’ Douay, 1615, 8vo. According to Wood, Stanyhurst died at Brussels in 1618. His nephew wrote at the time to Lydiat that ‘my late uncle's answer’ was to come out at Paris (ib. xv. 148).
Two of Stanyhurst's sons by his second wife became jesuits. The elder, Peter, born in the Netherlands, studied humanities under the jesuit fathers at Brussels, entered the society at Mechlin on 18 Sept. 1616, and died in Spain on 27 May 1627 (Foley, Records, vii. 731, Chron. Cat. p. 26). The younger son, William Stanyhurst (1602–1663), born at Brussels in 1602, after studying there, entered the Society of Jesus at Malines on 25 Sept. 1617 (De Backer). He chiefly resided at Brussels, and preached in both English and Flemish. Wood describes him as ‘a comely person endowed with rare parts.’ He died in Belgium on 10 Jan. 1663. He was a voluminous writer of religious works, many of which enjoyed a European vogue. His ‘Dei Immortalis in corpore mortali patientis Historia,’ which appeared at Antwerp in 1660, has been repeatedly reprinted down to the present day, both in the original Latin and in French, Spanish, Flemish, Dutch, German, Polish, and Hungarian translations. His ‘Veteris Hominis … quatuor novissima metamorphosis et novi genesis,’ dedicated to James van Baerlant, Antwerp, 1661 (Prague, 1700; Vienna, 1766), was translated into French, German, Italian, and Spanish. Others of his works, all of which passed through many editions, are: 1. ‘Album Marianum,’ describing God's beneficence to Austria (Louvain, 1641, fol.). 2. ‘Regio mortis sive Domus infelicis æternitatis,’ Antwerp, 1652,
