SECTION The History of the Waldenses, from the middle of the fourteenth, to the end of the fifteenth century.

A.D. 1350—1500 IT has been pertinently remarked by a late writer, that in reading the history of every country, there are certain periods at which the mind naturally pauses, to meditate upon and consider them, with reference, not only to their immediate effects, but to their more remote consequences. This remark is as applicable to the history of the Christian church, as it is to that of any particular country. I have endeavored to conduct the reader through the mazes and labyrinths of that history, during a period of nearly fourteen hundred years, in which time we have traversed a dreary wilderness, through a dark and benighted season, until we are at length brought to approach the confines of light—the morning of the Reformation. In entering upon the last chapter of this book, it may be no unprofitable employ, therefore, for us to pause, and take a review of the existing state of Europe, at this interesting period, in reference to the great concern of religion. The picture, indeed, has been already sketched by an able artist, and probably I cannot do better than present it to the reader. “The state of religion at this time was truly deplorable.

Ecclesiastical government, instead of that evangelical simplicity and fraternal freedom which Jesus Christ and his apostles had taught, was now become a spiritual domination under the form of a temporal empire. An innumerable multitude of dignities, titles, rights, honors, privileges, and pre-eminences belonged to it, and were all dependent on a sovereign priest, who, being an absolute monarch, required every thought to be in subjection to him. The chief ministers of religion were actually become temporal princes; and the high-priest, being absolute sovereign of the ecclesiastical state, had his court and his council, his ambassadors to negotiate, and his armies to murder—his flock. The clergy had acquired immense wealth; and, as their chief study was either to collect and to augment their revenues, or to prevent the alienation of their estates, they had constituted numberless spiritual corporations, with powers, rights, statutes, privileges, and officers. The functions of the ministry were generally neglected, and of consequence, gross ignorance prevailed. All ranks of men were extremely depraved in their morals, and the pope’s penitentiary had published the price of every crime, as it was rated in the taxbook of the Roman chancery. Marriages, which reason and scripture allowed, the pope prohibited, and for money dispensed with those which both forbad. Church-benefices were sold to children, and to laymen, who then let them to under tenants, none of whom performed the duty for which the profits were paid: but all having obtained them by simony, spent their lives in fleecing the flock to repay themselves. The power of the pontiff was so great, that he assumed, and what was more astonishing, he was suffered to exercise, a supremacy over many kingdoms. When monarchs gratified his will, he put on a triple crown, ascended a throne, suffered them to call him Holiness, and to kiss his feet. When they dis-obliged him, he suspended all religious worship in their dominions; published false and abusive libels, called bulls, which operated as laws, to injure their persons; discharged their subjects from obedience; and gave their crowns to any who would usurp them. He claimed an infallibility of knowledge, and an omnipotence of strength; and he forbad the world to examine his claim. He was addressed by titles of blasphemy, and though he owned no jurisdiction over himself, yet he affected to extend his authority over heaven and hell, as well as over a middle place called purgatory, of all which places he said he kept the keys. This irregular church-polity was attended with quarrels, intrigues, schisms, and wars. “Religion itself was made to consist of the performance of numerous ceremonies, of Pagan, Jewish, and Monkish extraction, all which might be performed without either faith in God, or love to mankind. The church ritual was an address, not to the reason, but to the senses of men; music stole the ear, and soothed the passions; statues, paintings, vestments, and various ornaments, beguiled the eye; while the pause which was produced by that sudden attack which a multitude of objects made on the senses, on entering a spacious decorated edifice, was enthusiastically taken for devotion.

Blind obedience was first allowed by courtesy, and then established by law. Public worship was performed in an unknown tongue, and the sacrament was adored as the body and blood of Christ. The credit of the ceremonial produced in the people a notion that the performance of it was the practice of piety, and religion degenerated into gross superstition. Vice, uncontrolled by reason or scripture, retained a Pagan rigor, and committed the most horrid crimes; and superstition atoned for them, by building and endowing religious houses, and by bestowing donations on the church. Human merit was introduced, saints were invoked, and the perfections of God were distributed by canonization, among the creatures of the pope. “The pillars, that supported this edifice, were immense riches, arising, by imposts, from the sins of mankind; idle distinctions between supreme and subordinate adoration; senseless axioms, called the divinity of the schools; preachments of buffoonery, or blasphemy, or both; cruel casuistry, consisting of a body of dangerous and scandalous morality; false miracles and midnight visions; spurious books and paltry relics; oaths, dungeons, inquisitions, and crusades. The whole was denominated The Holy Catholic, and Apostolic Church, and laid to the charge of Jesus Christ.” 2 These things premised, we now return to the history of the Waldenses.

About the year 1400, a violent outrage was committed upon the Waldenses who inhabited the valley of Pragela, in Piedmont, by the catholic party resident in that neighborhood. The attack, which seems to have been of the most furious kind, was made towards the end of the month of December, when the mountains were covered with snow, and thereby rendered so difficult of access, that the peaceable inhabitants of the valleys were wholly unapprised that any such attempt was meditated; and the persecutors were in actual possession of their caves, ere the former seem to have been apprised of any hostile designs against them. In this pitiable plight they had recourse to the only alternative which remained for saving their lives—they fled to one of the highest mountains of the Alps, with their wives and children, the unhappy mothers carrying the cradle in one hand, and in the other leading such of their offspring as were able to walk. Their inhuman invaders, whose feet were swift to shed blood, pursued them in their flight, until night came on, and slew great numbers of them, before they could reach the mountains. Those that escaped, were, however, reserved to experience a fate not more enviable. Overtaken by the shades of night, they wandered up and down the mountains, covered with snow, destitute of the means of shelter from the inclemencies of the weather, or of supporting themselves under it by any of the comforts which Providence has destined for that purpose; benumbed with cold, they fell an easy prey to the severity of the climate, and when the night had passed away, there were found in their cradles, or lying upon the snow, fourscore of their infants, deprived of life, many of the mothers also lying dead by their sides, and others just upon the point of expiring. During the night, their enemies were busily employed in plundering the houses of every thing that was valuable, which they conveyed away to Susa. A poor woman, belonging to the Waldenses, named Margaret Athode, was next morning found hanging upon a tree!

This seems to have been the first general attack that was made by the Catholics on the Waldenses of Piedmont; for though the former had repeatedly availed themselves of the edicts of emperors, the bulls of the popes, and the promptitude of inquisitorial zeal, to disturb their peace, and put many of them to death, during the three preceding centuries, yet such had been the protection afforded them by the Dukes of Savoy, that the rage of their adversaries was happily restricted to the occasional apprehension of a few solitary heretics, for whose good they never failed to light up the fires as often as opportunity was afforded them. But the outrageous attack that was now made upon them was a novelty, and it made a lasting impression on their minds. They had experienced nothing like it, say their own historians, either in their own time, or that of their forefathers; and for more than a century afterwards, they were wont to speak of it as of a dreadful scene which was still present to their view; and from generation to generation, they continued to relate, with deep impressions of horror, that sudden surprise which had occasioned so much affliction and calamity among them. From that period, until about the year 1487, the Waldenses of Piedmont appear to have remained, in a great measure, unmolested in the profession of their religion. But scenes of far more extensive cruelty were awaiting them, as will hereafter be shown; it is, however, necessary for us first to take a view of the proceedings against their brethren in other quarters.

The persecution which had so furiously raged against them in France, during the earlier part of the thirteenth century, as detailed in a former section, and which may be said to have deluged the earth with their blood, had not wholly succeeded in extirpating the Waldenses from that country.

The rallies of Fraissiniere, Argentiere, and Loyse, 4 seem to have abounded with them in the year 1450, at which time a Franciscan monk, armed with inquisitorial authority by the archbishop of Ambrun, was sent on a mission of persecution, and to drive them from the neighborhood. Such was the ardor with which this zealot proceeded in his measures, that scarcely any persons in those valleys escaped being apprehended either as heretics or as their abettors. Those of them who were not of the profession of the Waldenses, had recourse to the king of France, Louis XI beseeching him to interfere, and, by his authority, put a stop to the course of such persecutions. The monarch listened to their application, and issued his royal letters, in which he pointedly condemns the conduct of the inquisitors, who by measures the most vexatious had molested the persons, and possessed themselves of the property of innocent subjects, whom they had, with that intent, falsely accused of heresy, and annoyed with process upon process, both in the parliament of Dauphiny and of several other countries.

Perrin has preserved a copy of these royal letters, in his History of the Waldenses: and they are entitled to regard from the disclosure which they make of the scandalous procedure of those agents of the court of Rome. A short extract will show the complexion of the whole. Thus his majesty proceeds, “And, whereas, in order to obtain the confiscation of the goods of those whom they charge with the said crime [of heresy] several of the judges, and even of the inquisitors of the faith—are continuing to send out processes against several poor people, without any just or reasonable cause; and have put some upon the rack, calling them to answer without any previous informations lodged against them; and have condemned them for crimes of which they were not guilty, as hath afterwards been discovered; while from others they have exacted large sums of money to obtain their liberty, and molested and troubled them by divers unjust and illegal means, to the injury not only of the said supplicants, but also of us and the whole republic of our country of Dauphiny,” etc. etc.—the king, therefore, puts a stop to such disgraceful proceedings; orders that all suits commenced against such persons as can give proof of their innocence be dismissed, and that restitution be made for any injury they may have sustained. But the zeal or avarice of the archbishop of Ambrun, and his inquisitorial colleagues, was so far from being damped by his majesty’s letters, that they proceeded with more energy than ever. They dexterously contrived to convert a certain clause of the letters, into an authority for their cruel proceedings, and found in it an entire justification of all their conduct; in consequence of which they resisted every application for redress or remuneration. Attempts were repeatedly made by some of these oppressed people to regain the property of which they had been despoiled; but though their cause was patronized, both by this monarch and by his successor, Charles VIII they never could obtain a remedy. INNOCENT VIII was raised to the pontifical chair in the year 1414, and soon after invested Albert de Capitaneis, archdeacon of Cremona, with full powers to act as his legate and commissioner. According to the usual practice of the popes on their accession to office, this pontiff issued his bull for the extirpation of heresy, pointing it particularly against the Waldenses, and arming Albert with authority to carry his will into effect.

Having recounted, in a long preamble, the titles which belonged to himself and to his “beloved son Albert,” he thus proceeds: “Our hearty desires chiefly tend to this, that as touching those, for the gaining of whom to the church, the supreme Maker of all things was pleased to undergo human infirmities, we to whom he hath committed the care and government of his flock, may, with all watchful industry endeavor to withdraw them from the precipices of error, that providing for their salvation, as it shall please God to favor us with grace, we may continually labor, that the catholic faith may, in our times, be propagated, and the evil of heresy be rooted out from the borders of the faithful.” After this precious specimen of dissimulation, his holiness condescends to be a little more explicit. “We have heard,” says he, “and it is come to our knowledge, not without much displeasure, that certain sons of iniquity, followers of that abominable and pernicious sect of malignant men, called the Poor of Lyons, or Waldenses, who have long ago endeavored in Piedmont and other places, to ensnare the sheep belonging to God, to the perdition of their souls, having damnably risen up, under a feigned pretense of holiness — being given up to a reprobate sense, and made to err greatly from the way of truth— committing things contrary to the orthodox faith, offensive to the eyes of the Divine Majesty, and which occasion a great hazard of souls,” etc., etc. “We, therefore, having determined to use all our endeavors, and to employ all our care, as we are bound by the duty of our pastoral charge, to root up and extirpate such a detestable sect — that the hearts of believers may not be damnably perverted from the catholic church—have thought good to constitute you, at this time, for the cause of God and the faith, the Nuncio Commissioner of us and of the apostolic see, within the dominions of our beloved son Charles, Duke of Savoy — to the end that you should induce the followers of the most wicked sect of the Waldenses, and all others polluted with heretical pravity — to abjure their errors etc. And, calling to your assistance all archbishops and bishops, seated in the said duchy [of Savoy] whom the Most High hath called to share with us in our cares — with the inquisitor, the ordinaries of the place, their vicars, etc. — you proceed to the execution thereof against the aforenamed Waldenses, and all other heretics whatever, to rise up in arms against them, and by a joint communication of processes, to tread them under foot as venomous adders; diligently providing that the people committed to their charge do persevere in the profession of the true faith—bending all your endeavors, and bestowing all your care towards so holy and so necessary an extermination of the same heretics.” In this style the pontiff proceeds through several succeeding pages, giving directions for the raising of an army of crusaders, appointing generals and officers to command it— issuing instructions how to seize the effects of all heretics, and dispose of the booty, etc., etc. and at length he thus closes the address to Albert. “Thou, therefore, beloved son, taking upon thee with a devout mind the burden of so meritorious a work, show thyself, in the execution thereof, so careful in word and deed, and so diligent and studious, that the much wished-for fruits may, through the grace of God, redound unto thee from thy labors, and that thou mayest not only obtain the crown of glory which is bestowed as a reward on those that prosecute pious causes, but that thou mayest also ensure the approbation of us and of the apostolic see.” 6 —Given at Rome, at St. Peters, 27 April 1487, and the 3d of our popedom.

Albert was no sooner vested with his high commission, than he proceeded to the south of France, where he called to his aid the king’s lieutenant in the province of Dauphiny, who lost no time in levying troops for his service at the head of whom he himself marched, as directed by Albert, into the valley of Loyse. The inhabitants, apprised of their approach, fled into their caves at the tops of the mountains, carrying with them their children, and whatever valuables they had, as well as what was thought necessary for their support and nourishment. The lieutenant finding the inhabitants all fled, and that not an individual appeared with whom he could converse, at length discovered their retreats, and causing quantities of wood to be placed at their entrances, ordered it to be set on fire. The consequence was. that four hundred children were suffocated in their cradles, or in the arms of their dead mothers, while multitudes to avoid dying by suffocation, or being burnt to death, precipitated themselves headlong from their caverns upon the rocks below, where they were dashed in pieces; or if any escaped death by the fall, they were immediately slaughtered by the brutal soldiery. “It is held as unquestionably true,” says Perrin, “amongst the Waldenses dwelling in the adjacent valleys, that more than three thousand persons, men and women, belonging to the valley of Loyse, perished on this occasion. And, indeed, they were wholly exterminated, for that valley was afterwards peopled with new inhabitants, not one family of the Waldenses having subsequently resided in it; which proves beyond dispute, that all the inhabitants, and of both sexes, died at that time.” Having completed their work of extermination in the valley of Loyse, they next proceeded to that of Fraissiniere; but Albert’s presence and that of the army being found necessary in another quarter, he appointed as his substitute in these valleys a Franciscan monk, who, in the year 1489, began to exhibit fresh informations against the inhabitants of Fraissiniere.

He cited them to appear before him at Ambrun; but disregarding his citation, they were first excommunicated, then anathematized, and lastly, condemned as contumacious heretics, to be delivered over to the secular power, and their goods confiscated. A counselor, of the name of Ponce, attended on this occasion in behalf of the parliament of Dauphiny, the object of which was supposed to be that of precluding any appeal being made from this mixt judgment. The sentence was pronounced at the great church of Ambrun, and afterwards fixed upon the door of the church—to which were appended thirty-two articles of the faith of the Waldenses, chiefly relating to the mass, purgatory, the invocation of saints, pilgrimages, the observance of feasts, the distinction of meats on certain days, etc. on all which subjects they were regarded as heretical. To these, indeed, were added some detestable charges, concerning incest and uncleanness, but which, as they never had the semblance of probability to support, or even render them plausible, I deem it unnecessary to particularize.

The persecution which ensued, is said to have been extremely severe. For the Waldenses being condemned as heretics by the inquisitor; Ponce, the counselor, and Oronce, the judge, committed them to the flames, as fast as they were apprehended, without permitting them to make any appeal. The number of sufferers was also considerably augmented on another ground; for, whoever presumed to intercede in their behalf, though it were the child for the parent, or the parent for the child, he was instantly committed to prison, and himself prosecuted as a favorer of heretics. While these merciless proceedings were going on against the Waldenses in France, Albert de Capatineis had advanced in the year 1488, at the head of eighteen thousand soldiers, against the valleys of Piedmont. The invading army was also joined by many of the Piedmontese Catholics, who hastened to it from all parts, allured by the specious promise of obtaining the remission of their sins, and the hope of sharing in the sweets of plunder. The more effectually to get possession of the country, the enemy’s forces were divided into detachments, and marching in different directions against Angrogne, Lucerne, la Perouse, St. Martin, Praviglerm, and Biolet, which is in the marquisate of Saluces; thus, as it were, encompassing the whole of the valleys. They also raised troops in Dauphiny, to overrun the valley of Pragela. But the Waldenses, armed with wooden targets and cross bows, availing themselves of the advantages of their situation, everywhere defended the passes of their mountains, and repulsed their invaders—“the women and children on their knees, during the conflict, entreating the Lord to protect his people.”

When information of this affair was brought to the Duke of Savoy, his heart was touched with compassion towards his subjects. He was convinced they had always been a loyal and obedient people, and he candidly distinguished between the resistance which on this occasion, his subjects had made, and a spirit of sedition and turbulence. They sent a deputation to wait upon him, and explain the motives of their conduct; at the same time offering an apology for whatever might seem improper. The prince accepted their apology and forgave them what was passed. But having been informed that their young children were born with black throats—that they were hairy, and had four rows of teeth, with only one eye, and that placed in the middle of their forehead, he commanded some of them to be brought before him to Pignerol, where, being satisfied by ocular demonstration, that the Waldenses were not monsters, he blamed himself for being so easily imposed upon by the clergy of the catholic church, as to credit such idle reports; and, at the same time, declared his determination to protect them henceforward in the undisturbed possession of those privileges which had been allowed their ancestors, and which the rest of his subjects in Piedmont still enjoyed. But though this declaration sufficiently manifested the kind intentions of the prince towards his subjects, he seems to have wanted the power necessary for carrying them into effect. The inquisitors, who lay in ambush in a convent near Pignerol, issued their processes daily against the Waldenses, and as often as they could apprehend any of them they were delivered over for punishment to the secular power. In this way they continued to harass them in that quarter until the year 1532. And it appears from their history, that by these means a visible impression was made upon their public church-meetings. The fear of the inquisitors had imperceptibly led them to study to avoid publicity; and in process of time they assembled for worship wholly in private. In the year last mentioned, however, they seem to have been sensibly struck with the impropriety of this mode of procedure; for upon reviewing the existing state of matters among them, they came to the determination no longer to conceal their meetings for worship, but resolved that their elders should preach the gospel openly and boldly, unawed by the apprehension of danger from their adversaries.

The Duke of Savoy, instigated by the archbishop and the inquisitor of Turin, seems to have taken umbrage at this reappearance in public of the Waldenses; for, on being told of it, he so far yielded to the solicitations of the clergy, as to dispatch one of his officers at the head of five hundred men, horse and foot, who, before the inhabitants were apprised, entered the valleys, pillaging, plundering, and laying waste whatever came in their way. The unsuspecting people were, at the time the army approached, industriously employed about the cultivation of their lands. But recovering from the panic into which they had been thrown by this unexpected attack, they took courage, and every man quitting his plough and his agricultural pursuits, they fled to the passes of their mountains, which they secured; and then arming themselves with slings and stones, encountered their invaders so manfully that they compelled them to flee, leaving their booty behind, and many of their men dead upon the field.

When the news of this reached the Duke of Savoy, he remarked that experience had sufficiently shown it to be an improper plan to attempt to reclaim and subdue the inhabitants of Piedmont by military force; the strength of their country, and their intimate acquaintance with the defiles and passes of the mountains giving them an infinite advantage over their assailants; and, therefore, while the skin of one of the Waldenses was to be purchased at the expense of the lives of a dozen of his other subjects, it was foolish to proceed in that way. He consequently, declined employing his military force any more against them, and relinquished it to the inquisitors after heresy, to apprehend them two or three at a time, as they came in or went out of the valleys. I believe I must here interrupt the narrative, for the purpose of introducing a short extract from that lively French writer, Monsieur Voltaire, in which he furnishes us with an estimate of the character of the Waldenses in France, of whom we have been speaking. It is interesting to compare the opinions of different writers upon any particular subject; and the reader cannot be displeased at having the opportunity of seeing how nearly, on this topic, those of Voltaire, a man of no religion, coincided with the sentiments of the liberal Sleidan, and the incomparable Thuanus, to both of whom we have already had occasion to advert, and shall again in the sequel. “In the twelfth century,” says Voltaire, “there was one Peter Waldo, a rich merchant of Lyons, whose piety and errors are said to have given rise to the Vaudois, (Waldenses.) This man having retired with several poor people, whom he maintained, to the desert valleys betwixt Provence and Dauphine, acted both as their high-priest and father, instructing them in his doctrine, in which he differed very little from the Albigenses, or from Wickliff, John Huss, Luther, and Zuinglius, in regard to several of the chief articles. These men lived a great while in obscurity, busied in the culture of barren lands, which, with indefatigable industry, they rendered fit for corn and pasture: a proof of our being greatly to blame, if through neglect, we suffer any part of France to be uncultivated. The neighboring grounds were let to them on leases; and they improved them by their labor, so as to maintain themselves, and to enrich their landlords, who never complained of their behavior. In the space of 250 years, their number increased to near 18,000, who were dispersed in thirty small towns, besides hamlets. All this was the fruit of their industry. There were no priests among them, no quarrels about religious worship, no lawsuits; they determined their differences among themselves. None but those who repaired to the neighboring cities knew that there existed any such things as mass or bishops. They prayed to God in their own jargon; 11 and, being continually employed, they had the happiness to know no vice. This peaceful state they enjoyed for above 200 years, since the wars against the Albigenses, with which the nation had been wearied. When mankind have long rioted in cruelty, their fury abates and sinks into languor and indifference; as we see constantly verified both in the case of individuals and whole nations. Such was the tranquillity which the Waldenses enjoyed, when the reformers of Germany and Geneva came to hear that there were others of the same persuasion as themselves.

Immediately they sent some of their ministers, a name given to the curates of the Protestant churches, to visit them; and since then, the Waldenses are but too well known.” So for Mons. Voltaire, whose narrative, considering the principles of the author, is as candid and correct as could reasonably be expected.

Of the number of persons who professed the faith of the Waldenses, both within and without the valleys of Piedmont, at the beginning of the sixteenth century—the period when Luther broke off from the church of Rome and began the Reformation in Germany, it would be impossible to attain any certainty. But it is presumed the reader will have seen enough in the preceding pages to satisfy him, that the opinion which has so currently prevailed among us, of the almost total extinction of the Christian profession, in its purity, at the time of, and for ages preceding, the Lutheran reformation, is altogether a popular error. There was a period, in the history of ancient Israel, when idolatry and profaneness appeared to have so wholly deluged the land, that the prophet Elijah was led to consider himself as a solitary worshipper of the true God, in the midst of the creation. Yet the Lord had reserved to himself seven thousand souls who had not bowed the knee to Baal, although unknown to the prophet. It appears from what Voltaire has just remarked, and, indeed, an attentive reader of the works of Luther and his associates will easily perceive, that their minds labored under a somewhat similar mistake as to their own case.

It was not without surprise they learnt, that there were numbers around them, in every country, opposed to the corruptions of the church of Rome, and sighing in secret for a reform. It may also be added, that Protestants in every succeeding age have but too implicitly imbibed their error. 13 The blessed God hath never left himself without witnesses in the world; and even during the reign of Antichrist—a period of the most general and awful defection from the purity of his worship, he had reserved to himself thousands and tens of thousands of such as kept his commandments and the faith of Jesus. Nor is there any thing in this to occasion our surprise. The real followers of Christ are subjects of a kingdom that is not of this world. And having no national establishment, nor aiming at worldly power, their principles and conduct have seldom been thought worthy of regard by the world, except in so far as their public testimony against it has subjected them to persecution. The true profession of Christianity leads its friends to cultivate peace and union among themselves, and, like its divine author, to avoid all turbulence and faction in the state.

But amidst the rubbish of error, as a late writer has justly remarked, which had accumulated century after century till the Reformation, God determined to erect the temple of Truth, and his providence cleared an ample space, chose a variety of workmen, and reared the admirable structure. And as in the erection of a building, it is necessary that there be different kinds of laborers, all cooperating together and all essential to complete the undertaking, so it was requisite, in erecting this great edifice, to prepare and to employ persons very differently constituted, but all capable of useful cooperation. If the Reformation claimed the steady efforts of true courage and inextinguishable zeal, it ought also to be remembered, that it no less required a proportion of nice discernment, elegant taste, and literary skill; — if a superstition which invested a mortal with the prerogative of infallibility, were to be attacked and leveled with the dust, the ignorance which, with its characteristic blindness supported that superstition, was at the same time to be dethroned and demolished; — if old abuses were to be removed, and a new order of things to be introduced and systematized, it was desirable to find not only a nervous, but a polished mind, at once to clear away the rubbish of error, and clothe unwelcome novelties with attractive beauty;—in a word, if existing circumstances called for aLUTHER, they also demanded aMELANCTHON. In the year 1530, George Morel, one of the pastors of a church of the Waldenses, published Memoirs of the History of their Churches, in which he states, that at the time he wrote, there were above eight hundred thousand persons professing the religion of the Waldenses; 15 nor will this appear an exaggerated statement, if we consider the view that was given, in the last section, of their dispersions throughout almost every country of Europe—the immense numbers that suffered martyrdom; and what was formerly mentioned, that in the year 1315, namely two centuries before this time, there were eighty thousand of them in the small kingdom of Bohemia.

It seems reasonable, however, to conclude, that the Waldenses must have beheld with infinite satisfaction, the schism which took place in the Roman church, when Luther and his associates withdrew from its communion.

For, independent of the labors of this intrepid reformer, the great cause for which the Waldenses were contending, viz. the purity of the doctrines of the gospel, and the simplicity of christian worship—was powerfully supported by a host of learned men, who rose up in rapid succession, and ranged themselves on the side of Luther. Among these were Philip Melancthon, John Ecolampadius, Martin Bucer, John Calvin, Theodore Beza; Zuinglius, Peter Martyr, Bullinger, and many others all advocates of reform, and men of eminent talents, who, by their various labors, both from the pulpit and the press, contributed greatly to disseminate the knowledge of divine truth, and free the minds of their contemporaries from the slavish shackles of ignorance and superstition.

But although we may readily conceive the pleasure which it must have yielded the Waldenses, to contemplate the labors of these great men in so glorious a cause, they do not appear to have acted precipitately in interfering with them, or soliciting an union of churches. The reformers, with all their zeal and learning, were babes in scriptural knowledge, when compared with the more illiterate Waldenses—particularly in regard to the nature of the kingdom of Christ, and its institutions, laws, and worship in general. Luther, for instance; besides that both he and Calvin always contended for a form of national Christianity—a principle which, the moment it is received into the mind, must necessarily darken it as to the nature of the kingdom of Christ; Luther, with all his zeal against popery, was never able to disentangle his own mind from the inexplicable doctrine of transubstantiation, which he had imbibed in the church of Rome. He, indeed, changed the name, but he retained all the absurdity of the thing. He rejected the word transubstantiation, but insisted strenuously on a consubstantiation — that is, the bread and wine were not changed into the substance of the body and blood of Christ, but the body and blood of Christ were really and actually present in the elements of bread and wine, and were therefore literally eaten and drank by the communicants! 16 And with respect to Calvin, it is manifest, that the leading, and to me at least, the most hateful feature in all the multiform character of popery adhered to him through life—I mean the spirit of persecution. Holding, as I do, many doctrinal sentiments in common with Calvin, I am prompted to speak my opinion of him with the less reserve. I regard him as a man whom the Creator had endowed with transcendent talents, and have no doubt that he knew what “flesh and blood could never reveal to him.” He seems to have been blessed with an extraordinary insight into the economy of human redemption, as revealed in the sacred writings; and his vast and capacious mind took a comprehensive grasp of a system which angels contemplate with wonder and amazement, and in which they study the manifold wisdom of God. No mere man, probably, ever surpassed Calvin, in his indefatigable labors, according to the measure of his bodily strength, in making known to others the unsearchable riches of Christ Jesus, both from the pulpit and the press; and his bitterest enemies cannot deny that the progress of the Reformation was wonderfully accelerated by his means.

Yet, with all these excellencies, Calvin was a persecutor! He had yet to learn, or at least how to practice, that simple lesson of the kingdom of heaven, “whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them.” Calvin could never comprehend, how another man could have as great a right to think wrong, as he himself had to think right! And that it is the sole prerogative of the King of Zion to punish his enemies and the corrupters of his truth. Upon this point his judgment was perverted by the principles of his education, and unhappily for his own character and the cause of truth, his conduct was founded upon this erroneous judgment.

His behavior throughout the whole affair of Servetus, is too well known to need any explanation in this place; but I conceive it to be the imperious duty of every friend to toleration and the rights of conscience, to express their marked abhorrence of this part of the character of Calvin. And more especially is it the duty of those, the similarity of whose theological creed to that which he contended for, hath subjected them to the imputation of being his followers. As an obscure, and humble individual of that class, I strenuously deprecate every attempt to palliate the enormity of Calvin’s conduct in the instance referred to, by pleading, as many have done, that Socinus was as bitter a persecutor as himself: for until it be made apparent to my understanding how two blacks constitute one white, I must regard such pleas as extremely ill-judged. The truth is, and it ought to be avowed, that the conduct of Calvin admits of no apology! It was a violent outrage upon the laws of humanity as well as upon the laws of God, and has fixed a stigma upon the character of that otherwise great man, which will never be obliterated. But let not the enemies of the truth, from this take occasion, as they too often have done, to identify the spirit of persecution with the doctrines which Calvin held. His conduct, in this particular, has drawn tears of lamentation and regret from the eyes of thousands, since his time, on account of the reproach it has brought upon the way of truth, “causing it to be evil spoken of,” and it will continue to suffuse with all the consciousness of shame, the cheeks of thousands yet unborn.

SECTION History of the Waldenses from the end of the fifteenth to the middle of the sixteenth century; and more especially of the proceedings against them in the south of France.

A.D. 1500-1550 THE history of Modern Europe does not present us with a more interesting period than the commencement of the sixteenth century, the era at which we are now arrived. The sanguinary proceedings that had been carried on against the Waldenses in the southern provinces of France, towards the close of the former century, had apparently exhausted the malice of the court of Rome; the heretics, for the moment at least, were driven from public view; and the state of the catholic church was more than usually tranquil. The empire and the priesthood, which for several centuries had been constantly in arms against each other, had depopulated Italy, Germany, and almost every other country in Europe, but the contest ended in the triumph of the church. The Roman pontiffs, says a late writer, have always possessed an advantage over the other sovereigns of Europe, from the singular union of ecclesiastical and temporal power in the same person; two engines which long experience had taught them to use with a dexterity equal to that with which the heroes of antiquity availed themselves by turns of the shield and the spear. When schemes of ambition and aggrandizement were to be pursued; the pope, as a temporal prince, could enter into alliances, raise supplies, and furnish his contingent of troops, so as effectually to carry on an offensive war; but no sooner was he endangered by defeat, and alarmed for the safety of his own government, than he resorted for shelter to his pontifical robes, and loudly called upon all Christendom to defend from violation the head of the holy church. These characters were successively assumed with great address and advantage; and although some difficulties might occasionally arise in the exercise of them, yet the world has been sufficiently indulgent to their situation; nor has even the shedding of Christian blood been thought an invincible objection to the conferring on a deceased pontiff the honor of adoration, and placing him in the highest order of sainthood conferred by the church. At the opening of the sixteenth century the pontifical chair was filled by Alexander VI who died in 1508, after a reign of eleven years, leaving behind him a memory, says Voltaire, more odious than the Nero’s or Caligula’s, because a greater degree of guilt arose from the sanctity of his character. He was succeeded by Julius II who, after a military but successful reign of a few years, gave place to the celebrated Leo X in whose pontificate Luther commenced hostilities with the papacy, threw off his allegiance to the See of Rome, and entered upon his career of reform. A.D. 1517.

To enter upon any thing like a circumstantial detail of the History of the Reformation, would not only demand much more space than can be allotted to it in the present undertaking, but would also, in a great measure, be to depart from my leading object. Nor, indeed, is such a narrative called for by the public exigence. Any deficiency of that kind which may be experienced by the readers of the present work, may be readily supplied by consulting the authors mentioned below, 2 whose writings are in the hands of every scholar. Instead, therefore, of treading this beaten track over again, I shall only remark upon it, that the flame which was kindled throughout Europe, at this time, by the preaching and writings of Luther and his associates, so completely occupied the attention of the catholic party for about a dozen years, namely, from 1517 to 1530, that the Waldenses, both in France and Piedmont, were happily, in a great measure, overlooked. But as the conflagration excited by Luther’s hostility gradually subsided, they began again to attract the notice of their adversaries and to come in for an equal share of their malice and malignity; of the truth of which the reader will soon have before him abundant proof.

In the year 1530, the Waldenses seem to have been entirely employed in paving the way for a more unreserved intercourse between them and the German Reformers. Such of them as resided in the south of France, had, at this time, been sustaining the fire of papal persecution, and it would seem that they had not encountered it with their usual fortitude. Many amongst them had been induced to shrink from the cross; and to avoid its inconvenience, were fallen into the practice of feigning a complaisant kind of acquiescence with the national forms of worship. Some of the Waldensian churches of Provence appear to have been deeply affected at seeing this Laodicean conduct prevail; and to bring the matter to its proper bearing, they commissioned two of their pastors, viz. George Morel and Peter Burgoine, to confer with the other churches and with some of the Reformers upon that subject. They first visited their sister churches in the neighboring provinces of Dauphiny, and from thence proceeded on their journey towards Germany, to have a personal interview with John Ecolampadius, minister of Basle, in Switzerland; with Martin Bucer, at Strasburgh; and Richard Haller, at Berne. The churches sent letters by them explaining their situation, and asking their advice. The following is an extract of their letter to Ecolampadius. Health be to you, Mr. Ecolampadius, “Whereas several persons have given us to understand that He who is able to do all things hath replenished you with the blessings of his Holy Spirit, as conspicuously appear by its fruits, we have recourse to you from a far country under the firm hope and confidence, that by your means the Holy Spirit will enlighten our minds into the knowledge of several things, concerning which we, at present, stand in doubt.” They then proceed to explain the immediate occasion of their writing — “We, poor instructors of this small people,” say they, “have sustained, for above these four hundred years, most severe and cruel persecutions, not without signal marks of Christ’s favor, as all the faithful can testify; for he has often interposed for the deliverance of his people, when under the harrow of these cruel and severe persecutions; and we now come unto you for advice and consolation in this our state of distress,” etc., etc.

The particular subjects of difficulty and distress may be easily gathered from the letter which Ecolampadius wrote them in reply, and which is so excellent that I shall here insert it entire. Ecolampadius wishes the grace of God, through Jesus Christ his Son, and the Holy Spirit, to his well-beloved brethren in Christ, called WALDENSES. “We understand that the fear of persecution hath caused you to conceal and dissemble your faith. Now, with the heart we believe unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. But those who are afraid to confess Christ before the world, shall find no acceptance with God the Father; for our God is truth without any dissimulation; and as he is a jealous God, he cannot endure that any of his servants should take upon them the yoke of antichrist. For there is no fellowship or communion between Christ and Belial; and if you communicate with infidels, by going to their abominable masses, you will there hear blasphemies against the death and sufferings of Christ. For when they boast, that by means of such sacrifices they make satisfaction to God for the sins of both the living and the dead, what naturally follows from thence, but that Christ by his death hath not made sufficient expiation and satisfaction, and consequently that Christ is not Jesus—that is, not a Savior, and that he died for us in vain?

That if we participate of that impure table, we thereby declare ourselves to be of one and the same body with the wicked, however contrary we may pretend it to be to our wills and inclinations. And when we say Amen to their prayers, do we not deny Christ? “What death ought we not rather to undergo; what torture and torment ought we not rather to endure—nay, into what abyss of woe and misery ought we not rather to plunge ourselves, than by our presence to testify our consent to, and approbation of, the blasphemies of the wicked? I know that your infirmity is great; but those who have been taught that they were redeemed by the blood of Christ, ought to be more courageous, and always to stand in awe of Him who can cast both body and soul into hell. And what! is it enough for us to have preserved this life alone? Shall this be more precious to us than that of Christ? And are we satisfied with having enjoyed the delights and pleasures of this world? Are there not crowns laid before us, and shall we flinch back and recoil? Who will believe that our faith was true and sincere, if it want zeal and ardor in the time of persecution? We beseech the Lord to increase your faith. But surely it is better for us to lose our lives than to be overcome by temptations. And, therefore, brethren, I beseech you thoroughly to consider this matter; for if it be lawful for us to conceal our faith under the tyranny of antichrist, it must be lawful so to do under that of the Turk, and, with Dioclesian, to worship a Jupiter or a Venus. It would then have been lawful for Tobit to worship the calf in Bethel—and what then will become of our faith towards God? If we do not pay to God that honor which is due to him, and if our lives be nothing else than hypocrisy and dissimulation, he will spue us out of his mouth, like base and lukewarm wretches. And how shall we glorify the Lord in the midst of sufferings and tribulations, if we deny him! We must not, brethren, look back, when once we have put our hand to the plough; nor must we yield to the dictates and instigations of our flesh, which by prompting us to sin, though it may endure many things that are distressing in this world— may, after all, suffer shipwreck in the haven.”

This excellent letter came very opportunely to the aid of the poor persecuted Waldenses, who were immediately called to carry its principles into effect. Peter Masson, one of their pastors, and messengers of the churches on this occasion, returning home, was seized at Dijon, and condemned to death as a Lutheran. George Morel narrowly escaped with his letters and papers, but arrived safe in Provence, where he labored assiduously and with much success in re-establishing the Waldensian churches. But the reader will best learn the state of affairs among the Waldensian brethren in the south of France, from the year 1540 to 1550, by my laying before him the following extracts from two eminent writers, who lived shortly after the events which they have recorded, and whose works are of unquestionable veracity; and I the rather do this, that I may not be suspected of any wish to exaggerate the sanguinary proceedings of the catholic party against the Waldenses. The following is Sleidan’s account.— “In Provence, in France, there are a people called Waldenses, who, by an ancient custom, acknowledge not the pope of Rome, having always professed a greater purity of doctrine; and, since Luther appeared, eagerly thirsted after knowledge. Many times had they been complained of to the king, as despisers of magistrates and fomenters of rebellion, which envious, rather than true accusation, is by most made use of at this day. They live together in some towns and villages, amongst which is Merindole. About five years since, sentence was pronounced against them in the parliament of Aix, the chief judicature of the province, That they shall all promiscuously be destroyed, that the houses shall be pulled down, the village leveled with the ground, all the trees also cut down, and the place rendered a desert. Now though this sentence was pronounced, yet it was not then put in execution, William de Bellay, of Langey, the king’s lieutenant in Piedmont, with some others, having represented the matter to the king, as a case that ought to be reviewed by himself. But, at length, this year, 1545, John Meinier, president of the parliament of Aix, having, April the 12th, called the parliament, read to them the king’s letters, which warranted him to put the sentence into execution. Now Meinier is said to have procured these letters by means of the Cardinal of Tournon, and the solicitation of Philip Cortine, a proper agent in the case. However, having received them in the month of January, he did not immediately produce them, but kept them till a season more proper for the exploit. The letters being read, some of the parliament were selected to see the matter put in execution, to whom Meinier offered himself as assistant, because that in the absence of Grignian, the governor of the province, he had the chief command. Before that time, he had by the king’s orders raised forces for the English war, and these he made use of for his purpose: besides these, he commanded all that were able to carry arms in Marseilles, Aix, Aries, and other populous places, to repair to him, under severe penalties, if they disobeyed, having assistance likewise sent him from the country of Avignon, under the dominion of the pope. The first attempt then was not made upon those of Merindole, but upon the country adjoining the town of Pertuse.

April the thirteenth, Meinier attended by a multitude of gentleman and officers, came to Cadenet. In the meantime some officers made an irruption into one or two villages upon the river of La Druance, and putting all to fire and sword, plundered and carried away a great many cattle. The same also was done in other places, whilst those of Merindole seeing all in a flame about them, left their habitations, flew into the woods, and in great consternation spent the night at the village of Sainfalaise. The inhabitants of that place were themselves preparing to fly; for the pope’s vice-legate had ordered some officers to fall upon them, and put them to the sword. Next day they advanced farther into the woods; for they were beset on all hands with danger, Meinier having made it death for any person to aid or assist them, and commanding them all, without respect, to be killed wherever they were found. The same edict was in force in the neighboring places of the pope’s jurisdiction, and some bishops of that country were reported to have maintained a great part of those forces. They had a tedious and uneasy journey of it then, marching with their children on their backs and in their arms, nay, and some in the cradle; poor women also big with child following them. When they were got to the appointed place, whither many in that forlorn condition had fled, they had intelligence not long after, that Meinier was mustering together all his forces, that he might fall upon them, and this news they learnt towards the evening. Wherefore, consulting together what was best to be done, they resolved upon the spot, because the ways were rough and difficult, to leave their wives, daughters, and little children there, with some few to bear them company, amongst whom was one of their ministers, and the rest betook themselves to the town of Mus: this they did in hope, that the enemy might show some compassion towards a helpless and comfortless multitude. But what wailing and lamentation, what sighing and embracing, there was at parting, any man may easily imagine. Having marched all night long, and passed the mountain De Leberon, they had the sad prospect of many villages and farms all in a flame. Meinier, in the meantime, having divided his forces, set about the work; and, because he had got intelligence of the place to which those of Merindole, had betaken themselves, he himself marched to Merindole and sent the rest of his men in search and pursuit of them. But, before these were come into the wood, one of the soldiers, moved with pity, ran before, and from the top of a rock, in the place where he judged the poor fugitives might have rested, he threw down two stones, calling to them by intervals, though he did not see them, that they should instantly fly for their lives. And at the same instant, two of those who had betaken themselves to Mus came; and having got notice of the enemy’s approach, advised the minister of the church, and the rest of those few guards that were left with the women, to be gone, having showed them a steep way through the wood, by which they might escape all danger in their flight. Hardly were these gone, when the raging soldiers came in shouting and making a frightful noise, and with drawn swords preparing for the butchery. However, at that time, they forbore to kill, but having committed many insolencies, and robbed the poor creatures of all their money and provisions, they carried them away prisoners. They had purposed to have used them more basely, but a captain of horse prevented it, who by chance coming in, threatened them, and commanded them to march straight to Meineir; so that they proceeded no farther, but leaving the women there, who were about five hundred in number, they carried off the cattle and booty. In the meantime Meinier came to Merindole, and finding it forsaken by the inhabitants, he plundered and set it on fire, which was ushered in by a very cruel action; for having found there one single youth, he commanded him to be tied to an olive tree, and there shot to death. He marched next to Cabriere, and began to batter the town; but, by the mediation of Captain Poulain, he persuaded the town’s people, upon promise of indemnity, to open the gates; which being done, and the soldiers let in, after a little pause, all were put to the sword, without respect to age or sex. Many fled to the church, others to other places, and some into the wine-cellar of the castle; but being dragged out into a meadow, and stripped naked, they were all put to the sword, not only the men, but also the women, and many of these with child too. Meinier also shut up about forty women in a barn full of hay and straw, and then set it on fire; and after that, the poor creatures having attempted, in vain, to smother the fire with their clothes, which for that end they had pulled off, betook themselves to the great window, at which the hay is commonly pitched up into the barn, with an intention to leap down from thence: but they were kept in with pikes and spears, so that all of them perished in the flames; and this happened on the twentieth of April. Meinier after this sent part of his forces to besiege the town of Coste; but when they were just upon their march, those were found, who, as we said a little before, had fled into the wine-cellar of the castle: a noise being thereupon raised, as if there had been some ambush laid, the soldiers were recalled, who put every man of them to the sword.

The number of the slain, as well in the town as abroad in the fields, amounted to eight hundred! The young infants, which survived the fury, were for the most re-baptized by the enemy. Affairs thus dispatched at Cabriere, the forces were sent to Coste: the lord of that town had beforehand agreed with the inhabitants, that they should carry their arms into the castle, and in four places make breaches in the walls; which if they did, he promised them that he would use his interest, which he knew could easily prevail with Meinier, that they should receive no damage. Being over persuaded, they obeyed; and he departed with a purpose seemingly to treat and intercede for them; but he was not gone far before the soldiers met him, who nevertheless proceeded in their march, and attacked the place. At the first onset they did but little, but next day they more briskly renewed the assault: and having burnt all the suburbs about, they easily became masters of the place, and the rather, that the night before, most had deserted the town and fled, having got down over the walls by ropes. After the victorious had put all that stood in their way to fire and sword, they ran into a garden adjoining the castle, and there satiated their lust upon the women and young girls promiscuously, who in great fear and consternation had fled thither, and for a day and night’s time, that they kept them shut up there, so inhumanely and barbarously did they use them, that the pregnant women and younger girls shortly after died of it.

In the meantime the Merindolians, and many others, who wandered with them over the woods and rocks, being taken, were either sent to the galleys, or put to death, and many also were starved. Not far also from the town of Mus, as we mentioned before, some fiveand- twenty men had got into a cave, and kept lurking there, but being betrayed, all of them were either smothered with smoke, or burnt: so that no kind of cruelty was omitted. Some, however, that had escaped this butchery, got to Geneva, and the places thereabouts. When the news of this was brought into Germany, many were highly offended thereat; and the Swiss, who are not of the popish religion, interceded with the French king, that he would be merciful to those who had fled their country. But the king answered them, that he had just cause for what he had done; and that what he did within his own territories, and how he punished the guilty, concerned them no more to know, than it did him what was done amongst them.” I cannot better close this section than by an extract from an eminent catholic writer, who was contemporary with the dreadful occurrences which he has so impartially recorded; and notwithstanding its length, and also that it touches upon some particulars already adverted to by Sleidan, I persuade myself that its importance and interesting nature will more than compensate for its prolixity. “When the inhabitants of Merindole and Cabriere, at the report of those things which were done in Germany, lifted up their crests, and hiring teachers out of Germany, discovered themselves more manifestly than they had done before, they were brought to judgment by the parliament of Aix, at the instance of the king’s procurator; but being admonished by their friends and deterred by the danger that undoubtedly attended their trial, they failed to appear. And having been summoned for three market-days together, they were condemned as contumacious, by a most horrible and immeasurably cruel sentence, on the eighteenth day of November, about the year 1540, Bartholomew la Chassagne, a lawyer of great reputation, being at that time president of the parliament. By that decree the fathers of families were condemned to the flames, and the estates, wives, children, and servants of the condemned parties confiscated to the use of the treasury. And because Merindole had hitherto been the usual den and receptacle of such sort of infected persons, it was ordered, that all the houses should be laid level with the ground, that the subterraneous caves and vaults, where they might be concealed, should be demolished and filled up; that the wood round about it should be cut down, and even the very trees of the gardens; that the possessions of those who dwelt at Merindole should not be so much as let for the future to any of the same family, or even of the same name with the former owners. The execution of this cruel decree was committed to the ordinary judges of Aix, Tournes, St. Maximim, and Apt; but it was thought by most people very proper to be suspended, until in process of time the sentence issued against the absent and contumacious, should pass by the laws and customs of the realm into a definite sentence. Others, on the contrary, judged it more fit to be precipitated, out of hatred to the crime, and regard to the danger which that contagion certainly threatened, if any delay were interposed. In the first place the bishops of Aix and Arles pressed Chassagne to proceed against the rebels with an armed force, promising, in their own and the name of the other ecclesiastics, a great sum of money towards the expenses of that war. Whilst they disputed on each side with great warmth, the matter was put off, by a method ridiculous enough in itself, but well accommodated to the person with whom it was used. There was at Aix, Nicolas Allens, a gentleman of Arles, of great respectability, and not unskilled in letters, an intimate friend of Chassagne’s, who shocked at the injustice of the decree, and greatly desiring to have it respited, at a private conference, addressed himself to the wavering president in the following speech. “You are not ignorant of the discourses which everywhere pass in relation to the sentence lately issued against the inhabitants of Merindole; nor is it my business or inclination to give my opinion of them, well knowing how important it is to a well ordered commonwealth, that judgments should be solemnly regarded and not rashly called in question. But if we consider the magnitude of the affair, it seems