They searched after them with that diligence and strictness, that they were constrained to disperse themselves into other parts, to escape the fury of the persecution. This flight proved very beneficial to the church, because many learned preachers were hereby dispersed abroad to divulge and make known the purity of their religion to the world." In the year 1230, Conrad de Marpurg, was made superintendent of the inquisition by the pope. He exercised this office with extreme cruelty against all sorts of persons, without any respect even of the priests themselves, whose bodies he punished, and confiscated their goods. He used to try men with a hot iron, saying, that they who could hold a red hot iron in their hands, and not be burnt, were good christians, but if on the contrary they felt the fire, he delivered them up to the secular power. The Waldenses had at that time a considerable number of schools, wherein they caused their children to be instructed in their faith; and notwithstanding all the persecutions and inquisitions executed upon their flocks, yet they ventured to preach, calling their congregations together by the sound of a bell, maintaining and affirming in publica statione, that is, openly and publicly before all the world, saith the historian, that the pope was a heretic, his prelates simoniacs, and seducers of the people; that the truth was no where preached but amongst them; and that if they had not come to preach amongst them, God, rather than he would have suffered the faith to perish, and be banished out of the world, would have raised up others out of the very stones themselves, to instruct and enlighten his church by the true preaching of the gospel. Hitherto, said they, your preachers have buried and concealed the truth, and published falsehood; we, on the contrary, preach the truth, and bury falsehood and lies. In short, we do not give a false and fictitious remission, invented and ordained by the pope, but by God himself, and according to our vocation and ministry. It is observed by Matthew Paris, an English historiographer, that about the year 1230, a great number of them took up arms in Germany, where they were cut to pieces, being surprised in a place very disadvantageous to them, being bounded on the one side with a marsh and on the other with the sea, so that it was impossible for them to make their escape.' About the year also 1330, they were grievously harassed and oppressed in several other places of Germany, by Echard, a Jacobin monk, the inquisitor. But after many cruelties practised against them, as he urged the Waldenses to discover to him the cause and reasons of their separation from the church of Rome; being convinced in conscience, that they charged it with several errors and corruptions of which it was really guilty, and not being able to disprove the articles of their faith by the word of God, he gave glory to God, and confessing that the truth had gained the victory, hé entered into communion with the Waldensian churches, which he had for a long time persecuted and punished with death. The other inquisitors being advertised of that alteration, were highly incensed thereat, and sent so many persons in pursuit after him, that he was at length taken and carried to Heidelberg, where he was burnt, maintaining and affirming that it b Constans upon the Revelation. C Vignier, First part of his Bibli. Historial. a Trithem Chron. Hirsaugiensi, Godefridus Mon. in Annalibus. * Krantz Metrop. 1. 8, § 18, and Saxon. 1. 8, cap. 16. f Matth. Paris, Henr. 3, Anno 1230. was a notorious piece of injustice to put so many innocent and righteous persons to death, for adhering to the righteousness of Christ in opposition to the forgeries and inventions of antichrist." In the year 1391, the monks inquisitors apprehended four hundred and forty-three Waldenses in Saxony and Pomerania, who confessed that they had for a long time been instructed in their faith and religion by their ancestors, and that their teachers came from Bohemia. In the year 1457, the monks inquisitors of the diocese of Eistein in Germany discovered and apprehended several Waldenses, whom they put to death. They had twelve barbes or ministers amongst them, who instructed them. We must not pass by the thirty-five citizens of Mayence, who were burnt at Binge, because they were known to be professors of the faith of the Waldenses: nor those fifty whom the bishop of Strasburg caused to be burnt in the same fire; nor the report of Trithemius, that they confessed that in those days the Waldenses were so numerous, that in travelling from Cologne to Milan, they might take up their inns with hosts of their own profession, and that the signs and gates were marked with certain tokens whereby they might be distinguished. ses. The most excellent instrument among them in God's hands, was Raynard Lollard, who was at first a Franciscan monk, and an enemy to the WaldenBut he was a person inspired with holy zeal and a desire to find out the true way to salvation, wherein he made such a progress, that the enemies themselves were forced to commend him. John le Maire ranks him in the number of those holy persons, who foretold by Divine revelation, several things which came to pass in his time. That worthy man teaching the doctrine of the Waldenses, was taken by the monks inquisitors in Germany, and being delivered up to the secular power, was burnt at Cologne.i This person wrote a commentary upon the Revelations, wherein he observed that several things were spoken therein with reference to the antichrist of Rome. From him the faithful were called Lollards in England, where he used to teach. Witness that tower in London, which is at present called by his name, Lollard's tower, where the faithful were wont to be confined and imprisoned.' 8 Vignier, in the third part of his Bibliotheca Historialis, in the year 1330. Krantz, Metrop. lib. 8, pag. 18, and in Sax. 1. 8, cap. 16. i John le Maire, in the third part of the Diff. of Schisms, in the twenty-fourth Schism. j" LOLLARD'S TOWER," was a large detached room belonging to bishop Bonner's palace in London, and formed a prison of the most gloomy nature. It was set apart for the punishment of protestants, formerly called Lollards, who were brought before him on an accusation of heresy, and who were there subjected to various tortures, at the discretion of that bigoted and merciless tyrant. The most common punishment inflicted was setting them in the stocks in which some were fastened by the hands, and others by the feet. They were in general permitted to sit on a stool, but to increase their punishment, some were deprived of that indulgence, so that lying with their backs on the ground, their situation was exceedingly painful. In this dungeon, and under these tortures, they were kept, some for several days, others for weeks, without any other sustenance than bread and water, and to aggravate their sufferings, they were prohibited from being seen by their relations or friends. Many of those who had tender constitutions, died under those inhuman inflictions; but those who were otherwise, survived to execrate the name of their barbarous persecutors. CHAPTER XII. The Waldenses who were persecuted in England. ENGLAND was one of the first places which was honoured with the reception of the gospel. For a little after the departure of Waldo from Lyons, many there were condemned to death as Waldenses, about eleven years after the dispersion of the Waldenses from the city of Lyons. Waldo departed from Lyons in the year 1163, and Matthew Paris observes, that the monks inquisitors caused the Waldenses to be burnt in England in the year 1175. John Basse makes mention of a person who was burnt at London in the year 1210, for no other reason but because he was tainted with the faith of the Waldenses." Thomas Walden, an Englishman, hath written that in the reign of Henry II. king of England, the Waldenses were grievously and cruelly persecuted, and that they were called Publicans. As to those against whom they could prove nothing worthy of death, they branded them in the forehead with a red hot key, that every body might know them. The faith of the Waldenses was much more public and notorious during the wars against the Albigenses, because as the Sieur de la Popeliniere hath well observed, the proximity or nearness of the territories of the earl Remond of Thoulouse to Guienne, then in possession of the English, and the alliance to the king of England, who was brother-inlaw to earl Remond, gave the English opportunity, not only of assisting the subjects of Remond in their wars, but also to inform themselves of the faith of the Albigenses, which was the same in all respects with that of the Waldenses; and they alleged that the violence and injustice practised against them was so great that the English were often constrained to defend them against those who invaded their lands under the colour and pretence of religion. Rainard Lollard, was the happy instrument whom God at that time made use of to make known to the English, by lively and powerful remonstrances and exhortations, that doctrine for which the Waldenses were put to death. The said doctrine was received by Wickliff, as hath been observed in the book which treats of the original and confession of the Bohemian churches, who were thereby very much let into the knowledge of the truth. He was a very eminent divine in the University of Oxford, rector of the parish of Lutterworth, in the diocese of Lincoln, and a man of great and profound learning and eloquence. He won the hearts and esteem of several Englishmen, and of even the prime nobility of the kingdom; the duke of Lancaster, uncle to king Richard, Henry Persy, Lewis Gifford, and the chancellor, the earl of Salisbury; by whose favour the doctrine of the Waldenses or of Wickliff, took footing and became current in England until pope Gregory XI. severely persecuted the receivers of it, by means of the monks inquisitors. The flames of persecution were then raised and kindled in England for the space of several years, to put a stop to its progress and to prevent its spreading; but it a Matthew Paris, Hist. of England, the year 1163. b John Basse, Chron. of London. Tho. Walden, fourth volume of Things Sacramental, lib. 12, chap. 10. was all to no purpose, for it was there held and maintained in spite of all the endeavours of antichrist to the contrary, until such times as his yoke was entirely rejected and thrown off. True it is, that the bones of Wickliff were disinterred above thirty years after his death, and condemned to be burnt, together with such books of his as his enemies could discover; but there was so vast a number of them abroad, that it was altogether impossible for his enemies wholly to deprive the church of them, for the more they endeavoured to prevent the reading and knowledge of them by terrible menaces even of death itself, the more were the affections of the people moved and incited to read and peruse them with the greater fervour and ardency. It is likewise said, that a certain scholar having carried one of Wickliff's books into Bohemia, entitled the Universals, and communicated it to John Huss, he attained thereby to such a degree of knowledge and wisdom, that he became the admiration of all Bohemia, and very much edified those who with himself readily forsook the church of Rome. Which occasioned the Hussites to say that Wickliff did at first awaken their John Huss. Wickliff wrote above a hundred volumes against antichrist, or the church of Rome; the catalogue of which we find in the book of the description of famous men, who have resisted and opposed antichrist and his errors. CHAPTER XIII. The Waldenses fled into Flanders, and there were persecuted. AFTER the great persecution raised against the Waldenses in the time of Philip le Bel, the historians make mention of their retreat into Flanders, where he pursued them, and caused a great many of them to be burnt. Lib de Origine et Confess. Eccles. Bohemiæ. Wicclefus a Valdensibus adjutus Hussum nostrum excitavit, page 264. f In the middle of the twelfth century, when a dreadful persecution raged upon the European continent, against the disciples of Christ, a company of the Waldenses, about thirty men and women, to escape from their implacable adversaries, fled from Germany to England. They resided near Oxford, and speaking only the German language, soon attracted notice by their religious practices. They were all arrested upon suspicion of heresy, and conducted before a council of Inquisitors at Oxford. When examined respecting their religion, GERRARD, the pastor of the little flock, answered, that they were Christians-that they believed the doctrine of the Apostles; but that they did not receive the Romish tenets of purgatory, prayers for the dead, the invocation of saints, and similar anti-christian superstitions. They were instantly condemned as heretics, and delivered to the secular power to be tormented. Henry II., then king of England, through the instigation of the Roman prelates, commanded that those Waldenses should be "branded with a hot iron on the forehead, then whipped through the streets of Oxford, and having their clothes cut off at the girdles, should be left in the fields; and all persons were prohibited from affording them any shelter or relief, or exhibiting towards them any proof or act of humanity, under the penalty of torture and death!" That malignant and cruel decree was executed in its utmost rigour. In the most intense cold of a very inclement winter, the whole Christian company speedily perished, from nakedness, starvation, and the frost; in the year 1166.-Henry's Great Britain, vol. v. page 338. Aldeg. first table of the Diff. Fol. 149. John Dubravius in the history of Bohemia, lib. 14. And because they were constrained to fly into the woods, to escape the fury of their persecutors, they were called tarlupins, that is, inhabiters with wolves. Matthew Paris says, that one Robert Bougre, a Jacobin monk, did formerly live amongst the Waldenses, and was a professor of their faith; but having forsaken them, he became a monk, and a most violent persecutor, so that he caused several of them to be burnt in Flanders. But when his own party and friends understood that he abused his power, and the authority of his office, laying several things to their charge of which they were not guilty, and made use of it against those who were altogether ignorant of the faith of the Waldenses, he was not only deprived of his office of inquisitor, but also imprisoned: he was likewise convicted of several crimes. for which he was condemned to perpetual imprisonment." CHAPTER XIV, The Waldenses who were persecuted in Poland. ABOUT the year of our Lord 1330, there were several persons in the kingdom of Poland, who made profession of the religion of the Waldenses. The bishops had recourse to the means appointed by the pope, the inquisition, whereby they delivered many of them into the hands of the executioner. The author of the Catalogue of the Witnesses of the Truth tells us, that he had the forms of the inquisition lying by him, which the inquisitors made use of in this persecution." Vignier saith, that at their departure out of Picardy, several of those who were there persecuted, retired into Poland." Le Sieur de la Popeliniere tells us in his history, that the religion of the Waldenses did spread and extend itself throughout all the places of Europe, even among the Polonians and Lithuanians; and that they have ever since the year 1100, been sowing and propagating their doctrine, which was but very little different from that of the modern protestants; and that notwithstanding the efforts and endeavours of all the potentates and princes to the contrary, they have to this day stoutly and courageously maintained and defended it. CHAPTER XV. Several of the Waldenses were persecuted at Paris. In the year 1210, twenty-four Waldenses were taken at Paris, of which some were imprisoned, and some burnt. There happened also during the Mat. Paris, Life of Henry III. a Flac. Illy. Catal. of the Wit. p. 539. |