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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A28933	The history of the Vaudois. Wherein is shewn their original; how God has preserved the Christian religion among them in its purity, from the time of the Apostles to our days; the wonders he has done for their preservation, with the signal and miraculous victories that they have gained over their enemies; how they were dispersed, and their churches ruined; and how at last they were re-established, beyond the expectation and hope of all the world. / By Peter Boyer ... ; and newly translated out of French by a person of quality.; Abrégé de l'histoire des Vaudois. English	Boyer, P. (Pierre), 1619-ca. 1700.; Boyer, Abel, 1667-1729.; Person of quality.	1692 (1692)	Wing B3918A; ESTC R5697	97,378	276

THE HISTORY OF THE VAUDOIS WHEREIN Is shewn their Original how God has preserved the Christian Religion among them in its Purity from the time of the Apostles to our days The Wonders he has done for their preservation with the Signal and Miraculous Victories that they have gained over their Enemies how they were dispersed and their Churches ruined and how at last they were re-established beyond the expectation and hope of all the World By Peter Boyer a Minister of the Gospel Dedicated to the King of England and newly translated out of French by a Person of Quality LONDON Printed for Edward Mory at the Three Bibles in St. Paul's Church-Yard M DC XCII TO THE KING OF Great BRITTAIN SIR THE wonders that God has done by Your Ministry in England and Ireland makes me hope that the History of the Vaudois will not be unacceptable and makes me take the liberty of presenting Your Majesty with it You will in it as in a fine mirror clearly see the wonders God has done for the preservation the of Churches of Piemont and the calm they enjoyed from the time of the Apostles when they received the doctrine of the Gospel till the year 1488 that Pope Innocent the VIII caused the Croisade to be published against them The number of those that took upon them the Badge of the Cross were 18000 men of regular Troops and 8000 Voluntiers of Piemont which were all intirely defeated by a handful of Vaudois Ever since that time they have been continually persecuted and disturbed with cruel wars But as they fought the battel of God in defending his truth so it visibly appeared that the God of battel was with them and fought for them without whose aid it had been impossible for them to have performed such extraordinary exploits and gained so many victories over their Enemies who were often times twenty or thirty sometimes a hundred against one Your Majesty shall see the cruel persecutions that the Enemies of the Gospel have made them to undergo and the constancy with which the Martyrs have sealed this Celestial Verity with their Blood If the Enemies had any advantage over them it was only then in violating the Publick Faith which should be inviolably sacred among men In conclusion Your Majesty will be astonished how so few have been able to subsist in the Valleys of Piemont till the year 1686 being surrounded with such puissant Enemies cruel full of diabolical artifices without Faith without Law but if their subsisting be miraculous their return and re-establishment is no less One may see every where that it 's the work of God and not of men I could not Sir address this my Little Work better to any than to Your Majesty who has seen the God of Armies march before you as anciently he marched before the Camp of Israel and as he marched and yet marches before them who are the subject of this History You maintain as they Sir the Cause of God and you fight for his Truth and there is no doubt but that he is with you and fights for you and with you the happy success of Your Enterprizes puts it beyond all doubt I pray God with all my heart that he may preserve Your Majestys Sacred Person that he may give you a flourishing and happy Kingdom and bless all Your Just Designs to his Honour and Glory this is the Ardent Prayer of him who with the most profound respect is SIR Your Majesties Most Humble Most Faithful and Most Obedient Servant P. Boyer ADVERTISEMENT OF all the people that ever have been from the Creation of the world till our times there is none except the ancient people of the Jews whose History contains so many wonders as this of the Vaudois of Piemont for whether one consider their Perseverance in the profession of the holy doctrine of the Apostles or one reflects upon the wars they have maintained these 200 years to preserve among them the Purity of the Christian Religion one sees so many miracles of Wisdom Goodness and Power of God that it 's impossible not to confess that God has declared himself plainly to be the God of this people and that he is the Protector and Defender of their Persons as well as Religion We learn from the Holy Scripture that the people of the Jews whom God had chosen above all the people of the Earth to be his people and in favour of whom he had done so many miracles in Aegypt in the Red Sea and the Wilderness often fell into Idolatry and polluted thimselves with the abominations of the Heathens that dwelt round about them but we do not find that the Vaudois did ever fall into Idolatry after they were once planted in the field of the Church we likewise see that many Heresies were introduced into the Primitive Church by the craft of Satan as those of the Eutichians Nestorians and above all that of the Arians but we can never discover that any of these Heresies took footing in the Valleys of Piemont and when all the world ran after the Beast of the Apocalypse after the great Harlot with whom the Kings of the Earth have committed Whoredom and who with her wine made all the Inhabitants of the Earth drunk the Churches of Piemont only followed Iesus Christ and inviolably adhered to his Doctrine So the Valleys had antiently for their arms a Torch environed with thick Darkness with this Motto Lux lucet in tenebris Light shines in darkness and as all Aegypt was covered over with palpable Darkness only in the Land of Goshen shined a clear bright Light even so as long as the Christian world was covered over with the Darkness of Idolatry and Errors there were only the Churches of Piemont that were illuminated with the clear light of the Gospel Now how was it possible that this celestial verity should be preserved pure in these Valleys even to our times if God by his infinite power and adorable wisdom had not hindred Satan from sowing his Cockle in the mystical Field of his Church to corrupt as he had done in other places the good seed of his word by the mixture of humane Traditions and Pagan Ceremonies which have corrupted sound Doctrine and that which is the greatest cause of admiration is that these Valleys are scituated in Italy where the great Whore has her Seat and the Princes of Piemont are subject to her Empire As to the wars that the Vaudois have maintained against their Enemies who rose against them to destroy them and to extinguish the bright Lamp of the Gospel they are all full of Miracles where one may see a handful of men conducted by Chieftains of no military experience put to flight great Armies commanded by the most valiant and most experienced Captains of the Age their Enemies were 20 and 30 and sometimes 100 against one Now how was it possible they should have got so many signal victories if the God of Battle had not fought for them and

defended them If God had not given them a most singular Courage and had not confounded their Enemies and struck them with a pannick fear but that which is the fullest of miracles and the greatest cause of Astonishment is that neither so many wars raised by their Enemies during the space of 200 years nor so many Battels they have fought during those long and bloody wars nor the cruel Persecutions they have endured nor the diabolical artifices of the Emissaries of Antichrist have been able to destroy or to dissipate these poor Churches till the year 1686. when Perfidiousness and Treachery triumphed over their Innocence If the subsistence of the Vaudois in th●…s●… Valleys during so long a space of time and among so many obstacles be full of wonders their return and re-establishment is not less miraculous The King of France and the Duke of Savoy who were leagued together to destroy them and drive them out of the Valleys joyned together to oppose their return and re-establishment Nine hundred Vaudois and some Refugees of France pass the Lake of Geneva enter into Savoy cross an Enemies Country of 14 or 15 days journey force many difficult passes and defiles guarded with a Force far greater than theirs and in spight of all those rubs they repossessed themselves of their Country and while that these two Princes who are the bitterest and cruelest Enemies of the Vaudois and breathed nothing but their extirpation and ruine were joining their arms to execute their project God blasts their designs and reduces all into Smoak he sows a great division betwixt those two great Friends they become great Enemies and turn their arms one against the other In conclusion in despight of their intrigues God established the Vaudois in their own Country even by order of their Prince who excused himself to them for intreating them so ill and imputed the cause of it to the King of France and of those the Duke designed for destruction he has made his principal Rampart against France The surprising wonders that God has done for them and the surprising changes and chances that have hapned to them are in short and truly represented in this Book in which we speak first of all of their Original Secondly Of their Religion which they have preserved pure from the time of the Apostles even to our times Thirdly Of the great calm they enjoyed during many Ages even to the 15th Age. Fourthly Of the Croisade made by Innocent the 8th for to destroy them in the year 1488. Fifthly Of the wars of the Dukes of Savoy and the Princes of Piemont from Philip the 8th to Charles Emmanuel the 2d. Sixthly Of the Massacre which was made of them by surprize in our days and were not averred by ey●… witnesses of indubitable credit They are called Vaudois not that they are descended of Peter Valdo of Lyons as some Historians have thought but because they are original Inhabitants of the Valleys For the word Vaudois or Valdenses comes from the word Val which signifies a Valley So we see the Protestants of Bohemia were at first called Picards because they came out of Picardy the place of their ancient habitation The Taborites were likewise so called from the City Tabor the place of their ordinary residence and the Albigenses were so called because they inhabited the City of Albi which was full of Protestants against which the Pope declared as they most impiously phrased it a holy War to destroy them From the Vaudois of Piemont are descended the Vaudois of Province which is near Piemont Where some of them took up their habitation and sow'd their doctrine and from Province they spread themselves into Languedoc where they made a wonderful progress This shows that the Vandois of Piemont did not derive themselves from Peter Waldo for after that Valdo or Waldo was driven out of Lyons by the Archbishop according to the order he had received from the Pope he did not retire into Piemont but into Flanders where he sow'd the doctrine of the Gospel which spread it self into Picardy which joyns to Flanders These poor People being persecuted by the King of France retire into Bohemia and for that reason were called Picards because they came out of Picardy this we learn from D' Aubigni in his universal History where he says that those of the remnant of Waldo who fled into Picardy did so increase and multiply that to root them out or at least to weaken them Philip Augustus King of France quite destroyed three hundred Gentlemens houses And what is more and makes the thing evident beyond any doubt it 's proved by authentical Records and Acts that the Vaudois of Piemont had protested against the errors of the Church of Rome seventy Years bofore Waldo appeared in the world For Waldo did not begin to preach against the Roman Church till the Year 1175 but the Vaudois in their own Language produce divers acts and monuments of affairs relating to the Reformation done in the Year 1100 and others in the Year 1120. 70. or 75. Years before Waldo These Acts were saved from the Flames and lamentable Massacre committed upon these poor people in the Year 1655. and the originals were put in the hands of Mr Moreland the English Ambassador and after sent to be kept in the University of Cambridge One may find Copies of them in the general History of the Churches of the Vaudois written by J. Leger Minister of the Vallies printed at Lcyden 1669 and it 's not to be doubted but that the Vaudois of Piemont had more ancient Acts and Records of their doctrine which were buried in the ruines of their Churches by their Enemies In this Book we will only speak of the Vaudois of Piemont and not of the descendants of Peter Waldo CHAP. I. Of the Religion of the Vaudois of Piemont THE Vaudois or the Inhabitants of the Vallies of Piemont received the Doctrine of the Gospel in the time of the Apostles either from the Apostles themselves or by those who immediately succeeded them St. Paul being carried Prisoner to Rome in the Reign of Nero sojourned there two Years during which space he had the Liberty to go round the City from house to house dragging a Chain after him which was the Badge of a criminal Prisoner and there in the capital City Mistress of the world he preached the Gospel of Christ and laid the Foundation of a flourishing Church to which he writ from Corinth after his departure that excellent Epistle of St. Paul to the Romans during his Imprisonment he writ many other learned Epistles to Galatians Ephesians Philippians and Colossians His fame and doctrine sounded high in the Court of the Emperor as it 's clear from the Epistle that he then wrote from Rome to the Philippians where he says Phil. 1. 12. 13. that what hapned to him there proved the great advancement of the Gospel so that his Bonds in Christ were become famous through all the

of the Prophecy It 's said in the same Prophecy that after these three days and an half the spirit of life coming from God shall enter into them and they shall live again and that great fear shall seize upon them that shall see them and that they shall hear a great voice from Heaven saying to them ascend hither and they shall ascend up to Heaven in a Cloud and their Enemies to their great confusion shall see them this was exactly fulfilled in respect of the Vaudois who after three years and an half were as it were revived again and freed from the miserable estate and condition into which they were reduced by the furious malice of their Enemies for the Prisoners were set at liberty the Banished were recalled home and all by order of their Prince re-established in their Country in a better condition than ever In the year 1686 the Duke of Savoy at the earnest entreaty of the Protestant Cantons freed out of Prison the greatest part of the Vaudois but it was only to send them into banishment in a strange Country but those whom he set at liberty the last Iune were sent home in peace and had greater priviledges and advantages given them than ever He promised to Cloath those that he set at liberty in the year 1686 which notwithstanding he did not but those that he freed after three years and an half he cloathed very well he excused himself to them was sorry for what had passed imputed the cause of all their suffering to the King of France The Duke of Savoy and his Predecessors these two hundred years past have applied themselves with all their power to dispeople these Valleys of Protestants as we have sufficiently related above But after the three years and an half there has been an extraordinary care taken to people them again with Protestants for the Duke has not only re-established the Vaudois as well Prisoners as Exiles but he has given free leave and encouragement to the Protestant Refugees of France to come and inhabit the Valleys The Duke of Savoy and his Councel made use of the wickedest methods imaginable to destroy the Protestant Religion in these Valleys but after the death of the Witnesses viz. after the three years and an half he did not only give free exercise of Religion in the Valleys but even in Turin it self the Capital City of his Dominions And this miraculous change happened almost in an instant to the great confusion of their Enemies who looked upon them as lost men This shews evidently that the re-establishment of the Vaudois was the work of Heaven and not of men for so the Prophecy says that the spirit of life shall enter into them and they shall live again The Author of the Fifth Empire Printed at the Hague by Meyndert Vytwert closes with our Opinion and discourses excellently to our purpose concerning the three years and an half of the death of the two Witnesses I hope it will not be troublesome to give them his own words out of the 13th Chapter of his Book The time says this excellent Author that the two Witnesses should remain in the state we have represent them in the precedent Chapter is limited to three days and an half after which they shall be revived These three days and an half are prophetical days as 1260 days are and every day must be taken for a year it 's not easie to determine whether the three years and an half after the death of the Witnesses should commence after that the Edict of Nants was cancelled and revoked and the Ministers of France condemned to perpetual banishment or when the Faithful of the Valleys of Piemont who from the time of the Apostles have maintained and concerted the truth among them were driven out of their Country after which the Author gives his sentiment in these words It 's probable that these three years and an half should commence when the Churches of Piemont were destroyed which were the visible conservers of the Truth that was always preached and professed among them and after three years and an half were most gloriously re-established for the Vaudois were not totally driven out of the Valleys till about the end of October 1686. Then those that were hid in the Caverns and Rocks and Woods coming out of their safe and hidden retreats after that the Army of France was retreated and that the Troops of Mondovy and other places of Piemont were returned into their own Country seized upon some advantagious Posts in the Valleys of Lucerne and St. Martin and made excursions upon their Enemies and forced them to furnish them with Provisions and all things necessary and their Enemies not being able to chace them out of those advantagious Posts granted them Letters of safe conduct to go into Switzerland Before the banishment of these we cannot say that the Vaudois were killed and dead for that they made their Enemies pay contribution Now they were established by order of their Prince in the beginning of Iune 1690. three years and an half after their total dissipation for this was only one month after the three years and an half that were past so the Prophecy speaks not of their re-establishment till this time be compleated and that which is to be considered more exactly is that in the month of May the Vaudois began to revive the spirit of God then entring into them for having this month received succours from the Allies as well of Men as Mony instead of their Enemies chasing them they chaced their Enemies out of their strong holds and so we see in them the Prophecy fulfilled of the 11th Chapter of the Revelation in the time set down by the Penman of that Holy Mysterious Book The Churches of Piemont being the root of the Protestant Churches they have been the first established the Churches of France Hungary and other places being but the branches shall be established in due time God will not stay to do his own work to the shame and confusion of his Enemies the thing will come to pass in the re-establishment of the Protestant Churches that hath been done in the re-establishment of the Churches of Israel those of Judah returned first out of Captivity though they were the last that were transported but God did not stay long to deliver the rest though at different times and on different occasions The same thing without doubt will come to pass in respect of the Christian Churches that groan under the captivity of Antichrist God will deliver them speedily he has already delivered the Mother and he will not long leave the Daughter behind he will finish what he has gloriously begun and not leave his work imperfect he will gather together the dispersed Churches and bring back to the Fold the Sheep that have gone astray then Israel and Judah shall dwell together in peace none shall be able to give them the least disturbance Since the Vaudois were re-established in the Valleys by order of their Prince they have chaced the French out of them have beaten the Marquess of Feuquiers and slain 1500 men of his Army among whom were two Colonels forty Captains and a great number of subalterne Officers They have sometimes defeated two hundred sometimes one hundred fifty Dragoons of the King of France taken several Conveys that were going to the Army commanded by Monsieur Catinat have made many excursions into the Delphinate and have carried away a good booty and several Prisoners one may say without any hyperbole that the Vaudois in one Campaign have endamaged the French more than all the Allies with their great Armies The great services that they have done the Duke of Savoy without doubt will oblige him to augment their priviledges and all the Allied Princes to make a firm and lasting treaty between the Duke and the Vaudois in case that peace be made between France and the Allies of which the Protestant Princes will be guarantee I have only extended the History of the Vaudois till the beginning of October 1690. If they perform any considerable action hereafter I will continue their History if God give me life and health to whom be all honour and glory world without end Amen FINIS