after they had beaten him with staves and stript him to his shirt they hang'd him up by one leg with his head downwards in the water up to the breast and whilst he was yet living they ript up his belly pluckt out his guts and slung them into the river and sticking his heart on a Lance they carryed it about saying This is the heart of the President of the Hugonots Shortly after some hundreds of the richest and best sort of Citizens were murthered the Duke of Monpensieur seting up Gibbets stakes and wheels in all places to execute them on and when any man or woman was put to death they entred their houses Murther'd their Children and took all their goods At Ponteale Mer was also used all kinds of cruelties and where many suffered And at Roan many hundreds suffer'd among the rest 3. Councellors were hanged and the Town sack'd for 4. moneths together at Vire Valougnes Agen and Remes such horrid cruelties were acted as I am weary to relate and such beastiality used towards the women as cannot in modesty be set down In the last of these places there was 500. hang'd upon Gibbets among whom was a grave Conncellor in his gown and square Cap one poor man they mangled and cut his body and fill'd all his wounds with salt At Blois several were executed among the rest several women flung into the river and if any came to shore by swiming they were thrust back with pikes and halberts At Guilâ—â—â— they flung many from the top of a Rock upon other under-lying rocks by which their bodies were torn to peeces In Souraize many perished with several tortures among which one woman had her mouth forc'd open with a dagger and cramm'd with lime and then piss poured down her throat and besides used very cruelly by beating and with cords Another man one Peter Roche they caused to dig his own grave and to go into it to see how it would fit him and then buried him alive At Marsans they rowned one woman with Thorns then whip'd her and lastly stoned her to death The like they did by another called Janctta Calvin In Mont de Martin they put several to death and buried one quick In Tholouse was a very great massacre there being in that City at least 30000 Protestants so that the River was cover'd o're with the Bodies of the slain In Limoux all the cruelties and villanies that could be devised were acted and also at Carcasson and at Nonnay where they knocked out the brains of a naylor upon his own Anvill because he would not give himself to the Devill several thrown from an high Tower others drag'd about the streets and stab'd wives and virgins openly ravished At Foix Aurange Grenoble Cisterno Beaune and Mascon were no less all partaking of the general calamity than all the fore-rehearsed villanies committed in as barbarous a manner so that all France reaked with the blood of the Innoeent and their goar defiled all the Land But to conclude this Tragical Scene we will now end with the great and notorious massacre of Paris at the end of the Civill war of France Aug. 24. 1522. Thuanus which happened upon that unholy League between the Pope the Kings of France and Spain the Duke of Savoy and the Guises Peace being seemingly concluded between the Leaguers and the Protestant party and all differences ended and adjusted though through the private instigations and councells of the Queen mother nothing less was intended the marriage betwixt the King of Navar and the Lady Margaret the Kings Sister being made the stale to draw all the Heads of the Protestant party into the Net and with the Heart and Soul of them as they called Coligny Admiral of France to out off all the rest The plot was laid and with great artice and dissimulation the chief of all the Protestant NObility in the Kingdome are drawn without suspition to Paris to assist at these Nuptials invited by the King with all amicable signes of Love Peace and kindness Coligny among the rest though disswaded by many of his Friends would not seem to suspect the Kings kindness and Royal word But at the time appointed which was at the tolling of the Palace bell before day in the morning all things being before prepared and ordered by the Guises the wicked and bloody instruments the Massacre begun the Papists distinguishing themselves by hankerchiefs on their Armes and white Crosses in their hats The Admiral Coligny was the first they set upon and Murther'd and then the rest of the Protestant Nobility and Gentry who were most lodged in a quarter together and then through the whole City where ever they could finde them so that there was nothing but blood horror death murthering and slaying through that great City at which time fell by this barbarous means 10000 Protestants The body of that Noble Admiral they drag'd about the streets having cut off his hands and head which was sent as a present to the Pope at Rome and then hung it on a Gibbet and making a fire under it used it with all the dispight imaginable But this was not enough to satiate and glut their bloody mindes immediately the King causes Letters to be sent away post through all his Kingdome to the chief Citys and Towns to do the like And presently all France is filled with Murthers and slaughters and the Earth is bathed with the blood of the Hugonots In some places more in some less as the Governors and Magistrates were more or less cruelly and popishly affected At Meaux at Troys at Orliance at Roan Burdeaux Tholouse Angiers Lions and several other Cities Towns Villages and places nothing but Massacres flaughters Murthers blood torments and cruelties were enacted so that the dead Corps in every place lay like dung on the face of the Earth and they gathered the fat and greese of men and women sold it about at 3 s. the pound the Rivers were pestered with carcasses thrown into them and nothing but horror and confusion reigned in all places So that at that time by computation at least 30000 fell besides those in Paris but some reckon more for the King himself confest he had a list of 7000. slain as Cicarela relates in vita Greg. 13. And of all this blood and Murthers and Massacres the Popes Legat publiquely absolved them who were the chief Actors in it We will not after this mention to you the siege of Sancre 1573 in which the poor Protestants were fain to eat Dogs Cats Rats Mice Moles Horse hoofs Hornes Lanthorns Calves and Sheep-skins Girdles and all their furniture for their horses and one eat the head and brains of his own daughter that dyed for famine nor the seige of Rochel 1575. in which they endured famine misery and hardship nor of the seige of the same place in the year 1628. in which also the famine was so great that they eat the very buttocks of the dead and at the taking it
oppression till the peace of Munster and Osnaburg 1648. which put a stop to the Persecution they being forced to it by Gods bringing in the King of Sweden who over-run Germany and revived the cause of the Protestants As also in Hungary almost overthrown by so many thousand persecutions These bloody Tyrants vented their rage and fury not only in Germany but also in Hungary and other parts they committed there also the same Tragedys where they had any power and the Ministers were generally banished and put to death and the same picture of their cruelties which you have had represented to you in Germany might have been acted over again in this Kingdom but we have not room at this time for the like relation only one new sort of death read of used to a Minister in Hungary by tying about his naked body Hens Geese Ducks and Hares and so seting dogs upon them baited him to death tearing and renting his flesh till he dyed Their rage in the Low Countrys The Low Countrys Hist of the Netherlands and Sleidens Commenta or Netherlands was no less nothing but fire and fagot among them by which suffered many a worthy and Godly person of every Age and Sex as well in Holland as else where At Antwerp one Nicholas a pious holy man was bound up in a sack and so drowned In Holland Pistorius was burnt being carryed to the stake with a fools Coat on his back and also a widdow called Wendelmuta who shewed much constancy Several Ministers were beheaded among the rest one George Scherter who some time after he was beheaded his body lying on the belly turned himself on the back and crossing the right foot over the left and his right hand over the left so continued to the great admiration of the spectators and the conversion of many Several were drowned others made away in Prisons others shut up in dark and noysome places and none suffer'd to come at them fed only with bread and water till they were famish'd At Lovain several were Martyr'd some by fire others beheaded In the years 1543. and 1544. There was a very great persecution all over Flanders so that there was neither Town nor city in all the Country wherein some were not banished beheaded or condemned to perpetual Imprisonment neither was there any respect to either Age or Sex But especially at Gaunt many of the chief men were burned for Religion The like was in Brabant and Artois insomuch that 200. men and women were made away at one time some drowned some buried quick and some privily Murthered so that the hands of the hangmen begun to be tyred and weary with Executions At Delden at echlin at Dornic several were put to death among the rest two Noble Virgins sisters and one Mother and her 3. Sons who all dyed owning the Gospel and exclaming against the cruelty of the Papists At the same time they miserably punished one Bertand for trampling the host under his feet in his zeal by tormenting him thrice upon the Rack and then because he would not recant in the market place of Lornick they put a ball of ron into his mouth to keep him from speaking and then crushed his right hand betwixt two flat red hot rons till the form of his hand was changed and after that they did the like by his right foot which he enduring with admirable patience taking the Ball of iron out of his mouth they cut out his Tongue and then thrust in the Ball again then tying him with a chain about the middle with a pully hoisted him up and making a fire underneath let him down by degrees into the fire and so continued hoisting him up and letting him down till he dyed and was burnt to ashes which they cast into the River At Valence also several were executed and also at Lisle where one of the Judges pronouncing the sentence of condemnation said This day you shall go to dwell with all the Devills in hell-fire But the great instrument of â—ersecution in these Countrys was the Duke of Alva who boasted that besides those he had slain in the wars he had put into the hand of the Common Hangman to be executed within the space of six years no less than 18000. persons permitting his Soldiers to ravish honest matrons and virgins and many times causing their parents and husbands to stand by and behold it His Son Don Frederick following his Fathers Steps committed many cruelties and at Zutphen he hang'd drown'd and murther'd a great number of the inhabitants shewing infinite cruelties upon their wives and Virgins not sparing the very Infants and also in Naerden in Holland where entering the Town without resistance he committed such abominable Cruelties that never Turks Seythians or the most barbarous and inhumane Nations in the World exceeded them Here treacherously he commanded all the Burgers and chief of the inhabitants to assemble themselves together that he might acquaint them with some Orders and when they were all assembled together in the Chappell of the HOspital he commanded his Soldiers to murther them all without sparing any one The men were all slain and the women of the Town first ravished and then barbarously murthered the children and infants had their Throats out so that the whole Town was destroyed and neither man wife maid nor child young nor old spared and the Town was rased without pitty or mercy The same Don Frederick at Herlem exercised the like perfidiousness for when they had been forced to deliver up their Town through Famine having eat for hunger bread made with linseed and turneps and lived upon Horses Dogs and cats they made a composition by which they paid 240000 florins to redeem their Town from spoil yet being entred according to that wicked Principle of theirs that no faith is to be kept with Hereticks he commanded all the Towns-men to bring in their arms and to assemble themselves in the Cloyster of Zyel and all the women in the Cathedral and all the Soldiers into another Church where he made his Soldiers guard them whilst the persidious Spanyards plundred their Houses The next day he caused 300 Walloons to be hanged and beheaded and two hundred and forty seven Soldiers more to be drowned in the Mcre at Harlem The day following 300. Soldiers and Burgers lost their heads and the next day many more and several Ministers and also all the English and Scots they could finde and to fill up the Sea of blood all the sick and wounded were beheaded at the door of the Hospital And a party of Soldiers that were in an out-Sconce were all starved to death At Valenciennes they hang'd up all the French Soldiers all the Protestants and ministers they could take in the Town and consiscated all their goods which amounted to a great vallue At Antwerp they drowned one John de Boscane a Protestant in a Tub of water and because he was tall and the tub of the shortest so that they
THE Antichristian Principle fully Discovered In a Brief and true ACCOUNT OF All the Hellish Plots Bloody Persecutions Horrid Massacres and most Inhumane Cruelties and Tortures exercised by the Papists on the Persons of Protestant Dissenters from the Church of Rome for the cause of Religion only as well abroad as here in England Scotland and Ireland from the very beginning till this present year 1678. Faithfully Collected out of divers both Ancient and Modern Histories Records and Writings for the Information and undeceiving of the People Psal 137.8 O Daughter of Babylon who art to be destroy'd happy shall he be that rewardeth thee as thou hast served us With Allowance LONDON Printed in the Year 1679. THe Church of Rome growing great and mighty Rich and Proud at once lost its humility and purity of Religion and assumed pollitick and tyrannick Principles which caused her defiled hands to lay aside the sword of the spirit and to make use of that bloody one of Persecution and to run into bloody and murtherous Practises hellish plots and contrivances devillish Machinations and horrid and barbarous Massacres There is nothing can better demonstrate this Antichristian spirit than to give you a short specimen of all her bloody Acts to shew you her sword reaking with the goar of the Innocent and I think it ought to be more prevalent than all the force of Arguments and disputations in the World for let even those of her own Religion be judge whether so many horrid and barbarous Persecutions Deaths and Torments inflicted on men and women for the sake of Religion only and which we shall here briefly enumerate can be according to the spirit of Christ or the Doctrine of the Apostles and do not rather entitle those who command and execute such inhumane Acts as to take away the life of man and with fire and sword to lay wast Countrys to subvert Kingdoms and destroy States under the Notion and name of Religion and holiness to be called Tyrants bloody and wicked Persecutors and the principles by which they act and seek to justifie such horrid monstrous and bloody Persecutions to be Diabolical and Antichristian Let I say all the world judge by all the bloody Tragedies which the Church of Rome hath acted and promoted whether that murtherous Principle be of Christ or Antichrist of God or the Devil or which is more near to his holy doctrine and commands to love our Enemies and to do good to those that dispightfully use us or to burn hang draw torment and put to Death all such as will not be of our minds and Religion The first then that flung away the spiritual Keys The Persecution of the Waldenses and stoutly began to brandish the bloody sword of Persecution was Pope Alexander the 3d who with it began to hack and hew the poor Waldenses so called from Peter Waldo or Valdo of Lyons in France whom God had raised up to oppose the many corruptions of the Romish Church as the consecration of Images Reliques Oyle Candles c. Merits auricular confession Supremacy of the Pope adoration of Images Indulgences false miracles Purgatory praying to Saints prayers for the dead Extream Unction and the like so early were these things questioned and preached against The persecution of this Valdo and his followers which were increased to a very great Number began in France in the year 1160. Valdo himself being forced to fly into Daupheny many into Picardy where they were called Picards many into Flanders and into Alsatia 〈…〉 tinuâ—â—â— for many years in Picardy Planders Germany and so they spread themselves for the safety of their lives into all places In Picardy by the Command of King Phillip three hundred Gentlemens houses were burnt and several walled Towns destroyed and in Flanders whether those of that party fled several were burnt for this cause of their Religion Neither were they safe who fled into Germany for at Mayance the Bishop there caused no less then thirty five Burgesses of that place to be burnt in one fire and eighteen in another And at Strasburg at the same time by the Bishop there eighty persons were burnt together for professing the same Tenents Many then that fled into England for shelter England were cruelly put to death at Oxford At Collen in Germany 1163. were four men and one woman burnt And in Spain by â—rolamation 't was made Treason to relieve these people or to suffer them to live in that Country but liberty was given to use them at will and pleasure and none to be called to account for it But these people still increasing caused the Pope to set on work the bloody Inquisition which with Racks Fire torments and other cruelties have sent so many good and holy men for their Conscience sake out of this World France Anno 1201 at Paris was burnt a Noble Knight called Enrandus and this persecution still continuing the people of the Vally of Loyse flying from their barbarous persecutors Daupheny into the caves of the Mountains were all smother'd in those caves by their cruel Enemies where were found afterwards no less then four hundred Infants stifled in their Cradles which some Mothers had carried thither at their backs and in their dead Mothers Arms. In Daupheny many were also burnt and the raging fire of persecution flamed thorow the whole Land Piedmont And also in Piedmont where there was scarce a Town or City that many had not been put to death And at Turin one of them had his Bowels torn out of his Belly and put into a bason before his face and after that they Martyr'd him These Countrys being so hot with the fire of persecution many of these poor people fled into Calabria Calabria where they began to plant and to build Towns and Citys as St. Xist La Garde c. Where they continued till the year 1560. where they were grieviously persecuted by Pope Pius the 4th forcing them to leave their Houses and Habitations and to fly into the Woods for shelter of their lives but being there pursued by the Order of the Viceroy of Naples most of them were cruelly and barbarously put to death by the Soldiers and when they could not kill with the Sword kept them so beseiged that they dyed with Famine At which time they rackt one Charlin so horridly that his guts came out at his belly and another they tormented eight hours upon the Rack to make him confess strange lyes invented against their Religion which he would not Some were strip'd stark naked and whipt to death with Rods of Iron some drawn through the streets and burnt with fire brands others thrown down from an high Tower and some slashed with sharp knives And in one place by the Order of the Inquisitor Panza eighty had their Throats cut as Butchers do sheep then causing them to be divided into four quarters he made their Limbs to be set upon stakes for the space of
distinction of Age or Sex In the year 1213. near Muret a Town upon the Garronne Muret. there were slain in battle in the pursute and afterwards about two Millions of Albingenses with the King of Araagon who then took their parts In the year 1215. Fryer Conradus of Marpurg the Popes inquisitor most horribly tortured all that made profession of the Gospel or were but suspected marking them with red hot Irons and then giving them to the secular power to be burnt so that neither Noble nor Ignoble Clerks Monks Nuns Burgesses Citizens and Country people escaped the slames by the-means of this bloody Inquisitor The Town of Miromand being taken by Prince Lewis of France Miromand he destroyed there of the Albingenses for the same cause to the number of five thousand men women and children In the year 1234. many of these Albingenses being fled into Spain Spain the Pope caused a Croisado to be preached against them whereby a great Army of Pilgrims assembled together were sent by Pope Gregory against the Albingenses whom they slew with their Bishops and Teachers burnt their houses destroyed their Towns and plunderd and carried away their goods And about the same time those who retired into a fenny place on the borders of Germany were also all slain At the same time also many of them were slain and burnt in Millain and other parts of Italy beyond the Alpes In the year 1242. there were burnt in Tholouse 200. of these Albingenses Tholouse being taken in a certain Castle hard by and the year following 220. more in the same place In the year 1281. a great persecution was raised against them in Albi by one Gourdon so that they were almost all extirpated and rooted out and forced to fly for safety of their lives to all parts Albi. At the same time by the Popes Order many of the chief preachers of the Albingenses bones were dug up and burnt 20. and 30. years after they had been buried Luthers Forerunners and Cades Justification The perse cution of the Bohimians Ex-Hist Persecutionum Ecclesiae Bohem The persecution of the Bohemians begun betimes even neer the year 977. by Pope Hildebrand and afterwards by Celestine continuing down to the times of Mathias of Frague 1375. and to John Hus and Jerome of Prague who were both burnt in defence of the Gospel at Constance notwithstanding the publique faith of Germany given them for their security At Cuttenburg where there are many deep Mines in the year 1420. they threw into one of them 1700. persons and into another 1038. and into â— third 1334. persons In the year 1421. at Litomeritia twenty four of the chief Citizens among whom was the Son-in-Law of the chief persecutor and Magistrate of the City were thrust into a great Tower and almost famished to death from whence being at last drawn because they would not abjure their Religion they were condemned to be all drowned in the River Albis which was accordingly done their hands and feet being bound and so thrown into the midst of the River and if the stream brought any of them to the sides of the bank they were goared to death with Iron forks and Pikes The daughter of the chief persecutor seeing she could not move her Father by her tears and prayers to save the Life of her Husband flung her self after him into the River and embracing his body perished with him and was found the next day with him fast in her Armes and were buried in one grave About the same time at Prague 4. men 4 boys and a Minister were then burnt in one fire because they administred and received the Sacrament in both kindes Many and indeed innumerable were the Murthers and torments and unheard of babarities executed both publiquely and privately on those poor wretches by those bloody Executioners About the year 1523. Martin Luther began to shine as a great light in Germany and his Doctrine to overspread those parts even to Bohemia which caused more violent persecutions wherein multitudes of Saints lost their Lives by the means of Ferdinand the first and Charles the 5th so that it wou'd be almost endless to enumerate every particular In the year 1549 there were no less then 200. Ministers banished out of this Kingdom and the Baron of Schanow because a Lutheran but under the pretence of a Conspiracy was laid upon the Rack but he magnanimously cut out his own Tongue and being asked the reason he wrote that it was lest the torments of the Rack should make him speak falsly against himself or others In the year 1617. Ferdinand the Second being obtruded upon by the Bohemians he siding with the Papists raised up a very great persecution against the Protestants which was the cause of Electing Frederick Palatine of the Rhine King of Bohemia and the cause of all those Wars and embroylments In which suffered many a godly Minister and other holy pious and harmless men by the sapistical Souldiers with that barbarous cruelty that Christian Ears cannot hear nor Tongue relate without indignation and abhorrency For some of them were stoned to death others hanged upon a beam with a soft fire made under them rosted to death others cut peace-meal And one Minister they laid on his back ramming his mouth full of Compowder set fire to it and blew his head all to peeces Another they hanged up by the privy Members being 70. years old and burnt his own books under him and at last shot him after he had endured a world of torment and pain In the year 1621. all the Ministers were banished out of Prague and out of the Kingdome of Bohemia and all the provinces thereunto belonging never more to return and made it death to harbour or conceal any one of them Also at Cuttenburg 21. Ministers were banished about the same time Anno 1624. a Popish Captain caused a Ministers hand first to be stricken off and then his head his bowels to be taken forth and wrapt in his shirt and his 4. quarters to be set on 4 stakes and his head on another At that time also 50. of the Nobility were condemned some to death some to perpetual banishment and some to perpetual Imprisonment 27. were executed some of their right hands and heads were hung upon the Tower of the Bridge who all dyed with great constancy of minde and fervency of spirit sealing to the Protestant cause with their blood whose heads were afterwards solemnly buried by Gustavus Adolphus King of Sweden Next came forth an Edict to banish all the Protestants and to take away the children from them that they might be bred in the Romish Religion And then another to banish all the Wives of such as were Catholicks from their Husbands unless they would turn Then they enacted that those who were not Catholicks should be prohibited all traffick and commerce with them There was hardly a City or Town that escaped their barbarous cruelties And at Prachatice
a bushel of Wheat was sold for 20 l. a pound of bread 20 s. a quarter of Mutton 6 l. a pound of Butter 30 s. an Egg 8 s. an ounce of Sugar 2 s 6 d. a dry'd Fish 20 s. a pint of French Wine 20 s. a pint of Milk 30 s. a pound of Grapes 3 s. c. Nor speak of the persecutions of the Protestants since by pulling down their Churches grievous fines imprisonments and banishment being still wearied and oppressed groaning under the yoak of their Egyptian bondage I am almost weary with writing and perhaps thou art with reading these Massacres and slaughters therefore I will here mention no more but briefly proceed We will now leave the Kingdome of the most Christian King Spain and passing over the Pyrennes see if the Gospel can have any harbour Gonsalvus Montanus Discovery of the Spanish Empress or its professors peace in that of the most Catholick King But alas the same Tyrannic cruelty if not worse we shall finde exercised against all that dissent from the Church of Rome Spain cannot afford so many Martyrs as France because there the professors of the Gospell were but few being kept from thence by the terror of the Inquisition They have been here so carefull as to crush all appearance of the Gospell in the Bud and such care and inspection is taken and such diligent search made and such horrid punishments inflicted by these inquisitors that it is almost impossible any Protestant should be in the Kingdome of Spain and not to be found out and punished Yet in the year 1545. several Protestants at St. Lucar Validolid Siril and other places in Spain suffer'd death 30 at one time and 1550 man more There were Francis Romanes Rochus Calculla a Doctor John Pontio Gonsalvo a Priest Juliano Leon Arias Losada a Physitian with a Lady and several women and Virgins burnt at several times in several places and 20. others in one fire after they had endured all the horrid torments of the Rack the Pully the Trough the Barnacle the twisting Cord and the like horrid inventions of tortures in the Prison of the inquisition Burton Bakere Burgat Burges and Hooker Englishmen were there burnt and horridly tormented by these cursed Inquisitors who have their Agents in every corner to finde out and betray all such as they have but the least suspition of for favoring Hereticks as they call Protestants These Agents they name Familiars who like spirits insinuate into the bosome of people to deceive and betray them and others Flys who are also busy in taking up such as their Familiars betray So that by these cruelties subtle arts and sly practises they have stifled the Protestant Faith in Spain and though there are privately many who own the truth they are forced to keep it so private as scarce to communicate their minds to a Brother or a Sister for fear of the torments of the Inquisition which is much more feared then death As Portugal is but a little Kingdome Portugal and the power of the Pope and his Instruments great there as well as in Spain they have mightyly supprest the truth with their tortures yet some have there also suffer'd and among others one William Gardner an English man whom they put to death with most exquisit torments at Lisbon 1552. We will pass over the Alpes into Italy Italy which being so neer the particular Inspection of the Pope we may well suppose it does not harbour many Protestants at least such as dare appear to be such and to own the profession publiquely by reason of the same strict Court of Inquisition Clerks Martyrology at first instituted against the Moors and Jews in Spain and now used only for the finding out of good Christians and for their torture and punishment yet there have been severall that have owned the Gospell even in Rome it self and in severall Cittys of Italy and have sealed their profession with their Blood as Arnold of Brixia Fannius at Ferrara Dominicus at Placentia Gelacius Tricius at St. Angelo John Mollins at Rome 1553. Francis Gamba at Milan Algerius at Padua 1555 Aloysins at Rome Bovellus at the same place all martyred for their Faith Pope Pius the 4th raised up a very hot persecution in all the Terriitorys of the Church of Rome wherein many suffered And it grew so hot in the year 1560. in the Kingdome of Naples that many noble men and their wives and divers others were slain and butchered 88. at one time being thurst up in a close pen and one by one being taken forth and being blindfolded and led a little way from the place the executioner commanded them to kneel down and so cut their throats one after another like sheep leaving them half dead on the ground returning with the bloody knife in his mouth and muffler in his hand goes to the rest till he had cut all their throats This was in Calabria 1560. The City of Venice kept it self free for a long time Venice from this plague of the Inquisition till the year 1542 at which time the Pope so far prevailed as to set up there the Inquisition and then began a terrible persecution wherein many a servant of Jesus Christ suffer'd Here they found out a new way of murthering them that they condemned to dye which was accounted the more merecifull Judgment than their Racking whipping beating and water torments they fastned and Iron Chain about their middles with a very heavy stone tyed at it then were they laid upon a plank between two Gondelo's or small boats and rowed to an appointed place in the Sea where the boats parting asunder they immediately sunk to the bottom and were drowned In the year 1566. a minister and many others suffer'd after this manner and divers sent to Rome where they ended their days by slaughter or else more miserably in stinking and nasty dungeons not being permitted to have any thing to lye on but straw About that time suffer'd also at Venice by drowning Anthony Bicetto Francis Spinola Sega and others And 1595. a young Englishman at Rome whom they used cruelly having led him from the Capitol his upper parts naked on his head a cap made in shape of a devil his Breeches painted like Hell-fire with devills in it and thus being brought to the place of execution they cut off his right hand alive and because he began to praise God they gagged him and then seared all his flesh with hot Irons and at last burnt him at the Stake It is not the Rocks nor the fastnesses of the Alpes that can keep out this monster of persecution he even ascends those precipices The Valtoline and in the Valtoline or the Country of the Grisons he scratches graves for the faithfull with his murtherous Claws There had been for a long time a free exercise of the Religion which invited many to fly into those mountains for safety but when the power of Rome got
among them it made an horrible slaughter and a bloody edict was procured by the Papists at Rome for the killing and murthering all the Protestants in those parts and which was soon and cruelly executed at Tel. Tyrane Bruse Sondres Malenco Caspano Trahen and other Towns in the Valtoline where a very great company of all Sects Ages and Conditions were as barbarously used and there murthered as in any other place and this in the year 1620. Many were drowned in the River Alba and Adda some had their Cheeks slit up to their ears some strapadoed others their mouths and ears filled with gunpowder and so fired others slash'd and cut and so miserably driven to the mountains others again flung from those high rocks into the deep valleys and so broken to peices and most of them one way or other destroy'd without any commiseration or pitty In the Marquisate of Saluces are several Churches of the Protestant Religion as Pravillem Biolts Bietone Dronier The Marquisate of Saluces and divers others who liv'd peaceably for a long time under the Government of France notwithstanding the many attempts of the apists against them but after the massacre ot Paris the Kings Letters were sent to the Governour Monsieur Biraguâ— to destroy them all but his prudence put a stop to it for the present only imprisoning the cheif heads of them till he had orders for their release but after this Marquisate came to the possession of the Duke of Savoy he made a cruel edict that all persons that would not within 15 days renounce their Religion and go to Mass should depart for ever out of the Marquisate giving them only two months time to remove in upon pain of Death This was published 1601. so that there was nothing to be seen all over the Country but packing up and marching away into banishment leaving their Houses Fields and Country which they had for Ages enjoy'd some retired into France beyond the Alps some to Geneva and some to the Vallies of Piemont none being suffer'd to stay but such as would submit against their Consciences to go to mass and to worship Idols but their neighbours are not free no place is exempt where ever the power of this beast reigns as we may behold in the adjoyning Vallies The poor and distressed Protestants in the Vallies of Piemont The valleys of Piemont quasi Pede montium at the foot of the mountains of the Alps have been very great sufferers by the popish Tyrany They are under the Government of the Duke of Savoy and are the offspring of the old Waldeneses and from that time professing that Religion having Evangelical Churches in the several Vallies of Angrognia Bobio Villaro Valguicharda Rora Tagliaretto La Ricca di Boneti La Torre St. Martino Dcrosa Roccapiata Lucarna St Barthelmo in all which the Inhabitants were most Protestants and had been long indulged in their Religion by the Princes of Savoy Sir Sam. Morlands Hist of the Evang Churches in the valleys of Piedmont to whom they were Subjects But in the year 1565. a cruel edict was published that all such as would not comply with the Church of Rome and go to Mass within ten days should be banished from their Country and habitation but by the intercession of the King of France and the Elector Palatine of the Rhine this Edict was recalled and they continued quiet till the year 1655 wherein the late great massacre was comitted against these poor men for their Religion Sake Though all along the Papists had by many cunning plots and contrivances endeavoured their subversion by endeavouring to stir them up to Rebellion and by planting Colledges of Emissaries amongst them which like goads in their sides still annoyed them and proved a great trouble and affliction to them always procuring some cruel and harsh edict against them by their complaints and lyes raised against them as 1602 an edict for the banishing all private and publique Protestant Schoolmasters as incendiaries and 1622. That no strangers either Ministers or Schoolmasters should be entertained among them 1634 an Edict came out that all the Protestants of Cumpiglione should be banished and 1654 the same was done against those of the vallies of Martino and Perosa These Missionary Fathers behaving themselves among them more cruelly than Turks or Barbarians But resolving to root the Protestants from among them and thorowly to do the work of their Father the Pope in the midst of winter which is very sharp in those mountains viz. 25 Jan. 1655. they procured an Order for the Banishment of all the Protestants out of the vallies of Lucerna Lucernetta St. Giovanni La Terre Bubbiana Fenite Compiglione Bercherassio and St. Secondo within three days after pubcation unless they would turn Roman Catholiks and this extended to all in general none exempted of what rank degree or condition soever And thus these poor creatures were forced in compliance to this cruel edict to fly to save their Lives and consciences in the depth of the snow and all the vallies covered with waters women with child some brought newly to Bed old women and decrepit men leaning on their staves young children crying and lamenting dragged over Ice thorow Rain Snow Waters and a 1000. inconveniences and hardships so that it would have grieved the heart of a Barbarian to have seen them leaving their goods behind them or selling them for little to the Catholicks who took no pitty of their bitter tears sighing wringing of hands knocking of breasts mourning complaining and lamenting 't was but as the bleeting of Sheep or the lowing of Kine in their ears and they rather rejoyced than any way commiserated these poor wretches They were no sooner out of their houses but they were pillaged rifled and ransack'd of all they left pulling down their houses cutting down their Trees making havock and devastation of all things and turning all into a Wilderness This cruel edict was put in execution by Gustaldo and others but this is not all they had a further design of extirpating and rooting out all Hereticks as they call these poor Protestants it is not enough to have banished these few they could have no redress at Court and all their humble Petitions and remonstrances were not heard for they had more wicked and bloody designes instigated by the Ministers of Rome who had great influence over his Royall Highness and Madam Royal. Upon the 17th of April 1655. whilst the Protestants Deputies were detained at Turin and delayed sometimes with hope of redress some Soldiers of purpose fell upon the Protestans unexpectedly who peaceably attended the issue of their petitions which begat some bustle they being but few the Protestants made some resistance whereupon many thousands got together under the Marquess of Piadessa and on the 21th of the same month began the most horrible Massacre among these poor Protestants of these Vallies as ever was heard of There was nothing to be seen thorow the Protestant