death he was condemned to be burnt and so being brought out of prison his sentence was read in the same place and cast into the fire And this was the last of the Waldenses that is come to our knowledge that hath been persecuted to the death for his beliefe CHAP. V. Of the Waldenses inhabiting in the Valleys of Meane and Maites and the Marquisate of Saluces and the last persecutions that they suffered AT what time the Waldenses of Dauphine dispersed themselues in Piedmont there were some that made their abode in the Marquisate of Saluces in the Valleys Maties and Meane and the parts thereabouts These were not forborne during the grieuous persecutions which their brethren of the Valleys of Angrongne Saint Martin and others suffered All their refuge was to flie into the said Valleys namely when the said Gouernours of the said Marquisate persecuted them by the commandement of the Kings of France who condemned to death within their Realmes all such as made profession of the same beliefe that they did Now the deceased King of Happy memory Henry the Great and fourth of that name hauing giuen to his Subiects an edict of pacification the Waldenses that liued in the Marquisate inioyed the same priuiledges that the other Subiects did of the same Realme but when afterwards by the treaty with the Duke of Sauoy la Bresse was changed for the Marquisate of Saluces the poore Waldenses were depriued of the free exercises of their Religion within the iurisdiction of the said Marquisate for at the instance of the Nuntio of Pope Clement the eight the free liberty of their Religion was not onely interdicted but by a new edict all they were banished that within the said Marquisate made profession of any other Religion then that of the Church of Rome and for the better furtherance of their speedy departure there were sent to the said Valleys and Marquisate a great number of Monkes Inquisitors who went from house to house examining the consciences of euery one by which meanes there were aboue fiue hundred families banished who retired themselues into the Realme of France but especially into Dauphine And to the end that in those places into which they were come it might not be cast in their teeth that they were banished out of their Countries for some wickednesse that they had committed but that it was onely the zeale they bare to their religion that had made them wanderers in the world they made this Declaration following in the yeere 1603. The Declaration of the VValdenses of the Valleys Maties and Meane and the Marquisate of Saluces made in the yeere 1603. FOrasmuch as time out of minde and from the father vnto the sonne our Predecessors haue been instructed and nourished in the doctrine and Religion whereof from our infancy we haue made open profession and haue instructed our families as we haue learnt of our fore-fathers As also that during the time that the King of France held the Marquisate of Saluces it was lawfull for vs to make profession not being disquieted or molested as our brethren of the Valleys of Lucerna la Perouse and others who by an expresse treaty and agreement made with our Soueraign Prince Lord haue inioyed vnto this present the free exercise of the reformed religion but his Highnesse being perswaded by euill councell and ill affected people rather then his owne will hath resolued to molest vs and to that end hath published an edict To the end therefore that it may be made known to all men that it is not for any crime committed either against the person of our Prince or for any rebellion against his edicts or the committing of any murthers or thest that wee are thus tormented and spoiled of our goods and houses Wee declare that being certainly assured and perswaded that the doctrine and Religion taught and followed in the reformed Churches as well of France Switserland Germany Geneua England Scotland Denmarke Suâ—dia Polonia as other Realmes Countries and Signories whereof we haue vnto this present time made open profession vnder the obedience of our Princes and Soueraigne Lords is the onely true doctrine and Christian religion ordained and approued of God which onely can make vs agreeable vnto him and conduct vs to saluation Wee are resolued to follow it with the losse of our liues goods and honours and to continue therein the remainder of our liues And if any shall pretend that we are in an error we require him to make vs see our error and offer incontinently to abiure and do likewise promise to follow that which shall be proued vnto vs to be the better desiring nothing so much as with an assured and safe conscience to follow the true and lawfull seruice which we poore creatures owe vnto our Creator and by that meanes to attaine to the true and eternall felicity But if any shall goe about by force and constraint to cause vs to forsake and abandon the true way of our saluation and to enforce vs to follow the errours and superstitions and false doctrines inuented by men wee desire a great deale rather to abandon our houses our goods and liues too We therefore humbly beseech his Highnesse whom we acknowledge to bee our lawfull Prince and Lord not to suffer vs to molested without cause but rather permit vs to continue so long as wee liue and our children and posterity after vs in that obedience and seruice which vnto this day wee haue rendred vnto him as faithfull and loyall Subiects and so much the rather because we demand no other thing of him but that we yeelding faithfully vnto him that which we are bound vnto by the expresse commandement of God it may likewise bee lawfull for vs to render vnto God that homage and seruice which wee owe vnto him and he requires at our hands in his holy word Beseeching in the meane time in the middle of our exile and calamity the Reformed Churches to hold vs and acknowledge vs to bee true members therereof being willing to seale withour blood if God will haue it so the Confession of faith made and published by them which we acknowledge in all things and throughout conformable to the doctrine taught and written by the holy Apostles and therefore truely Apostolicall Wee promise to liue and die therein And if so doing we be afflicted and persecuted we yeeld hearty thanks vnto God who hath done vs that honour to suffer for his name leauing the issue of our affaires and the iustice of our cause in the hands of his diuine prouidence who will deliuer vs when and by what meanes it pleaseth him Humbly beseeching him that as he hath the hearts of Kings and Princes in his hands he will be pleased to mollifie the heart of his Highnesse to take pitty of those that haue neuer offended him or purpose to offend him to the end hee may hold and acknowledge those to be more faithfull loyall and obedient to his seruice then they are that
even in this that the poor Protestants through the influence of their Adversaries and accusers upon the Magistrate were without hearing or the least Summons sentenced to banishment upon pain of death without giving them any respite or admitting them to make any Protestation or Appeal unlesse their Petitions were drawn in such form as might please the Commissioner who is the great Protector of this persecution and according to the mind of their Adversaries in such termes as they should prescribe whereby they must necessarily betray themselves and their Cause and then after execution of the foresaid penalty they have been pleased to give some of the poor Exiles a hearing and permitted them to plead their Cause and that onely by a Popish Advocate or Proctor who had been so charmed and terrified by the Clergy that before he entered upon the Cause he was faign to crave pardon upon his knees for undertaking to plead it And as for the pleading it was not managed before competent and lawfull Judges but the Protestants chiefest adversaries sat in judgment the Arch-Bishop of Turâ—n the Dukes Confessor the Abbot de la Monta the Prior of Rorene and some others devoted to the Court of Rome yea and in the Arch Bishops own house Moreover whereas according to certain Grants made by the Prince leave was given to the Protestants to dwell in their wonted habitations where they had a Toleration and it remaines on their part to be proved that those were the accustomed places of their habitation the matter was so handled by the Romish Clergie that they endeavoured as much as in them lay to hinder the Papists from giving any testimony on the behalfe of their Neighbours of the Reformed Religion concerning this their habitation which at length our brethren made a hard shift to wrest out of them to the exceeding regret and indignation of the Clergy and so proved at last by those authentick testimonials under the hands of their Popish Neighbours that all those places out of which they were driven have been places inhabited by Protestants time out of mind But to the end that it may more fully and clearly appear upon what account of right or wrong the Popish adversaries do incite their Soveraign the Duke of Savoy who is yet but young to the driving of the poor Protestants out of their antient patrimonies and places of abode in the midst of a sharp and terrible winter and this upon pain of death unlesse within three daies after publication of that decree of perpetuall banishment they immediately quit their native Country or else abjure the true and devote themselves and their families to the Romish Religion It is to be observed omitting the mention of their more antient rights and priviledges and the long possession which they have held beyond the memory of man that in the * They are to be seen in the History of the Martyrs set forth in French to the year 1561. Edicts set forth by the Dukes of Savoy and the agreements made for the Protestants enjoying a liberty of Religion the limits appointed for the publick preaching of the Reformed Religion do not extend so far as the dwellings of those men that professe it nor are the limits of their dwelling to be contracted into so narrow a compasse as the places limited for preaching But that the reformed professors have a right of habitation in those places out of which they are now expelled is evident not only by an antient prescription of many ages seeing their Fathers Grandfathers Great-Grandfathers and other their Ancestors have inhabited there before them but also by those very Grants and Concessions confirmed by Duke Charles Emanuel wherein it was acknowledged by publick Edict that this habitation was derived to them from their fathers For when he through the instigation of the Court of Rome had by a surreptitious dâ—cree commanded them to depart thence towards the latter end of the year one thousand six hundred and two afterward being well informed of their right he by an authentick Charter gave them leave to dwell there again for the confirmation of which Charter they paid six thousand Ducatoons into the Duke's Exchequer upon the 17th day of August Anno 1620. and it was confirmed again by the Prince now raigning upon the 29th of Decemberr Anno 1655. And yet now contrary to faith given upon the 25th of January last in the depth of winter not sparing even women with child near delivery nor those that had Infants hanging on their breasts they were all without distinction both men women and children driven out to wander through frost and snow in a most bitter season without the least warning or delay And no sooner had these old inhabitants quitted their antient inheritances for the saving of their lives but those savage Theeves that gaped after the prey presently fell to plundering and spoiling their houses driving away their Cattle felling and cutting down trees or else rooting them up In a word they destroy all and by this means attempt to drive these poor wretches to the utmost point of desperation and if any man endeavour to withstand or oppose them they immediately crie out he is a Traitour So I commend these miserable exiles to the mercy of God and the compassion of their brethren of the reformed Churches Andreas Galstaldus Doctor in Law Conservator and ordinary Auditor sitting in the Honourable Chamber of accounts of his Royall Highnesse and Generall Conservator of the holy Faith appointed to put in execution all orders which are published against the pretended Reformed Religion in the Valleys of Lucerne Perouse and St. Martin and particularly appointed by his said Highnesse for this speciall businesse ACcording to the power given us by his Highnesse by his Letters dispatched to us in due form signed Violetta and sealed bearing date of the thirteenth of this Month and in performance of the instructions given us as also at the instance made to us by Master Barth lomew Gastaldus intervening in the behalfe of the Royall Exchequer we ordain and command the first Sergeant or Bailiffe sworn to make command and injunction to all the heads of Families and to each particular of the pretended Reformed Religion of whatsoever estate condition and degree no inhabitant excepted possessing any goods in the territories of Lucerne Lucernette Saint John la Tour Bobiane Fenill Campiglion Bricheras and St. Seeond within three daies next after the publication hereof to relinquish and abandon with their Families the said places and to transport themselves into those places and limits which by the good pleasure of his Royall Highnesse are prescribed unto them viz. Bobiane the valley of Angrogne Rorata and Country of Bonetti under pain of life and confiscation of their houses possessous and goods which are extant without the said limits in case they cannot within twentie daies make proofe before us that they are Catholiques or that they have sold their estates unto some Catholiques His Royall Highnesse
Law of God and common Justice so also by several Decrees of the Dukes of Savey made in favour of the Protestants September 29. 1603. and June 4. 1653. it is prohibited that the innocent should not suffer for the guilty so the Professors of the Reformed Religion do not desire to hinder but make it their humble and earnest Request that such as are guilty may be brought to punishment From hence then it is obvious enough to any man upon what account it is that the enemies of the Reformed Churches have not onely driven very many of them out of their native Countrey and ancient dwellings into banishment but goe on stil to persecute them by a most cruel and bloody war which they have cause to believe is not carried on against them by the proper inclination and direction of the Prince himselfe but through the perswasion and instigation of the Congregation for propagating the Faith and extirpation of Hereticks who have usurped the cognizance of this Controversie being the onely persons that have hindred the Protestants from being heard by the Prince when they have presented their Petitions or made any Addresses to his Royal Highnesse But yet they so ordered the matter that they directed divers Courtiers their creatures to feed the poore Protestants with hope that the eares of the Prince being wearied out with continued Petitions they might at length obtaine the favour to have their businesse brought to a triall before competent Judges while in the mean time they prepared Forces underhand with which they make it their businesse to fall upon them unawares and oppresse and destroy them It is against this unjust violence that the Protestants endeavour to defend themselves They struggle not against their Prince but with the said Congregation for extirpating Hereticks who as in the hearing and judging of this Cause so also in the bloody execution of their sentence by the sword have for the covering of their injustice made use of the name and Authority of the most illustrious Prince Moreover they with the like injury blame those Churches in the Valleys of Piedmont about those Letters of intercession written on their behalf to the Duke of Savoy by forrein Magistrates of the Reformed Religion as if they applied themselves to States Princes abroad for protection whereas those Letters are no more but friendly offices writtten without the privity of those Churches much lesse upon their intreaty and sent by those Magistrates of their own accord induced thereto by a Pious and Zealous affection and out of a brotherly commiseration of that most grievous calamity which might have moved even stocks and stones and whereof they had sufficient notice from other Parts seeing the turning of so many men women children Infants and sick persons out of dores to the wide world in the midst of winter at three daies warning upon pain of death was become a most notorious businesse which cried out aloud of it self and by reason of the wandring of those miserable Exiles who were forced to rove up and down like vagabonds to beg their bread Nor could they be ignorant how unjustly those their Protastant brethren of the Valleys of Piedmont were oppressed by their Adversaries in the Congregation for propagating the Faith who had openly arrogated to themselves the judging of the Cause of those our brethren in the Archbishop of Turin's house contrary to all the Rules of judicial proceeding and abused the Authority of the Duke of Savoy to oppresse and destroy them An Appendix to the foregoing Apologie AS we are informed by severall Letters the ruine long intended by the enemies of the truth of the Churches of Piedmont by the permission of God being angry because of our sinnes is now executed Indeed they had put off the execution by fained shewes and hopes of reconciliation that they might the while provide all necessaries to compasse their ends But against our expectation upon the 16. of April 1655. the Army made up of the Forces of the Duke of Savoy and of the King of France amongst which were some Irish Regiments fell upon the Churches of the Valley of Lucerna and with them the Militia of Piedmont and a crew of banished theeves felons and other malefactors let on purpose out of prison and from all parts flocking together in hope of prey whose incursions in an hostile manner the Reformed mistrusting at first and fearing to be crushed ere they could be heard when all means of approach by supplication to his Highnesse the Duke of Savoy was taken from them they withdrew themselves into the mountaines But the Commander of that Army the Marquesse of Pianesse sewing the Fox skin to that of the Lyons feigned he had no other intention then to intreate the Reformed that they would approve to the Prince their faith and obedience not by bare words but by reall facts viz. by quartering onely for three daies three Regiments of the Army viz. one at Angrogne another at Villars and a third at Boby which if they did he faithfully promised that no harme to them or theirs should be done which when it was granted by the Reformed and they had received the three Regiments presently the whole Army rushed upon them no difference made of men women children or sucking babes dashing them against stones some laying hold on them by the legges and either dismembring them or hurling them headlong into precipices with such fury that the very rocks were wet bloody with their brains and that in sight of the mothers who after the murther committed upon their children were themselves likewise murthered as it was done in the Borrough of Villars and Boby with such horrible butchery that some appeared to be indeed partakers of the crosse of Christ by being nailed to trees and put to imgring deaths am ongst whom one Paul Clement a man of a very upright life who being nailed the head downward did undergoe with great constancy the butchery and continued in holy prayers to God to the very last others especially of the weaker age and sex striving to flie from the fury of the souldiers being driven through Precipices into the mountaines full of snow died of cold and of other accidents as the numerous family of the L. Scipion Bastia In the Countries of St. John and la Tour they fell with fire and Sword upon Churches and private houses this holy fire being kindled by a Priest and a Franciscan Frier thereby to prove himselfe a Seraphin with his St. Francis to whom his Disciples give the seat of Lucifer This disaster being made in the Churches of Lucerne the Commander of the neighbour Valleys under the Duke of Savoy namely in that of Perouse St. Martine and Rupelate as glorying at the thing done commanded the Inhabitants of those places in case they did not turn Papists to leave the Countrey Whereupon those who perferred the richesses of Christ and Heaven to the earthy Country chearfully went out carrying his shame and followed him
that they made no great account of their Clergie and Prelates And for this cause being excommunicated and chased out of the countrey they dispersed themselues into many and diuerse places as into Dauphiney Prouence Languedoc Piemont Calabria Bohemia England and other places Some haue written that one part of the Waldenses retired themselues into Lombardie where they multiplyed in such a manner that their doctrine was dispersed throughout all Italie and came as farre as Sicile Neuerthelesse in this great dispersion they alwayes kept themselues in vnion and fraternitie for the space of foure hundred yeares liuing in great sinceritie and the feare of God The Author of the Historie of the State of the Church writes of them thus The Historie of the Estate of the Church p. 336. After that Waldo saith he and his followers were driuen out of Lions one part of them retired to Lombardie where they multiplied in such a manner that their doctrine began to disperse it selfe into Italie and came into Sicile as the Patents of Fredericke the second giuen out against them whilest he reigned do witnesse Vesembecius saith Vesemb in his oration of the Waldenses p. 3. that when the Pope and his catchpoles saw that the Romane Hierarchie receiued great detriment by meanes of the Waldenses insomuch that there were certaine Princes that had taken their defence amongst whom was the King of Aragon and the Earles of Toulonze in those dayes puissant Princes in France they began to oppresse them vpon most vniust occasions bringing them into hatred with the people and especially of Kings to the end that by this meanes they might be vtterly exterminated Vignier makes mention of the Waldenses in his Historical Bibliotheke Vignier in his Historicall Bibliothec p. 130. and saith that they haue endured many long and grieuous persecutions and yet notwithstanding there was neuer any thing that could hinder them from retaining that doctrine which they had receiued from the Waldenses deliuering it as it were from hand to hand vnto their children Hologaray affirmes Hologaray in his History of Foix p. 120. 121. that the Waldenses and Albigenses were of a contrary opinion to the Bishop of Rome in all those maximes or principles that were publickly preached commanded by his authoritie that is that were inuented by him and contrary to the word of God And he witnesseth withall that there were amongst them wise men and very learned and sufficient to defend their beliefe against the Monkes Mathias Illyricus writes Math. Illyricus in his Catal. of the witnesses of the truth p. 134. that he finds by the writings of Waldo which lay by him in certaine ancient parchments that Waldo was a learned man and that he did not cause the bookes of the Bible to be translated into the vulgar tongue but that he tooke paines therein himselfe It is most certaine that the aduersaries of Waldo and the Waldenses make no great account of these aboue named testimonies because they hold them to be both of one and the same ranke and order both the witnesses and those to whom they beare witnesse that is all for hereticks but this Historie is not onely for the enemies of the truth but to the end the louers thereof may see that that which is here produced doth not intend onely our owne particular commendations but to shew that there haue bene before vs certaine great personages whose memorie they reuerence that haue spoken of the Waldenses as of the true Sacraments of God who haue maintained the truth with the losse of their liues and earnestly desired in their times to see the reformation we enioy in ours And as le Sieur de S. Aldegonde saith In the first table of his differences the third part p. 150. the occasion why they were condemned for heretickes was no other but because they maintained that the Masse was an impious corruption of the holy Supper of the Lord. That the Hoste was an idoll forged by men That the Church of Rome was wholly adulterated and corrupted and full of infidelitie and idolatrie That the traditions of the Church were but superstitions and humane inuentions That the Pope was not the head of the Church and for other points of this nature And as the said Aldegonde obserues it was a great worke of God that how diligent soeuer the Popes with their Clergie haue bene vsing likewise the assistance of secular Princes and magistrates to roote them out yet they could neuer do it neither by proscriptions nor banishments nor excommunications nor publications of their Bulles nor Indulgences and Pardons to all those that shall make warre against them nor by any manner of torments fire flames gibets or other cruell effusion of bloud could they euer hinder the current of their doctrine but it hath spread it selfe almost into all the corners of the earth This hath le Sieur de Saint Aldegonde writ of the Waldenses But forasmuch as doubt may be made whether we haue in these dayes any proofes in the world of their beleefe it is necessary that we produce hereabouts an inuentorie of bookes which they haue left vnto vs to the end that when there shall be any question of their doctrine euery one may vnderstand what the writings are out of which we haue gathered that which they taught CHAP. VII That Peter Waldo and the Waldenses haue left bookes which make proofe of their beliefe and what they are THat Waldo left something in writing vnto vs In the former Chap. it appeares by that which Math. Illyricus saith that he hath certaine parchments of his which shew him to be a learned man Historie of the Estate of the Church p. 307. The Author of the Historie of the Estate of the Church giues this testimonie that followeth Waldo at the same time saith he made a collection in the vulgar tongue of sundry passages of the ancient Fathers to the end he might defend his opinions not onely by the authoritie of the holy Scripture but also by the testimonie of the Doctors against his aduersaties About fortie yeares since le Sieur de Vignaux Pastor of the Churches of the Waldenses in Piemont writ as followeth in his memorials that he made Of the beginning Antiquitie Doctrine Religion Manners Discipline Persecutions Confessions and progresse of the people called Waldenses I that write saith he can witnesse that being sent vnto these people to preach the Gospell of our Lord Iesus Christ which I did about some fortie yeares together I had no need to take much paines to win them from the ceremonies of the Church of Rome nor to roote out of their minds the Pope the Masse Purgatory and such other things wherein they were a long time Doctors before my coming although the greatest part of them knew neither A nor B. It is to this seruant of God to whom we are much bound for the multitude of bookes written by the Waldenses For as oft as he lighted vpon any
those Latine verses which were written a gainst the said Alexander the sixth Vendit Alexander cruces altaria Christum Emer at ille prius vendere iure potest Pope Alexander sold altars Christ and his crosse He bought them had he not sold had liued by the losse Againe Templa Sacerdotes Altaria Sacra Coronae Ignis Thura Preces Caelum est venale Deúsque Temples Priests Altars Crowns they sell for pelfe Fire Frankincense Prayers heauen and God himselfe which is to be vnderstood of their breaden god in the Masse The Arch-bishop therfore was the cause why others kept still those goods in their possession without any restitution and though some particular persons were afterwards called into question as namely Le Sieur de Montainar de Rames and others yet they could neuer haue any remedy In the yeere one thousand fiue hundred sixty the Waldenses of Frassiniere and Pragela had their Churches furnished with Pastors who held them in the exercise of their religion at that time wherein they persecuted vnto death all those that made profession of reformation The President Truchon made an Oration to the States of Prouence assembled the same yeere the sixt of Nouember of purpose to exterminate the said Waldenses of Frassinieres and Pragela saying that it was necessary to purge the old and ancient Leuen likely to make soure the whole Country of Dauphine if some course were not taken to preuent it By these States it was rerefolued by open force to extirpate them and by armes and to this purpose Commissions were giuen forth to leuy troopes of men and to passe into the said Valleies but so soone as the drumme was strooken vp and the men in armes throughout Prouence the vnexpected death of King Francis the second of that name altered the designe and afterwards the said Waldensian Churches in Dauphine continued as still they doe by the singular fauour of God CHAP. IIII. Of the Waldensian Churches in Piedmont and those persecutions they endured that are come to our knowledge THE Waldenses haue had famous Churches in the Valleis of Piedmont Angrongne la Perouse the Valley Saint Martin Lucerna and other bordering places for time out of minde It is held for certaine amongst them that they are a part of the Waldenses of Dauphine Pragela Frassinieres and other places their neere neighbours and that in time being multiplied in so great abundance that the Country could not feed them they were constrained to disperse themselues at length and at large where they might best settle themselues So deare like brothers haue they been one to another and notwithstanding they haue been alwaies oppressed with troubles yet with a most hearty loue and charity they haue euer succoured one another not sparing their liues and goods for their mutuall conseruation The first troubles that the Waldenses of Piedmont endured came from the report of certaine Priests sent thither by the Arch-bishop of Turin who informed that the people that were committed to their charge liued not according to the manners and be liefe of the Church of Rome neither offering for the dead nor caring for Masses or absolutions nor to get any of theirs out of the paines of Purgatory by any of their vsuall meanes The Arch-bishops of Turin haue persecuted them as much as lay in their power making them odious to their Princes who vnderstanding of the good report that their neighbours gaue of their milde honest conuersation Vignaux in his memorials fol. 7. and that they were a simple people fearing God of a good carriage without deceit or malice louing integrity and plaine dealing alwaies ready to serue their Princes and that very willingly they yeelded vnto them all dutifull obedience and that with alacrity Being in such grace and fauour with the people their neighbours that they endeauoured to bring into Piedmont to their seruice their young people and to prouide their nurses amongst them to bring vp their yong infants the said Princes continued a long time in a purpose not to molest them but the Priests and Monkes that were frequent amongst them gaining nothing by this their beliefe charged them with an infinite number of Calumnies and whensoeuer they went into Piedmont vpon occasion of businesse they alwaies caught one or other and deliuered him to the Inquisitors and the Inquisitors to the executioner In such manner that there was hardly any Towne or Citty in Piedmont in which one or other of them was not put to death For Iordan Tertian was burnt at Suse Hypolite Roussier was burnt at Turin Villermin Ambroise was hanged at Meane as also Anthony Hiun Hugh Chiampe de Fenestrelles being taken at Suse was conueied to Turin where his bowels were torne out of his belly and put into a bason and hee afterwards cruelly martyred among which the seruants of God there were some who haue maintained that truth which they haue knowne for aboue two hundred and fifty yeeres and others aboue a hundred and fifty But amongst all the rest the constancy of one Catelin Girard is worthy the remembrance who being vpon the blocke whereon hee should bee burnt at Reuel in the Marquisate of Saluces he requested his executioners to giue him a coupple of stones into his hands which they refused to doe fearing he had a purpose to fling them at some one or other but hee protesting the contrary at the last they deliuered them vnto him Vignaux in his memorials fol. 7. who hauing them in his hands said vnto them when I shall haue eaten these stones then shall ye see an end of that religion for which you put me to death and so cast the stones vpon the ground The fires were kindled vntill the yeere one thousands foure hundred eighty eight at what time they resolued to assault them by open force because besides that they perceiued that the constancy of those whom they did publikely put to death drew a great number of others to the knowledge of God they likewise found that by this meanes they should neuer come to their purposed designe And therefore they leuied men to ioyne with Albert de Capitaneis one put in Commission by Pope Sixtus the fourth and Innocent the eight There were eighteene thousand souldiers mustered besides a great number of the Inhabitants of Piedmont who ran to the pillage from all parts They marched all at once to Angrongne Lucerne la Perouse Saint Martin Prauiglerm and Biolet which is in the Marquisate of Saluces as also they raised troopes in Vaucluson in Dauphine ouerrunning the Valley of Pragela to the end that being bound to their owne defence they might not be able to fauour their neighbours the Waldensian Churches in Piedmont All this was guided by the singular prouidence of God in that they diuided their troopes by bands rather out of their pride then for their better expedition For notwithstanding they were all imployed in their owne defence and could not succor one another yet the enemy by this diuision did
hands by the Inquisitors This Parliament caused a great number to be burnt at Turin in immitation of other Parliaments in France who burnt in those times those they called Lutherans They had recourse vnto the King presenting vnto him their petition that they might not be persecuted by the said Parliament for the profession of that Religion in the which they and their ancestors had liued for many hundred yeeres and that by the permission of their Princes But they made it worse with them then it was before for the King enioyned them to liue according to the laws of the Church of Rome vpon paine to bee chastised as Heretickes He likewise commanded the Court of Parliament at Turin to cause all his Subiects within their iurisdiction to professe his religion Adding withall that he did not burne the Lutherans throughout his whole Kingdome of France to make a reseruation of them among the Alpes The Parliament endeuoured speedily to put the commandement of the King in execution and for that cause enioyned them vpon paine of their liues to quit themselues presently of their Ministers and to receiue Priests to sing Masse liuing after the manner of other the Kings subiects They answered that they could not obey any such commands against the commandement of God whom in what belonges vnto his seruice they would rather obey then men But had not the King at that time had other imployments elsewhere without all doubt this Parliament would haue made them doe that by force which they would not be brought vnto by simple commands They therefore contented themselues to prosecute them by the Inquisition and to receiue from the Monkes those they condemned to the fire But afterwards in the yeere 1555 they increased the persecution For hauing condemned to the fire one Barthelmew Hector a Stationer who was executed at Turin because hee died with admirable constancy insomuch that hee edified the assistants and standers by in such manner that he drew teares from their eyes and words of compassion from their mouthes iustifying him with a mutuall applause which they gaue of his good speeches and prayers vnto God The Parliament tooke occasion herupon to do their best endeauor to ouerthrow this profession in the very source and to vse the authority of the King to enforce this people to liue vnder the lawes of the Church of Rome In the Booke of the martyrs of our time lib. 8. fol 122. or miserably to perish To this end and purpose the Parliament of Turin deputed a certaine President of Saint Iulian and a Collaterall named de Ecclesia to transport themselues vnto those places and there to put in practice whatsoeuer they thought good either to reduce or to exterminate the said people with promise to assist them with whatsoeuer shall be needfull to this purpose according to the aduise and counsell they should receiue from them This President with his Collaterall ttooke their iourney to Perouse and caused Proclamations publikly to be made in the name of the King that euery one of the Inhabitants was to goe to Masse vpon paine of his life Afterwards they came to Pignerol where they cited many to appeare before them Amongst others there appeared a poore simple labouring man whom the President commanded to cause his child to be re-baptized which had lately been baptized by the minister of Saint Iohn neere Angrongne This poore man requested so much respite as that he might pray vnto God before hee answered him Which being granted with some laughter he fell downe vpon his knees in the presence of all that were there and his prayer being ended he said to the President that hee would cause his childe to be re-baptised vpon condition that the said President would discharge him by a bill signed with his owne hand of the sinne which he should commit in causing it to be re-baptized and beare one day before God the punishment and condemnation which should befall him taking this iniquity vpon him and his Which the President vnderstanding hee commanded him out of his presence not pressing him any farther Now hauing framed diuers indictments against some particular persons of the said Valleys and made some collections of whatsoeuer the President could imagine might hurt the people hee assayed also to winne them by the preachings of the Monkes whom he brought with him into the Valley of Angrongne Being therefore come vnto the place where their Temple was he caused one of his Monkes to preach in the presence of the people who made vnto them a long exhortation to returne vnto the Church of Rome of which hee reported many things which the people beleeued not After that the Monke had said as much as he would and that he held his peace the greatest number of the people required that the Pastors that were there present or some one of them for all might be permitted louingly and mildly to answer to the discourse that had been made by the Preacher but the President by no meanes would giue way thereunto whereupon there followed a certaine rumour or muttering among the people which strooke the President and his Monkes with an astonishment in such sort that they could haue been content to haue been elsewhere but dissembling their feare the President retired himselfe without a word speaking to Turin whether being come hee related to the Parliament what hee had done and withall signified vnto them the difficulties that were to winne this people by extremities because if any attempt should bee made to take them by violence they were resolued to defend themselues and the places of their abode being fauourable vnto them it was to bee feared it would cost a great deale of labour and much blood would bee shed before they could either bee brought into the Church of Rome or out of the world That is was the worke of a King to roote them out and a King of Franc and therefore it was necessary to send the reports and to commit vnto his owne will and pleasure the issue of so troublesome an enterprise This aduice was followed the indictments and reports were sent to the King but as the affaires of the Court cannot be finished but with long time there passed a whole yeere before there was any other course spoken of or taken against them then that of the Inquisitors who alwaies deliuered some one or other to the secular power but the yeere being expired there came from the Court expresse commands of the King to make them to doe that by force which they would not be brought vnto by words or friendly vsage The Parliament re-sent the said President of Saint Iulien who so soone as hee was arriued at Angrongne he commanded them in the name of the King to goe to the Masse vpon paine of Confiscation of bodies and goods They demanded a Copy both of his commission and his speech promising to answere him in such a manner that he should haue reason to rest contented but nothing could
of Calabria soiourned in in Prouence that is to disburden their Valleys of the great multitudes of people that were there And though in the beginning of their arriuall in Prouence the Country where they made their abode was a desart yet they made it in few yeeres fertile and fit by the blessing of God to yeeld Corne Wine oyle of Oliues Chestnuts and other fruits and that in great aboundance The first persecutions which they suffered are not come to our knowledge notwithstanding we finde ouen at this day the Commissions that haue been giuen by the Popes and Anti-popes residing in Auignon very neere to the place of their abiding against the Waldenses inhabiting in Prouence as that of the Arch-deacon of Cremona See before in the 3. Chap. Albert de Capitaneis and of the Monke frier Minor Francis Borelli hauing Commission against them in the yeer 1380 to make inquiry of the Waldenses in the Diocesse of Aix in Prouence Arles and Selon As also when they were retired into the said Prouince in the yeere 1228 when the Arch-bishop of Aix Arles and of Narbonne were assembled at Auignon to giue aduice to the Inquisitors touching the Waldenses See Chap. 2. who then said as you haue heard before that the Inquisitors had apprehended so great a number that there was not onely a want of victuall to feed them but of lyme and stone to build their prisons It is most certaine that then the Waldenses of Prouence dwelling as it were in the very gates of the Popes Palace and about their Earledome of Auignon were not forgotten But forasmuch as we haue no Copies of instruments that may make good the said persecutions we will insert into this discourse nothing but what we shall be able sufficiently to proue The first persecution is that whereof we haue the History in the time of King Lewis the twelfth about the yeere 1506 That is that this good King being informed that there were in Prouence a certaine kind of people that liued not according to the lawes of the Church of Rome but were an accursed people committing all manner of wickednesse and villanies euen such as the very memory of them strooke a horrour into mens hearts and the Christians in the primitiue Church had been vpbraided with he gaue Commission to his Court of Parliament in Prouence to take knowledge thereof and to chastise them according to their merit Whereunto the said Court hauing diligently attended so soone as the King vnderstood that diuers innocent persons were put to death he limited the authority of the said Court and would not suffer them to continue their executions vntill he were truely informed Vesembecius in Oratione de Waldensibâ—s what kind of people they were that to him had been reported to be so wicked To this purpose he sent Master Adam Fumee his Master of requests who told him at his returne that what had been giuen him to vnderstand touching the Waldenses of Prouence was very vntrue for they were not any way tainted either with sorcery or whoredome but that they liued like honest men doing hurt to no man they caused their children to be baptized taught them the Articles of their beliefe and the Commandements of God they carefully kept the Lords day and the word of God was purely expounded vnto them Vesembecius in Orotione de Waldensibus His auditis Rex iureiurando addito me inquit caetero populo meo Catholico meliores illi viri sunt A certaine Iacobin Monke named Parui confessor to the King witnessed as much who by the King was ioyned in Commission with the said Master of Requests Which the King hauing vnderstood he said and bound it with an oath that they were honester men then himselfe or the rest of his Catholike people This persecution being stained by King Lewis the twelfth they continued in peace vnto the raigne of King Francis the first of that name and at what time there was some speech in France of a reformation of Religion they sent two of their Pastors that is to say George Morel of Frassinieres in Dauphine and Peter Masson of Burgundy to Oecolampadius Minister at Basse to Capito and Martin Bucer at Strasbourg and to Berthand Haller at Berne to conferre with them about matters touching their Religion and to haue their aduice and counsell about many points wherein they desired to be better satisfied The Letters which Oecolampadius and Bucer sent vnto them are set downe at length in the first Booke of this History the Sixt Chapter where I endeauoured to make it appeare vnto the world that many great personages amongst them that made profession of reformation haue giuen testimony of their piety and probity which is the reason why we insert them not againe in this discourse onely we will produce those of the Waldenses in their own language and afterwards in English Salut a Monseignor Oecolampadio CAr moti racontant a sona a nostras oreillas que aquel que po totas cosas c. The Letter of the Waldenses of Prouence to Mr. Oecolampadius Health to Master Oecolampadius FOrasmuch as diuers haue giuen vs to vnderstand and the report is come vnto our eares that he that is able to doe all things hath replenished you with the blessings of his holy Spirit as it well appeares by the fruites we who liue farre distant from you haue thought good to haue recourse vnto you and with ioyfull hearts we hope and trust that the holy Ghost will illuminate vs by your meanes and will satisfie vs concerning many things whereof we are now in doubt and are hidden from vs because of our ignorance and negligence and as it is to be feared to 〈…〉 and the people whom we teach with great insufficiency For that you may know at once how matters stand Wee such as we are weake instructers of this little flocke haue remained for aboue foure hundred yeeres in the middest of sharpe and cruell thornes and yet in the meane time not without the great fauour of Christ as all the faithfull can easily testifie for this people hath many times been deliuered by the fauour and mercy of God being gored and tormented by the said thornes And therefore we come vnto you to be counselled and confirmed in our weaknesse They writ another Letter to the same purpose to Martin Bucer the which for breuities sake we omit wherein they relate that they had addressed themselues for the selfe same cause to their brethren of Newcastle Morat and Berne which shewes how carefull the Waldenses were to seeke out all manner of meanes that their vnderstandings might be enlightned in the mysteries of piety for the saluation of their soules especially seeing that then they sought the meanes to aduance and order their Church in the open view of the world when the fires were kindled throughout all France against those of the same Religion that they were who in those times were called Lutherans The greater
there remaine in peace both of body and soule he returned into his Country and perswaded many to goe to Bohemia and to inhabit there who were louingly entertained and after that time there haue been no assemblies of the Waldenses in particular but they haue ioyned themselues vnto the Churches of the Hussites CHAP. XI Of the Waldenses inhabiting in Germany and the persecutions that there they suffered whereof we haue the proofes NOtwithstanding that incontinently after that Peter Waldo with those that followed him came into Germany there was so great a persecution along vpon the Rhine by the incitement and instigation of the Archbishops of Mayence and Strasbourg that there were burnt in one day in one fire Dubranius in the history of Bohemia to the number of eighteene yet wee find that in the time of the Emperor Frederic the second about the yeere one thousand two hundred and thirteene Germany and especially Alsatia was full of the VValdenses The searchers were so diligent and exact Coistans vpon the Reuel that they were inforced to disperse themselues into other places to auoide the persecution This flight turned to the great benefit of the Church because hereby many learned Teachers were scattered here and there to make knowne vnto the world the purity of their Religion In the yeere one thousand two hundred thirty a certaine Inquisitor named Conrad de Marpurg Vigâ—ier in the 1. part of his Bibli Historiale was ordained by the Pope Superintendent of the Inquisition He exercised this charge with extreame cruelty against all sorts of persons without any respect euen of the Priests themselues Trithem in Chron. Hirsaugiensi Godefridus Monan Aunalâ—bus whose bodies and goods he confiscated He tried men with a hot iron saying that they that could hold an iron red hot in their hands and not be burnt were good Christians but on the contrary if they felt the fire he deliuered them to the secular power In these times the Waldenses had in the Diocesse of Treues many Schooles wherein they caused their children to be instructed in their beliefe and notwithstanding all the Inquisitions persecutions executed vpon their flockes yet they aduentured to preach Krautz in Metropol l. 8. §. 18 in Saxon l. 8. ca. 16. calling their assemblies by the sound of a bell maintaining in publica statione saith the Historiographer publikly that the Pope was an hereticke his Prelates Simonaicall and seducers of the people That the truth was not preached but amongst them and that had not they come amongst them to teach God before he would haue suffered their faith to perish would haue raised others euen the stones themselues to enlighten his Church by the preaching of the word Vntill these times say they our Preachers haue buried the truth and preached lyes we on the contrary preach the truth and bury falshood and lyes and lastly we offer not a feined remission inuented by the Pope but by God alone and according to our vocation Mathew Paris an English writer obserueth that about the yeere 1220 Math Paris in Henry 3. anno 1220. there were a great number in a part of Germany that tooke armes where the Waldenses were cut in peeces being surprised in a place of great disaduantage hauing on the one side a marish ground and on the other the sea in such sort that it was impossible for them to escape About the yeer 1330 they were strangely vexed in many parts of Germanie Vignier in his third part of his Historicall Biblio in the yeere 1330. by a certaine Iacobin Monke Inquisitor named Echard but after many cruelties executed vpon them as hee pressed the Waldenses to discouer vnto him the reasons for which they were seperated from the Church of Rome being vanquished in his owne conscience and acknowledging those defects and corruptions which they alleaged to be in the Church of Rome to bee true and not being able to disproue the points of their beliefe by the word of God he gaue glory vnto God and confessing that the truth had ouercome him hee became a member of that Church which hee had a long time before persecuted to the death The other Inquisitors being aduertised of this alteration were much displeased and they sent presently so many after him that in the end hee was apprehended and brought to Heidelberg where he was burnt maintaining that it was iniustice and wrong to condemne so many good men to death for the righteousnesse of Christ against the inuentions of Antichrist In the yeere 1391 the Monkes Inquisitors tooke in Soxony and Pomerania foure hundred forty three VValdenses Krautzin Metrop l. 8. p. 18. in â—ax l. 8. cap. 16. who all confessed that they had been instructed in that beliefe for a long time by their ancestors and that their teachers came from Bohemia In the yeere one thousand foure fifty seuen the Monkes Inquisitors of the Diocesse of Eisten in Germany discouered many VValdenses which they put to death They had amongst them twelue Pastors that instructed them We must not ouerpasse the thirty fiue Burgesses of Mayence that were burned in the Towne of Bingue because they were knowne to be of the beliefe of the VValdenses nor the fourescore which the Bishop of Strasbourg caused to be burnt in one fire nor that which Trithemius recounts that they confessed in in those times that the number of VValdenses was so great that they could goe from Cologne to Milan and lodge themselues with hostes of their owne profession and that they had signes vpon their houses and gates whereby the might know them But the most excellent instrument amongst them that God imployed in his seruice was one Raynard Lollard who at the first was a Franciscan Monke and an enemy of the VValdenses but yet a man carried with a sanctified desire to finde the way of saluation wherein he had so profited that his aduersaries themselues were constrained to commend him Iohn le Maire in the 3. part of the diff of Schismes in the 24. scisme For Iohn le Maire puts him in the ranke of those holy men that haue foretold by diuine reuellation many things that haue come to passe in his time This worthy man taught the doctrine of the VValdenses was apprehended in Germany by the Monkes Inquisitors and being deliuered to the secular power was burnt at Cologne This man hath writ a Commentary vpon the Apocalipse where hee hath set downe many things that are spoken of the Romane Antichrist This was he of whom the faithfull in England were called Lollards where he taught witnesse that Towre in London which at this present is called by his name Lollards Tower where the faithfull that professed his Religion were imprisoned CHAP. XII Of the VValdenses that haue been persecuted in England ENgland hath been one of the first places that hath been honoured for receiuing the Gospell for not long after that VValdo departed from Lion there were many condemned to
aboue fiftie yeeres Vnder this name wee comprehend all the subiects of the Earles Remonds of Toulouze father and sonne and the subiects of the Earles of Foix and Comminge and all those that haue taken part with them that haue fought for their Religion and suffered the selfesame persecutions They receiued the beleefe of the Waldenses a little after the departure of Waldo from Lion The instruments that were imployed in this worke were Peter Bruis one Henry one Ioseph one Esperon and Arnold Hott of whom they were afterward called Pierrebruisiens or Petrobrusiens Henriciens Iosephists Esperonists and Arnoldists but aboue all the rest Henry and Arnold trauelled in the Countrey of Albi and that with so good successe that in a short time there were found but a few and in some places not any that would goe any more to Masse affirming that the sacrifice of the Masse was onely inuented to enrich the Priests and to make them to be more esteemed in the world as making the Body of Christ by their words and sacrificing him to God the Father for the sinnes of the liuing and of the dead which was an impierie destroying the sacrifice of the Sonne of God and annihilating the merit of his death and passion There were many that gaue eare to their reasons in the diocese of Rhodes Cahors Agen Toulouze and Narbonne Iaques de Riberia in his collections 〈◊〉 the Citie of Toulouze because the Doctors that taught amongst the Waldenses were learned men conuersant in the reading of the holy Scriptures whereas on the other side the Priests who studied nothing more than the sacrifices of the Masse and how to receiue their oblations for the dead were altogether ignorant and therefore contemned of the people Pope Alexander the third Claud. de Rubis in his History of the Citie o◠Lion Lib. 3. pa◠269. being much mooued with anger because he saw many great Prouinces to shake off the yoke of the Romish Church and to dispence with their obedience condemned them for Heretikes in the Councell of Latran Neuerthelesse they were in such a manner multiplied that in the yeere 1200. they possessed the Cities of Toulouze Apamies Montauban Villemur Saint Antonin Hologaray in his History of Foix. Puech Laurence Castres Lambes Carcassonne Beziers Narbonne Beaucaire Auignon Tarascon the Count Venecin and in Dauphine Crest Arnaud and Monteil-Amar And which is more they had many great Lords who tooke part with them that is to say the Earle Remond of Toulouze Remond Earle of Foix the Vicount of Beziers Gaston Lord of Bearne the Earle of Carmain the Earle of Bigorre the Lady of Lauaur and diuers others of whom we shall make mention in their deu place And besides all these the Kings of Aragon and of England haue many times defended their case by reason of that alliance that they had with the Earle Remond of Toulouze The doctrines that they maintained against the Church of Rome were these 1 That the Romish Church is not the holy Church and Spouse of Christ but a Church watered with the Doctrine of Deuils That Babylon which Saint Iohn hath described in the Apocalypse the mother of fornications and abominations couered with the bloud of Saints 2 That the Masse was not instituted by Christ nor by his Apostles but that it is the inuention of men 3 That the prayers of the liuing profit not the dead 4 That Purgatorie maintained in the Church of Rome was a humane inuention to glut and satisfie the couetousnesse of the Priests 5 That Saints are not to be praied vnto 6 That Transubstantiation is the inuention of men and an erroneous doctrine And that the adoration of the Bread is a manifest Idolatry And that therefore they were to forsake the Church of Rome wherein the contrary was affirmed and taught because a man may not bee present at the Masses where Idolatry is practised nor attaine saluation by any other meanes than by Iesus Christ nor transferre vnto the creatures the honor that is due to the Creator nor say of the Bread that it is God and adore it as being God without the incurring of eternall damnation for Idolaters shall not inherit the Kingdome of Heauen For all these things affirmed by them they haue beene hated and persecuted to the death CHAP. II. Pope Innocent the third of that name made shew of a desire to winne the Albingenses to the Church of Rome by preaching and conference A famous disputation at Montreal To what end the Pope permitted disputation in matter of Religion POpe Innocent the third of that name seemed to be carried with a desire to reduce the Albingenses vnto the Church of Rome by preachings and reasons or to oppresse them and vtterly root them out by violence of armes and by crueltie of punishments But before he would come to extremities he thought in necessary for the better iustification of his proceedings to begin with words and after wards to come to blowes Hee sent therefore amongst them certaine Preachers who endeuoured to draw them by gentle perswasions See here how the Compiler of the treasure of Histories speakes of those times The Comp. of the Treasure of Histories in the yeere 1206. When there came newes saith he to Pope Innocent the third that in his Prouince of Narbonne the traiterous Heresie was spread abroad not onely amongst the poore but Earles Barons and Knights he sent the Abbot of Cisteaux and two Monkes with him to preach against those disloyall buggerers When they had trauelled some little way preaching throughout the Countrey they came to Mompelier where they met with a worthy man that was Bishop of Cestre This honest man asked the Abbot of Cisteaux what hee did there He answered that the Pope had sent him thither against those Sodomites but that he could not conuert them This good man was nothing astonied at it but he still maintained the worke of the Lord valiantly and went on foot to giue good example to others and they stayed and went on foot with him Afterwards the Abbot returned to the Chapter or generall assembly but the Bishop and the two Monkes passing a long time through the Countrey and preaching they conuerted many of the meaner sort of people but of the great ones and richer sort there were few or none that returned to the true faith The Abbot came backe into the Countrey and brought with him another Abbot and diuers Monkes and came all on foot whereupon the Bishop of Cestre began to thinke with himselfe how to returne into his Countrey but dyed by the way The Monkes who preached throughout the Countrey found the Princes so obdurate in their malice that they resolued to stay no longer there but returned into their Countries except one good man who was called Frier Peter of Chasteauneuf who continued preaching with one of his companions When the Albingenses knew the intention of the Pope which was to prerend that he was not the cause why they whom
he iudged to be wanderers did not returne to the bosome of the Church of Rome by gentle meanes and force of reason they began to thinke that it stood them vpon to maintaine their beleefe by such conference otherwise they should giue occasion to the aduersaries to thinke that there was in their Religion some weaknesse if there were not any Pastor that would take vpon him the defence thereof It was therefore concluded amongst the Albingenses to giue the Bishops to vnderstand that their Pastors or any one of them for the rest were ready to maintaine their beleefe by the word of God prouided that the conference were well ordered and moderated that is to say that there may be moderators that are men of authoritie both on the one side and the other that may haue wherewithall to hinder all tumult and sedition Prouided also that it be in a place vnto which there may be free accesse and the place secured for all persons that may assist or be present at the said conference Moreouer that there bee some matter or subiect chosen by common consent not to bee giuen ouer before it be determined and that he that cannot defend it by the word of God is to bee reputed and held to be vanquished The Bishops and Monkes did all allow of the said conditions The place was Montreal neere Carcasonne This disputation was the most famous that hath bin betweene the Albingenses the Bishops and Priests the time in the yeere one thousand two hundred and six The Arbitrators agreed vpon by the one part and the other B. de Villeneufue and B. Auxerre for the Bishops and for the Albingenses R. de Bot and Antony Riuiere Arnold Hott was the Pastor for the Albingenses Chassagnon maketh mention in his first booke of the History of the Albingenses pag. 72. accompanied with those that were accounted fit for such an action He was the first that arriued at the place and day assigned Afterwards came the Bishop Eusus and the Monke Dominique a Spaniard with two of the Popes Legats that is to say Also Iaques de Riberia in his collect of the Citie of Toulouze Peter Chastel and Racul de Iust Abbot of Candets P. Bertrand Prior d' Auteriue as also the Prior de Palats and diuers other Priests and Monkes The Theses or tenerall questions proposed by Arnold This disputation was sent me from the Albingēses by Mr. Rafin Pastor of the Church of Realmont in old Manuscripts were these That the Masse with the Transubstantiation was the inuention of men not the ordinance of Christ nor his Apostles That the Romish Church is not the Spouse of Christ but the Church of tumult and molestation made drunken with the bloud of Martyrs That the policie of the Church of Rome is neither good nor holy nor established by Iesus Christ Arnold sent these Propositions to the Bishop who demanded a respit of fifteene dayes to answer which was granted him At the day appointed the Bishop failed not to appeare with a long and large writing Arnold Hott desired to bee heard by word of mouth saying That he would answer to all that was contained in the said writing intreating his auditorie that it might not be troublesome vnto them if he were long in answering to so long a discourse It was granted that he should bee heard with attention and patience and without interruption He discoursed at diuers houres for foure dayes together and with such admiration of those that were present and readinesse for his part that all the Bishops Abbots Monkes and Priests had reason to desire they had beene elsewhere For he framed his answer according to the points set downe in the said writing with such order and plainnesse that hee gaue all that were present to vnderstand that the Bishop hauing written much had neuerthelesse concluded nothing that might truly turne to the aduantage of the Church of Rome against his Propositions Afterwards Arnold made a request that forasmuch as the Bishops and himselfe in the beginning of their conference were bound to proue whatsoeuer they affirmed by the onely word of God it might bee imposed vpon the Bishops and Priests to make good their Masse such as they sing it part by part to haue beene instituted by the Sonne of God and sung in the like manner by his Apostles beginning at the entrance vnto the Ile Missa est as they terme it but the Bishops were not able to proue that the Masse or any part thereof was ordained in such an action either by Iesus Christ or his Apostles With this the Bishops were much discontented and ashamed For Arnold had brought them to the onely Canon which they pretended to be the best part of their Masse touching which point he proued That the holy Supper of our Lord was n ot the Masse For if the Masse were the holy Supper instituted by our Sauiour there would remaine after the Consecration all that which was in the Supper of the Lord that is to say Bread but in the Masse there is no bread for by Transubstantiation the bread is vanished away therefore the Masse saith he without bread is not the holy Supper of the Lord for there is bread Iesus Christ brake bread The Priest breakes the body not the bread St. Paul brake the bread The Priest breakes the body not the bread Therefore the Priest doth not that which Christ Iesus hath done and St. Paul Vpon these Antitheses which Arnold made touching the Supper of the Lord and the Masse to proue that it came not from Christ nor his Apostles the Monkes Bishops Legats and Priests retired themselues not being willing to heare any more and fearing lest they should worke such an impression in those that were present as might shake their beleefe touching the Masse The Monke of the Valley Seruay The Monke of the Valley Seruay in his Hist of the Albing chap. 5. endeuoureth to bring this action into suspition affirming that at what time the Hereticall Iudges exceeded in number seeing the badnesse of their cause and the wretchednesse of their disputation they would not saith hee giue any iudgement thereof nor deliuer their writings to their aduersaries for feare lest they should come to light and render to the Heretikes their owne But how should two Legats of the Pope the Bishops Abbots Monkes and Priests put themselues into any such place where they could bee thus ouercharged with number This Monke saith in the same place that the principall Arch-heretikes came to the Catholikes at the Castle of Montreal to dispute with them So that they held then the Castle and therefore there was no occasion of doubt or any such violence And furthermore how could it be that the Bishops should request the moderators to giue iudgement in a point of disputation when they hold that there needs no other sentence than the Popes who cannot erre Againe how did the Monke know that the Albingenses were ouercome if there
the walls and so entred the towne calying themselues towards the inhabitants thereof after the same manner as they had done before to those of Beziers for they put them all to the sword and fire Whilest those things were in doing the king of Aragon arriued at the army of the Legat and went first to the tent of the Earle Remond who was constrained to giue his assistance at this siege against his owne Nephew From thence he went to the Legat and told him that hauing vnderstood that his kinsman the Earle of Beziers was besieged within Carcassonne hee was come vnto him to doe his best endeuour to make the said Earle to vnderstand what his duty was towards the Pope and the Church which hee presumed hee should the more easily doe because hee knew well that the said Earle had alwaies made profession of the Romish religion The Legat gaue him leaue to vndertake what hee had said The king of Aragon made his approach to the Rampiers The Earle of Beziers came to parley with him The king of Aragon desired to know of him what had moued him to shut vp himselfe within the citie of Carcassonne against so great an Army of Pelerins The Earle answered that it greatly stood him vpon hauing so necessary and so iust cause to defend his life his goods and his subiects That hee knew well that vnder the pretence of religion the Pope had a purpose vtterly to ouerthrow the Earle Remond his vncle and himselfe That he found by that mediation which he had made for his subiects of Beziers the Romish Catholikes whereof he would not receiue into grace and fauour neither had spared the Priests themselues who were all cut in peeces euen adorned with their Priestly ornaments and vnder the banner of the Crosse That this example of cruell impietie added vnto that which had passed in the towne of Carcassonne where they were all exposed to fire and sword without distinction of age or sex had taught him not to looke for any mercy either at the hands of the Legat or his Pelerins And that therefore he chose rather to die with his subiects defending himselfe than to bee exposed to the mercy of so inexorable an enemy as the Legat was And that notwithstanding there were within the city of Carcassonne diuers of his subiects that were of a contrary religion to that of the Church of Rome yet they were such a kinde of people as had neuer wronged any that they were come to succor him at his greatest extremity and for this their good seruice he was resolued not to abandon them as they had promised for their part to expose their liues and goods for his defence to all hazard and danger whatsoeuer That his trust was in God who is the defender of the oppressed that he would bee pleased to assist them against that world of men ill-aduised who vnder the colour of meriting heauen haue forsaken their houses to burne and pill and sacke and ransacke and kill in the houses of other men without either reason iudgement or mercy The King of Aragon returned to the Legat who assembled together diuers of his great Lords and Prelates to heare and vnderstand what the King of Aragon would relate vnto him who told him that hee found the Earle of Beziers his kinsman much discontented with the former proceedings against his subiects of Beziers and the Towne of Carcassonne which gaue him reason to beleeue that forasmuch as they had not spared the Romish Catholikes nor the Priests that it was not a warre vndertaken for the cause of Religion but vnder the colour of Religion a kind of theeuery that his hope was that God would giue him the grace to make him know his innocencie and the iust occasion he had to defend himselfe that they should no longer hope they would yeeld themselues to their discretion because they saw their discretion was no other but to kill as many as should yeeld themselues thereunto And that therefore if it would please the Legat to grant vnto the Earle of Beziers and his subiects some tollerable composition that gentlenesse and mercy would sooner ioyne the Albingenses to the Church of Rome than extreme crueltie and that aboue all they should remember that the Earle of Beziers was young and a Romish Catholike who might doe good seruice for the reducing of those that did any way relie or put their trust in him The Legat answered the King of Aragon that if hee would retire himselfe a little they would consult together of that which should be fittest to be done The King being recalled the Legat gaue him to vnderstand that for his sake and in consideration of his intercession he would receiue the Earle of Beziers vnto mercie and with him some dozen might likewise come forth with their bag and baggage if hee thought good but for the people that were within the Citie of Carcassonne they should not depart but at his discretion The Monke of the Valley Sernay Chap. 20. Du Hailan in his History of France touching the siege of Carcassenne whereof they should hope well and haue a good opinion because hee was the Popes Legat and that they should all come forth naked men women maids children without shirts or smocks or other couering to hide their nakednesse Also that the Earle of Beziers should be deliuered to sure guard and all his goods to remaine to the future Lord of that Countrey which should be chosen for the preseruation thereof The King of Aragon though he saw this composition to be vnworthy the proposing to the Earle of Beziers yet neuerthelesse thought good to discharge his office herein to whom the Earle of Beziers answered That he would neuer come forth vpon conditions so seasoned and so vniust and that hee was resolued to defend himselfe with his subiects by such meanes as it should please God to giue vnto him The King of Aragon retired himselfe not without shew of the great discontent he receiued by this vniust proceeding The Legat hereupon commanded all his engins of warre to play and that they should take the Citie by force But it was a spectacle little pleasing vnto him for hee was an eye-witnesse of the losse of a great number of his Pelerins For they of the Citie threw downe such a quantitie of great stones with fire and pitch and brimstone and boyling water and gauled the assaylants with such infinite numbers of arrowes that the earth was couered and the ditches filled with the dead bodies of the Pelerins which caused a wonderfull noysome stench both in the Campe and in the Citie This rude vnwelcome ouerthrow caused many of his Souldiers of the Crosse to forrage and seeke for booty abroad as hauing accomplished their tearme of fortie daies during the which they had gained Paradice and refusing to conquer any more after so faire a purchase for feare they should change their former felicitie for blowes The Legat being much troubled to see his
therefore they should consult with themselues to cast their eyes vpon some one of the Lords of the Crosse to whom the conquered Countries might be committed and the care for the direction of this holy warre vntill it might be otherwise determined by the Pope This charge was first offered to the Duke of Burgongue afterwards to the Earle of Enneuers and to the Earle of St. Paul who did all refuse it Which the Legat seeing and perceiuing it would be a difficult matter to agree in the nomination of a Captaine with one mutuall consent they named two Bishops with the Abbot of Cisteaux Legat of the Apostolike Sea and foure men of Armes to whom they gaue power to choose him that hereafter should leade the Armie of the Church They named the Earle Simon of Montfort neere Paris notice whereof being giuen vnto him hee excused himselfe alledging his incapacitie and vnhabilities but in the end he accepted of it after that the Abbot of Cisteaux had laid his commandement vpon him enioyning him by vertue of obedience to accept of the said nomination The Treasure of Histories in the Treat of Albingenses whereupon hee promised saith the Compiler of the Treasure of Histories to doe his best endeauour to vex the enemies of our Lord for so they tearme the Albingenses The Earle Simon of Montfort being Generall of the Armie of the Church made his abode at Carcassonne with foure thousand of his Pelerins which as yet remained of that great Leuy of three hundred thousand men Montreal Fauiaux and Limons contributed great summes of money for the Garison For they were not to harbour those Pilgrims that were not bound to any seruice their time of fortie daies being expired but such Souldiers as were well affected for the guard of that place In this meane time the Earle Remond of Toulouze went to King Phillip Dieu-donne to get his letters of Commendation to the Pope to the end he might bee fully cleered and iustified touching the death of the Monke Frier Peter de Chasteauneuf of the which hee was iniustly forced to confesse himselfe guilty onely because the murder was committed within his territories for which the Legat Milon had imposed an vniust penance vpon From the Court of the King of France he trauelled to Rome where he did immediatly receiue his absolution of Pope Innocent the third as if it had beene ready and prouided for him The Pope receiued him with all the curtesie that might be giuing him for a present a rich Cloke and a Ring of great price and granting vnto him full remission and absolution touching the said murder and declaring that he held him in this regard sufficiently instified The Earle of Beziers being prisoner at Carcassonne dyed shortly after the Earle Simon of Montfort was put in possession of his Lands not without great suspition of poison The Earle Simon made shew to be much grieued therewith and caused him to be interred in the great Church of Carcassonne with great pompe and with his face vncouered to the end that none of his Subiects might afterwards doubt of his death Presently after he made challenge to the inheritance and whole estate of the said Earle by vertue of those donations which the Legat of the Pope had conferred vpon him and that charge that was laid vpon him for the Church In pursuit whereof hee demanded of the King of Aragon the inuestiture of the Earledome of Beziers and the Citie of Carcassonne The King of Aragon would not yeeld thereunto bewraying much discontent to see this house ouerthrowne vnder a pretence of Religion The like discontent did the Duke of Bourgongue shew at what time the charge of the Generall was offered vnto him saying Chassag pag. 126. That hee had Lands and Lordships enough without the accepting of those of the Earle of Beziers and the spoiling him of his goods adding therewithall that he had alreadie suffered wrong enough All the bordering neighbours of the Earle Simon began to feare him vpon a report which he gaue forth that at the spring following he would haue a great Armie of Pelerins at his command and that then hee would chastise those which had not acknowledged the authoritie wherein the Church had placed him Castres sent vnto him the Keyes of their Citie by some of their Bourgesses The Castle of Pamies was yeelded vnto him euery one submitted themselues to his command round about Carcassonne and the Vicountie of Beziers But he receiued a back-blow in the middest of his prosperitie which was a presage vnto him of some euill For the King of Aragon keeking secretly the Gentlemen of the Vicountie of Beziers in breath encouraged them to bring vnto equall termes this petty-tyrant who was brought in for the good of another saying That if he were not constrained to haue alwaies a world of Pilgrims for his conquests he would abuse this his rest to take heart to inuade the goods of all those that are neere adioyning vnder a pretence of that charge hee hath from the Pope but if he once knew how dangerous it would be for him to want his Souldiers of the Crosse hee would be better aduised considering that it is not possible that he should alwaies haue so great a number of Pilgrims that should alwaies make him fearefull for there must be time for the leuying of them time for the conducting of them from farre Countries and if he should make no vse of them within fortie daies of their arriuall hee would be more weake than before after the expiration of their Pilgrimage That to hurt and hinder him there can be no better course taken than to keepe themselues locked vp in their Garrisons at the comming of the Pilgrims and at their departure when they were weake to set vpon him on euery part that at the last he will be so weary of his great trauels that he will thinke he hath bought at a deare rate the good which he beleeued he had gotten by the title of a Donation of those that had nothing to giue The King of Aragon added hereunto that he had neuer heard of any so vniust a vsurpation for if this war were made to take away the goods and liues of the Albingensens by what title had the Legat confiscated the goods of the Earle of Beziers who had alwaies liued and also died in the beleefe of the Church of Rome That he therefore perceiued that the greatest crime they could finde in the said Earle was that they found him to be young and no way powerfull That if God gaue him life he would make it appeare that he loued the Earle of Beziers and that he was his Kinsman and would likewise shew himselfe a true friend to those that had any feeling of those wrongs and outrages that were offered him Those hopes to be succoured by the King of Aragon gaue heart and courage vnto those that with great impatiency bare the dominion and power of the Earle Simon of Montfort
The Monke of the Valley Sernay Chap. 33. in such sort that the said Earle being one day gone from Carcassonne to Montpelier he found at his returne that diuers had taken Armes to shake off their yoake hauing besieged certaine of his Souldiers in a Tower neere to Carcassonne He speedily made his returne to succour them but too late for not being able to passe a Riuer called Sarasse and being gone to Carcassonne to passe by the bridge the Tower was taken before hee came This small affront brought him into some contempt and gaue heart to others to offer the like About this time Captaine Boucard for the said Earle Simon at the Castle of Seissac attempted the surprise of the strong Castle of Cabaret whereof mention hath beene made heretofore for this end and purpose he made his approach vnto the said Castle as closely as he could Captaine Roger who was within the said Castle for the Earle Remond was come forth with fourescore horse to forrage and seeke for bootie Boucard vpon the sudden and vnlooked for charged him and had well-neere discomfited him but Roger hauing taken knowledge of the enemy doubled the charge vpon him in so furious a manner that he ouercame the troops of Boucard and brought him Prisoner to that Castle which he said he came to surprise At this very time Gerard of Pepios tooke part with the Albingenses and seized vpon Puisorignier and the Castle of Menerbe Now the warre began to grow very cruell for if it be true that the Monke of the Vallies Sernay hath written Gerard caused the eyes of all the Souldiers of the Earle Simon which he could take to be pluckt out and cut off their eares and their noses with their vpper lip sent them all naked to the Earle Simon of Montfort leauing one for a guide vnto the other with one eye On the other part whensoeuer the Earle Simon was victorer in any place he caused a great fire to bee made and cast into it as many of the Albingenses as he could take All they of the Romish Church did as much that bare Armes for the Albingenses for William of Rochford Bishop of Carcassonne caused the Abbot of Cisteaux to be slaine meeting him neere vnto Carcassonne his body being found murdered with six and thirtie wounds and the Monke which accompanied him with foure and twentie Then the Citie of Carcassonne saith the Monke and the Souldiers that were in it were stricken with such feare That they had little hope to defend themselues but by flight for they saw themselues saith he enuironed on all sides with infinite enemies From these miseries which did much moue the patience of the Earle Simon hee tooke occasion to write to all the Prelats throughout Europe that if in the Spring following he were not assisted with new succours of Pilgrims it was impossible for him to hold out for his enemies finding his weaknesse tooke the aduantage thereof witnesse that after the last departure of the Pilgrims he had lost aboue forty townes Castles of which the people had before brought him the keyes and were now all reuolted from him and the Church being beyond his power to remedy it for want of men Hee therefore intreated them in the name of God to giue their helping hand otherwise he must be enforced to yeeld vp the rights of the Church and the Countrey altogether Now matters thus standing the Earle Simon attending new succours tooke the Castle of Beron neare Montreal where he caused the eies of aboue a hundred Albingenses to bee pulled out and cut off their noses leauing onely one with one eye to bee a guide to the rest and to conduct them to Cabaret This stirred vp the Albingenses in such sort Chass pag. 136. that had not succours instantly come they had shut him vp on euery side CHAP. VII New succours of Pilgrimes come to the Earle Simon conducted from France by his Wife The Earle Simon by them recouereth the Castles of Menerbe and Termes and the Towne De la Vaur The Earle Remond is cited before the Legat He refuseth to appeare Folquet the Bishop of Toulouze ouer-reacheth him causeth him to lose the Castle Narbonnes The Legat Milon dieth IN the yeare one thousand two hundred and ten the Earle Simon being shut vp saith the Treasure of Histories within Carcassonne for want of Pilgrims he vnderstood that the Countesse his Wife came from France and brought with her a great number of Pelerins which gaue him great comfort and he went out to meet her A pleasant warre it was wherein Priests leuied the Souldiers and a woman conducted them to the warres The Pelerins were imployed in the recourerie of the Castle of Menerbe a place very strong by nature vpon the Frontiers of Spaine This siege was procured by the intreatie of Ameri Lord of Narbonne and the Inhabitants thereof who complained that alwaies in former times this place had beene as a thorne in their feet They yeelded themselues for want of water to the discretion of the Legat who caused the Pilgrims to enter the place with the Crosse and the Banner and singing Te Deum laudamus The Abbot of Vaux would needs preach to those that were within the Castle and to exhort them to acknowledge the Pope and to sticke to the Romish Church but they not staying till he had ended his Discourse they all of them cryed out The Monk of the Vallies of Sernay chap. 47. Chass lib. 3. chap. 7. saying We will not forsake our faith we reiect the Romish you labour but in vaine for neither life nor death shall make vs to abandon our beleefe Vpon this answer the Earle Simon and the Legat commanded a great fire to bee made and cast into it a hundred and fortie persons as well women as men who went into it with ioy giuing thankes vnto God for that it pleased him to doe them the honour to suffer and to dye for his names sake Thus did these true Martirs of Christ Iesus finish their fraile liues in the midst of the flames to liue eternally in heauen And thus did they triumph ouer the Legat of the Pope resisting him to his face and threatning the iust iudgement of God vpon the Earle Simon and that one day hee would pay dearely for his cruelties howsoeuer he seemed now to commit them scotfree yet he would pay for all when the bookes should be opened There were a number of Priests and Monkes that did exhort them to take pitty on themselues promising them their liues if they would liue according to the beleefe of the Church of Rome There were only three women that accepted of the condition that is to say to liue by abiuring their religion all the rest died constantly but they were vanquished by the allurements of the mother of Richard de Marsiac After this expedition Termes The Lord of Tholo in the hist of his times pa. 459. the Earle Simon besieged the Castle of
Roger de Leni The Earle of Comminge his lands which one named Ioris detained from him An aduantagious encounter for the Albingenses in Lauragues Expeditions of small effect after the death of the Earle Simon The Prince Lewis tooke Marmande and returned into France hauing summoned Toulouze to yeeld it selfe THe Earle Remond followed the victory making himselfe Master of the Castle of Narbonnes and fortifying it against the Pilgrims which hee knew very well would come the yeere following in the meane time hee sent his sonne into Agenois who brought vnto the obedience of his father Condon Holagaray in his history of Foix. 162. Marmande Aguillon and other places adioyning On the other side the Earle of Foix besieged Mirepoix summoned Roger de Leni to restore it vnto him telling him that hee was not now to hope any longer in the Earle Simon for he was dead that it must content him that he had now long enough and vniustly kept that which was his That if he changed his patience into furie he would lose both his life and Mirepoix altogether It troubled much the Marshall of the Faith for that was the vaine title which the Legats had giuen him to yeeld vp this place but in the end he deliuered it into the hands of the Earle of Foix. The Earle of Comminge had also his right of one Ioris to whom the Legats had giuen all that the Souldiers of the Crosse had taken in his Countries for he tooke them all from him yea life and all At the spring of the yeere following 1219. Almaric or Aimeri of Montfort came into Agenois with some troopes of Souldiers of the Crosse to recouer that which his father had there possessed and for this cause hee besieged Marmande The young Earle Remond of Toulouze went to succour the besieged when the Earle of Foix writ vnto him that hee had gotten a great bootie in Lauragues both of people and beasts but he feared hee should not bring it to Toulouze and not be fought withall by the way by the Garrison of Carcassone and therefore hee entreated him to succour him Young Remond tooke his iourney towards him and came in so good an houre to the Earle Foix that being vpon the point of losing his booty being followed by the Vicount of Lautrec and the Captaines Faucant and Valas. Being come to the combat Chass lib. 4. chap. 13. the said Foucant and Valas encouraged with a loud voice their Pilgrims saying that they fought for Heauen and for the Church The young Earle Remond hearing it cryed vnto his as loud as he Courage my friends for we fight for our Religion and against theeues and robbers vnder the name of the Church They haue robbed enough let vs make them vomit it vp againe and pay the arrerages of their thefts which they haue heretofore freely committed And hereupon they gaue the Charge The Vicount of Lautrec fled Foucant was taken prisoner and all their troopes cut in peeces Seguret a Captaine and professed robber was taken and hanged in the field vpon a tree Thus victorious and laden with bootie they came to Toulouze with their prisoners and cattell The siege of Marmande continued but vnprofitably and without any aduantage For Almaric hauing caused a generall assault to be made the inhabitants defended themselues with such valour and resolution that the ditches were full of the dead bodies of the Pilgrims This was at that time when the great expedition of Prince Lewis arriued who brought with him thirtie Earles An expedition for the leuying whereof the Legat Bertrand writ in these termes to King Philip Faile you not to be in the quarters of Toulouze for the whole moneth of May in the yeere 1219. with all your forces and powers to reuenge the death of the Earle Montfort and I will procure that the Pope shall publish and preach the Croisade or expedition of Christians throughout the world for your better aid and succours Thus you see how the Legat commands the King of France His sonne arriued at Marmande and summoned those within to yeeld They compound with him and he promiseth them their liues Almaric complaines thereof saying that they were not worthy of life that tooke away his Fathers He assembleth the Prelats declareth vnto them the discontent which he receiued by this composition in that life was granted vnto those who were the murderers of his Father The Prelats were all of opinion that notwithstanding the word giuen they should all die Prince Lewis his will was that the composition should hold Almaric neuerthelesse caused his troopes to slip into the Citie with charge to kill all men women and children They doe it whereat the Prince being offended departed from the Legat and Almaric and passing along summoned those of Toulouze to yeeld They defend themselues against him Hee receiueth newes of the death of his father which caused him to retire Thus you see all the effects of this great expedition which should haue buried all the Albingenses aliue and vanished without any assault giuen CHAP. IIII. The warre of the Albingenses changeth countenance because of the death of Pope Innocent the third of the change of the Legat the death of the Earle Remond of Toulouze of the disease of Remond Earle of Foix and the Lady Philippe de Moncade mother to the Earle of Foix and of the Monke Dominick THe Legat Bertrand Bonauenture being weary of the long labours of this warre and perceiuing that therein the danger was greater than either the pleasure or the profit tooke occasion vnder a pretence of his decrepit age to retire himselfe to Rome euen at that time when Pope Innocent the third being departed Pope Honorius his successour who had not managed this warre by his authoritie from the beginning thereof knew neither the importance thereof nor what direction to giue and therefore had need to be enformed by his Legat touching the meanes of the continuance thereof and the commoditie that might arise vnto his Seat Bonauenture entreated him to depute another Legat and told him that the necessitie of this warre was such that it concerned not onely the losse of all those Lands of the Albingenses which were conquered because they might be easily recouered by them if no opposition were made but also the ruine of the Church of Rome because the Doctrine of the Waldenses and Albingenses did directly shake the authoritie of the Popes and ouerthrow the Statutes of the Church That this warre had beene very chargeable and cost them deere for within the space of fifteene yeares and lesse there had died aboue three hundred thousand souldiers of the Crosse that at diuers times had come to end their liues in Languedoc as if there were not enough else-where to burie them or as if there were a necessitie in those times to be borne in France and to dye encountring the Albingenses That all this would be lost if they continued not to spend and weaken them vntill they were
Egyptians It is called Antichrist because being couered and adorned vnder the colour of Christ and of his Church and the faithfull members thereof it oppugneth the saluation purchased by Christ and truely administred in the Church of Christ whereof the faithfull are partakers by Faith Hope and Charity Thus it contradicteth the truth by the wisedome of the world by false religion by counterfeited holinesse by spirituall power secular tyrannie riches honours dignities and the delights and delicacies of the world Forasmuch therefore as it is manifest to euery one that Antichrist cannot come in any forme or fashion whatsoeuer but so as that all these things aboue mentioned must bee ioyned together to make a perfect hypocrisie and falsehood that is to say with the wise of the world the Religious Pharises Ministers Doctors with the secular power with the people of the world ioyned all together who then altogether make the man of sinne and errour fully compleate For notwithstanding Antichrist were long since conceiued in the Apostles times yet it was then in the infancie and it wanted members both inward and outward And therefore it was the more easily knowne and destroyed and keptvnder and being but rude and rusticall as yet was dumbe For it had not the wisedome nor the reason to excuse it selfe to define and pronounce sentence It had not as yet Ministers without truth it wanted humane Lawes and Statutes and outwardly it had no religious followers And therefore though it were fallen into errour and sinne yet it had nothing wherewith to couer its villany and the shame of errour and sinne for hauing neither riches nor doctations it could not winne Ministers for seruice nor multiply and preserue and defend its owne for it was destitute of secular power and helpe and could not inforce or constraine any from the trueth to falsehood And forasmuch as many things were wanting it could not pollute nor scandalize any with its trumperies and therefore being as yet tender and feeble could obtaine no place in the Church But afterwards growing in its members that is to say in its blinde Ministers and hypocrites and the vassals of the World it is growen to a perfect man in the fulnesse of age that is to say when the spirituall and secular louers of the World blinde in faith were multiplied in the Church with all power These being wicked and willing to be entreated and honoured touching things spirituall they haue couered their maiesty malice and sinnes by making vse of the wise men of the World and the Pharises to this purpose as it is said before Now this is a great wickednesse to couer and to adorne that iniquity worthy excommunâ—cation and to establish it by such a meanes as cannot by man bee giuen to man but belongs onely vnto God and to Iesus Christ as he is Mediator Most deceitfully and by rapine to take these things from God and to transferre them to it selfe and it workes seemes to be a great robbery as when it attributeth to it selfe the power to regenerate to forgiue sinnes to distribute the graces of the holy Spirit to make Christ and other the like things And in all these to couer it selfe with the cloake of authority and of the Word deceiuing by this meanes the rude people who follow the World separating themselues from God and the true Faith and the reformation of the holy Spirit from true repentance and the powerfull operation of perseuerance in good forsaking charity patience humility and that which is worst of all departing from the true hope and putting their trust in the vaine confidence of the World making themselues seruants to ceâ—emonies which make for these things fraudulently causing the people to fall downe and to worship the Idols of the World vnder the name of Saints and reliques in such sort that men wandring wickedly from the way of truth thinke they serue God and doe well and so they are moued to hatred and malice against those that loue the truth commit diuers murders of soules as the Apostle speakes truly This is that compleat man of sinne which exalteth himselfe aboue all that is called God and that oppugneth all truth who sits in the Temple of God that is in the Church shewing himselfe as if hee were God who is come with all falshood and lying for those that perish And forasmuch as he is truly come wee neede no longer expect him for hee is already olde by the permission of God yea he is already in the wayne and his power and authority much diminished for the Lord hath long since slaine this man of sinne with the breath of his mouth by sundry good and godly persons giuing them a power contrary to his and those that loue him and hath brought vnto naught his place and his possessions and diuided this City of Babylon in which all manner of wickednesse is in his full strength and vigour What the workes of Antichrist are THe first worke of Antichrst is to take away the truth and to change it into falsehood and errour and heresie The second to couer falsehood with the truth and to confirme an vntruth by seeming faith and by vertue and to mingle falsehood with things spirituall amongst those people that are subiect vnto him whether it bee by meanes of his Ministers or the Ministerie Now this two-fold manner of proceeding containeth a perfect and most accomplished malice which could not bee in any tyrant or powerfull Potentate from the beginning of the world vntill the time of Antichrist Neither hath Christ had any enemy before this which could so change the way of truth into falsehood or that had power to peruert those that make profession either of the one or the other that is to say of truth or falsehood In such sort that our holy Mother the Church with her true children is trodden vnder-foot especially for the true seruice of God and the Ministery thereof inso much that shee and her members breake out into those mournefull complaints of the Prophet Ieremy How doeth the Citie sit solitary that was full of people How is shee become a widdow that is destitute of the trueth of her Spause Shee that was great among the nations because of that power shee had ouer sinne and errour and the Princesse among the Prouinces by that part shee had in the world and the things in the world Mourne and behold with a carefull eye and thou shalt finde all these things accomplished euen in these times For the holy Church is reputed a Synagogue and the Synagogue of the wicked is acknowledged to bee the mother of those that beleeue in God and obey his Lawes Falsehood is Preached for truth wrong for right Iniustice is held for Iustice errour for faith sinne for vertue vanity for verity Obiect But what other workes proceed from these first Answer These that follow The first worke is that hee turneth that seruice and worship which is onely proper and due vnto God to himselfe and
deep resentment hereof and will endeavour the consolation and reestablishment of many thousands of persons escaped from this Butchery who have chosen rather to quit their Houses and Goods than to make shipwrack of their Faith This also is an occasion which God by his providence hath set before your Highness to shew the incomparable zeale which you have for his service and Glory and to give to the Protestants an evident prof of the affection your Highness bears them and to confirm them in the confidence they have conceived of your Highnes Protection This all the Israel of God expects from your Highness upon this occasion looking upon your Highness as a Zerubbabel whom God hath sent for the repairing of his Hierusalem I beseech the Lord who by the marveilous dispensations of his Providence hath rais'd your Highnes to this great dignity that he would grant you to be the Protector of the people of God in all Nations as he hath in this and that he would long preserve your Highness to the end you may imploy the power he hath given your Highness for the accomplishment of his great Works for the defence of his whole Church the preservation of them which remain and the reestablishment of the desolate and afflicted for the propagation of his Gospell the advancement of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ and the Glory of his great name Which is the Prayer My Lord of Your Highness's most humble faithfull and obedient servant J. B. Stouppe TO THE CHRISTIAN READER AMongst all the Churches of Christ that do profess the pure holy Religion which he hath taught in his Word that of the Waldenses is the most considerable as well for her Antiquity as for the sharp and continuall persecutions it hath suffred Her Antiquity is such that no man can truly find out her beginning so that even her Adversaries say that the Heresie of the Waldenses thus they call their Doctrine began in the Apostles dayes and allwaies hath been in the Valley of Angrogna But of all the Certificates which many Papists have given of the antiquity of the Waldenses and of their Doctrine that of Reynerius a Roman Inquisitor whose VVritings have been procured to us by Gretserus the Jesuite is most remarkable for thus he speakes of them Amongst all the Sects that are in the World there is none that hath been or is still more perncious than that of the VValdenses or Leonistes for three Reasons First because it hath lasted longer than all others some saying it began in Sylvester his time others deriving them from the Apostles Secondly because it is so Universall that there is no Countrie where it is not Thirdly because the Professors of it live more uprightly before men and hold all the Articles of the Apostles Creed blaspheaming onely against the Church of Rome and hating it But however this Reynerius living about the end of the Eleventh age of the Church and the beginning of the twelfth and so there being above 400. years since he did call the Waldenses an old Sect he shew's cleerely they had then been a time in the Church Besides it is certain as we find in many credible Historians that 1160. a great number of faithfull souls call'd then the poor of Lions or Waldenses because they had been taught by Peter Waldus a man of great Erudition and singular pietie being persecuted at Lions by the Roman Clergie by reason of the Reformation which he procur'd unto the Church they retir'd into those Vallies where finding the Natives to be of their own opinions they compos'd together those reform'd Churches of the Waldenses which have ever since subsisted Which proves that the reformed Religion profest in those Vallies did not begin within an age or two of this as some ignorant adversaries say but that it hath been either from the very Apostles or from the * Bishop Usher de Successione c. Pag. 151. and 210. first ages and that the Waldenses found there the seed of the true Religion having nothing to do on either side but to encourage each other to do better and better and to set up the banner of truth in the view of the world Since that time those poor Churches have always been the mark for worldlings to shoot at and spend against them all the arrows of their malice Sathan hath done all he could against them and Antichrist hath spar'd nothing to destroy them fires have been kindled and flames blown up to reduce them into ashes they have had experiments of the barbarous crueltie of men And as there is no war so bloudie as that which is undertaken in hatred of Religion so to suffer proscriptions and exiles confiscations of goods and imprisoning torturing and killing of bodies have been the ordinary excercises of the faithfull in those Countries Yet notwithstanding the great Massacres acted therein from age to age God by his Providence hath allwaies preserved a considerable number of them which made up many fine and flourishing Churches although they were alwaies under the Cross I will not enlarge my discourse to make a description of the perjecutions they have suffered since a large Volume would not suffice for that I will only say something of those evills they have been exposed to these two lest years There was great probability they should of late in the time of their Princes Coronation enâ—oy some quietness and tranquillity since they had obtained the confirmation of their Possessions and old Priviledges but they were soon frustrate of their hope For the Court of Rome and the Popes servants and Agents did work so cunningly that they were deprived of the benefit of those Priviledges Commerce was forbidden them many men driven out of their Habitations and finally after the publication of a Croisade they were 1653. assaulted by a great Army which had wholly extirpated them if God had not assisted them by an extraordinary Rain which did oppose the endeavours of their Adversaries and made them vain And because this bloody Design did not succeed them well they endeavoured afterwards to ruin wholly those faithfull persons by extraordinary Impositions and Burthens much above their own strength and which were not set upon the Papists in those parts Thus they did engage them unto great expences to obtain again the Confirmation of their Priviledges and being obtained their Enemies exacted from them prodigious summes of mony to have it sealed Yea the matter was brought to that height of injustice to make them bear the charges of those who were come to fight and ruin them Besides all that there being a French Army in those parts it was sent to take its winte quarters in the midst of those Churches which thus were wholly deprived of what remained for their subsistence But all that was but a beginning of greater sorrow for if they had then cause to grone and sigh they have had since occasions to shed whole streames of teanes since they have try'd how far the crueltie of
declaring that it was never his design nor of his Royall Predecessours by any act done or to be done nor his intention much lesse his will to enlarge their bounds and that if any thing hath been done or published to the contrary it was both against his own orders or those of his Magistrates but a meer usurpation against the disposition of those Acts as it is manifest and therefore the transgressours have undergone the penalties mentioned in his Declarations Besides that his Highnesse doth intend that in all those places and each of them where they are lovingly tolerated the sacrifice of the holy Masse be celebrated Prohibiting all subjects of the pretended Reformed Religion to give any molestation in deeds or words to the Fathers Missionaries and those that officiate under them much lesse to disturb or divertany of the pretended Reformed Religion from turning Catholiques under pain of death Charging and particularly commanding each particular Minister of the pretended Reformed Religion to see the forementioned injunctions inviolably observed as they will answer it at their utmost perills Declaring his intention to be that the execution hereof be done by posting or fixing Copies of these presents which shall be at the like value as if they had been made and intimated to each in particular Given at Lucerne the 25th of January 1655. Andrew Galstaldus Commissioner A second Apology in the behalfe of the Reformed inhabiting the Valleys of Piedmont THe History of the Reformed Churches whom God hath preserved in a corner of Italy in the valleys of Piedmont as miraculously as he did Moses his Bush in Horeb not onely since the yeare 1100 when the poore Vaudois and Albigeois retired themselves thither well knowing that the traditions of the Romish Church namely the modern had no accesse there but also time out of minde that is alwaies and from all time as saith the Monk Belvedere in his book intitled a Relation to the Congregation de propagandâ fide and as it is gathered out of Thuanus his History and many others is at large described in several books written to that purpose by Mr. du Perrin and lately by Master Giles Pastor in those quarters and shall yet further be seen God willing by a second Edition which will come forth with an exact addition of what hath happened since and very suddenly by as ample a Manifest as the case doth require it that will be more particularly made manifest which now in these few lines is but slightly touched concerning their number their extent their fights their deliverances the Edicts Priviledges and Concessions by vertue whereof they have enjoyed the peaceable habitation and the exercise of their Religion the disturbances which from time to time the Romish Clergy hath raised unto them and the deliverances the Lord hath vouchsafed them until these latter dayes wherein he hath broken down their hedges and the Boars of the wood have utterly wasted that Vineyard and the Hawks have chased and torne to pieces that Dove even in the very clefts of the Rocks In the years 1560. and 1561. Emanuel Philebert Duke of Savoy and Prince of Piedmont at the instigation of the Komish Clergy sent a mighty army to destroy the poore Reformed of the Valleys of Lucerne Perouse and Saint Martin in the said Piedmont hard by the Dauphinè under the command of the Count de la Trinité That Warre was long and bloody After they grew weary of it both parties came to an agreement bearing among several other heads the permission unto all of the Reformed Religion to inhabit all places and lands of the aforesaid three Valleys wherein were any afore the Warre begun In consequence of which agreement and Concession they were restored into Lucerne Lucernette Saint John la Tour Fenil Bobiane and Saint Second which places are lower towards the plaine about Turin and Pinerol as well as into the more remote places towards the neighbouring Mountaines of Dauphiné and they have been preserved there and protected by their Princes until the year 1602. Then Charles Emanuel Duke of Savoy and Prince of Piedmont of glorious memory after the banishment of the reformed out of the Marquisate of Salluces gave leave to his Delegates to pubblish several Orders against the inhabitants of the Valley of Lucerne who dwelt towards the South of it beyond the river called Pelice viz. the Reformed of the Borroughs of Lucerne Bobiane and Fenil which are but small dependences of the Church of Saint John but would not suffer them to touch the rest And indeed it shall not be found that during the former persecutions any Duke of Savoy hath ever pretended that all the other places nor any of them of those marked in the Order be out of the limits of the habitation granted to the Reformed It is very remarkable that soon after viz. in April 1603. he made a Decree whereby he ordered to those of Lucerne Bobiane and Fâ—nil who alone had beene turned out to inhabite againe their houses and enjoy their estates recalling all orders to the contrary He confirmed the same by a Decree of the 29th of September in the same yeare in the first Article And he kept them in the possession untill the year 1620 at which time yet they offered to stirre against those of the same Lands of Lucerne Bobiane and Fenil but the clemency and Justice of his said Royall Highnesse was yet such that he no sooner had granted the order for their banishment but presently he recalled it and granted them againe a fine Decree whereby he declared That he was willing and intended that all the pretended Reformed for such are his words should peaceably enjoy their habitation in all the places formerly granted and accustomed such as the aforesaid were Ordered that they should be no more molested therein and even granted them the enjoyment of some Temples pretended to be lower towards the plaine then the limits of the preaching extended unto and that he granted for a Sum of 6000 Ducatoons he exacted from them All these have been confirmed by the Ducal Chamber and the Senate and were observed during all the rest of the life of the same Charles Emanuel After him Victorio Amedeo his successor of glorious memory left them also in the full enjoyment of whatsoever his Predecessors had granted unto them and specially the free commerce in his Dominions and the peaceable habitation in all the places which are questioned in the order which shall follow having only deprived them contrary to their ancient Concessions of bearing any publick Office saying that if his Father and Granfather had granted them that priviledge for his part he was not willing to continue it or as now the Marquis of Pianess doth speak that graces of Princes are not unalterable Afterwards Madam Royall during the time of her whole Regency hath yet preserved them in the same state without disturbing them for their habitation and even in 1638. issued out a fine Decree bearing an expresse promise