The sum and substance of their offense is mentioned by Cassini, a Franciscan friar, where he says, "That ALL THE ERRORS of these Waldenses consisted in this, that they denied the church of Rome to be the holy mother church, and would not obey her traditions."
In conclusion I quote from the celebrated Roman Catholic historian Thuanus. He states their tenets as follows: "That the church of Rome, because it renounced the true faith of Christ, WAS THE WHORE OF BABYLON ... that consequently no obedience was to be paid to the Pope, or to the bishops who maintain her errors; that a monastic life was the sink and dungeon of the church, the vows of which [relating to celibacy] were vain ... that the orders of the priesthood were marks of the great beast mentioned in the Apocalypse; that the fire of purgatory, the solemn mass, the consecration days of churches, the worship of saints, and propitiations for the dead, were the devices of Satan." Lib. VI, Sec. 16, Lib. XXVII. The chief offense of these so-called heretics seems to have been that they denounced the Pope as "Antichrist" and the apostate church of Rome as "the Babylonish harlot."
7. And when they shall have finished their testimony, the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them, and shall overcome them, and kill them.
8. And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified.
9. And they of the people and kindreds and tongues and nations shall see their dead bodies three days and an half, and shall not suffer their dead bodies to be put in graves.
10. And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry, and shall send gifts one to another; because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt on the earth.
11. And after three days and an half the Spirit of life from God entered into them, and they stood upon their feet; and great fear fell upon them which saw them.
12. And they heard a great voice from heaven saying unto them, Come up hither. And they ascended up to heaven in a cloud; and their enemies beheld them.
At the expiration of the twelve hundred and sixty years the scene changes. The prophecy of the witnesses in their sackcloth state, hidden away from sight in the wilderness, ends, and they are now brought out into public view—but only to be killed. Their slaughter takes place at the hands of the beast. When we come to consider [chapter XIII], we shall see that the Papacy is described as a beast reigning for forty-two months, or twelve hundred and sixty years, after which time another beast possessing great power and authority appears on the scene. This second beast is Protestantism, and through it the murder of the two witnesses at the close of the Papal supremacy in the vision before us was effected.
It would seem, by the similarity of statement that the beast "ascendeth out of the bottomless pit," that the slaughter of the witnesses was effected by the Papal beast (chap. [17:7, 8]); but the Mohammedan delusion also is said to have proceeded from "the bottomless pit." Chap. [9:1, 2]. The expression bottomless pit is doubtless used merely to signify the source of certain powers in contradistinction to the heavenly source from which others proceeded. Although the Papal beast is said to have originated in the bottomless pit, the second beast also doubtless proceeded from the same source, for he possessed many of the characteristics of the former, and caused the earth to worship the first beast, as explained in [chapter 13]. That he was not of heavenly origin is shown by the statement that he came up "out of the earth." Chap. [13:11]. But the direct proof that it was the Protestant beast, and not the Papal beast—although the same expression as to its origin is used concerning it—that slew the two witnesses, is found in the fact that the reign of the first, or Papal, beast was limited to forty two months (chap. [13:5]), corresponding to the twelve hundred and sixty years in which the witnesses prophesied in the vision before us; while it was after the close of this period, at the time when the second, or Protestant, beast arose (chap. [13:11]), that the witnesses were slain.
To many this may seem a hard saying; but I request that the matter be given the most careful attention in the light of prophecy and divine truth. It is true that the Sixteenth Century Reformation at first brought the witnesses out of the wilderness of seclusion where they had remained during the long night of Romanism and exhibited them to the public view; but when thus placed upon exhibition, they were soon robbed entirely of their position as the Vicars, or Governors, of God's church. Since creed and sect-making first began, the Word and Spirit have not possesed governing power and authority in Protestantism; but men have usurped that place and prescribed authoritative rules of faith and practise for the people. The principles of Higher Criticism have so far pervaded the realm of sectarian theology that a vast number of the clergy no longer regard the Bible as the inspired word of God to man, but simply as a remarkable piece of religious literature recording the natural development of the religious consciousness among a peculiarly sensitive race of people. Protestantism certainly has placed the Bible on the dissecting table and dismembered it in a manner wholly unknown before. While Protestants will not for a moment allow the blessed Book to be hidden out of sight—put "into graves"—still they will not grant it that place it should occupy as the sole discipline of faith, so it is a dead letter to them. That all-glorious doctrine of Bible unity, which fills the whole New Testament, strikes a deathblow to all the carnal divisions and institutions of sectarianism; and so with one accord they unite in fighting it. "Oh, the good old blessed Bible! we could not do without it," say they; yet, as everybody knows, they are governed by the discipline and laws that they or their representatives have formulated. Thus, the Word and Spirit of God are brought under the public gaze, only to be treated with such indignity in God's sight, and killed; while infidels look on, and tauntingly remark, "Either the religion of to-day is no Christianity, or the Word of God is a lie."
In the beginning of this dispensation the church of God not only consisted of all those who were spiritual, but constituted a visible, organic body as well, made up of numerous local congregations that were separate in the management of their internal affairs, yet interrelated with each other, and were directed by humble pastors, who were, in reference to each other, equal. The Word of God was their only discipline, and the Spirit of God, their great Teacher and Guide. Thus, the two witnesses were active in their official position, in the public view, as the Vicars or Governors of the church of God on earth. When, however, men usurped the place of these Vicars by ignoring the Spirit and rejecting the Word and making their own rules of faith, the effect was a national hierarchy—the church of Rome, which for twelve hundred and sixty years stood in the public view. Yet the two witnesses were still alive, though driven into obscurity and "clothed in sackcloth"; for they still acted in their official position in the congregations of the medieval Christians already referred to, who resisted the doctrines of men and clung tenaciously to the simple, primitive form of church government and allowed the Spirit and Word authority supreme.
But during the Protestant era Christians the world over became identified with the various sects, hence were representing to the world the beast power instead of the true church. Thus, during the Protestant period, the church of God, in its organic form, was not represented anywhere on earth; for its members were scattered among those who were "worshiping the beast and his image." Hence the two witnesses, during this era, had no place to operate in their official capacity as the Governors of God's church and are therefore represented as slain. The government of Protestant sects is not effected by the Word and Spirit; for the institutions themselves are of human origin, and men are their law-makers and governors.