Que sel se troba alcun bon que vollia amar Dio e temer Jeshu Xrist,
Que non vollia maudire, ni jura, ni mentir,
Ni avoutrar, ni aucire, ni penre de l'autruy,
Ni venjar se de li sio ennemie,
Illi dison quel es Vaudes e degne de murir.
[c] It would be difficult to specify all the dispersed authorities which attest the existence of the sects derived from the Waldenses and Paulicians in the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries. Besides Mosheim, who has paid considerable attention to the subject, I would mention some articles in Du Cange which supply gleanings; namely, Beghardi, Bulgari, Lollardi, Paterini, Picardi, Pifli, Populicani.
Upon the subject of the Waldenses and Albigenses generally, I have borrowed some light from Mr. Turner's History of England, vol. ii. p. 377, 393. This learned writer has seen some books that have not fallen into my way; and I am indebted to him for a knowledge of Alanus's treatise, which I have since read. At the same time I must observe, that Mr. Turner has not perceived the essential distinction between the two leading sects.
The name of Albigenses does not frequently occur after the middle of the thirteenth century; but the Waldenses, or sects bearing that denomination, were dispersed over Europe. As a term of different reproach was derived from the word Bulgarian, so vauderie, or the profession of the Vaudois, was sometimes applied to witchcraft. Thus in the proceedings of the Chambre Brulante at Arras, in 1459, against persons accused of sorcery, their crime is denominated vauderie. The fullest account of this remarkable story is found in the Memoirs of Du Clercq, first published in the general collection of Historical Memoirs, t. ix. p. 430, 471. It exhibits a complete parallel to the events that happened in 1682 at Salem in New England. A few obscure persons were accused of vauderie, or witchcraft. After their condemnation, which was founded on confessions obtained by torture, and afterwards retracted, an epidemical contagion of superstitious dread was diffused all around. Numbers were arrested, burned alive by order of a tribunal instituted for the detection of this offence, or detained in prison; so that no person in Arras thought himself safe. It was believed that many were accused for the sake of their possessions, which were confiscated to the use of the church. At length the duke of Burgundy interfered, and put a stop to the persecutions. The whole narrative in Du Clercq is interesting, as a curious document of the tyranny of bigots, and of the facility with which it is turned to private ends.
To return to the Waldenses: the principal course of their emigration is said to have been into Bohemia, where, in the fifteenth century, the name was borne by one of the seceding sects. By their profession of faith, presented to Ladislaus Posthumus, it appears that they acknowledged the corporal presence in the eucharist, but rejected purgatory and other Romish doctrines. See it in the Fasciculus Rerum expetendarum et fugiendarum, a collection of treatises illustrating the origin of the Reformation, originally published at Cologne in 1535, and reprinted at London in 1690.
[d] Opera Innocent III. p. 468, 537. A translation of the Bible had been made by direction of Peter Waldo; but whether this used in Lorrain was the same, does not appear. Metz was full of the Vaudois, as we find by other authorities.
[e] Schilteri Thesaurus Antiq. Teutonicorum.
[f] Mém. de l'Acad. des Inscript. t. xvii. p. 720.
[g] The Anglo-Saxon versions are deserving of particular remark. It has been said that our church maintained the privilege of having part of the daily service in the mother tongue. "Even the mass itself," says Lappenberg, "was not read entirely in Latin." Hist. of England, vol. i. p. 202. This, however, is denied by Lingard, whose authority is probably superior. Hist. of Ang.-Sax. Church, i. 307. But he allows that the Epistle and Gospel were read in English, which implies an authorized translation. And we may adopt in a great measure Lappenberg's proposition, which follows the above passage: "The numerous versions and paraphrases of the Old and New Testament made those books known to the laity and more familiar to the clergy."
We have seen a little above, that the laity were not permitted by the Greek Church of the ninth century, and probably before, to read the Scriptures, even in the original. This shows how much more honest and pious the Western Church was before she became corrupted by ambition and by the captivating hope of keeping the laity in servitude by means of ignorance. The translation of the four Books of Kings into French has been published in the Collection de Documens Inédits, 1841. It is in a northern dialect, but the age seems not satisfactorily ascertained; the close of the eleventh century is the earliest date that can be assigned. Translations into the Provençal by the Waldensian or other heretics were made in the twelfth; several manuscripts of them are in existence, and one has been published by Dr. Gilly. [1848.]