The Vaudois of Piedmont: A Visit to Their Valleys

by J. N. Worsfold

CHAPTER XIII.

We concluded our last amidst the gladness of heart which filled the souls of myriads to whom social progress, political freedom, and evangelical truth were precious. Our object now is to recount the fruits of that enlargement accorded to the Vaudois; and in order to do this we must take a retrospect of their religious condition for some few years before the arrival of that grand epoch. At that period the state of things in the valleys was far from satisfactory. Not to recount, as among the causes, those political disabilities to which reference has been previously made, I will refer to some additional circumstances of a vexatious and depressing character. One was the hindrances to the obtaining the most indispensable religious books, such as Bibles, catechisms, hymn-books. With each parcel of Bibles and New Testaments, the moderator was obliged to sign a formal undertaking that not a single copy should be sold, nor even lent to a Roman Catholic. Again, in all the communes of the valleys, where nearly all the proprietors were Protestants, and scarcely a Roman Catholic could be found who was not either living on alms or employed as a daily labourer, the law required that the majority of the members of the communal council should be always and necessarily composed of Romanists.

As regards primary education, the valleys were more favourably circumstanced than other parts of the kingdom. Out of a population of some twenty thousand, nearly four thousand attended school, at least during the winter months. However, it will be seen that the real work of education was not in so satisfactory a condition as the above statement, in a superficial point of view, might imply. To show this we will descend to details as to the schools, their kind, structure, fittings, and teachers.

First, then, we take the hamlet schools, about one hundred and twenty in number. They were carried on generally in a stable, and the place was neither remarkable for space nor cleanliness; so that on one side, in a narrow division, would be thirty or forty children, separated from the sheep or the goats by so slender a space that not infrequently the heads of the children and the animals would combine in a way more grotesque than effective for educational purposes.

The amount of didactic efficiency to be expected in the teacher may be surmised from the circumstance of his salary being sometimes less than the munificent sum of threepence-halfpenny per day! With such machinery we may feel it was an achievement to be grateful for, if by the end of the winter's session the children had learnt to read, write, and cipher moderately, and could repeat by heart a prayer for morning and evening, the Lord's Prayer, the Decalogue, and the Apostles' Creed.

Second. There were also the parish schools, open ten months in the year, and attended during the winter by a large number of children, the majority of whom had to leave on the advent of spring to work in the fields. Those not so required remained in the district or hamlet schools. The buildings in which the parish schools were conducted were not exactly stables, but yet entirely destitute of the light, air, fittings, and furniture requisite for school-work. The only reading-books were a French Bible and Italian acts of parliament. So much, then, for the primary schools. The condition of the secondary or grammar schools was not much more encouraging. The institution was migratory, and aimed to teach fifteen or twenty pupils, divided into five classes, under one teacher, not always very competent, and badly paid, as much Latin and Greek as would secure their admission as students in the academies of Strasbourg, Lausanne, or Geneva. But we pass from schools to things religious and ecclesiastical. Morals were comparatively pure; there was a respect for religion; a frequent attendance on public worship; a deep attachment to their ancestral faith; a disposition to endure everything rather than deny it; and affection and esteem for their pastors. As regards the pastors, they were, almost without exception, faithful to the ancient evangelical orthodoxy.

But there was that which both pastors and flocks were very imperfectly acquainted with, viz., on one side the aim and mission of the church, and on the other the true nature of the fruits intended to be produced by the preaching of the gospel. In a word, there was a lack of true spiritual energy, a realization of the need and preciousness of salvation. There was the outward shell of orthodoxy, but the living soul of godliness was wanting. Jesus Christ was present in name, but absent in reality.

In the administration of the church there were many serious defects. The meeting of the synods was very difficult, partly because of the suspicions of the government, and partly from the unwillingness of the communes to bear the expense connected therewith. Again, the synods themselves answered but imperfectly to the design of their institution, and their influence on the spiritual state of the church very small. The Table, in its turn, forgetting that its duties were essentially religious, sunk insensibly into a kind of higher tribunal for secular affairs. The same tendency showed itself in the bosom of the consistories.

However, amidst these deep shades some gleams of light, the heralds of better things, began to show themselves. The first of these hopeful signs was due to the liberality, as regards its beginning, of Madame Geymet, who in the year 1826 laid the foundation of a hospital for the poor Waldensians at La Torre. Madame Geymet was encouraged warmly by Pastor La Bert, the then moderator of the Waldensian Church, and Pastor Cellerier, of Geneva, who made a collection in aid of the object. The Count Waldburg Truchsesse, Prussian ambassador at Turin, obtained help from Prussia; Dr. Gilly, by means of the committee in London, sent large help from this country. Holland, France, and Russia also joined in the effort; so that at length the brave projector had the satisfaction of seeing two hospitals grow out of her once ridiculed scheme. The second hospital was erected at Pomaret, for the especial benefit of the valleys of San Martino and Pragela.

Another means of awakening at this time arose from the arrival of some young ministers, who had just left the foreign academies, especially that of Lausanne, where the influence of a spiritual revival had been particularly felt. A visit paid to the different parishes of the valleys in 1826 by Felix Neff and Pastor Blanc, of Mens, resulted in much spiritual fruit.