Remark.—From the time of Peter Waldo, about A. D. 1170, we have throughout followed, in the account of the martyrs, mostly the line of the Waldenses proper, without digressing materially to other sects, though some of them very closely approximated to the belief of the Waldenses. Hence it has come, that the number of those whom we have noticed as true martyrs, is not as large, as it might have been, if we had not purposed to follow the unmixed, pure line of the Waldenses. However, in notes, we have placed some who approached this belief very closely, and shall here add a few more.
Note.—A. D. 1494.—In the fourth year of Henry VII., on the 28th of April, a very old, honorable widow of over eighty years, was apprehended for maintaining eight of Wickliffe’s articles (whose belief against infant baptism and the swearing of oaths, we have already shown), and as she would not apostatize, she was burned alive in Smithfield, at London. She said that God and his angels loved her so, that she was not afraid of the fire. When she stood in the midst of the fire, she cried aloud: “Lord, receive my soul into thy holy hands;” whereupon she gave up the ghost. Compare the account in the second book of the Hist. of the Persecutions, fol. 599, col. 3, with Joh. Fox Angl., page 671. A. Bal., in Append. Al., page 627.
A. D. 1498.—Jerome Savonarola now most zealously rejected, in his teaching, the institutions of men, and maintained salvation in Christ alone. He defended the partaking of the holy Supper (called the Sacrament) under two forms; that is, with bread and wine; in opposition to the practice of the papists, who gave the common people only a consecrated wafer. He also rejected letters of indulgence, saying, moreover, that the Pope did not follow the doctrine and life of Christ, and that he was the antichrist, because he attributed to human institutions more than to the merits of Christ. For all these reasons, he was strangled and then burnt to ashes, at Florence, by order of Pope Alexander VI. Compare Chron. van den Ond., page 910, col. 2, with Joh. Munst., fol. 201. Guil. Meru., fol. 950. Hist. Andr., fol. 36. Also, A. Mell., fol. 600, col. 3, to fol. 606; where it is stated that two others died with him for the same belief, and were likewise on the 23d of May, in the market place at Florence, after preceding strangulation, burnt to ashes, and the ashes thrown into the river Arnus flowing by.
A. D. 1499.—Paul Scriptoris taught at this time against transubstantiation (or the essential change) of the bread into the body of Christ; as also, that all that is taught must be tried by the touch-stone of the Word of God, adding that all who teach otherwise teach falsely; hence he said there should speedily come a change in the (Roman) religion. For this reason he was driven into banishment by the Minorite monks; and, having lived full three years in exile, he died in the beginning of the year 1504. Compare P. J. Twisck, Chron., page 912, with Joh. Munst. Tract., fol. 199. With this we conclude the fifteenth century, and, consequently, also the account of the martyrs who then suffered.
CONCLUSION OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY.
We long to take our leave from this century, since we cannot longer behold this misery. However, we have only reached the summit of the mountain of martyrdom. In our ascent we have met scarcely anything but skulls, thigh-bones, and charred skeletons. In our descent deep pits, pools and blood-red rivers, into which the bodies of the saints are thrown, threaten us; to say nothing of the dark prisons, dungeons, torture-chambers, and countless instruments of torture.
But the merciful Lord, who has led us by the hand, and thus far aided us, will lead and help us still further. His love shown to me in this matter, has been wonderful. For, when the bands of death were around me, by reason of a half year’s severe sickness, which attacked me in the midst of this work, his gracious hand restored me, so that I have completed the work thus far, though not without anxiety and labor. Hence, though still in the grasp of severe fevers, I wrote, for my own remembrance, to the praise of my Creator, and to dedicate to my brethren this book, these words:
My heart with anxious fear did beat,
That I this work should not complete;
Since God had touched me with his hand,