L'Histoire Des Vaudois

After the late interesting publications of Allix, Jones, Gilly, Acland, and other writers, it may appear at the present time somewhat presumptuous, as well as unnecessary, to lay before the public any further details connected with the history of these excellent and primitive Christians; but as some of the Vaudois manuscripts and works are very scarce, and but little known in England, more particularly those of Peyran, Henri Arnaud, and Bresse, it may be desirable (even under the certainty of many repetitions) to give some short extracts from these curious documents, if only with the view and under the hope of keeping alive in the breasts of the people of this favoured isle that charitable zeal, which has again manifested itself, and is of such vital importance to the political and religious welfare of our noble though impoverished protestant brethren.

As the Valdenses most evidently are a part of the dispersed flock of the original Church of Christ, it becomes a matter of the highest interest to trace out their history from the earliest periods, and to observe how sedulously under the severest persecutions they have not only upheld their faith in its own purity and truth, but how gloriously they have continued to resist the growing corruptions of the Romish faith.

Scattered over the face of the earth, we find almost every where these primitive Christians under the various denominations given to them-of Cathari, or "the Pure," Paulicians, Petrobusians, Puritans, Leonists, Lollards, Henricians, Josephists, Patarines, Fraticelli, Insabati, Piphles, Toulousians, Albigenses, Lombardists, Bulgarians, Bohemian brethren, Barbets, Walloons, &c.

We not only find many colonies of these people in the eastern and western parts of Europe, but even in Africa and America, whither they emigrated to escape from oppression and massacre.

After the most cruel and wanton persecutions, we observe this oppressed people reduced in number by barbarous massacres, and at length driven out of their own purchased territories, because they would not submit to innovations and changes in their established religion; but in a few years we again find a remnant of them under their pastor, Henri Arnaud, led back into their native country almost in a miraculous manner to expel their savage oppressors, thousands of whom fled before this reduced but noble band of self-taught warriors.

Many refugees took up their abode in the Rhetian Alps, and a great number, after various edicts, were allowed to settle in the Duchy of Wirtemberg, where some of them were visited by the writer of these pages, for the express purpose of inquiring into their wants and privileges.