respectfully of the Clergy: And if they held Chap. 3.
any Errors, they were not publickly known. Queft.11
It was perhaps for their Difrefpect to the Cler-
gy, and because they pretended to wear a par
ticular Habit, and to be a Religious Order with-
out the Approbation of the Holy See, that
Pope Lucius the third, who fat in S. Peter's
Chair from the Year of Chrift 1181, to 1185,

call'd them (4) Hereticks. However they ap-
ply'd themselves to Pope Innocent the third,
an. 1212, and defir'd him to approve their
Inftitute, as Conrad Abbot of Urfperg, who
then faw them at Rome, teftifies. And it is
remarkable, that the Pope neither objected to
them Herefy nor Schifm: But diflik'd their
Drefs and their Mien, and approv'd S. Fran-
cis's Order in their ftead. So that what the
Abbot calls a (5) SECT, was then no more than
an ASSOCIATION, or an Order only. After
this the Vaudois fell openly into Schifm: And as
Schifm easily leads Men farther, they adopted
many of those Principles, which Protestants
have fince imbrac'd. But they were Unortho-
dox too upon other Accounts.

ift. They held, that (6) Paftors, whofe Life is irregular, can neither confecrate the B: Sacrament, nor give Abfolution.

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2dly,

(4) Quos Lucius Papa quondam hæreticos fcribebat, eo quod fuperftitiofa dogmata & obfervationes in eis reperirentur, inquit Conradus Ufperg. ad an. 1212.

(5) Et hi petebant fectam fuam a fede Apoftolica con. firmari, & privilegiari At Dominus Papa quædam fuperftitiofa in converfatione ipforum eisdem objecit, vide licet quod calceo's defuper pedem præcidebant. Conradus ad an. 1212. (6) Dicunt, quod facerdotes in mortali nor poffint conficere - Quod nullus poffit abfolvi a male facerdote. Reinerus. Lib. de Hær. cap. v.

Chap. 3. 2dly, that (7) Malefactors ought not to be pus Quefti 1 to Death: and that all Princes and Judges are damn'd for this Crime.

3dly, That (8) to take an Oath is always a deadly Sin.

4thly, That (9) All Pastors are oblig'd to Poverty, and to renounce their Estates.

5thly, That Christians (10) ought not to pay Tithes.

6thly, That any of the Vaudois, for need, (11) provided he wear Sandals, may confecrate the B. Sacrament.

III. The Vaudois, when in Power, were fierce and turbulent enough; As Dr. Heylin's Account of them fhews. Lions, fays he in his (12) Cofmography, proving no fafe Place for them, they retir'd into the more defart parts of Languedoc and Spreading on the Banks of the River Alby, obtain'd the Name of Albi genfes.

1

Supported by the two laft Earls of Tholouse, they became very masterful and infolent : in fo much that they murder'd Trincanel their Viscount in Beziers, and dafh'd out the Teeth of their Bifhop, who had taken Santuary in S. Magdalene's Church, one of the Churches of that City. Forty years after which high Out-rage, the divine Providence gave them over to the band of the

(7) Dicunt quod omnes Principes & Judices damnantur: & dicunt Maleficos non damnandos. Ibid. (8) Dicunt quod omne Juramentum fit mortale peccatum. Ib. (9) Pilichdorf, Reiner, &c. (10) Reiner, Ebrard de Bethunia, Cap. x. & Claudius Seyfellus. (11) dummo do baberet Sandalia, Petrus Vallium Cernai (12) L. 1. P. 193-

the Croifadas, under the Conduct of the French Chap. 3. Kings, and of many other noble Adventurers, Queiti who facrific'd them in the Self-fame Church, wherein they had spill'd the Blood of others. About the Year 1250, they were almost rooted out 新 of that Country alfo. The Remnants of them, being better'd (if you believe the Doctor) by this Affliction, betook themselves unto the Mountains, lying betwixt Daulphine, Provence, Piemont, and Savoy.

Concerning their Religion, Dr. Heylin fays, it may not be deny'd, but that among ft fome good Wheat, there were many Tares. And, I look not on thefe Men and their Congregations, as Founders of the Proteftant Church, or OF THE SAME CHURCH WITH THEM, as I see some do.

IV. But in one or two Things the Doctor was mistaken. ft. in attributing to Waldo the Errors of his Sect. 2dly, in making him to except against the Subtraction of the Cup in the Bleffed Sacrament. And if his Sect had done it, it was no more, than might have been expected from fuch illiterate and perverfe Men. But neither Reinerus, who flourish'd in the middle of the thirteenth Century, nor Pilichdorf, who writ a hundred years after him, take notice of any Difagreement, which the Vaudois then had with the Roman Church on that Subject,

*

V. Among other wicked Branches of the Vaudois, mention'd by Reinerus, one was that of the Cathari, or Manichæans of the thirteenth Age. The Diffenters call'd Albigenfes from the Town Alby, feated on the River Al

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by

Chap. 3. by in Languedoc) were of this Kind: who Queftii fpread themfelves in Languedoc, Provence, Daulphine, and Arragon. And we must either deny the whole History of the thirteenth Century, or we must grant, that these were Manichæans. Yet Mr. Whiston, in his Effay on the Apocalypfe, printed in the Year 1706, is not afraid to make (13) the two Witneffes, who fhall prophecy a thousand two hundred and threescore Days, cover'd in Sack-cloth Apoc. xi. v. 3, to be the Waldenfes and Albigenfes, prophecying in Sack-cloth the whole one thousand two hundred and fixty Years of the Reign of the Antichriftian Powers, till the Year (14) of Chrift 1686, when they were Slain, in the Prophetick Style, by Savoy and French Troops, but reftor'd to their former Habitations an. 1690. So impertinently wicked will fome Men be, who pretend to Learning! How the Vaudois were turn'd into Sacramentarians, and then into Calvinists, Monfieur Du Pin tells us. This Sect, fays (15) he, increas'd very much in the thirteenth Century, in Spite of the Inquifitors, and fpread it felf in Arragon and in the vallies of Piemont, where it has remain'd, ftill holding the fame Maxims, till it was united in the Year 1530 with Oecolampadius and the other Sacramentarians, to whom the Vaudois fent Peter Mafon and George Morel, who enter'd into a Treaty with Oecolampadius, and Martin Bu

cer,

(13) p. 204, 207. (14) By this Calculation, the Antichriftian Reign and the Set of the Waldenfes and Albigenfes, must have begun an. Chr. 426. So that the 3d. and 4th general Council was held in the Reign of Antichrift. (15) Cent. xiii. p. 149.

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;

cer. These two latter propos'd to them the Reje- Chap. 3.
Eting of feveral of their Errors, by acknowledging, Questi
that a Chriftian might Swear lawfully, and
"exercise the Office of a Magiftrate; that
the Ministers might poffefs fomething de
proprio that one might punish Malefa-
"ctors with Death; that wicked Minifters
"might adminifter the Sacraments, &c." And
they engag'd them to maintain others, which they
had never maintain'd before; particularly, that
the Body of Jefus Chrift is not in the Eucharist;
and that there was no Neceffity of Confeffing their
Sins; a Doctrine, which till then the Vaudois
never oppenly oppos'd. However, notwithstan-
ding this Union, most of the Vaudois perfifted
Still in their old Principles, till Neceffity forc'd
them in the Year 1630, to take the Calvinists
for their Paftors. Thus Du Pin.

VI. The Vaudois were but little esteem'd,
and even overlook'd by many of the first Eng-
lish Proteftants. Mr. Chillingworth grants,
that, before the Reformation, (16) all the vi-
fible Churches in the World had degenerated from
the Purity of the Gospel of Christ.

Mr. Perkins, in his Expofition of the Creed p. 400, fays, that for the Space of many bundred Years, before the Reformation, an univerfal Apoftacy over-fpread the whole Face of the Earth.

The Homily-Book, which the Church of England in her 35th Article approves, as containing godly, and wholefom Doctrine, and neceffary for thefe Times, and which She defires may be read in Churches diligently and distinctly,

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(16) Religion of Protestants. Chap. v. §. 13.