(A.D. 1616 TO A.D. 1633.)
It has been already stated that at this time Charles Emmanuel was at war with Spain about the matter of Montferrat. He asked aid from France, and Lesdiguières was sent to him. This illustrious general, who was then regarded as the head of the Protestant party in France, entered the province of Saluces in 1617.
Indignant at the manifold annoyances to which those of his own church were subjected, he interceded for them with their sovereign. The court of Savoy readily understood that the leader of the reformed could not fight its battles with very much zeal if it persecuted his party. On the ground of prudence, therefore, some repose was granted to the Vaudois of Saluces; and on the 28th of September, 1617, the duke, being at Asti, issued a decree to this effect. He said--"Out of particular regard for a great personage, we grant permission to the Protestant refugees, and persons banished from the marquisate of Saluces, to return and enter into free possession of their properties and their abodes, for a period of three full years;[2] to make arrangements about them, and sell them at their own pleasure during that time, they being prohibited, however, from spreading their heretical opinions or asserting their doctrines, upon pain of death. The prisoners detained upon account of religion shall be set at liberty, and enjoy the same privileges; and as to properties confiscated or sold, they shall be returned to their former owners upon a just indemnity, which we will grant to those who have acquired them."
These provisions would have been of great value if they had been permanent; but to assign them beforehand a limit so confined, was to grant nothing; it was only to sow the seed for fresh troubles and more ruin at a future time. The Protestants, nevertheless, showed themselves very grateful. Their conscientious sensitiveness was awakened only upon one point, and they wrote to the pastors of Geneva to know if they ought to accept this decree, seeing that it treated them as heretics.[3] Why did they not insist that these advantages should repose upon a less precarious foundation? The intercession of Lesdiguières obtained for them the omission of the reference to heresy, and in their honest simplicity these unsophisticated mountaineers, confiding in the justice of their prince, never imagined that he could make any revocation of this edict. With them what was just and true overnight must needs be still just and true in the morning. The variations of the Catholic Church, in point of honesty, would be found still more numerous than those of the Protestant Church in point of doctrine. Sad changes were already in preparation for the Vaudois, notwithstanding these things at present favourable to them, to which the Papal Church was obliged, in the meantime, to submit, but to which it hoped soon to put an end.
Nevertheless, the happy effect which they in the first instance produced surpassed all expectation. In a few days the aspect of the country was altered. "The night before," say the Capuchins, "we would have thought it almost purged of heretics, and next day they make their appearance from all quarters, like the soldiers of Cadmus, who rose in full armour from the sand of the earth." In the valley of the Stura, which is deeper and more extensive than the others, Protestantism, which had never been eradicated, flourished again with more vigour than ever. It was in the town of Aceil (distinguished in our days as the birthplace of the famous Cibrario, author of the history of European law during the middle ages), that the Reformation had the greatest number of adherents. The village of Pagliéro joined in this open profession of the gospel. The town of Verzol boldly declared for the same cause, but afterwards drew back. That of St. Michael, which appeared at first more cautious in its proceedings than the others, very soon acquired resolution, and followed Aceil with steadfastness.
The Protestants were, indeed, prohibited from having public assemblies, but the number of private meetings supplied the place of public worship; and, moreover, it was not long till they began to hold general congregations during the night, that climate being as mild as the climate of Nice. The secret of these congregations was not unfrequently betrayed by the joy which the people could not contain, either before they went to them or after they returned.
In the valley of Mayra, at Dronier, and other places,[4] so many made profession of Protestantism that the Catholics seemed to disappear. Many, instead of selling their lands, bought more; industrial activity, commerce, and agriculture, speedily made unusual advancement. It seemed as if they thought they had nothing to fear for the future; and this prosperity itself ought to have induced the Duke of Savoy to maintain the causes which had produced it, instead of destroying it, by allowing them to be removed.
It is well worthy of attention, that in all countries of the world in which Protestant doctrines have taken firm root, the people have prospered, as if an unseen benediction had been pronounced over them; and wherever Catholicism has maintained itself in greatest power, life has been extinguished, prosperity and morality have disappeared, as if under the influence of some mysterious curse.
The churches of Saluces recovered in one year all the lustre which belonged to them half a century before. "These heretics," says Rorengo (whom we cite in preference to other authorities, not as the source of our information, but in confirmation of it), "commenced to play the lords amongst the poor and disconsolate Papists, who with terror found themselves on the point of being annihilated in that country."[5] They no longer ventured to make processions, but cried out against the tyranny of the reformed.
The festival of Easter, in 1618, had been celebrated at Dronier by so great a concourse of Protestants, that the Bishop of Saluces repaired thither the same week, to restore in some degree the honours of his deserted church. Notwithstanding his presence at Dronier, on the Sabbath after Easter, there was still so numerous an assemblage of the reformed, that all the apartments of the private house in which they met were occupied. The hall, the landing-place before the door, the steps, and even upon the street--every place was overflowing, eye-witnesses say, with members of the church who could not find admission.[6] The pastor had commenced his opening prayer; all the people were on their knees around him, even to the outer steps of the domestic sanctuary. At that moment the bishop arrived in great pomp, escorted by soldiers and officers of justice. "In the name of his royal highness," said he, "dissolve your congregation." But the voice which prayed to God, ceased not at the bidding of that which spoke to men. The pastor continued his prayer and thanksgiving; the officers of law drew up their minute of proceedings; the bishop waited until the end of the prayer, and then renewed his summons. "In the name of our apostolical authority," said he, "we forbid you all from assembling again henceforth, contrary to the edicts of his royal highness." "In the name of Jesus," the pastor then replied, "we do not recognize any apostolical authority except in the gospel which he has given to us by the apostles, and which we faithfully preach. As for the edicts, we do not violate them, since we are assembled in a private house." This reply was taken down in the minute of proceedings, and the bishop retired. But he consulted lawyers to ascertain the legal import of the edict, and learned with victorious satisfaction that the setting forth of doctrines was forbidden. In consequence, he came back three days after, with the grand referendary, Milliot, to summon the Protestants to appear before the authorities as having been guilty of proclaiming their doctrines, contrary to the terms of the edict under which they sheltered themselves.
The Christians perceived that there was in this a plausible pretext for condemning them; and for people who had so often been condemned without reason, there was ground enough of alarm in the presence of a specious reason. However, the prohibition of asserting their doctrines could only, in fairness, be considered as a prohibition of Protestants endeavouring to convert Catholics, because, surely, they could not be prevented from speaking amongst themselves of their own beliefs; and as the number of persons authorized to meet in a private house was not limited, it could not well be made a crime in them to hold meetings more or less numerous. But these simple and honest people did not dream of having recourse to such arguments of defence; their convictions were too strong to admit of their not seeking their propagation. This was to have declared their doctrines. And after justice had already been denied them in so many instances more flagrant than this, a favourable interpretation of the law was what they would certainly not have obtained. They deemed it, therefore, more prudent to escape out of the way, and took refuge in the woods situated above Dronier. There they remained for forty days, like Jesus in the wilderness, fasting and praying to God, animated by an increasing ardour, an inextinguishable and delightful thirst for prayers, hymns, and pious meditations, for which their souls longed more eagerly, and in which they found increased satisfaction, in presence of danger and in the calm of these solitudes.
It was not, however, for want of courage that they took to flight; for the referendary Milliot having proceeded against them by individual citations, a number of Protestants, who had been omitted, spontaneously went and declared themselves partakers in the same transgressions, that is to say, in the same faith, and complained to the judges that they had not been included among the proscribed. Was not this devotedness of a sincere faith as noble and as courageous as a heroic resistance would have been?
The Catholics, seeing the town of Dronier almost deserted, and the fugitives self-condemned by their own apprehensions, fancied that they already saw their goods confiscated, and might divide them in anticipation of the event as already sure. But so great a number of Protestants had caused their names to be inscribed in the lists drawn up, that the magistrates shrunk from the necessity of adopting severe measures against such a multitude, and wrote to the Duke of Savoy, to remit the matter to his decision. On their side the Vaudois entreated Lesdiguières again to intercede for them, and Charles Emmanuel put an end to these uncertainties by covering all that was past with a general amnesty, after which he simply re-established the provisions of the edict of 28th September, 1617.
The fugitives thereupon returned to their abodes, more united and more fervent than ever; the Catholic clergy redoubled their efforts to give to their worship the sovereign pomp to which it was legally entitled, and for which it lacked only the attendance of a sufficient number of people. Processions, novense, and pilgrimages were multiplied. The parochial clergy received orders to preach sermons in their churches; proof sufficient of the negligence which had prevailed in this respect. The missionaries laboured to unite the force of argument with the magnificence of ceremonies; but power in reasoning depends upon truth, and truth is not to be determined by decrees, like the arrangements of a festival. These foreign merchants of crosses and amulets saw the public indifference increasing around them; they accused the Protestants of being the cause of that impious desertion, and accordingly their most earnest wishes were for the removal of Protestantism from the country. The reformed, upon their part, redoubled their zeal and ardour; and in consequence of this emulation between the two rival religions, many elements, by no means akin to piety, were mingled with their proceedings.
One day when the Bishop of Saluces,[7] accompanied by a missionary[8] and the superior of Coni,[9] was about to enter the parish church of Dronier, a voice amongst the crowd pronounced these words, "Ere long there will be no priests, nor monks, nor prelates!" The words certainly ought not to have been uttered; but perhaps it was nothing more than a remark made in a conversation betwixt two persons. Nay, it is possible that these words, even if uttered in an offensive manner, did not proceed from the mouth of a Vaudois, but from the perfidious lips of an enemy seeking their destruction. Be this as it might, this occurrence, which in our times it would be deemed puerile to notice, greatly excited the wrath of the bishop and the indignation of the clergy. It was reported to the sovereign; and as wounded pride exaggerates everything with which it comes in contact, these words were represented as manifesting intentions, and possessing a signification, perilous to the safety of the state, and it was necessary, at the very least, that the reprobation for which they called should extend to all the Protestants.
Count Milliot, to whom the histories now give the title of vice-chancellor, now made another visit to Dronier, and commenced by requiring[10] that all who desired to enjoy the benefit of the late edict[11] should come and have their names inscribed in a register to be kept for that purpose. The number of names inscribed accordingly was very considerable, for the number of the Protestants was increasing, and not diminishing. Many even of the Catholics ranked themselves along with them. Rorengo mentions a doctor of laws, a captain, and a physician.[12] This register of names was afterwards transmitted to the Senate of Turin.
Meanwhile the Catholics constantly sought to surprise the Protestants in the criminal act of public worship; and the Protestants, mistrusting the Catholics, kept upon their guard, went about armed, and were not sparing of disdain and recrimination against their adversaries. Thus the parties became more embittered by their very hostility. In such circumstances it is very difficult to avoid excesses, and the smallest spark will suffice to kindle a flame.
The Protestants were apprised that a noble personage, belonging to the family of Cardinal Almandi, had taken some steps against them. Indignation, fanaticism, and the savage excitement awakened by the wild solitudes to which they had so often been driven, armed the hand of an assassin.
The crime of the individual became a cause of offence against all. It was immediately reported to the sovereign, who, without delay, renewed the severe enactments of the ancient edicts; amongst others, those of the 25th of February, 1602, according to which the Protestant worship, mixed marriages, and the acquirement of property, were absolutely prohibited beyond the narrow limits of the Vaudois valleys. The leases and contracts by which they had taken or purchased lands from the Catholics were therefore annulled. At Aceil they had taken possession of the edifices of the Brotherhood of the Holy Spirit, and there they celebrated their worship. They were expelled from them, and prohibited from returning, under pain of death. Finally, an edict of Charles Emmanuel, of date the 2d of July, 1618, ordained all Protestant heads of families to bring, every man, a list of the names of his household to the magistrates of his canton, under penalty of a fine of 300 golden crowns, and of divers corporal punishments, even to imprisonment and the gibbet; whilst the Bishop of Saluces and the Capuchin missionaries watched, with an inexorable solicitude, to see that no one should enjoy his property beyond the expiry of the three years allowed by the edict of 28th September, 1617.
The fatal term drew near; conflicts became more numerous, especially upon occasion of funerals, at which the edict of 1618 had prohibited the Protestants from assembling in greater number than six persons, as well as from burying their dead in the Catholic cemeteries, or in ground inclosed with walls.
But in most of the communes at that time there was only one common cemetery; and in the towns where the Protestants had made one for themselves they had surrounded it with walls. It was now required that they should deposit the corpses of their brethren on the sides of the great roads, or in uninclosed grounds, open to every comer, and exposed to all profanations.
Besides, their dead were taken from them, to be transported to the cemetery of the Catholics, if it were known that the deceased had received baptism in the Church of Rome. At St. Michael even this was exceeded. A Vaudois woman had been buried for three months in the Protestant burying-place, which was inclosed with walls. The priest of the parish ordered the body to be exhumed, and caused the half-broken coffin to be carried and deposited before the abode of her friends; one of whom, meeting the sacrilegious priest one evening on a lonely road, gave him some blows with a stick, to revenge this outrage.
Immediately fifty Protestants of St. Michael were cited to Saluces, and many of them were detained prisoners. They were set at liberty by the intercession of Lesdiguières.
At Demont, in the valley of the Stura, a few fanatical Papists, after a supper party, excited by wine, swore death to heretics, and resolved to pursue the first who made his appearance. Having recognized a young man who walked before them as a Vaudois, they drew their swords and attacked him. The young man carried a little axe; and not being able to escape from their attack by flight, he wheeled round and killed the foremost of his assailants. The rest then took to flight; but, some days after, they returned, better armed and in greater numbers, furiously took possession of the village, violated the women, injured or killed the men, flung the children upon the street, and plundered the houses like brigands; then, loaded with booty, they derisively summoned the whole population to appear at Turin.
Here a fact falls to be mentioned, equally honourable to the Protestants and to the Catholics of Demont, that the latter offered to bear a share of the expenses and losses occasioned by these disorders, and by those of the criminal process which followed. This shows how readily the two parties would have lived on good terms with one another, if the breath of Rome had not constantly excited the hatred of her adherents, whom she accused of allowing themselves to be corrupted whenever they displayed any charity. At Dronier, likewise, it was to a Catholic gentleman that the Protestants of the district owed their deliverance from a snare which was laid for them, and from the prosecutions which would have been the consequence of their having been left unwarned. Thus, wherever they were known, the Vaudois found protectors, even amongst their adversaries; the latter also became more Christian by their intercourse with them; for wherever Protestantism has prevailed, manners have always been softened. The missionary monks, who had not come under this influence, sometimes exhibited themselves in the pulpit, bearing a naked sword in one hand and a torch in the other, to exhort the people to destroy the heretics, declaring that it was of no use to make any attempt upon them but by fire and sword.[13] This was a surer method for Popery than to make attempts by argument. But behold those who call themselves the ministers of God! men who pretend to grant absolution for the greatest crimes, but who have no pardon for the reading of the Bible, or for prayer!
To form a notion of these outrages, we must recollect that the episcopal palace of Saluces was the centre from which proceeded perpetual vexations to the Vaudois. But by and by their enemies went further, and regretted that they had been spared at St. Bartholomew's-day; it was an error, they said, and must be remedied. Accordingly it was deemed a duty to arrange a scheme for a general massacre of all the reformed in the province of Saluces. Here, also, the members of the Catholic Church showed themselves to be less cruel than their spiritual guides, for the greater part of the inhabitants of the country refused to enter into that conspiracy. However, the design was not given up; but God permitted it to be discovered, and we shall now see how the Protestants came by the knowledge of it.
One of those who had the management of it, Fabricius De Pétris, picked a quarrel with a young Protestant, and attacked him, but was killed himself; and amongst his papers were found written evidences of this conspiracy.
The report of this discovery spread with the rapidity of lightning. The ferment which existed betwixt the two parties still increased. On both sides new excesses were committed every day, of which, however, the Protestants were more frequently the victims. Those of St. Pierre, for example, in the valley of the Vrayta, were expelled from their abodes by the parish priest and the provost of the town. A few days before, five inhabitants of Dronier had also been banished, and had retired to the valley of Lucerna.
It was now the year 1619, and the fermentation increased continually. The vexations to which the adherents of the Reformed Church were subjected, were multiplied upon all sorts of pretexts.
At Demont two Protestant families were cruelly afflicted. And what was laid to their charge? That they had contracted marriage within the degrees of relationship prohibited by the canons of some old council. The spouses were separated; the husbands sent to the galleys, and the wives condemned to be scourged in the public square.
But these judges, so cruelly exact in maintaining the arbitrary prohibitions as to the degrees of consanguinity, to which, moreover, the Catholics alone ought to have been subjected--these very Papists, who so promptly dissolved the family ties sanctioned by a union upon which the blessing of Heaven had been invoked--what respect had they for virtue? It may be learned from what follows. An apothecary at Dronier, named Marin, had two daughters of rare beauty. Towards the end of July one of the Capuchins of the town sent for this man; the other monks entered his house during his absence, and seized his daughters with violence. A coach waited at the door--it was that of the Bishop of Saluces--the victims of this odious abduction were flung into it and conveyed to Turin, without regard to their tears and supplications, without pity for the distress of their family.[14]
A month after[15] the same bishop caused a poor woman to be apprehended, against whom were brought most singular accusations. "She received at Geneva," her accusers said, "a great black robe; and, clothed in this hearse curtain, she mounted the pulpit amongst the reformed, took a cow's horn, and blew the Holy Spirit through that horn upon those who were present." The book from which we derive these particulars adds, with an air of simplicity, "It must be confessed that this was an invention sufficiently ridiculous!"[16] Yet for this was this unhappy woman subjected five times to the rack, and tortured in presence of clerical dignitaries and the administrators of justice in the district. The prefect, the bishop, and the inquisitor, were there; and this in the 17th century! Yes, in the 17th century, but under the dominion of Catholicism. And in the 19th century itself; in 1845, where Popery still reigns, have we not seen a woman condemned to death for the crime of heresy?[17]
Thus passed these dark and troublous days, the storm ever threatening to break. Towards the end of the year 1619, an extraordinary meeting of priests, monks, and popish bigots of every confraternity, was convoked at Saluces, to consult as to the means of dealing effectively and conclusively with the heretics. After a repast, at which all these worthy guests were assembled, they had the leading Protestants burned in effigy, as they could not just yet do the same thing for their persons. These pastimes of the Catholic clergy sufficiently show by what spirit they were animated. They were men of no seriousness and no humanity. Cruelty and buffoonery, baseness and barbarism, were the characteristics of these pretended ministers of the God of perfection and of love. On the side of the Reformers the discontent went on increasing. A conflict was inevitable, in which the weaker party must perish.
The inhabitants of Aceil, who were nearly all of the same communion, and who had never ceased to hold their evangelical assemblies, still took advantage of their numbers to continue them. The governor of Dronier, Andrea della Negra, was sent against them; he apprehended and lodged in the prisons of Saluces the two distinguished members of the church who habitually conducted these meetings for prayer. The name of the one was Peter Marquisy, on the other, Maurice Monge. The apprehension of the former took place in June, that of the latter in September, 1619. Both of them were shortly condemned to death by the Inquisition.
From this judgment they appealed to the Senate of Turin. It was hoped that some influence might be used with the Duke of Savoy to save them; but that prince was then absent; he had gone to Savoy to receive Christina of France, who was on her way to Piedmont. The senate was thus left to itself, or rather to the suggestions of the dignified clergy, all powerful at court. Most unfortunately for the interests of the prisoners of Aceil, a new tumult had taken place in that town. The governor of the province, the Count of Sommariva, was killed by a shot of an arquebuse, on the hills of Mongardino, to which he had pursued the insurgents. And in unconscious prosecution of those pagan notions so familiar to the Catholics, it was thought necessary to offer up Maurice and Marquisy as expiatory victims to the manes of the governor. These courageous leaders of the church of Aceil were forthwith executed at Saluces[18] about four o'clock in the morning. But notwithstanding the hour, the bishop of the diocese was present at their execution, being conveyed to the spot in his coach. All the particulars of their courageous and edifying death have been preserved in a letter written from Saluces on the morning after their execution, and published at Geneva some days after. Part of them shall be given in the chapter devoted to the history of the martyrs.
In return for so many concessions to the demands of Rome, the new pope, Gregory XV, granted to the Duke of Savoy, by his brief of 27th May, 1621, the privilege of retaining the tithe of ecclesiastical revenues for six years, upon condition of his devoting the money to the extirpation of heresy. The duke grasped the money, and the clergy pressed him to act. In February, 1622, he began to employ these resources, or at least to show that he was husbanding them for the stipulated work, by resuming the prosecutions so often instituted against the Vaudois and the reformed of Piedmont, who did not abide within the narrow limits to which the territory of the Vaudois valleys had been circumscribed.
In the month of March following, the members of the church in Praviglelm and the surrounding communes were summoned to appear before the prefect of Saluces, under pain of death and confiscation. They might have repaired thither in so great numbers that the very display of firmness on their part would have awed their enemies. No penalty was yet denounced against those who might have obeyed. What made them hesitate? Perhaps the example of those who had been imprisoned when they made their appearance upon such a summons, with that kind of vis inertice which keeps the peasant from moving from his cottage, and a vague unreflecting fear of the tribunal of Saluces, which had proved so fatal to Protestants. Be this as it may, they did not attend. In place of acting vigorously, of showing themselves united and resolved, and firmly maintaining their rights, they exhibited in their conduct weakness and indecision--a severe censor might even say cowardice, for it is cowardly to abandon the defence of a right, as it is to shrink from the defence of one's native country. Not having appeared within the time prescribed, the inhabitants of Praviglelm and Paësane were all condemned to be banished from the dominions of his royal highness, and to be hanged if they fell into the hands of the authorities. As for their goods, it needs not to be said that they were confiscated. For the exchequer and for Rome, this was the clearest part of the business.
This sentence was passed at Saluces on the 15th of March, 1622, confirmed by the Senate of Turin on the 7th of June, and published at Paësane on the 29th of the same month.
The poor people had recourse to the intervention of Lesdiguières. But what had occurred? Being one day in company with the Cardinal Ludovisio of Bologna, Lesdiguières said to him, "When your eminence shall wear the tiara, I will renounce Protestantism." But eighteen months had now elapsed since Ludovisio had been elected pope, and Lesdiguières had changed his religion at the time he named. As one demits an office--as one delivers over goods upon an appointed day--the great general had laid down his religious beliefs when the almanac informed him that the time was come. However, he had not yet imbibed the inhuman spirit of his new church, and he wrote to Charles Emmanuel in favour of his former brethren in religion in the higher valleys.[19] "They have lived," said he, "without having given offence to any; and they have always been countenanced in the exercise of their religion. Whatsoever decree your highness may have issued with regard to others, may it please your highness to permit them to enjoy in peace the benefit of your kindness, which will thus augment, in the persons of these poor people, the obligations which make me, Monseigneur, your very humble," &c. The letter is dated from Grenoble, 29th July, 1622. Lesdiguières wrote with the same object to the French ambassador at the court of Turin; and, in consequence, the Vaudois, without obtaining a formal revocation of the atrocious sentence, received nevertheless a promise that no steps would be taken upon it, and that they might live in peace on the little heritages that had been transmitted to then from their fathers. Some of them, however, who had already left the country, were apprehended on their return.
The same pope, who had received the abjuration of the French general, founded at that time (in 1622) the sanguinary congregation de propaganda fide et extirpandis hoereticis, and canonised Ignatius de Loyola. This congregation was, for nearly a century, the most formidable engine which fanaticism and error ever employed to prevent the triumph of the doctrines of the Bible. But it was in Piedmont especially that the Propaganda, that disgraceful offspring of Jesuitism and the Inquisition, perpetrated its terrible ravages. We shall shortly see it at work in the Vaudois valleys. Meanwhile let us attend to its operations in the marquisate of Saluces, where it lost no time in establishing itself and where it thenceforth became a permanent source of trouble and persecution.
In 1627, the valley of Stura was cruelly tormented by proselytizers. The last vestiges of Protestantism which remained at Carail, were rooted out, according to the heart's wish of the monks by fire and sword. It was now no longer necessary to have been present at the meetings of the reformed in order to be thrown into prison; it was enough not to go to mass. At St. Michael, at Pagliero, and at Demont, the incessant prosecutions to which the Vaudois were subjected, deprived these once flourishing little towns of the peaceful citizens to whom they owed their prosperity, to fill the prisons with victims, and to people the mountains with outlawed men. The greater part retired to France, but, ere long, France also became utterly inhospitable to them. The history of a family has been discovered at Berlin, which left Demont at this period, settled in Provence, and was afterwards expelled from the latter country at the time of the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. What miseries religious wars and antipathies have occasioned!
And how far must the general feeling have become alienated from the doctrine of Christ, ere that impious combination of words. Religious wars and antipathies, could be introduced into language!
Some of the many prisoners made by the Propaganda at this period, bought their lives by the payment of a heavy ransom. The fortune gathered by the father for his children, went to enrich convents, jailers, and executioners.
Thus impoverished, decimated, proscribed, and persecuted everywhere, these unfortunate churches of Saluces became weaker daily. For many years, every manifestation of evangelical life, except patience and resignation, was forbidden to them; and if the sacred fire survived in their paralyzed members, it was like the last pulsations of a heart slowly dying in the breast of a motionless sufferer, against whom the tortures of the Inquisition are still ferociously employed. O! why should religious congregations have acted like wild beasts, destroying human beings in this way?
In the higher valleys of the Po, at Oncino, Praviglelm, and Bietonet, the proscribed worship still survived for a time in the retirements of poor cottages and Alpine shepherds' huts. But it was not long that these first and last branches of the great Vaudois family, in the province of Saluces, were exempted from persecution. When the fire has devoured the outer parts, it spares not the heart of the tree.
In 1629, the Count De La Mente, who was lieutenant-general of the duke's armies in the marquisate, imposed a fine of 400 ducats on the Protestants of Praviglelm. They did not make haste to pay it. This, probably, was what had been expected; it was the triumph of the persecuting skill of the Propaganda and the clergy. Without loss of time, the Count De La Mente sent four hundred soldiers to Praviglelm to lay waste the fields, carry off the cattle, and plunder the dwellings of the unfortunate Vaudois. The booty was transported to Paësane, and 1000 ducats had to be paid before it was restored.
Another seigneur, envious of the success of this expedition, came some days after at the head of twenty-five men, in order to seize the pastor of Praviglelm, and to carry off some hostages, whom he would not have released afterwards without a heavy ransom. These poor mountaineers were abandoned to all incursions, as a country without a master is abandoned to the first who chooses to take possession. This time, however, they repelled the aggressor, with his twenty-five men; but he came back very soon, accompanied no longer by soldiers, but by monks. A few words will explain the meaning of this new expedition.
The captain of this cowled legion began by ordering all the inhabitants of the district to attend the preaching of the missionaries, under pain of a fine of a crown of gold for each instance of disobedience. The instances were numerous, and, under pretence of making the Vaudois pay the fines incurred, their crops and their goods were again seized. Hereupon the inhabitants of the valley of Lucerna decided upon taking arms, to go to the assistance of their brethren in the valley of the Po. At the same time, their first plunderer, the Count De La Mente, afraid that things might be carried too far, and that he himself might be brought to a reckoning, put an end to these scandalous extortions.
The plague which ravaged Piedmont in 1630, did not spare the inhabitants of these mountains; but this scourge, at all events, did not produce irritation and division amongst men. A new out-breaking of popish zeal soon succeeded it, attended by all these sad effects.
Victor Amadeus had ascended the throne; the nuncio, the prelates, the monkish congregations, and all the representatives of Popery thronged in haste around him. "What a glory it would be for your highness to carry into full effect at last the designs transmitted from generation to generation of your predecessors, and completely to extirpate heresy from your dominions! Not only would it be a glory; it is a duty. It would be the consecration of your accession!--the best security for the blessings of God upon your crown." Such was the language addressed on every side to the new sovereign. He was then forty-three years of age. Notwithstanding the natural firmness of his character, his prudence, and the capacity which he displayed of thinking and scheming for himself by which he had already obtained the treaty of Tatisbon,[20] and that of Quiérasque,[21] restoring to him the possession of a great part of his dominions, he yielded at last to these suggestions.
Happily the Vaudois valleys of Lucerna, Perouse, St. Martin, and Pragela, belonged at that time to France; but, next to that great centre of Protestantism in Piedmont, the marquisate of Saluces contained the greatest number of its professors.
The duke issued, therefore, on the 23d of September, 1623, an edict, in the following terms:--
"The princes of the earth being appointed by God, ought to have nothing more at heart than the defence of his religion. Therefore, in order to restore peace to the church, and to give proof of our indulgence to the heretics of Saluces, who have rendered themselves liable to the penalty of death by their continued obstinacy, we ordain that they abjure their errors within the space of two months after the publication of the present edict, and that according to the forms which shall be prescribed to them by the Bishop of Saluces. In this case we will remit to them all the penalties to which they have become liable; but if they allow that term to pass without abjuring, they will be required to quit our dominions, under pain of death."
This was the way in which a sovereign gave proof of his kindness towards his subjects; this was the way in which he pretended to do service to the Christian religion! In this edict, here much abridged, the churches of Biolet, Biétonet, Croésio, and Praviglelm are mentioned by name. It was the death-stroke for these unfortunate communities, and our chapter must now be closed with their last sigh.
Upon the publication of this edict, many Vaudois families, perceiving that the final agony of the evangelical churches of their dear valleys was nigh at hand, silently withdrew into exile, to Dauphiny. At the same time the Bishop of Saluces, exulting in his now approaching triumph, and inflated with the importance which the edict had given him, arrived in these poor villages, escorted by monks and soldiers. The ultima ratio regum is also the ultima ratio Romoe. Shall I relate how the prelate could make his boast of having converted numbers of those indigent families, who would not have had even a trifle to support them on their journey, if they had left their native land? No; but I will relate how others, abandoning their possessions, retired to the mountains, where, in the persons of these wandering outlaws, amidst the misery and distresses of exile, were extinguished the last relics of that Vaudois Church which flourished so long about the sources of the Po. Their houses were burned and demolished, their goods confiscated, their flocks seized and sold for behoof of the bishop, the monks, and the exchequer.
Let anyone compare at the present day the moral and the general condition of the Vaudois valleys in which the gospel has been maintained, with the obscurity and decay into which those of the Stura and of the Po have fallen, from which it was banished at the expense of so much time and so many efforts, and he will see if Catholicism be favourable to the prosperity of nations. If the sphere within which this comparison is made be regarded as too limited, in being confined to these humble valleys, let him pursue in all quarters of the world the same parallel betwixt Catholic and Protestant countries, and he will arrive at the same result.
Thus were these interesting Vaudois communities extinguished, whose history no one has hitherto written. But the spirit which animated them has not disappeared. May it ever continue to animate what remains of the Israel of the Alps amongst the mountains so long moistened with the blood of martyrs!
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