Volume II Part 5 (2/2)

The fasts and feasts prescribed in the calendar were not to be observed, and the indulgences so lavishly sold were useless. As of old, oaths and homicide were forbidden. Yet enough of the traditional ascetic tendencies were preserved to lead to the existence of a monastic fraternity whose members divested themselves of all individual property, and promised chast.i.ty, with obedience to a superior. Bernard Gui refers, with a brevity which shows how little importance he attached to them, to stories about s.e.xual abominations performed in nocturnal a.s.semblies, and he indicates the growth of popular superst.i.tion by a brief allusion to a dog which appears in these gatherings and sprinkles the sectaries with his tail.[167]

The non-resistance doctrines of the Waldenses rendered them, as a rule, a comparatively easy prey, but human nature sometimes a.s.serted itself, and a sharp persecution carried on at this period by Frere Jacques Bernard, Inquisitor of Provence, provoked a b.l.o.o.d.y reprisal. In 1321 he sent two deputies--Freres Catalan Fabri and Pierre Paschal--to the diocese of Valence to make inquisition there. Former raids had left the people in an angry mood. Mult.i.tudes had been subjected to the humiliation of crosses, and these and their friends vowed revenge on the appearance of the new persecutors. A plot was rapidly formed to a.s.sa.s.sinate the inquisitors at a village where they were to pa.s.s the night. For some reason, however, they changed their plans, and pa.s.sed on to the Priory of Montoison. The conspirators followed them, broke down the doors, and slew them. Strangely enough, the Prior of Montoison was accused of complicity in the murder, and was arrested when the murderers were seized. The bodies of the martyrs were solemnly buried in the Franciscan convent at Valence, where they soon began to manifest their sanct.i.ty in miracles, and they would have been canonized by John XXII.

had not the quarrel which soon afterwards sprang up between him and the Franciscans rendered it impolitic for him to increase the number of Franciscan saints.[168]

A few Waldenses appear in the prosecutions of Henri de Chamay of Carca.s.sonne in 1328 and 1329, and, from the occasional notices which have reached us in the succeeding years, we may conclude that persecution, more or less fitful, never wholly ceased; while, in spite of this, the heresy kept constantly growing. After the disappearance of Catharism, indeed, it was the only refuge for ordinary humanity when dissatisfied with Rome. The Begghards were mystics whose speculations were attractive only to a certain order of minds. The Spirituals and Fraticelli were Franciscan ascetics. The Waldenses sought only to restore Christianity to its simplicity; their doctrines could be understood by the poor and illiterate, groaning under the burdens of sacerdotalism, and they found constantly wider acceptance among the people, in spite of all the efforts put forth by the waning power of the Inquisition. Benedict XII., in 1335, summoned Humbert II., Dauphin of Viennois, and Adhemar of Poitou to a.s.sist the inquisitors. Humbert obeyed, and from 1336 to 1346 there were expeditions sent against them which drove them from their homes and captured some of them. Of these a portion abjured and the rest were burned; their possessions were confiscated and the bones of the dead exhumed. The secular and ecclesiastical officials of Embrun joined in these efforts, but they had no permanent result. In Languedoc Frere Jean Dumoulin, Inquisitor of Toulouse, in 1344 attacked them vigorously, but only succeeded in scattering them throughout Bearn, Foix, and Aragon. In 1348 Clement VI.

again urged Humbert, who responded with strict orders to his officers to aid the ecclesiastical authorities with what force might be necessary, and this time we hear of twelve Waldenses brought to Embrun, and burned on the square in front of the cathedral. When Dauphine became a possession of the crown the royal officials were equally ready to a.s.sist. Letters of October 20, 1351, from the governor, order the authorities of Briancon to give the inquisitor armed support in his operations against the heretics of the Brianconnais, but this seems to have been ineffective; and the next year Clement VI. appealed to the Dauphin Charles, and to Louis and Joanna of Naples, to aid Frere Pierre Dumont, the Inquisitor of Provence, and summoned prelates and magistrates to co-operate in the good work. The only recorded result of this was the penancing of seven Waldenses by Dumont in 1353. More successful were the Christian labors of Guillaume de Bordes, Archbishop of Embrun from 1352 to 1363, surnamed the Apostle of the Waldenses, who tried the unusual expedient of kindness and persuasion. He personally visited the mountain valleys, and had the satisfaction of winning over a number of the heretics. With his death his methods were abandoned, and Urban V., from 1363 to 1365, was earnest in calling upon the civil power and in stimulating the zeal of the Provencal inquisitors, Freres Hugues Cardilion and Jean Richard. The celebrated inquisitor Francois Borel now appears upon the scene. Armed expeditions were sent into the mountains which had considerable success. Many of the heretics were obstinate and were burned, while others saved their lives by abjuration. Their pitiful little properties were confiscated; one had a cow, another two cows and clothes of white cloth. In the purse of another, more wealthy, were found two florins--a booty which scarce proved profitable, for the wood to burn him and a comrade cost sixty-two sols and six deniers. One woman named Juven who was burned possessed a vineyard. The vintage was gathered and the must stored in her cabin, when the wrathful neighbors fired it at night and destroyed the product.[169]

All this was of no avail. When Gregory XI. ascended the pontifical throne, in 1370, his attention was early directed to the deplorable condition of the Church in Provence, Dauphine, and the Lyonnais. The whole region was full of Waldenses, and many n.o.bles were now beginning to embrace the heresy. The prelates were powerless or negligent, and the Inquisition ineffective. He set to work vigorously, appointing inquisitors and stimulating their zeal, but the whole system by this time was so discredited that his labors were ineffectual. The royal officials, so far from aiding the inquisitors, had no scruple in impeding them. Unsafe places were a.s.signed to them in which to conduct their operations; they were forced to permit secular judges to act as a.s.sessors with them; their proceedings were submitted for revision to the secular courts, and even their prisoners were set at liberty without consulting them. The secular officials refused to take oaths to purge the land of heresy, and openly protected heretics, especially n.o.bles, when prosecutions were commenced against them.[170]

Gregory duly complained of this to Charles le Sage in 1373, but to little purpose at first. The evil continued unabated, and in 1375 he returned to the charge still more vigorously. No stone was left unturned. Not only was the king requested to send a special deputy to the infected district, but the pope wrote directly to the royal lieutenant, Charles de Banville, reproaching him for his protection of heretics, and threatening him if he did not mend his ways. Certain n.o.bles who had become conspicuous as favorers of heresy were significantly reminded of the fate of Raymond of Toulouse; the prelates were scolded and stimulated; Amedeo of Savoy was summoned to a.s.sist, and the Tarantaise was added to the district of Provence that nothing might interfere with the projected campaign. As the spread of heresy was attributable to the lack of preachers, and to the neglect of prelates and clergy in instructing their flocks, the inquisitor was empowered to call in the services of Dominicans, Franciscans, Carmelites, and Augustinians, to spread over the land and teach the people the truths of religion. These multiplied efforts at length began to tell. Charles issued orders to enforce the laws against heresy, and when Gregory sent a special Apostolic Internuncio, Antonio, Bishop of Ma.s.sa, to direct operations, persecution began in earnest. Frere Francois Borel, the Inquisitor of Provence, had long been struggling against the indifference of the prelates and the hostility of the secular power. Now that he was sure of efficient seconding be was like a hound slipped from the leash. His forays against the miserable populations of Freyssinieres, l'Argentiere, and Val-Pute (or Val-Louise) have conferred on him a sinister reputation, unredeemed by the efficient aid which he contributed to regaining the liberties of his native town of Gap.[171]

The immediate success which rewarded these efforts was so overwhelming as to bring new cause for solicitude. The Bishop of Ma.s.sa's mission commenced early in May, 1375, and already, by June 17, Gregory is concerned about the housing and support of the crowds of wretches who had been captured. In spite of numerous burnings of those who proved obstinate, the prisons of the land were insufficient for the detention of the captives, and Gregory at once ordered new and strong ones to be built in Embrun, Avignon, and Vienne. To solve the financial complications which immediately arose, the bishops, whose negligence was accountable for the growth of heresy, were summoned within three months to furnish four thousand gold florins to build the prisons, and eight hundred florins per annum for five years for the support of the prisoners. This they were allowed to take from the legacies for pious uses, and the rest.i.tutions of wrongly-acquired funds, with a threat, if they should demur, that they should be deprived of these sources of income and be excommunicated besides. The bishops, however, were no more amenable to such arguments than those of Languedoc had been in 1245, and, after the three months had pa.s.sed, Gregory answers, October 5, the anxious inquiry of the Bishop of Ma.s.sa as to how he shall feed his prisoners, by telling him that it is the business of every bishop to support those of his diocese, and that any one who refuses to do so is to be coerced with excommunication and the secular arm. This was a mere _brutum fulmen_, and in 1376 he endeavored to secure a share in the confiscations, but King Charles refused to divide them, though in 1378 he at last agreed to give the inquisitors a yearly stipend for their own support, similar to that paid to their brethren at Toulouse.[172]

All other devices being exhausted, Gregory at last had recourse to the unfailing resource of the curia--an indulgence. There is something so appallingly grotesque in tearing honest, industrious folk from their homes by the thousand, in thrusting them into dungeons to rot and starve, and then evading the cost of feeding them by presenting them to the faithful as objects of charity, that the proclamation which Gregory issued August 15, 1370, is perhaps the most shameless monument of a shameless age--

”To all the faithful in Christ: As the help of prisoners is counted among pious works, it befits the piety of the faithful to mercifully a.s.sist the incarcerated of all kinds who suffer from poverty. As we learn that our beloved son, the Inquisitor Francois Borelli, has imprisoned for safe-keeping or punishment many heretics and those defamed for heresy, who in consequence of their poverty cannot be sustained in prison unless the pious liberality of the faithful shall a.s.sist them as a work of charity; and as we wish that these prisoners shall not starve, but shall have time for repentance in the said prisons; now, in order that the faithful in Christ may through devotion lend a helping hand, we admonish, ask, and exhort you all, enjoining it on you in remission of your sins, that from the goods which G.o.d has given you, you bestow pious alms and grateful charity for the food of these prisoners, so that they may be sustained by your help, and you, through this and other good works inspired by G.o.d, may attain eternal blessedness!”[173]

Imagination refuses to picture the horrors of the economically constructed jails where these unfortunates were crowded to wear out their dreary lives, while their jailers vainly begged for the miserable pittance that should prolong their agonies. Yet so far was Gregory from being satisfied with victims in number far beyond his ability to keep, that, December 28, 1375, he bitterly scolded the officials of Dauphine for the negligent manner in which they obeyed the king's commands to aid the inquisitors--a complaint which he reiterated May 18, 1376. From some expressions in these letters it is permissible to a.s.sume that this whole inhuman business had shocked even the dull sensibilities of that age of violence. Yet in spite of all that had been accomplished the heretics remained obstinate, and in 1377 Gregory indignantly chronicles their increase, while reproaching the inquisitors with their slackness in performing the duties for which they had been appointed.[174]

What effect on the future of the Waldenses a continuance of Gregory's remorseless energy would have wrought can only be matter of conjecture.

He died March 27, 1378, and the Great Schism which speedily followed gave the heretics some relief, during which they continued to increase, although in 1380 Clement VII. renewed the commission of Borel, whose activity was unabated until 1393, and his victims were numbered by the hundred. A good many conversions rewarded his labors, and the converts were allowed to retain their property on payment of a certain sum of money, as shown by a list made out in 1385. In 1393 he is said to have burned a hundred and fifty at Gren.o.ble in a single day. San Vicente Ferrer was a missionary of a different stamp, and his self-devoted labors for several years in the Waldensian valleys won over numerous converts. His memory is still cherished there, and the village of Puy-Saint-Vincent, with a chapel dedicated to him, shows that his kindly ministrations were not altogether lost.[175]

The Waldenses by this time were substantially the only heretics with whom the Church had to deal outside of Germany. The French version of the _Schwabenspiegel_, or South German munic.i.p.al code, made for the Romande speaking provinces of the empire, is a.s.signable to the closing years of the century, and it attests the predominance of Waldensianism in its chapter on heresy, by translating the _Kaezer_ (Catharus) of the original by _vaudois_. Even ”Leschandus” (Childeric III.) is said to have been dethroned by Pope Zachary because he was a protector of vaudois. That at this period the Inquisition had become inoperative in those regions where it had once been so busy is proved by the episcopal tribunals being alone referred to as having cognizance of such cases--the heretic is to be accused to his bishop, who is to have him examined by experts.[176]

How completely the Waldenses dropped out of sight in the struggles of the Great Schism is seen in a bull of Alexander V., in 1409, to Frere Pons Feugeyron, whose enormous district extended from Ma.r.s.eilles to Lyons and from Beaucaire to the Val d'Aosta. This comprehended the whole district which Francois Borel and Vicente Ferrer found swarming with heretics. The inquisitor is urged to use his utmost endeavors against the schismatic followers of Benedict XIII. and Gregory XII., against the increasing numbers of sorcerers, against apostate Jews and the Talmud, but not a word is said about Waldenses. They seem to have been completely forgotten.[177]

After the Church had reorganized itself at the Council of Constance it had leisure to look after the interests of the faith, although its energies were mostly monopolized by the Hussite troubles. In 1417 we hear of Catharine Sauve, an anchorite, burned at Montpellier for Waldensian doctrines by the deputy-inquisitor, Frere Raymond Caba.s.se, a.s.sisted by the Bishop of Maguelonne. The absence of persecution had by no means been caused by a diminution in the number of heretics. In 1432 the Council of Bourges complained that the Waldenses of Dauphine had taxed themselves to send money to the Hussites, whom they recognized as brethren; and there were plenty of them to be found by any one who took the trouble to look after them. On August 23, of this same year, we have a letter from Frere Pierre Fabri, Inquisitor of Embrun, to the Council of Basle, excusing himself for not immediately obeying a summons to attend it on the ground of his indescribable poverty, and of his preoccupations in persecuting the Waldenses. In spite of the great executions which he had already made, he describes them as flouris.h.i.+ng as numerously as ever in the valleys of Freyssinieres, Argentiere, and Pute, which had been almost depopulated by the ferocious raids of Francois Borel. He now has in his dungeons of Embrun and Briancon six relapsed heretics, who have revealed to him the names of more than five hundred others whom he is about to seize, and whose trials will be a work of time, but as soon as he can absent himself without prejudice to the faith his first duty will be to attend the council. Evidently the harvest was abundant and the reapers were few.[178]

In 1441 the Inquisitor of Provence, Jean Voyle, made some effort at persecution, but apparently with little result, and the Waldensian churches seem to have enjoyed a long respite, for the terrible episode of the so-called Vaudois of Arras, in 1460, as we shall see hereafter, was merely a delirium of witchcraft. In France, so completely had the Waldenses monopolized the field of misbelief in the public mind that sorcery became popularly known as _vauderie_ and witches as _vaudoises_.

Accordingly, when, in 1465, at Lille, five ”Poor Men of Lyons” were tried, and four of them recanted and one was burned, it was necessary to find some other name for them, and they were designated as Turelupins.[179]

It is not until 1475 that we find the inquisitors again at work in their old hunting-ground among the valleys around the headwaters of the Durance. The Waldenses had quietly multiplied again. They held their conventicles undisturbed, they dared openly to preach their abhorred faith, and their missionary zeal was rewarded with abundant conversions.

Worse than all, when the bishops and inquisitors sought to repress them in the accustomed manner, they appealed to the royal court, which was so untrue to its duty that it granted them letters of protection and they waxed more insolent than ever. In vain Sixtus IV. sent special commissions armed with full powers to put an end to this disgraceful state of things. Men at this time in France recked little of papal authority, and the commissioners found themselves scorned. Sixtus, therefore, July 1, 1475, addressed an earnest remonstrance to Louis XI.

The king was surely ignorant of the acts of his representatives; he would hasten to disavow them and lend the whole power of the State, as of old, to the support of the Inquisition.[180]

The correspondence which ensued would doubtless be interesting reading if it were accessible. Its purport, however, can readily be discerned in the Ordonnance of May 18, 1478, which marks in the most emphatic manner the supremacy which the State had obtained over the Church. The king a.s.sumed that his subjects of Dauphine were all good Catholics. In a studied tone of contemptuous insolence he alludes to the old Mendicants (_vieux mendiens_) styling themselves inquisitors, who vex the faithful with accusations of heresy and hara.s.s them with prosecutions in the royal and ecclesiastical courts for purposes of extortion or to secure the confiscation of their property. He therefore forbids his officers to aid in making such confiscations, decrees that the heirs shall be reinstated in all cases that have occurred, and in order to put a stop to the frauds and abuses of the inquisitors he strictly enjoins that for the future they shall not be permitted to prosecute the inhabitants in any manner.[181]

Such was the outcome of the efforts which, for two hundred and fifty years, the Church had unremittingly made to obtain despotic control over the human mind. For far less than such defiance it had destroyed Raymond of Toulouse and the civilization of Languedoc. It had built up the monarchy with the spoils of heresy, and now the monarchy cuffed it and bade it bury its Inquisition out of the sight of decent men. This put an end for a time to the labors of the Inquisition against the Waldenses of Dauphine, but the troubles of the latter were by no means over. The death of Louis, in 1483, deprived them of their protector, and the Italian policy of Charles VIII. rendered him less indifferent to the wishes of the Holy See. At the request of the Archbishop of Embrun, Innocent VIII. ordered the persecutions renewed. The Franciscan Inquisitor, Jean Veyleti, whose excesses had caused the appeal to the throne in 1475, was soon again at work, and had the satisfaction of burning both consuls of Freyssinieres. Though the Waldenses had represented themselves to Louis XI. as faithful Catholics, the ancient errors were readily brought to light by the efficient means of torture.

Though they believed in transubstantiation, they denied that it could be effected by sinful priests. Their _barbes_, or pastors, were ordained, and administered absolution after confession, but the pope, the bishops, and the priests had lost that power. They denied the existence of purgatory, the utility of prayers for the dead, the intercession of saints, the power of the Virgin, and the obligation of keeping any feast-days save Sunday. Wearied with their stubbornness, the archbishop, in June and July, 1486, summoned them either to leave the country or to come forward and submit, and as they did neither he excommunicated them.

This was equally ineffective, and he appealed again to Innocent VIII., who resolved to end the heresy with a decisive blow. Accordingly, in 1488, a crusade on a large scale was organized in both Dauphine and Savoy. The papal commissioner, Alberto de' Capitanei, obtained the a.s.sistance of the Parlement of Gren.o.ble, and a force was raised under the command of Hugues de La Palu, Comte de Vanax, to attack them on every side. The attack was delayed by legal formalities, during which they were urged to submission, but refused, saying that their faith was pure and that they would die rather than abandon it. At length, in March, 1489, the crusaders advanced. The valley of Pragelato was the first a.s.sailed, and, after a few days, was reduced to the alternative of death or abjuration, when fifteen obstinate heretics were burned. In Val Cluson and Freyssinieres the resistance was more stubborn and there was considerable carnage, which so frightened the inhabitants of Argentiere that they submitted peaceably. In Val Louise the people took refuge in the cavern of Aigue Fraide, which they imagined inaccessible, but La Palu succeeded in reaching it, and built fires in the mouth, suffocating the unhappy refugees. This, and the confiscations which followed, divided between Charles VIII. and the Archbishop of Embrun, gave a fatal blow to Waldensianism in the valleys. To prevent its resuscitation the legate left behind him Francois Ploireri as Inquisitor of Provence, who continued to hara.s.s the people with citations and p.r.o.nounced condemnations for contumacy, burning an occasional _barbe_ and confiscating the property of relapsed and hardened heretics.[182]

With a new king, in the person of Louis XII., there came a new phase in the affairs of the Waldenses. A conference was held in Paris before the royal chancellor, where envoys from Freyssinieres met Rostain, the new Archbishop of Embrun, and deputies of the Parlement of Gren.o.ble. It was resolved to send to the spot papal and royal commissioners, with power to determine the status of the so-called heretics. They went to Freyssinieres and examined witnesses, who satisfied them that the population were good Catholics, in spite of the urgent a.s.sertions of the archbishop that they were notorious heretics. All the excommunications were removed, which put an end to the prosecutions. On October 12, 1502, Louis XII. confirmed the decision, and Alexander VI., to whose son, Caesar Borgia, Louis had given the Duchy of Valentinois, embracing the territory in question, was not disposed to run counter to the royal wishes. The Waldenses were, however, unable to loosen the grip of the Archbishop of Embrun on the property which he had confiscated, in spite of positive orders for its restoration from the king, but at least they were allowed, under the guise of Catholicism, to wors.h.i.+p G.o.d after their own fas.h.i.+on, until the crowding pressure of the Reformation forced them to a merger with the Calvinists. In the Brianconnais, in spite of occasional burnings, heresy continued to spread until, in 1514, Antoine d'Estaing, Bishop of Angouleme, was sent thither, when the measures he adopted, vigorously enforced by the secular authorities, put an end to it in a few years.[183]

CHAPTER III.

THE SPANISH PENINSULA.

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