those parts, adhering to the doctrines of devils, are known to have cast off."

This profound logic was too irresistible to be withstood by Louis, who began to collect an army of crusaders, at the head of which he placed himself, and sat down before the city of Avignon. Raymond, at that time, held several cautionary lands of the King of England; and the Pope, suspecting that he might possibly apply for assistance to our English monarch to enable him to defend them, wrote to caution him not to take up arms against the French king, in these words, "Make no war, either by yourself, or your brother, or any other person, on the said king, so long as he is engaged in the affair of the faith and service of Jesus Christ, lest by your obstructing the matter, which God forbid you should do, the king with his prelates and barons of France, should be forced to turn their arms from the extirpation of heretics to their own defence. As for us, since we could not excuse such a conduct, an instance of great indevotion, we could not impart to you our paternal favour, which, under other circumstances, at all proper seasons, should never be wanting to you. And as we are not only ready to do you justice, but even to shew you favour, as far as God enables us, we have taken care, that whatever becomes of heretics and their lands, your rights and those of other catholics shall be safe."

The city of Avignon was defended by Earl Raymond with great bravery, and multitudes of the French army fell during the siege. For, besides those that were killed in the ordinary mode of warfare, the army was afflicted with a dysentery and other diseases, which carried off numbers, and among the rest the French monarch. The pope's legate, for some time, concealed the death of the king, lest the army should break up with disgrace from the siege of a single city, without being able to take it. Finding, however, that it was not to be conquered by force, the

legate had recourse to fraud; and even these measures for some time failed him. He then desired that he might be admitted into the city, in company with his prelates, under the pretence that he would examine into the faith of the inhabitants, and affirming with an oath that he put off the siege of the city for no other cause than the welfare of their souls. He added, that the cry of their infidelity had ascended to the Pope; and that he wished to inquire whether they had done altogether according to the cry that had come up before him. The too credulous citizens, not suspecting the fraud, and especially relying upon the sacredness of his oath, opened their gates, on which the soldiers. of the French army, as had been previously determined, rushed violently into the city, seized the citizens, bound them in chains, plundered their houses, killed numbers of the inhabitants, and having thus, by treachery, got possession, they brake down the towers, and destroyed the walls of that noble city. Such is the narrative of the monk of St. Albans, Matthew Paris.

Avignon being thus taken, the crusaders next bent all their forces against Toulouse. This city, which was most gallantly defended, maintained a long siege, but it was at length taken, in 1221, and young Raymond compelled to submit to terms even more severe than those which were proposed to his father in the council of Arles. From this period the Albigenses declined greatly in France. For, being no longer permitted to find an asylum under any of the reigning princes, such of them as escaped the edge of the sword, and the vengeance of their adversaries, fled for refuge into the vallies of Piedmont and other places, dispersing themselves in every direction, as will be shewn in the ensuing section, wherever they could enjoy quietness and the liberty of worshipping God agreeably to the exer-. cise of a good conscience.

As to the ordinary manner of proceeding with such as

fell into their hands captives of war, a single extract from Limborch's history may suffice to shew. "A person of the name of Robert," says he, quoting the Annals of Bzovius and of Raynaldus, 1207, &c. “who had been of the sect of the Albigenses, but afterwards joined the Dominicans, supported by the authority of the princes and magistrates, burnt all who persisted in their heresy. Within two months he caused fifty persons, without distinction of sex, either to be burnt or buried alive, whence he was called the Hammer of the Heretics.' In 1211 they took the city of Alby, and there put numbers to death. They took la Vaur by storm, and burnt in it multitudes of the Albigenses. They hanged Almeric, the governor of that city, who was of a very noble family; and beheaded eighty of the inferior rank, not sparing the females. They threw the sister of Almeric, who was the principal lady of the sect of the Albigenses, into a well, and covered her with stones. Afterwards they conquered Carcum, and put sixty men to death. They seized on Pulchra Vallis, a large city near Toulouse, committed four hundred Albigenses to the flames, and hanged fifty more." Thuanus, that impartial Catholic writer, in the History of his own Times, book vi. confirms this dreadful statement in its general results, and further adds, " that after the capture of La Vaur, the towns of Les Cures, Rabastains, Gaillac, St. Marcel, St. Anthonin, Causac, and Moisac, were stormed, and a great massacre made of the townsmen by the conquerors. The castle of Perre in the Agenois having after a long siege capitulated, seventy of the soldiers were hanged, and the others who adhered to their errors were burnt alive. Nor was Paris itself exempt from this contagion, for fourteen persons, most of whom were priests (teachers among the Albigenses) being convicted of this error expired in the flames. In England they were handled with more mildness, if loss of life be the measure of punishment, but with

more ignominy; the convicted persons being branded with a hot iron on their shoulders, or even on their foreheads."

But, independent of those that fell by the edge of the sword, or were committed to the flames by the soldiers and magistrates, the inquisition was constantly at work, from the year 1206 to 1228, and produced the most dreadful havoc among the disciples of Christ. Of the effects occasioned by this infernal engine of cruelty and oppression, we may have some notion from this circumstance, that in the last-mentioned year the archbishops of Aix, Arles, and Narbonne, found it necessary to intercede with the monks of the inquisition, to defer a little their work of imprisonmen, tuntil the Pope was apprised of the immense numbers apprehended-numbers so great, that it was impossible to defray the charge of their subsistence, or even to provide stone and mortar to build prisons for them. Their own language, indeed, is so remarkable, that it deserves to be laid before the reader, and here it is.

"It has come to our knowledge," say they, "that you have apprehended so many of the WALDENSES, that it is not only impossible to defray the charges of their subsistence, but also to provide stone and mortar to build prisons for them. We, therefore, advise you to defer for a while augmenting their numbers, until the Pope be apprised of the great multitudes that have been apprehended, and until he notify what he pleases to have done in this case. Nor is there any reason you should take offence hereat; for as to those who are altogether impenitent and incorrigible, or concerning whom you may doubt of their relapse or escape, or that, being at large again, they would infect others, you may condemn such without delay.”*

Such is the representation given us by writers of unimpeachable veracity, of the merciless treatment which the

VOL. II.

• Perrin's Hist. des Vaudois, b. ii. ch. ii.

T

Albigenses received from the Catholics at this period, purely on account of their religious profession.* Before I dismiss the subject, it may be proper to notice a difficulty which will strike the minds of reflecting readers. It has been intimated both by the friends and enemies of the Waldenses, that they had religious scruples against bearing arms, and even shedding the blood of animals unnecessarily. The question, therefore, naturally presents itself, "Were they at last driven to the necessity of taking up the sword in defence of their religion and lives?" Upon the lawfulness or unlawfulness of doing so, when pressed by dire necessity, I shall offer no opinion in this place. My business is to state facts as I find them; and, that the reader may not suspect me of a wish to misrepresent their principles and conduct in the instance referred to, I shall quote the words of Mr. Robinson, who had much better means of information than have fallen to my lot.

"The difficulty here is," says he, "how such people as bore no arms, and shed no blood, could be said to bring large armies into the field to defend their rights. The proper answer is the pious were named from the provinces, the provinces and princes from the pious; for one common principle, that all mankind had a right to be free, brought together Goths and professors of the gospel.

* In the council of Toulouse, held in the year 1229, a most severe and sanguinary inquisition, was established against heretics. One of its canons is, ' It shall not be permitted to laymen to have the books of the - Old and New Testament; only they who out of devotion desire it, may have a Psalter, a Breviary, and the hours of the Virgin. But we absolutely forbid them to have the above-mentioned books translated into the vulgar tongue. This is the first time, says the Abbé Fleury, in his Ecclesiastical History, that I have met with this prohibition: but it may be favour. ably explained by observing that the minds of men being then much irritated, there was no other method of putting a stop to contentions, than by taking away from them the Holy Scriptures, of which the heretics made a bad use." A poor excuse indeed! says Dr. Jortin. Remarks, Vol. III. p. 311.