heretical theology, without attempting to refute them. Even simple recantations have been handed down from those ages, bearing the stamp of sincerity: thus Durand of Huesca, a contemporary of Ermengaud, had disbelieved in the Trinity, and in the real humanity of Christ. Our information about the dualistic heretics is complete enough to enable us to ascertain the characteristics of the different schools into which they were divided, the phases through which their theology passed at different times and in different countries, and the arguments, whether taken from reason or Scripture, which they were in the habit of putting forward; and it is impossible not to feel that we have before us real phenomena in the history of the human mind, and earnest attempts to fasten upon the Bible a false view of the divine conduct and of human nature. Thus we are told, they pleaded the tempter's offer of the kingdoms of the world to Jesus, (Matt. iv. 9,) and the expressions, "Prince of this world," (John xiv. 30,) "My kingdom is not of this world,” (John xviii. 36,) as proofs that Satan was really lord of this creation. When Jesus speaks in another place of plants which his Heavenly Father had not planted, (Matt. xv. 13,) it is clear to them that there must be a second creator. The two masters are radically opposed, (Matt. vi. 24,) and must therefore be both eternal. When it is said, "Ye are of your father the devil," (John viii. 44,) they understand it literally and materially. In the same way, they found means to establish a perpetual and profound contrast between the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New. The former, said they, began His work by chaos and darkness; while the latter is light, and "in Him is no darkness at all." The former created man, male and female; while "in Christ Jesus there is neither male nor female." The God of the Old Testament says, "I will put enmity between thee and the woman;" the God of the New Testament reconciles all things to Himself. The one curses, and the other blesses. The one repents of what He has made; the other is the author of nothing but what is good and perfect. (Gen. i. 2; 1 John i. 5; Gen. i. 27; Gal. iii. 28; Gen. iii. 15; Col. i. 20; Gen. vi. 7; James i. 17.) The God of the Old Testament puts His creatures in the way of temptation; He often betrays a forgetfulness which is inconsistent with omniscience, and is repeatedly cruel and vindictive.

Contemporaneous writers, synods, and tribunals, not only distinguish between the Waldenses, or orthodox sectaries, and the Cathari, but tell us that both parties were engaged in continual controversy with each other. Stephen de Bellavilla says that the Waldenses called the Cathari "demons." It appears that some ignorant Priests used even to put the Vaudois forward to dispute with the Manichæans, because they were conscious of their own incapacity to do so. The remains of Waldensian literature still in our hands enable us to substantiate the fact

The Distinction confirmed by Waldensian Documents. 7

of their polemical attitude towards Manichæan heretics, and furnish thereby a final proof, if such were needed, of the contemporaneous existence of the latter. The poem called "Lo PAYRE ETERNAL" (MS. Dublin University, printed in Hahn's "Waldenses") seems to be the confession of one who, after trying in vain to find peace and spiritual life among Manichæans, had at last embraced the doctrine of the Waldenses: it dwells especially on the Trinity, the reality of the Incarnation, and the identity of the God of the New and Old Testaments. The "NOBLA LEYCZON," that oldest monument of the faith of the Waldenses, and frequently printed, is pervaded by a strain of indirect controversy on this order of subjects: it proclaims the unity of God, and His creation of the world; it justifies the destruction of Sodom and the judgments inflicted upon the Egyptians, against those who pretended that God made people only to let them perish; it lays stress on the charitable precepts of the Law, on the nine months spent by the Saviour in the Virgin's womb, on His baptism, and on the liberty of the human will. "LI ARTICLES DE LA FE" (MS. Geneva and Dublin, printed by Hahn) is a sort of brief Confession of Faith repeated by the Waldensian Ministers at their ordination. It is very positive about the creation of all things visible and invisible by the Holy Trinity, and on the divine character and holiness of the Law given to Moses, and adds, "It is a deadly sin to affirm that Christ was not born of the Virgin." A remarkable Commentary, in verse, on the Song of Solomon, "CANTICA," (MS. Geneva,) is still more explicit: it says, that the true holy Church has to contend with both heretics and bad Catholics; it gives glory to God that many had been called to the true faith from the errors of Egypt and the darkness of heresy," las tenebras de li hereges;" it speaks of using the sword of the word against the errors of heretics, and says, that these, "and those whose names ye know," (doubtless the Priests and monks,) are the little foxes that spoil the grapes. "The streets in which the bride seeks her beloved without finding him, are the different sects of heretics; for, as there are streets in a town, so in this world there are different sects and churches of wicked men,"-" gleisas de li malignant." The comparison is carried so far, that the worldly and indifferent are put in the open places of the city, while the heretics, leading a more ascetic life," la vita plus streyta,"—are the narrow streets! The same poem speaks expressly of "the error of those who say that Christ is not a real man, and has not taken real flesh;" it sweetly applies the language of the bride, "My beloved speaks with me, "" to that close intercourse with the Saviour which a true faith in His person alone admits of; and it uses the exclamation, "Turn away thine eyes from me," (Cant. vi. 4,) as a text for a protestation against the spirit of proud and unhealthy speculation in which the heretics indulged. The tract "TRIBU

LACIONS," (MS. Dublin, printed in part by Hahn,) written in the thirteenth century, reproaches the Roman Catholics with their cruelty towards others as well as the Vaudois themselves, and shows, from the parable of the tares, that even the bad are not to be exterminated by violence.

The Waldenses appear to have been constantly in contact with the Cathari, to have established themselves frequently in the same regions, and to have shared in the same persecutions; but they increased in numbers, in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, in proportion as their fellow-sufferers diminished; and it is remarkable that the French Albigenses, in their adversity, never sought refuge in the strongholds of the Waldenses, but in other countries rather, in Lombardy, in Sicily, and in Illyria.

There exists a natural and, upon the whole, a just prejudice in favour of every cause which has been ennobled by martyrdom; but when we consult the records of religious intolerance, we find innumerable instances of the Roman Catholic, the Socinian, the Jew, and even the Mussulman, sealing their convictions with their blood. Such high resolve is never wholly lost. The martyr for the worst of faiths proves that, for man's inmost being, the claims of religion are paramount to every other; but he does not prove the truth of the particular religion for which he died. With the evidence before us, it is impossible to maintain the orthodoxy of the Albigenses as a body. We can still revere in their persons sufferers for man's dearest and most fundamental liberty,-the right to confess and worship God according to his conscience. They resisted the most impious usurpation that can be perpetrated under heaven,-the attempt of a religious corporation to treat mankind as its chattels, and to impose its faith with the sword, the rack, and the brand. But we cannot believe they made a felicitous use of the liberty they so heroically asserted. The inconsistencies we mentioned, that strike one on the first perusal of the charges against those sectaries, are easily disposed of. Some of them arise from a confounding of Waldenses and Albigenses; others, from the not distinguishing between the extreme asceticism which the latter required of their formally received members or perfects, and the comparative licence allowed to those who were only hearers or disciples. A third source of misunderstanding is the fact that, while the mitigated Dualists of Illyria and Italy (of whom more hereafter) rejected the Old Testament altogether, the absolute Dualists of France and Italy only rejected the historical books, receiving the Prophets, Psalms, Job, Solomon, and the Wisdom of Sirach: this last was in especial favour, because of a passage (xlii. 25) which was understood to confirm their doctrine. Even the party who represented the Prophets as messengers of the evil one, thought that God sometimes constrained them to utter true oracles; and they accounted in this rude way for the

Origin of the Cathari.

9

Messianic prophecies, and in general for all those passages of the Old Testament which are quoted in the New.

While the evangelical dissent of the Middle Ages was of indigenous origin, their Manichæism was imported from the East, as is attested by the Greek term Kalapoi,* "Puritans," by which its adepts were designated. Some poor creatures who were burnt at Cologne in 1146, said that their doctrine had been preserved in Greece from the times of the Apostles; and this tradition seems to have been general. A trace of the early preponderance of Sclavonian Catholicism over that of other countries is perceptible in the fact, that the three principal orders or schools of the sect were called, respectively, the Tragurian, (from Trau, a Dalmatian sea-port,) the Bulgarian, and the Sclavonian. At the Council of St. Felix, (near Toulouse,) in 1167, the French and Italians present submitted to the decisions of the Catharic Bishop of Constantinople, because he was supposed to be more cognisant of the traditions of the primitive Church. Schmidt and Reuss observe that the use of the Doxology at the end of the Lord's Prayer by the Cathari is a feature of resemblance to the Greek and Sclavonian Liturgies; it is wanting in the Vulgate of Matt. vi. 13, and is not used by the Church of Rome. However, Schmidt's supposition that the Albigensian version of the New Testament was not made after the Vulgate, but after an original Greek text, has not been confirmed by the examination of the manuscript of Lyons. The apocryphal books received in the sect were of Greek origin, being the old Gnostic "Vision of Isaiah," and a pretended conversation between our Lord and St. John. The name Bulgare, and by contraction Bougre, frequently given to heretics in France, and associated with the foulest calumnies, is no certain proof of their Oriental origin; for it does not occur before the thirteenth century, and may have been brought from the East by crusaders who had met with Dualists there. The same remark applies to another current term of reproach, Poblicans, which is understood to be a corruption of Paulicians.

We hope, at a future period, to study the history of the Waldenses, but must confine ourselves, for the present, to their heterodox contemporaries. The origin of the Cathari is shrouded in mystery. Many writers have supposed them to be the lineal representatives of the Manichees of the third and fourth centuries; but Schmidt, who is certainly the most judicious writer on this subject, has shown this opinion to be inadmissible. The heresy of the Middle Ages is a much simpler and more popular system than the subtle religious philosophy of Manes; it is altogether devoid of the mythological elements

* Hence, by corruption, the German Ketzer, applied to all heretics.

which that heresiarch borrowed from the religion of Persia, and contains no astronomical or cosmogonical fables as the envelope of metaphysical ideas. According to the Manichees, the creation is the result of the union of the soul of the world with matter; while the Cathari taught that the whole material creation was exclusively the work of the evil principle. Above all, there is among them no trace of the profound personal reverence for Manes, and worship of his memory, which was one essential characteristic of the genuine Manichees, who looked upon their founder as the Paraclete promised by Jesus to His disciples. The Priscillianists succeeded the Manichees in the West, and the Paulicians in the East; yet these latter, properly Syrian Gnostics, execrated Manes. The Paulicians were thought by Mosheim, Gibbon, and Maitland, to have been the immediate religious ancestors of the Cathari. It is well known that numbers of those religionists were transplanted into Thrace by Constantine Copronymus, about the middle of the eighth century; and Petrus Siculus, who visited the Paulicians of Armenia about 870, was informed of an intended mission to strengthen their exiled brethren, and to tempt the infant faith of the Bulgarians. Yet the Paulicians had no rites. or ceremonies whatever, no ecclesiastical or hierarchical organization; they were strangers to ascetic abstinence from animal food, and did not condemn marriage. Such radical differences as these will not allow us to suppose the heterodox movement of southern and western Europe to have been a simple transplantation of Asiatic Paulicianism, though this sect may have contributed in some measure-more or less directly to the formation of Catharism. The fact seems to be, that Dualism manifested itself in Christendom at different periods, under various successive and independent forms. Imperfect and superficial reflection on the relation of the world to God, and on the origin of evil, can so naturally arrive at the doctrine of two opposite principles,-one, the Father of spirits and Author of all good; the other, the author of matter and of evil,—that we are not obliged to suppose the doctrine was transmitted ready-made from pre-existing sects. There is a strong tendency in human nature to transfer sin from the real self-from the moral man-to a something else immediately without and around him: the physical laws of his own material nature and of the world are treated as intrinsically evil, or leading to evil, while the true culprit-his selfish and rebellious will-escapes detection. This is the principle of all the austerities of Paganism. A dark instinct of a state of abnormal and dangerous antipathy to God leads the devotee to take vengeance in time upon that part of himself which is outside, and which may be hardly treated, and even tortured, at far less cost than the renewal of the spirit of his mind, and