Henri Arnaud, a pastor who accompanied the exiles during that persecution, afterwards conceived and executed the bold design of leading back the dispersed Vaudois from Switzerland, over the mountains of Savoy, to their native valleys. By the great skill of Arnaud, and the extraordinary valour of the band of about 800 men who accompanied him, those lands which had been so unjustly wrested from them were regained, and their families re-established, by their sovereign's permission, in the humble, but ever-cherished retreats of their ancestors. Arnaud, compelled to leave Piedmont, visited the Vaudois exiles in Germany, where his ardent mind sought repose in the peaceful discharge of pastoral duties at Schoenberg, and his robust frame that had sustained almost incredible hardships, rests in a vault in the small neat church of that village. He had previously composed a work," La glorieuse Rentrée," &c. designed to commemorate the return of the Vaudois, which contains minute details on the subject.

During the last century another author appeared amongst the Vaudois, the minister Brez, who officiated in Holland, and who commenced, but did not live to complete a history of the Vaudois, which would have included events subsequent to the time of the

historian Leger. One volume only was published. The MSS. of M. Brez have been entrusted to the Editor.

The late moderator, J. Rodolphe Peyran, should be next mentioned; whose claim to distinction may be estimated by the list of his MSS. entrusted to the Editor, which has already appeared in a former part of this volume. He was indeed a man of research and a laborious divine!

The pastors who now preside over the several churches in the Valleys of Piedmont, are generally well-informed upon literary subjects; assiduous in preparing discourses distinguished for perspicuity of style, and the importance of the Christian truths they comprise; and exemplarily attentive to the laborious duties of the pastoral charge.

Amongst these M. Bert has, by the unanimous suffrages of his brethren, been appointed moderator, and thus sustains an office, which, in addition to his labours as the pastor of La Tour, includes both presiding at the synod, and visiting several churches. In this work he is assisted by an assistant-moderator, M. Rostaing of Villeseche, who visits the remaining churches; whilst M. Muston of Bobi acts as secretary. M. Bert is the author of a small work (" Notice Historique") relative to the Vaudois, and is engaged in preparing a

book of devotions," Livre de Famille" for their

use.

Some of the Vaudois ministers are stationed in countries distant from home; M. Mondon in a Vaudois colony in Germany; and M. Appia as pastor of a church at Frankfort. M. Appia has collected numerous printed documents and MSS. relative to the Waldenses; for the use of which, as he has been so obliging as to lend them to the Editor, in the most handsome and liberal manner, to assist him in compiling a history of the Vaudois, the most grateful acknowledgments are due to that talented Christian minister.

P. 51. "L'on a vu les plus grands empereurs, les Frederic, &c.......obligés de fléchir.”—At the coronation of the emperor Frederic I. Pope Adrian IV. "insisted upon Frederic's performing the office of equerry, and holding the stirrup to his holiness."

Frederic II. was excommunicated by Pope Gregory IX. for having delayed going with an army to Palestine longer than was agreeable to the "incensed pontiff."*

P. 52. " Dominique....le favori..du pape, qui le mit au nombre des saints après sa mort.”— Dominic, the founder of the order that bears his

* Mosheim's Ecc. Hist. III. 52, 136.

name, was by birth a Spaniard, of the noble family of Guzman, and inventor of that horrid engine of civil and ecclesiastical tyranny, the inquisition, which was first brought into action against the Albigenses.

P. 53. "Le pape devenu insensiblement d'évêque de Rome......évêque universel,” &c.-Mosheim observes,* in reference to the growing ascendancy of the Pope in the 5th century,—a period when the contest for supremacy ran high,-"The patriarch of Constantinople....elated with the favour and proximity of the imperial court.... on the one hand reduced under his jurisdiction the patriarchs of Alexandria and Antioch, as prelates only of the second order...... None of the bishops found the occurrences of the times so favourable to his ambition as the Roman pontiff. Notwithstanding the redoubled efforts of the bishop of Constantinople, a variety of circumstances united in augmenting his power and authority, though he had not, as yet, assumed the dignity of supreme lawgiver and judge of the whole christian church. The bishops of Alexandria and Antioch, unable to make head against the prelate of Constantinople, fled often to the Roman pontiff for succour against his violence; and the inferior

* Vol. ii. pp. 27, 28, 29.

order of bishops used the same method when their rights were invaded by the prelates of Alexandria and Antioch. So that the bishop of Rome, by taking all these prelates alternately under his protection, daily added new degrees of influence and authority to the Roman see."

Ecclesiastical writers have largely descanted on the contest between the bishops of Rome and Constantinople; each of whom arrogated to himself superiority, not only among, but even over other churches,

It is worthy of particular notice in the history of this ambitious claim to sacerdotal sovereignty, that Pope Gregory I. so warmly declaimed against assuming the title of œcumenical or universal bishop, (which the Greek emperors gave to the bishop of Constantinople) as to declare that in his opinion the man who should assume that title would be the antichrist whose appearance is foretold in the Scriptures; -and yet, within a few years, a successor of Gregory I., namely, Boniface III., actually obtained this title from the tyrant Phocas, who, by the murder of his sovereign, Mauritius, had reached the summit of power. That supremacy in the christian church, which has been since abused by the introduction and establishment of numerous errors, having been conferred on the pope by the usurper in the year 606, many