VALDO, or Waldo, Peter, frequently described as the Lyonese reformer of the twelfth century, appears in contemporary documents under the appellation of Valdes. In the earliest existing documents he is called Valdes (by W. Mapes,) and Valdesius (by the Chronicler of Laon), Valdesius, Valdius, Valdensis, Waldius, and Walderisis. Unless he derived his name from some locality, Valdes or Valdo was his right appellation. The latter is of very common occurrence in Gallic and Germanic documents, from the ninth to the twelfth century, and W is the Germano-Burgundian spelling. It is uncertain why or where he was first named Peter. His praenomen Petrus occurs, we believe for the first time, in a Latin book of Peter de Polichdorf, written during the last half of the fourteenth century.

Contemporary and documentary history is silent as to the place and date of Valdo’s birth, and the events of his earlier days; but tradition states that he was born in a place which, by some, has been called Vaud, Vaux, Vaudram; by others Walden and Val-Grant. There is still a village near Lyon called Vaux, and another in the mountain region, between Mont Dauphiné and Briançon, called Vaux de Rame. The first authentic mention of the Gallic reformer appears in the Chronicle of Laon, under the year 1173. He is there introduced to our notice as a citizen of Lyon, who, having amassed considerable wealth by usurious practices, had his conscience alarmed in a very remarkable manner. One Sunday, in the year 1173, hearing a Troubadour in the streets of the city, reciting passages from the Romaunt called the “Life of Alexis,” Valdo invited him home, and listened with earnest attention to the whole of the poem. Alexis, as the legend tells us, was a saint of eminent piety, who was so dead to all the attractions of this world, that he fled from the house of a wealthy father, and left his young bride on the day of his marriage, to devote himself to a fife of poverty and mortification. After seventeen years of self-imposed exile, he returned to the paternal abode, in the character of a mendicant, and for many years received daily relief at his father’s door, without making himself known. At his death a written paper revealed his secret. The narrative made a deep impression on the mind of Valdo, of which the Troubadour^[1. In those days, many of the jongleurs and wandering troubadours often combined the several characters of pedlars, poets and religious Instructors. They were a privileged order, whose harp, and song, and news, obtained for them admission into the castles of the lierons, and the houses of the citizens. They would oftentimes begin by diverting their hearers, and. after touching some string which roused devout feelings, they would launch into sacred subjects, produce transcripts of Scripture, and converse on the deepest points of sacred truth. ] failed not to take advantage. Moved by the serious discourse of his guest, Valdo went the next morning to unburthen his mind to a priest of great reputation in the city, and consulted him as to what he should do for the attainment of Christian perfection. “If thou wouldest be perfect,” was the answer, “Go, sell all thou hast, and give to the poor.” Valdo resolved to obey the injunction to the very letter. He converted his property into money; he placed his two daughters in the convent of Fontevrault;^[2. In Poitou. A fraternity, called “The Poor of Christ,” was settled here in 1103, under the government of a woman; an institution which has been severely attacked by Bayle. ] he distributed largely to the poor; he fed all who came to him three days in the week; and on the festival of the assumption of the Virgin Mary, he publicly proclaimed his intention of abandoning the service of mammon for that or God , and invited his fellow-citizens to follow his example. His wife, alarmed by these proceedings, implored the archbishop of Lyon to check the imprudent zeal of her husband, and that prelate and his suffragan, the bishop of Bourg-en-Bresse, gave Valdo some advice upon the occasion. Nothing however could damp his ardour; he persevered in his system of self-denial, and gained over a number of followers, who imitated his example, by embracing voluntary poverty, and by ministering bountifully to the wants of the poor.

A severe famine, which desolated the whole of Gaul at this time, gave them full opportunities of exercising the virtue of almsgiving, and they did so to the very utmost. Forming themselves into a fraternity, under the name of “Poor Men of Lyon,” Valdo and his disciples at first made themselves conspicuous, by the sanctity of their lives only, but they soon began to attract further notice, by rebuking the rapaciousness and corrupt manners of the ecclesiastical and monkish orders. Here indeed was ample room for complaint: the ignorance and profligacy of the clergy, with some few bright exceptions, were the scandal of the church; and we require not the evidence of her adversaries—that of churchmen is quite sufficient—to establish this fact. It was a long course of wickedness in high places, and inefficiency on the part of those who called themselves the successors of the apostles, and the lawfully appointed ministers of Christ, which prepared the way for such a work as Valdo had to perform. But though he was one of the most eminent of early reformers, he was not the first to rouse Christendom from her unholy slumbers, and to say to those who slept, “awake !” Even before the scenes at Orleans in 1017, described by Glaber, voices had been heard, almost simultaneously, from Germany, France, and Italy, protesting against ecclesiastical corruptions; and we have the testimony of Bernard of Clairvaux, Peter of Clugny, and Evervinus of Cologne, who flourished between 1120 and 1150, to prove that, in that age, zealous and holy men were to be found, who declaimed against the vices and errors of the clergy, and proposed schemes of reformation.

By degrees, Valdo and the Poor Men of Lyon took upon themselves to exhort and to admonish, in fact to preach both in public and private. “Coeperunt paulatim,” says the Chronicle of Laon, “tam publicis quam privatis admonitionibus sua et aliena culpare peccata.” This was no slight matter of exasperation to a powerful body of men, whose priesthood was disgraced by priestcraft; but another proceeding of the reformer called forth their fiercest animosity. Valdo employed his time and property on one of the most useful and sacred objects to which a Christian could dedicate himself, the translation and circulation of Scripture in the vernacular tongue of the country, and for this he has never been forgiven by the successors of Hildebrand. To lock up Scripture, or to refuse the free use of it, was one of the novelties of an imperious and jealous church, and a disproof of the infallibility of popes and councils. In 841, the third council of Tours decreed, in its seventh canon, that bishops should promote scriptural instruction by translations of certain homilies and psalms in the vulgar tongue, “in rusticam Romanam linguam aut Theotiscam.” In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, a new light broke in upon Christian hierarchs, or they began to prefer darkness to light, and it was forbidden by councils[7:21:546] to turn Scripture into vernacular languages for the use of the people. The manner in which Valdo set about his work, attests the soundness of his judgment, as well as the devotedness of his zeal. In the first place, he obtained the assistance of three eminent scholars, who had a critical acquaintance with the sacred writings; Bernard of Ydros, who was afterwards held in great estimation by the Dominican order; Stephen of Ansa or Empsa, eminent as a grammarian and linguist, who was promoted in course of time to a benefice in the city of Lyon;^[3. Stephen de Borbone, apud Echart Scrip. Ordinis Praedicatorum, vol. i. p. 192. ] and John of Lugio,^[4. Reinerus de Cath. c. 6; and Polickdorf, c. 1. ] j a biblical scholar of high reputation, who became the head of a religious congregation in Lombardy. The latter was the only one of the three who remained faithful to the cause of Valdo, and the silence of the two former, after they deserted him, as to any spots in his moral character, is a strong attestation in his favour. Stephen translated into the Gallo-Provençal language, John examined authorities and corrected the translations, and Bernard transcribed the version so prepared for the use of the copyists, who were to multiply copies for general circulation. But not satisfied with these means for procuring correct translations of the Bible, Valdo also collected sentences of the ancient fathers, particularly of Ambrose, Augustin, Gregory, and Jerome^[5. See Moneta contra Valdenses, lib. v. c. 1. ]? in illustration of the b∞ks of Scripture, of which copies were to be made; and these, too, he put in circulation to serve as notes or comments for the help of his Scripture readers. This being done, the master and his disciples committed many passages of Scripture to memory, and thus armed with the word of God, they went forth into the streets and the houses of Lyon, and into the villages of the neighbourhood, and delivered the gospel message with so much ardour and success, as largely to increase the number of their adherents. In some few places the churches were open to them by consent of the secular clergy; and where they could not have access to the sanctuaries, they preached and expounded Scripture in the streets and highways. It is uncertain how many books of the Bible were translated and circulated by the Lyonese Reformer, and the Poor Men of Lyons. Walter Mapes says, that the volume of Valdo which was presented to Pope Alexander, contained the text and a gloss of the Psalms, and of many books of the Old and New Testament. Reiner leads us to believe, that the whole of the New Testament was circulated by them, in the vulgar tongue. Stephen de Borbone speaks only of many books of the Bible, without designating them. The effect produced by the gospel tidings, as they were delivered by these new expounders, was felt like an electric spark throughout the whole of the province and diocese of Lyon. The common people heard them gladly, for now, for the first time in their lives, they listened to preachers who spoke in the language of Scripture, and pointed to the sacred page, in confirmation of every doctrine which they urged.

After persevering in this course for five years, Valdo found that the increasing enmity of the monks and clergy of Lyons had become dangerous to him. In 1178, he therefore took the bold and honest step of going to Rome, to make his views known to the sovereign pontiff Alexander III. and to request the papal sanction to his proceedings.^[6. Chronicle of Laon. See Bouquet, vol. xiii. p. 680. ] In fact, he asked the pope to recognize his fraternity of the “Poor Men of Lyon” as an ecclesiastical order of authorised preachers, and licensed circulators of Scripture. Never did the founder of a religious community experience a better reception from prince or pontiff. The pope embraced Valdo, “Valdesium amplexatus est papa, approbans votum quod fuerat voluntariae paupertatis, &c.” says the faithful narrator whom we have before cited.^[7. Ibid. ] s He approved of the order of the “Poor Men of Lyon” as professors of voluntary poverty; but while he gave them a limited license as preachers, he forbade them to exercise it without the especial permission of the regular priesthood. Up to this period the conduct of Valdo and his disciples had been irreproachable even at Rome, or the pope would not have shown him such favour. In fact, all his proceedings hitherto had been strongly characteristic of one who acted as a dutiful member of the holy Catholic church. It was a church-legend which first made a serious impression upon him; it was to a priest that he first went for spiritual counsel, after his conscience had been awakened. The adviser whom he next consulted was a bishop; so closely did he observe the canon of Ignatius, “nihil sine episcopo.” He placed his daughters in a convent; an act which savoured of the most rigid adherence to ecclesiastical customs. The holy book on which the church builds its faith was his constant study; and his chosen fellow-labourers in the work of transcribing and translating, were members of the sacerdotal order. So blameless was his career, and so conscious was he himself of the purity of his motives, that he sought, as we have shewn, an interview with him who was called the supreme Head of the Church, and was received with indulgence and honour. The childlike submission and meekness of this exemplary Christian were carried to such an extent, that for a time he obeyed the pope, and forbore to preach, except on the terms imposed upon him. At length however his ardent zeal, sharpened by the opposition of the clergy, who hated the spirituality and fervour which condemned their own negligence, could no longer be restrained, and he preached without their permission. He and his disciples were commanded by episcopal authority not to speak at all, nor preach in the name of Jesus; they answered as Peter and John had done before the council at Jerusalem. They were accused of a presumptuous usurpation of the apostolic office, and were again admonished to be silent, on pain of the severest ecclesiastical censure. They however persevered, and from disobedience, says one of our historical witnesses, they fell into contumacy, and from contumacy, into the penalty of excommunication.^[8. Stephen de Borbone, ut supra. ] ® The fearful sentence, which was meant to deprive them of all the ordinances of religion, to exclude them from the church and the altar, to deny baptism to their children, burial to their dead, marriage to their betrothed, and to banish them from Lyon, was passed by John de Bellesmains, archbishop of Lyon, in 1181. Pope Lucius confirmed the excommunication in 1184. In the Lateran council of 1215, the same dread sentence was again fulminated against all who should embrace their doctrines, or receive them into their houses. They were driven ignominiously from their homes; and seeing no hope of producing a reformation in the bosom of the imperious church, out of which they had been cast, or of being received back into it, without doing violence to their consciences, Valdo and his followers had no other alternative than to form themselves into a community, in which persons, selected from their own body, were appointed to perform the offices of religion, and administer the sacraments.^[9. From all we can collect, this was not done until after very mature deliberation and consultation with religious persons in other countries, whose eyes had been opened to the corruptions of the Latin church. Monets, the most dispassionate of all their accusers, states that Valdo “ordinem habuit ab universitate fratrum suorum,” and that a Lombard separatist was his authority for this statement. Moneta contra Valdenses, lib. v. c. 1. ] Thus Valdo and the “Poor Men,” or “Valdenses of Lyon" were not voluntary seceders from the dominant church, but they were thrust out of her, and Rome, contrary to her usual policy, which is to turn enthusiasm to account [7:21:547]in her own favour, if not in her own way, has to thank herself for a schism, which rent from her communion some of the most devout Christians of France, and of several other countries, in which the doctrines of the Lyonese reformers gradually found recipients.

The “Poor Men of Lyon,” exiled from their native city, found refuge in the secluded parts of Provence and Lombardy, and were hospitably received there by persons who held kindred opinions. The document, which states this, points to religious communities on each side of the Cottian Alps, to the territorial Waldenses of ecclesiastical history, whose situation providentially enabled them to maintain in safety opinions at variance with those of Rome. A remarkable passage in the authority which gives us this information, adds that the exiles imbibed the errors of these subalpine heretics, and became, when they mingled with them, the most determined enemies of the church.^[10. See Stephen de Borbone, ut supra. ]

From this time the “Poor Men of Lyon,” and the Val-denses (territorially so called) of the Cottian Alps, became mixed up in ecclesiastical history, as if they were one and the same. But the former, after their exile from Lyon, were never gathered together in any one district or province as a distinct people, but were scattered among the nations; and those who embraced their tenets, sometimes adhered to them openly, sometimes secretly, but never in sufficient numbers, or local strength, to constitute a church. When or where Valdo died, remains in obscurity, but his name was given to almost every sect who protested against papal usurpation.

A happier destiny was reserved for the subalpine Valdenses. They were the inhabitants of a mountain tract of country, where they constituted the majority of the population; and at this hour the remains of them form an established church, and a well known and intelligent religious community in a region of Piedmont.

The persecutions which, for 200 years, swept Europe of all who were called Valdenses, except in the subalpine territories, were an outrage upon humanity, and have fixed an indelible stigma on the church of Rome. Her offended pride was satisfied with nothing short of death, whenever she could cause it to be inflicted on those who dared to dispute her authority; and Stephen de Borbone relates, without a breath of compunction, that he was present when eighty of Valdo’s sect were condemned to the flames. Albericus the chronicler states the number to have been 182, and speaks of it as a sacrifice of a sweet-smelling savour acceptable to the Lord,—“Holocaustum placabile Domino.” But with all the animosity of the early persecutors of Valdo and his disciples, they have not recorded one well authenticated accusation of immorality against them. It is a singular attestation to the moral and religious character of Valdo, that none of those calumnies, which were afterwards circulated by Roman catholic writers, were advanced against him during his lifetime. The chronicle of Laon briefly mentions his disobedience in preaching without permission, and the ruin and scandal which it occasioned.

Walter Mapes, who was present at Rome when Valdo appealed to the pope, indulges in a vein of irony against the Valdesii, who wanted to reform the church; he ridiculed them as a parcel of “houseless,”^[11. "Ydiotas, illiterates, ineptos. Hii certa nusquam babent domicilia, bini et bini circumeunt: nudi pedes, lancis induti, habentes omnia sibi communia tanquam Apostoli, nudi nudum Christum sequentes.” See Gualt. Map. MS. Bodl. ] “bare-footed,” “indigent,” and “illiterate idiots,” unworthy of notice; but utters not a word against their morality. On the contrary, in one of those unguarded expressions, which truth wrings from prejudice, he admitted that they preserved the faith, and were ready to die for the sake of the Lord Jesus Christ.^[12. Sunt certe temporibus nostris licet a nobis damnati et densi, qui fidero servare velint et si ponantur ad rationem ut dudum, ponant animas suas pro pastore suo Domino Jesu." Ibid. ]

The earliest calumniator of “the Poor Men of Lyon,” Alanus insignis theologus, who inveighed with the utmost severity against them, said nothing worse of their founder, than that he presumed to preach without inspiration or literature, to call himself an apostle without a mission, and a teacher without learning.^[13. Liber secundus Alani insig. Theol. contra Vald. p. 175. edit. Par. 1612. * Moneta contra Valdenses, lib. v. ]

Moneta,^[14. · Petri Monachi Hist. Albig.. p. 8. edit. Trever. 1615. ] ’ who wrote a history of the Valdenses of Lyon, within half a century after their first appearance, speaks of a certain man named Valdesius, from whom they derived their origin, without casting any stain upon his moral fame; and though Moneta was an inquisitor, the bosom friend of Dominic, and condemned heretics to the flames, and wrote forty folio pages in defence of persecution, yet he admits that the Valdenses still respected the validity of Romish ordination, received the Old as well as the New Testament, and did not give reins to licentiousness.

Peter, the monk of Vaux Sernay,^[15. 'The Greek ritualists inform us that the sandal was a mark of sacerdotal dignity. Some very curious mistakes bare occurred from the terms Xabatati and Subatati applied to the followers of Valdo. The term is derived from sabot, a sandal. ] β who wrote in 1217, and was clamorous for the total extinction of the Albigenses by fire and sword, mentions the name of Waldius, the founder of a sect of heretics called Waldenses, without a syllable of reproach; and states the principal errors of those schismatics to have been “an affected imitation of the apostles, refusal to take an oath, denial of the power of the magistrate to inflict the punishment of death, and presuming, because they were sandal-wearers,^[16. Reinerus de Sectis Antiq. Her. c. 4, 5 . Bibliotheca Patrum, vol. iv. ] to celebrate the Eucharist without episcopal ordination.”

Reiner, 8 whose work bears the date of 1250, has no charge to bring against Valdo, and no other against his followers than their separation from, and hostility to, the church of Rome, their use of Scripture in the vulgar tongue, and the estimation in which they held those of their sect who embraced a life of poverty, and believed in justification by faith. We may therefore consider that all the licentious tales which have been told at the expense of Valdo and his disciples, were the invention of after times. That individuals among them may have broached some extravagant and fanatical dogmas, is not improbable; but we have no contemporary evidence in proof of their having departed from the strictest rules of moral and religious purity, or of their having been guilty of any other than the unpardonable offence of disobeying a spiritual authority, which had become as tyrannical in the exercise of its power, as it was remiss in the discharge of the sacred trusts committed to it. “The worst that can be said of them,” said the inquisitor Reiner, whose business it was to accuse and hunt them down, “is, that they detest the Roman church." (d. f. )