to accept food only from her. Devoting himself to preaching the gospel through the streets and by the wayside, admiring imitators of both sexes sprang up around him, whom he despatched as missionaries to the neighboring towns. They entered houses, announcing the gospel to the inmates; they preached in the churches, they discoursed in the public places, and everywhere they found eager listeners, for, as we have seen, the negligence and indolence of the clergy had rendered the function of preaching almost a forgotten duty. According to the fashion of the time, they speedily adopted a peculiar form of dress, including, in imitation of the apostles, a sandal with a kind of plate upon it, whence they acquired the name of the "Shoed," Insabbatati, or Zaptati — though the appellation which they bestowed upon themselves was that of Li Poure de Lyod, or Poor Men of Lyons.[1]
- ↑ Chron. Canon. Laudunens. ann. 1173 (Bouquet XIII. 680). — Steph. de Borbone s. Bellavilla Lib. de Sept. Donis Spiritus, P. iv. Tit. vii. cap. 3 (D'Argentré Coll. Judicior. de Nov. Error. I. i. 85 sqq.). — Richard. Claniacens. Vit. Alex. PP. III. (Muratori III. 447). — David Augustens. Tract, de Paup. de Lugd. (Martene Thesaur. V. 1778).— Monetæ adv. Cath. et Waldens. Lib. v. cap. 1 § 4.— Pet. Sarnens. cap. 2. — Passaviens. Anon. ap. Gretser (Mag. Bib. Pat. Ed. 1618, T. XIII. p. 300). — Petri de Pilichdorf contr. Hæres. Waldens. cap. 1. — Pegnæ Comment. 39 in Eymerici Direct. Inquis. p. 280.
The pretension of the Waldenses to descend from the primitive Church through the Leonistæ and Claudius of Turin is, I believe, now generally abandoned. See Edouard Montet, Histoire Litt. des Vaudois, Paris, 1885, pp. 32, 33; Prof. Emilio Comba, in the Rivista Christiana, Giugno, 1882, pp. 200-206, and his Riforma in Italia, I. 233 sqq. — Bernard Gui, in his Practica, P. v. (MSS. Bib. Nat. Coll. Doat, T. XXX. fol. 185 sqq.), following Richard of Cluny and Stephen of Bourbon, places the rise of Peter Waldo about 1170, and the Canon of Laon gives the date of 1173.
The time and place of Peter Waldo's death are unknown. His French disciples affectionately revered his memory and that of his assistant Vivet, to the extent of asserting, as a point of belief, that they were in Paradise with God; the Lombard branch, however, would only prudently admit that they might be saved if they had satisfied God before death; both sides were obstinate, and at the Conference of Bergamo, in 1218, this promised to make a schism (Rescript. Paup. Lombard. 15. — W. Preger, Beiträge zur Geschichte der Waldesier, pp. 58, 59).
Waldensian literature long retained the impress given to it by Waldo of stringing together extracts from the Fathers of the Church. The slavishness with which these were followed is curiously exemplified in an exposition of Canticles analyzed by M. Montet (op. cit. p. 66). The verse "Take us the little
