own hands. In 1392 he issued a commission, as episcopal inquisi- tors, to Frederic, Bishop of Toul, Nicholas of Saulheim, the Dean of St. Stephen, and John Wasmod, of Homburg, a priest of the cathedral, to whom the papal inquisitor could adjoin himself if he so chose. These inquisitors were armed with full authority to arrest, try, torture, sentence, and abandon to the secular arm all heretics, and were instructed to proceed in accordance with the practice of the Inquisition. They zealously discharged their duty. A number of Waldenses were already in the episcopal prison, and they made diligent perquisition after the rest. By free use of torture they obtained the necessary avowals and evidence. Those who were obstinate were handed over to the secular arm, and an auto de fé celebrated at Bingen in 1392, where six-and-thirty wretches were burned, proved that the papal Inquisition itself could not have been more effective. A little tract on the examination of Waldenses, evidently written on this occasion, shows that the inquisitorial process was fairly well understood, and that the episcopal officials had not much to learn from their rivals.[1]
When attention was once attracted to this secret heresy, it was not long before Waldenses were discovered everywhere. In a short list of them, dated 1391, Poland, Hungary, Bavaria, Suabia,
- ↑ Index Error. Waldens. (Mag. Bib. Pat. XIII. 340).—Petri Herp Annal. Francofurt. ann. 1389 (Senckenberg Select. Juris II. 19).—Gudeni Cod. Diplom. III. 598–600.—Serrarii Hist. Mogunt. Lib. v. p. 707.—Hist. Ordin. Carthus. (Martene Ampl. Coll. VI. 214).-Modus examinandi Hæreticos (Mag. Bib. Pat. XIII. 341-2). John Wasmod subsequently wrote a tract against the Beghards which has been printed by Haupt (Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte, 1885, pp. 567-76). Its chief interest lies in its attributing to the Beghards the tenets of the Waldenses. There is no allusion to pantheism, to union with God, to refusal of the sacraments, to the denial of hell and purgatory. Either he confounds the sects, or else the Waldenses concealed themselves under the guise of Beghards, or else there were among the Beghards a certain number who constituted a church separate from that of Rome without adopting the distinctive principles of Amaurianism. Wasmod tells us that they do not easily receive applicants, whose obedience they test by making them eat putrid flesh, drink water foul with maggots, etc., at the risk of their lives. One of their strongest arguments is found in the corruption of the Church, which is thus deprived of the power of the keys. Distinctively referable to Beghardism is the assertion that these heretics are greatly favored and defended by the magistrates of the cities; and not very flattering to Rome is the explanation that the bulls in favor of the Beguines were obtained by the use of money.
