it to the Church of England, to whose fraternal care he commended the Brethren of a future age.[1]
4. Adrian Wengersky, an exiled minister of the Brethren. Under the assumed name of Regenvolscius he issued, in 1652, at Utrecht, an history of the Churches of Slavonic origin in Bohemia, Moravia and Poland.[2] In 1679 a second edition came out at Amsterdam, with his real name.
After the renewal of the Moravian Church (1722), these four secondary sources—we omit several minor ones because they are mere compilations from those we have mentioned—constituted, for a period of one hundred and twenty years, the only sources open to writers on the Bohemian and Moravian Brethren, whether they were friends or foes. By these Cranz, Loretz, Holmes and John Plitt[3] were guided; on one of these Perceval mainly relied. Of the existence of original records they know nothing.
In 1842, however, a Moravian elergyman, on a visit to Lissa, accidentally discovered these in the vestry-room of one of its churches. Thirteen volumes of the ancient archives were there, intact, and in a state of excellent preservation.[4] They were purchased by the Church, placed in the Library at Herrnhut, and are now technically known as the “Lissa Folios.”
These invaluable documents have thrown new light upon the early history of the Brethren. They have been examined with much care by Anton Gindely, a Roman Catholic Professor of Prague, and one of the most distinguished antiquaries of Bohemia, who has quite recently been appointed Archivist of that country; and by Franz Palacky, also a Roman Catholic, the great Bohemian historian,
- ↑ A third edition was published at Halle, in 1702, by Buddaeus, who wrote a lengthy introduction to it, and embodied with the work Comenius Treatise on the Amelioration of the Human Race. Of this edition, the following is the title; Jo. Amos Comeni, Eccl. F. F. Boh. Episcopi, Historia Fratrum Bohemorum, corum Ordo et Disciplina ecclesiastica, ad Ecclesiae Recte Constituendae Exemplar, cum Ecclesiae Bohem. ad Anglicanam Paraenesi.
- ↑ Regenvolseii Systema historico-chronologicum ecclesiarum Slavonicarum.
- ↑ In 1828, Rev. John Plitt wrote the best and most erudite history of the Boh. Brn. which existed prior to the discovery of the original sources. It was, however, not intended for publication, but as a guide for lectures in the Theological Seminaries of the Church. Hence it remains in manuscript.
- ↑ The 14th folio bas since been found in the Bohemian Museum at Prague.
