on the questions now under our consideration*. This new law, emanating from the "grand Conseil du Canton de Vaud sur la proposition du Conseil d'Etât," but not passed, as it should seem, without much debate and opposition, is alike faulty with the decree, in neither clearly defining the sect proscribed, nor pointing out the crime, nor abstaining from the low and degrading insult of calling hard names: "quelques personnes exaltées!" And it pushes its "march of science" beyond its miserable predecessor; inflicting punish ments of which the other had been silent: the offenders are to be visited either by a fine not exceeding 600 francs; or by the prohibition to go into a particular commune, or to remain in it; or by confinement in one commune for a term not exceeding a year; or by imprisonment for the same period; or, finally, by banishment out of the canton for a period not exceeding three years. Also, if the offender shall have broken the prohibition of going into, or remaining in, a commune, he shall be confined in his own commune for a term not exceeding a year. If he break this confinement, he shall be imprisoned for the remainder of the term. In the case of his breaking the sentence of banishment out of the canton, he shall be imprisoned for the rest of the period. Now not to dwell upon the preposterous character of a criminal law, which gives no better description of the objects of its pursuit and vengeance, than that they are "partisans de cette secte;" or that they do things tending "à gagner à cette secte;" or that they are "personnes exaltées ;" not to mention * The second edition of Mr. Wilson's Tour is almost a new work; and contains, among other added matters, some interesting extracts from the writings of Cardinal Borromeo, quite unknown to the English reader; and a valuable preface, in reply to some strictures of the Quarterly Review on the subject of "Evangelical Religion." the weakness and absurdity of leaving every thing to the eagerness of informers and the interpretation of tribunals, a system borrowed from the worst days of Jacobin and revolutionary France, the cruelty of the law is absolutely revolting. Whether the meeting of a few religious persons be accidental or not, n'importe. If one of them have prayed to God, and the others who were with him be deemed partisans of a sect, all are criminals. A father of a family reads and explains a chapter of the Bible, and prays with his children; a stranger, or his nextdoor neighbour, happens to come in; let but a familiar of the police enter the doors, and they are all immedi ately amenable to the law. I speak with a neighbour on some religious subject, whose opinions are opposed to mine: he yields to my arguments: if I am suspected by some police agent of belonging to a sect, as I cannot deny that I have made à convert of my opponent, the reward is fine, confinement, banishment, or imprisonment; and all this too when I profess the same worship with my judges: they declare their attachment to the Helvetic Confession; all the pastors of the canton have sworn to make it the basis of their teaching; yet, for arguing in defence of one of its doctrines, and gaining an opponent to the belief of it, I am condemned ! Take another case. An agriculturist has two fields adjoining to each other, in different communes. It has been his misfortune to think the learned and theological council not quite infallible in its interpretation of some passage in St. Paul; and for his want of that article of faith in these rulers, so essential in the canton of Vaud, he is confined to one commune: if he cannot afford to pay labourers, his other field must be fallow; thorns and thistles must be his produce, not from the sentence of God, but the curse of the council. The man is a good father, a good husband, devoted to his country; no body doubts it; but he is a pestilent fellow: he has had the audacity to find more edification in the instructions of one minister than in those of another; while others got drunk, he was perverse enough to read the Scriptures with his friends. The man is a Mummer: there will be no peace till he is driven into banishment. "Yes; but banishment," say the advocates of the law, "is a slight punishment; for the canton is a very small country." The march of science again! Does a man's love for his country depend upon the size of it? We would not live in that district, beautiful as it is: for tyranny of all sorts we detest; and especially tyranny under the mask of freedom. Wickedness and hypocrisy combined form a most hateful connexion; but we can believe that a native of the canton loves it with all its faults; and that banishment from the fair scenes of his early life, and from all the associations which are dearer than life, may be to him as hard a lot as to ourselves would be banishment from this land of genuine freedom. "But the law is not meant to be executed; it is only adopted in terrorem," Bad enough in that case; why frighten people out of their consciences and their liberties? What, however, is the fact? Let us see :— "M. Charles Rochat, minister of the Gospel, of the Canton de Vaud, of a respectable family, and whose brother is one of the national clergy of the canton, is the first on whom the severity of the new law has fallen. Five persons were found seated round a table in his house, with the Bible open before them; the wife of M. Rochat, a common friend, with two of his sisters, and a young person, a stranger. This was the whole crime. M. Rochat was found guilty of reading in his own house, before his wife and four friends, a chapter of the New Testament! For this he was at first condemned to three years' banishment, which, however, the tribunal of appeal reduced to one year. "Next, M. Olivier was banished for two years by the sentence of the same law. "Like judgments have been pronounced against MM. Chavannes, Juvet, and Fivaz, of whom the two former were previously confined TEN WEEKS IN PRISON. "Two females also were banished by the jugement de première instance of the tribunals of Orbe and Yverdun, on the charge of similar meetings being held at their houses; one of whom, however, has been since acquitted at Lausanne, as it was proved that she lived with her mother, and consequently that it was at her mother's house, and not at hers, that some friends after din ner had read the Bible together." "But," adds Mr. Wilson," it is not merely in the Canton de Vaud that these enormous instances of injustice have occurred; at Neufchatel, an act of arbitrary power has just been committed, almost incredible from its severity. An old law, long obsolete, has been discovered, which it seems was passed two or three hundred years back. An agriculturer has been made the first victim of its revived powers. He received into his house M. Juvet, one of the condemned ministers of the Canton de Vaud, and allowed him to administer the sacrament, For this crime he was thrown into prison for three months, and was then brought up in chains, and with a rope drawn tight round his neck to receive sentence. Ten years of banishment was the punishment pronounced; and if he shall attempt to return before the expiration of this term, he is to be marked with a hot iron for the first offence, and for the second to be hanged. No passport was given him, so that he was left to be hunted about from place to place like the most degraded criminal. This worthy man, whose name is Maguin, has a wife and three children, for whom he has now no means of procuring support." Wilson's Tour, 2d edit. vol. i. p. 325. Now, for the acts of atrocity so unexampled in civilized and Protestant states, there must be some motive: what reason then can be assigned for these outrages? Some allowance is probably to be made for the effect upon certain minds of gross misrepresentations: and for the imperturbable apathy of others; but says the eloquent writer, of whom we have already made so much use, citoyen innocent est prise pour but d'un These oppressive and inquisitorial proceedings are the more remarkable, because, at Lausanne the main doctrines of orthodoxy, as we have said, are strongly insisted on; whereas at Geneva the church has manifestly apostatised from the truth: yet in this latter case, nonconforming ministers and meetinghouses are at least tolerated and M. Malan himself, obnoxious as he is to Professor Chenevière, and to many of the pastors, has a chapel for public worship. Is Arianism or Socinianism more tolerant than Presbyterian orthodoxy? "Perhaps one may say," says Mr. D. Wilson, "that indifference naturally leads to toleration; and proud nominal orthodoxy towards persecution. Indifference inclines towards toleration, because it undervalues the importance of all religious "Mais après avoir fait ces deux exceptions légitimes, disons le hautement et sans crainte, car la vérité l'exige de nous, ce qui anime contre les séparatistes la majorité de ceux qui les attaquent, c'est moins la désapprobation de certaines doctrines, peut-être condamnables, que la haine de tout sentiment de dévotion. Ce qui importune dans les séparatistes, ce n'est pas l'exagération de tel ou tel dogme, c'est la piété évangélique elle-même; ce sentiments; and because it is aware que l'on redoute, c'est qu'une morale plus it needs for itself the forbearance it pure et plus austère ne vienne demander claims for others. But orthodoxy, le sacrifice d'un plaisir grossier ou d'un when separated from the true spirit sentiment égoïste. Si l'on révoquait en doute la vérité de cette assertion, que l'on of the Gospel, is often self-righteous, parcoure les poitions du canton de Vaud bigoted, proud-proud of talents, où les dissidens ont été le plus vivement proud of what it thinks the correct persécutés, que l'on voie quels sont les form of truth, proud of holding chefs et les promoteurs des émeutes. Que l'on observe les faits d'un ceil impartial, others in subjection, proud of crushet que tout homme équitable prononce. ing opposition, proud of erecting itIci, un ministre de l'évangile est insulté self as a pope in its own circle: it par la populace, sa maison est attaquée, therefore leans towards persecution. ses vitres sont brisées; là, ce sont des femmes que l'on maltraite et que l'on in- These incidental evils do not at all jurie; ailleurs, deux frères, dont le seul lessen the immense importance of erime était d'avoir chanté des psaumes truth: in fact, they are not evils bedans une réunion dissidente, sont pour-longing to truth, but to the want of suivis à coups de pierres et de bâtons; on les renverse, on les traîne par les cheveux, on les abreuve d'outrages, des cris blas phématoires accompagnent cette scène scandaleuse, et un déni de justice est la seule réparation qu' obtiennent les victimes; dans un autre lieu, l'effigie d'un CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 300. a practical, affectionate, humble apprehension of it, in all its extent." Tour, vol. i. pp. 307, 308. One great cause, however, of this distinction in the two cases arises,. 5 D we suspect, from the more statesman-like views of the Geneva council of state. It is not clear to us, that M. Chenevière would be heartbroken, if he saw introduced into his own city the proscriptions of Lausanne: on the occasions on which he mentions* the proceedings in that canton, we certainly have not observed any very decisive terms of disapproval or regret. He moralizes, we believe, no farther upon the subject, than to observe that the future will shew, whether the government has adopted an effective system. We would not, however, judge of all the pastors at Geneva by this specimen; and we therefore hope, that, generally speaking, they are indisposed to imitate the measures of the Pays de Vaud. We trust also, that even in that canton a better spirit is gradually rising up: a remonstrance addressed to the "grand Conseil du Canton," strongly recommending the abandonment of their harsh measures, and signed by six and twenty ministers, seems to justify the charitable hope. The address is highly to their honour, and it can scarcely be without effect. The latest accounts, however, mention no relaxation of the law on the contrary, the go-vernment is still prosecuting its plans; and fresh persecutions have been commenced and are in progress; but we understand that public opinion is at length taking a right direction. Of the exiles-and it appears that there are many-the larger number are in different parts of France +, mostly near the frontier : See pp. 33, 89, and 108. + One of them is now in that place where the wicked cease from troubling, and another seems to be rapidly advancing to it. M. Juvet, who signed, with two other ministers, the letter to the "Council of State," having been banished from his own canton, sought an asylum in another canton: this was refused. He then retired to Ferney-Voltaire, and pursued his labours. He was at that time weak from a pulmonary consumption; but he ventured on an excursion to L'Isle of Mantrichen to visit those who were disposed to hear the word of God. "He was in 6. History of the Crusades against the Albigenses in the Thirteenth Century, from the French of Sis sulted, attacked, and pursued by the powhere he arrived quite exhausted and in pulace from town to town; and at L'Isle, a profuse perspiration, he was thrown into a cold dungeon, with only a chair and some chopped straw, on which to pass the night. His friends were not permitted to give him either food, fire, or clothing, and in this state he was detained during fifteen hours." For two months he was confined in the prison of Yverdun, under circumstances of severe illness, and medical attendance and treatment were denied him. After leaving the prison he was presently arrested and expelled the commune. Under such accumulated sufferings, nature at length gave way: he slept in the Lord, and among his last prayers were petitions for his persecutors, whether the magistrates or the mob. mondi; with an Introduction by the Editor. 1 vol. 8vo. London. 1826. 8s. one a 66 WE stated in our last volume, (p. 781,) that we had delayed our notice of Mr. Gilly's very interesting excursion among the Vaudois, and of the plans in progress for the benefit of that interesting people, till we could combine in our review two important works which we understood were upon the eve of publication; the description of the Valleys and their inhabitants, by the Rev. T. Sims;" and the other a posthumous work from the pen of the late moderator of the Waldensian church, J. R. Peyrani, which it was stated would supply many new and interesting details respecting the history of his venerable church and countrymen. This last work has just been published, and under circumstances which claim for it an early and a favourable notice; the editor, Mr. Sims, having published it at his own risk, and for the sole benefit of the family of M. Peyran the patriarch of the Valleys." Reserving therefore a fuller notice of the works before us to some future Number in our next volume, we shall for the present detach, with little or no comment of our own, two or three copious extracts, which will put our readers in possesssion of some interesting details connected with the present condition of the Vaudois, and more especially make them acquainted with the late moderator, M. Peyran, of whom Mr. Gilly in particular has given a very affecting account. Mr. Sims, after describing those valleys of Piedmont in which the Waldenses dwell, namely Luzerna, Perosa, and San Martino, gives the following description of the modern inhabitants. "The modern Waldenses,-lineal descendants of ancient worthies, and inheriting both their names and possessious, compared with most other Christians must be considered a very exemplary race, of men. Those crimes which require the punishment of the magistrate, are of very rare occurrence. The stranger may pass through the country, by day or night, unmolested; and to this day, as above two centuries ago, when De Vignaux wrote his memoirs,'-the Vaudoises are preferred to others as domestics, by Roman Catholics;-an honourable, indeed, but a conspicuous amongst the Vaudois the foldangerous preference! From other virtues lowing may, in this rapid sketch, be more particularly specified; patient industry, humanity, and loyalty treme. The hardships they endure in pro"Their poverty and privations are excuring the necessary food for their families, are such as we rarely witness. Compel led to raise walls even to prevent the scanty portions of soil on the sides of the mountains from being washed down by heavy rains; obliged to break up that soil by manual labour, since no cattle can be used to plough it; forced, (women as well as men,) on account of the steepness of the ground, to carry hay, corn, &c. on their backs to a great distance, and thus undertake the drudgery assigned to cattle in England; and, after this excessive labour, obtaining, in the generality of instances, only rye, coarse buck-wheat, chesnuts, and potatoes for their subsistence;-it is obvious that their patient industry is such as to be almost unequalled. The humanity they have displayed on several occasions is also well worthy of remark. So circumstanced as to be always in need of the sympathy of others, they have learnt that beneficial lesson which is usually acquired in the school of affliction,-compassion for others when in misery. If any one is ill, the neighbours cheerfully and gratuitously sit up at night in the sick-chamber, and there is even a competition who shall pay the first and the greatest attentions. In case of an accident that a poor person has met with, a sermon is sometimes preached, and a collection made. But this kindness is by no means confined to their own friends. Whilst the Roman Catholics around usually relieve the necessitous of their own church, the Vaudois give what they munion. can spare to the destitute of either com There is one illustrious instance, in particular, of their humanity, which should not pass unnoticed. When the Austrians and Russians, under marshal retreat, three hundred wounded French Suwarrow, compelled the French army to soldiers received all the assistance, with respect to medicines, &c. that could be given; and at the request of M. Rostaing their minister, the inhabitants of Bobi carried these poor men on their shoulders over the mountains to the French territory;-a most painful task, as those can well attest who have taken the tedious and difficult road of the mountains from Piedmont to Dauphiné. Their conduct appears to have been a pure act of huma |