Baptist History, Heritage & Distinctives – Waldenses 800k Survived & Scattered in Europe Baptist Peculiarity SEVEN (continued) Part 24 of 24

Thomas E Kresal Admin · 9 mins March 13, 2020

Baptist History, Heritage & Distinctives – Waldenses
800k Survived & Scattered in Europe
Baptist Peculiarity SEVEN (continued)
Part 24 of 24

King Louis XIV. was mainly guilty of the final dreadful slaughter and dispersion of the Waldenses. It was the French Catholics that perpetrated such monstrous barbarities upon the helpless women and children of the Waldenses. And the French Emperor has indorsed all these cruelties of his ancestors by supporting the Pope on his throne by his army at Rome.

France, as a Catholic country, has indorsed all the outrages perpetrated against these afflicted servants of God. And as God has declared that he will avenge his elect that cry unto him day and night, all those countries which have taken part in the persecution of the “martyrs of Jesus” may expect, in the day of vengeance, to drink blood; for they “are worthy.”

It would seem that the dreadful cup of vengeance is now being pressed to the lips of France. As we are now penning these lines, September, 1870, the news comes over the wires that the French armies are defeated in battle with dreadful slaughter, and that the Emperor Napoleon III is a prisoner in the hands of the victorious King of Prussia.

The cries of the souls of the martyrs under the altar will not always go unheeded. We have found that the ancient Waldenses possessed, in an eminent degree, the Baptist peculiarities. And, therefore, the dreadful slaughter of these servants of God was really the murder of the ancient Baptists, who were called Waldenses.

They were called “Anabaptists*’ all the time during this long period; and they were called Baptists and Waldenses interchangeably, toward the close of this period.

Though the period called the Waldensean period closes with the year 1686, yet the people who were called Waldenses were not annihilated. They were expelled from their ancient valleys; but this only scattered them, as the good seed, among all the countries of Europe, from whence they appeared, about the time of Luther, under the names of Baptists and Anabaptists, eight hundred thousand strong.

It will be seen in the next chapter, that the descendants of the ancient Waldenses were called Baptists in Germany and England.

Presented by Thomas E. Kresal from: “Baptist Succession” by D.B. Ray, 1871 Edition, pg. 392-93