lon, Duke of Lorraine, and his brother Baldwyn, led a regular Army of eighty thousand horse and foot, across the heart of Germany. Another formidable Body, headed by Raimond Count of Thoulouse, made their way through Sclavonia. While Robert Duke of Normandy, eldest son of the Conqueror of England; Hugh, brother to Philip the First of France; and Robert Earl of Flanders, embarked their respective Forces at Brundisi and Taranto, from whence they were transported to Dyrrachium ; whither they were followed by Bæmond Duke of Calabria, at the head of a Norman Host. This formidable Levy passed, without accident, the streights of Gallipolis, stormed Nice, the capital of Bithynia, subdued Antioch, and finally overran Judea. In the year 1099, God

frey

frey of Bouillon was saluted king of Jerusalem; and the Christian Armies returned to Europe, loaded with reliques, and inspired with a taste for the arts, and manners of the East.

IT that

was

in the Eleventh Century

Nicholas II. instituted the College of Cardinals, which first consisted of the seven Bishops of the Roman State, and the twenty-eight Presbyters of the Parish Churches of Rome. To these were afterward added the Priors of St. John de Lateran, St. Peter, and Santa Maria Maggiore; the Abbots of St. Paul, and St. Laurence; and finally as many other Clerical Personages, as the Popes inclined to favour, to the canonical number of seventy, which has never been exceeded. The celibacy of the

Clergy

Clergy had been enforced by Gregory VII. in a Council held at Rome in 1074; and the hardy Pontiff proceeded to anathematize whosoever should receive the investiture of a Bishopric, or an Abbacy, from the hands of a Layman.

In the mean time the Greeks accused the Latins-that they impiously made use of unleavened bread in the celebration of the Supper;-that the Monks, of their communion, scrupled not to eat lard-that the Priests of the altar, had the indecency to shave their chins-and that, in the rite of baptism, the Western Church used but one immersion, instead of three!

LETTER XX.

The rise and progress of the Reformation, from its earliest dawnings in the Vallies of Piedmont.

W

HO is this? that cometh up from

the Wilderness, under the beautiful figure, of a Woman leaning upon her Beloved? Is it not the true Church? the Spouse of Christ, made up of vital Christians-not only of all Denominations professing the Religion of Jesus-but of them that work righteousness, in every Nation, Kindred, Tongue and People.† The great Multitude that John saw stand

* Canticles VIII. 5. + Acts X. 35.

ing

ing before the Throne and before the Lamb, which was to be added unto the hundred and forty and four Thousand, that had been sealed among the Tribes of Israel.*

EVANGELIC purity of Faith and worship may be traced, from the remotest Ages, among the humble Inhabitants of the Vallies of Piedmont; who were afterward denominated Waldenses, from the pious Merchant of Lyons, that attached himself to their communion in the latter end of the Twelfth Century. As early as the year eight hundred and twenty three, Claudius, bishop of Turin, contemning reliques, and censuring pilgrimages, had ordered all Images, and even Crosses, to be removed from the Churches of his Diocese; and in the

last

• Rev. VII. 4-9.