Gothofredus, pastor and inspector of the churches of Perleberg, and historiographer to the king of Prussia, was born at Annaberg in the mountains of Misnia in 1666. He was a zealous defender of the Pietists, a sect among the German Protestants, and composed a great number of religious works; particularly an Ecclesiastical History, which exposed him to the resentment of the divines; and another giving an account of the doctrines and manners from the first ages, in which he frequently animadverts upon Cave's Primitive Christianity. He died in 1714. Various are the opinions concerning Arnoldus in Germany; some of his own countrymen and profession extolling him to the skies as a saint of the last century, and setting an inestimable value upon his works; while others pronounce damnation upon him as an arch-heretic, and condemn his writings as heterodox.