LEWIS CASPAR, one of the ablest scholars of the eighteenth century, was born at Leeuwarden in Friesland, in the year 1715. He prosecuted his scientific studies at Franeker and Leyden, and at an early age distinguished himself by his uncommon skill in ancient literature. The first appointment which his learning procured him was that of corrector of the gymnasium of Campen; and in 1741, after he had recommended himself by some very erudite publications, he succeeded Hemsterhuis in the Greek chair at Franeker. With this, in 1758, was united the professorship of Greek antiquities. In 1768 he was called to the university of Leyden; where, with the chair of the Greek language and Greek antiquities, he also held that of the history of his native country. In this honourable station he continued for nearly twenty years, in the enjoyment of a very high and well-earned reputation. He formed many excellent scholars, and eminently commi had to maintain the credit which the university had acquired as the first seminary of Greek literature. He died on the 15th of March 1785, in the seventieth year of his age.
Valkenaer possessed a masterly acquaintance with the entire compass of the Greek language and literature. He was an acute and sagacious critic, and he displayed no mean talents as a Latin orator. We subjoin a list of his principal works. De Ritibus in Jurando a veteribus Hebraeis maxime ac Graecis observatis. Francofueræ, 1735, 4to. Specimina Academica. Francofueræ, 1737, 4to. Ammonium de aditione Vocabulorum Differentia. Accedunt Opuscula nondum edita, &c. Lugd. Bat. 1739, 4to. Euripidis Phoenissae Interpretationem addidit H. Grotii; Geæ castigavit e Mstis, atque adnotationibus instruxit; schola, partim nunc primum evulgata, subjicit. Francofueræ, 1755, 4to. Euripidis Hippolytus, &c. Accedit Diatribe in Euripides perditorum Dramatum Reliquias. Lugd. Bat. 1768, 4to. The Diatribe, which is very able and elaborate, was published separately in 1767. Theocriti, Bionis, et Moschi Carmina Bucolica, Graece et Latine. Emendavit varisque lectionibus instruxit. Lugd. Bat. 1779, 8vo. He had published ten idyls of Theocritus in 1773. Ti. Hemsterhusii Oriones, quorum prima est de Paulo Apostolo. L. C. Valckenarii tres Orationes, quibus subjunctum est Schediasma, quo exhibens Adnotationem Criticarum in Loca quaestiones Librorum Sacrorum Novi Testamento. Praefigitur dua Oriones Joannis Chrysostomi in Laudem Pauli Apostoli, ex veteri versione Latina Aniani, ex cod. MS. hic illice emat. Lugd. Bat. 1784, 8vo. Schedius was the editor of his Observations Academicæ, quibus via munatur ad Graecas investigandas, Lexicorumque Defectus resicientes. Traj. ad Rhén. 1790, 8vo. These observations are accompanied with the prelections of Van Lemnep De lingua Graeca. The following posthumous work of Valckenear was published by his son-in-law Luzac: Calcidici Elegiarum Fragmenta, cum Elegia Catuli Callimachi. Lugd. Bat. 1799, 8vo. J. A. H. Tittmann publ. Libri Davidis Ruhnkenii, L. C. Valckenarii, et aliorum, ad Jo. Ang. Ernesti Epistolam. Accedunt D. Ruhnkenii Observationes in Callimachum, et L. C. Valckenarii Adnotationes ad Thomam Magistrum. Lipsiae, 1802, 2 tom. 8vo. Disce de Aristobulo Judæo, Philosopho Peripatetico Alexandrino. Lugd. Bat. 1806, 4to. Opuscula Philologica-Critica, et Oratoria, nunc primum conjunctim edita. Lugd. 1809, 2 tom. 8vo.
Essex John Valckenear, successively professor of law at Leuven, Utrecht, and Leyden, was likewise known as an author. He was a strenuous adherent of the popular party in opposition to the house of Orange; and he acted a conspicuous part in the public affairs of the eventful era to which he belonged. He became a member of the legislative body of the new republic; and the Batavian directory sent him on a diplomatic mission to Spain. When Bonaparte had divulged his intention of incorporating the kingdom of Holland with the French empire, Valckenear was despatched to Paris in order to remonstrate against such a measure. His eloquence was however ineffectual; and, on his return, relinquishing all connection with politics, he took himself to a delightful retreat in the vicinity of Haarlem, where he died on the 19th of January 1820, at the age of sixty-two.
Valdenses, Waldenses, Vallenses, Valdesi, Vaudois, or Vaudois, a community of Christians in the Cottian Alps, well known under these names, whether used as a territorial or ecclesiastical distinction. They formerly occupied a continuous and extensive mountain tract of country both in France and Italy, in the provinces of Dauphiné and Provence, and in Piedmont, when these provinces were under one sovereignty; but, reduced by a long series of persecutions, they are now confined to the three valleys of Perosa, San Martino, and Lucerna, on the Italian side of the mountains, in the dominions of the king of Sardinia.
In these beautiful valleys, extending up the slopes of mount Viso and mount Genevre, and lying between the rivers Pelice and Clusone, which come to a point of junction a little before they fall into the Po, the remnant of the Valdenses still have their existence as an established church of regular organization. They have endowments of land, churches, schools, and institutions peculiar to themselves; they have a liturgy of their own; they are recognised by the laws of the country to which they belong, and protected by treaties and compacts with the Protestant powers of Europe. It has not been accurately determined at what time, or how, they obtained the appellation of Valdenses, under which they have been known since the 12th century, and which, from the resemblance in sound and orthography, has been erroneously thought to identify their derivation with that of the disciples of Valdo, the Lyonesse reformer. From the circumstances of the times, and, from the fact, that the fugitives from Lyon took refuge with them as with a people of similar religious tenets, they come into historical notoriety under the name of Vaudois and Waldenses contemporaneously with Valdo; but traces of them, as a body of subalpine Christians, protesting against the errors of Rome, are found in ecclesiastical records of a much earlier date.
That the Cottian Alps have been inhabited by a relatively pure association of Christians from time immemorial, who have testified for the truth, upon the same articles of faith, as the Protestant churches of modern times, is a tradition not unsupported by documentary evidence, but still open to discussion. The Valdenses of these regions maintain that they are descended from a race, who peopled the same villages, and professed the same gospel, in the first centuries of the Christian era. "We have inherited our religion," say they, "with our lands, from the primitive Christians." This is no modern pretension, put forth since the Reformation; for the same language, as to their antiquity, was held by their ancestors, not only after the time of Valdo, but in the age before that reformer, to whom their origin is sometimes imputed.
The author of the "Nobla Leyczon," a.d. 1100; Moneta, who wrote against the alleged heresies of his day, and died in 1240; and Reinerus, the inquisitor, whose treatise was completed in 1250; all bear witness that the religionists mentioned by them, under the appellations of Vaudois and Lombardi Pauperes, and whom we are led to identify with the Valdenses, professed, in those times, to trace their religious genealogy and characteristics to the primitive ages.
The inquirer, who would make himself master of the religious character of the Valdesian church, must take care not to be led out of his way in search of it. He must confine his attention to one particular locality, that is, the subalpine territory lying between Mount Genevre and Mount Viso. It has been the mistake of many writers and readers to ask among the heretics of all times and places for the creed of the Valdenses. But, if we would do them justice, and ascertain the articles of faith really maintained by them, we should look to three periods of time for this information.
The first is the present period.
The second is a point of time immediately before the Reformation. The third is the age immediately before that of Valdo.
The authorities to be consulted for the religious opinions of the Valdenses at these periods, are, 1. the public acts of synod, and the liturgy of the Valdesian church, as it now exists; 2. the account given of the Valdenses by Claude Scyssel, archbishop of Turin, after his visitation of the diocese in 1517; and, 3. that admirable monument of faith, hope, and charity, called the Nobla Leyzon, alleged to have been written in the year 1100. These represent the Valdenses as rejecting image worship, the invocation of saints, the necessity of auricular confession, the obligations to celibacy, papal supremacy and infallibility, and the doctrine of purgatory; as professing to take scripture for the only rule of faith; and believing in the holy Trinity, in original sin, in the atonement and mediation of Christ alone, in justification by faith, in the two sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper, and in the apostolical ordinance of holy orders.
The misrepresentations of friends and enemies, and the destruction of their documents in the course of numberless persecutions, render it a hard task to disentangle Valdesian history from the confusion under which it lies. Notwithstanding all that has been written on the subject, we still want evidence of a more convincing and irresistible nature, as to their origin, succession, and progress. There are provoking uncertainties attending the inquiry; but amidst all the clouds in which it is involved, one bright truth gleams strongly out of the darkness, even from the time when the Valdenses came first into notoriety and conflict. The little Christian flock has been indestructible, in defiance of those who strove to be its destroyers, and, like the flaming bush, it has burned, but has not been consumed. Neither executions nor arguments, neither violence nor calumnies, have prevailed for its extinction. To what can this be attributed? Not to the protection of situation only, not to accidental causes, but, under the divine blessing, to the stronghold which the sanctity of truth has upon the sympathies of men, in spite of their angry passions. The Valdenses found favour with their sovereigns, and obtained immunities, privileges, and pledges of security from time to time, which could not have been forced from the strong by the weak, and never would have been conceded to fanatical or rebellious subjects. The very fact of their existence is an attestation to the purity of their faith and conduct, and a refutation of those who reproached them with gross errors. He who has made darkness his secret place, has mysteriously preserved them; and astonished the pride of Christian orthodoxy, by making a fold for these few sheep in the wilderness, from whence they might rebuke error, and bear witness to the truth.
The history of Piedmont, and of all the states subject to the house of Savoy, whether in the Cottian Alps, or elsewhere, has hitherto been a sealed book, in consequence of the reluctance of the dukes of Savoy and kings of Sardinia, to permit the family and state documents to be brought to light. Muratori confessed that he despaired of illustrating the history of Piedmont. Giannone relinquished in disgust his intended history of the country, because the archives of Turin were not more freely opened to him. Hallam says that the history of Piedmont is far less elucidated by ancient and modern writers than that of any other part of Italy; and Dal Pozzo, a native writer, has declared, in a very learned work, that in no region of Europe has the truth of history been so concealed.
Another circumstance which has contributed to darken Valdesian history, is the doubtful line of separation between kingdom and kingdom, diocese and diocese, during the middle ages, and the frequent transfers from one authority to another. The bishops of Turin and Embrun sometimes exercised jurisdiction almost indiscriminately on each side of the Cottian Alps; and in many of the old documents, when we read of the valleys of Fraissinieres, Pragels, Cesone, and others, it is difficult to understand to what localities or people they refer. Need it therefore occasion surprise, if many links are found to be wanting, in the chain of documentary evidence necessary to unite the present with the past, in the annals of an obscure district, belonging to a realm whose entire history was wrapped in mystery?
In a few years, perhaps, it will be more easy to give a satisfactory account of the Valdenses, because the present king of Sardinia is permitting the ancient records of his states to be examined and published; and an historical commission at Turin has already sent many important documents to press, which throw light on subalpine affairs.
It is in vain to pretend to reduce the annals of the Valdesian church to any thing like connected history, till we descend to the period when persecution brought it into notice. We may, it is true, pick up a few materials relating to the country, and to the general aspect of religion, from the early documents which have come down to us, but these are scanty and unsatisfactory. For example, we learn that the Cottian Alps received the gospel in the second century, and that Irenaeus, bishop of Lyon, made himself master of the Celtic language, that he might minister among the mountaineers; that facilities of intercourse between the subalpines and the inhabitants of the plain, were secured by good roads leading through the centre of the valleys now called Protestant, in the direction of Mount Genevre, Oulx and Fenestrelle; that the village of St Secondo, in the valley of the Cluse, is so called from a martyr of that name in the year 120; that Crisolò, near Rora in Val Lucerna, was the place of St Geoffrey's concealment, before his martyrdom in 297; and that, during the persecution of Diocletian, many Christians of the Theban legion found refuge in these regions.
We know that a hundred years afterwards, Ambrose of Milan, whose diocese extended to the Alps, complained of his mountain clergy refusing to become celibates, on the plea of ancient custom; and that Vigiliantius made the Cottian Alps the place of his sojournment, when he opposed himself to the errors of the church; because there he was received with kindness by professors of Christianity, who refused to adopt the observances of Monachism prayers for the dead, saint and relic worship, and other superstitions, which were creeping into practice. After an interval of more than 400 years, we find, that doctrines, called by Jonas of Orleans and Dungalus, heresy of Vigiliantius, were still cherished here, and that Claude, bishop of Turin, "that bright and golden ring," the chain of Cisalpine Protestantism," gave the sanction of his episcopal authority to opinions, which the Gallic reformer of the fourth century had been reviled by Jews.
On the origin of the Valdenses, some curious materials for conjecture will be found in the history of the Gothic Christians of the fifth century, and their relics in France and Italy. Salvianus de Gub, Dei, l. 7, Alcinus in his Epistles, and Theodolphus, three hundred years later, speak of the purity of their lives, while they allude to the imperfections of their notions in relation to church observances.
These publications appear in folio volumes, under the title "Historiae Patriae Monumenta." The first was printed at Turin in 1833.
See "Storia delle Alpi Marittime," published in Hist. Patr. Mon.
Hieron. Opera, vol. iv. p. 279. Epist. 37, alter 53.
Mr Faber (see his very learned Inquiry into the History of the Vallenses, p. 227) thinks the Valdenses may have been called Lusitans from this Vigiliantius, the Lusitan or native of Lugdunum Consecrum.
See Dungalus Epist. adv. Cland. and Jonas Aur. Episc. Epist. adv. Cland. in Bib. Pat. vol. iv. p. 536, and vol. v. pp. 153-163.