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Truth Triumphant - Benjamin G. Wilkinson

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in the Wilderness have endeavored to confuse their<br />

history by tracing to a wrong source the origin of<br />

the name, Waldenses. They seek to connect its<br />

beginnings with Peter Waldo, an opulent merchant<br />

of Lyons, France, who came into notice about A.D.<br />

1175. The story of this remarkable man commands<br />

a worthy niche in the temple of events. However,<br />

there is nothing in the original or the earliest<br />

documents of the Waldenses--their histories,<br />

poems, and confessions of faith--which can be<br />

traced to him or which make any mention of him.<br />

Waldo, being converted in middle life to truths<br />

similar to those held by the Vaudois, distributed his<br />

fortune to the poor and labored extensively to<br />

spread evangelical teachings. He and his followers<br />

soon met with cruel opposition. Finally, in<br />

desperation they fled for refuge to those Waldenses<br />

who had crossed the Alps and had formed a<br />

considerable body in eastern France.<br />

The great antiquity of the Waldensian<br />

vernacular preserved through the centuries<br />

witnesses to their line of descent independent of<br />

495

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