Note 26 — Chapter XXI · THE REFORMATION OF THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY.

Owing to the noble protection granted to the remnants of the old Waldenses in the valleys of the Cottonian Alps by Cromwell, and continued by subsequent English governments, till the full emancipation of the sect by King Charles Albert in 1848, their history and doctrines have excited a great deal of interest in this country. A rich and valuable literature on the subject exists in our language, disfigured only by the desire, on the part of theologians, to absolutely identify the original doctrine of the Vaudois with that of the Protestant reformers. This kind of retrospective propagandism may have been useful in the days of the Commonwealth to raise Puritan sympathy for oppressed fellow Protestants, but surely is out of place in our critical times. The works by Blair, Faber, Gilly, Allix, and others are well known. The reader’s attention is called to an interesting volume by Dr. Todd, containing a description of the Waldensian manuscripts in the library of Trinity College, Dublin, also reprints of articles by the late Hon. Algernon Herbert, Dr. Gilly, and other authors, on the Waldenses and their representative poem, the ‘Noble Lesson.’ Here also will be found a curious account of the re-discovery of certain interesting MSS., brought over to England by Morland, Cromwell’s envoy to the Duke of Savoy, and deposited by him in the library of Cambridge University. They were long supposed to have disappeared, but were ultimately found by Mr. H. Bradshaw, the accomplished scholar, in 1862, on the identical shelf where Morland had deposited them. The possibility of this strange neglect Mr. Bradshaw explains from the fact that ‘the history of the MSS. was lost sight of, and they had come to be regarded as miscellaneous pieces, apparently in Spanish.’ The italicised suggestion reveals a beautiful development of modern philology at Cambridge. Does that state of things continue at the present day? What reason is there to believe the contrary, or what chance of improvement?