Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 2.djvu/432

 ,,g GERMANY. man, who had tried Hagen, was sent to Angermiinde as episcopal inquisitor; he found many sectaries but no obstinacy, for they willingly submitted and abjured* There was, in fact, enough in common between the doctrmes of the more radical Hussites and those of the Waldenses to brmg the sects eventually together. The Waldenses had by no means been extirpated, and when, in 1467, the remnant of the Tabontes known as the Bohemian Brethren opened communication with them, the envoys sent had no difficulty in finding them on the confines between Austria and Moravia, where they had existed for more than two centuries. They had a bishop named Stephen, who speedily called in another bishop to perform the rite of ordi- nation for the Brethren, showing that the heretic communities wore numerous and well organized. The negotiations unfortu- nately attracted attention, and the Church made short work of those on whom it could lay its hands. Bishop Stephen was burned at Vienna and the flock was scattered, many of them finding refuge in Moravia. Others fled as far as Brandenburg, where alreadv there were flourishing Waldensian communities. These were soon afterwards discovered, and steel, fire, and water were unsparingly used for their destruction, without blotting them out. A portion of those who escaped emigrated to Bohemia, where they were gladly received by the Bohemian Brethren and incorporated into their societies. The close association thus formed between the Brethren and the Waldenses resulted in a virtual coalescence which gave rise to a new word in the nomenclature of heresy. When in 1479, Sixtus IV. confirmed Friar Thomas Gognati as Inquisitor of Vienna, he urged him to put forth every exertion to suppress the Hussites and Nicolinistee. These latter, who took their name from Nicholas of Silesia, were evidently Bohemian Brethren who adhered to the extreme doctrine common to both sects, that nothing could justify putting a human being to death Thus the struggle continued, and though the danger was averted which had once seemed threatening, of the widespread adoption of Hussite theories, there remained concealed enough Hussite and Waldensian hostility to Kome to serve as a nucleus of discontent and to give sufficient support to revolt when a man was found, • Wattenbach, Sitzungsberichte der Preuss. Akad. 1886, pp. 57-8.