Page:The Waldensian Church in the valleys of Piedmont.djvu/36

 instruction of Felix, Bishop of Urgel, of whom he was a disciple, he withstood them all, and gained the confidence of his royal master, Louis, surnamed the Débonnaire. Whilst in the comparatively humble situation of one of the court chaplains, the young divine displayed great talents for preaching, and the same fearless defence of truth as characterised his more matured ministry. "I teach no new doctrine," he replied to those who termed the tenets of the Bible heresy, "but I keep myself to the pure truth; and I will persist in opposing to the uttermost all superstitions." When his royal master became Emperor of Germany, he immediately appointed Claude to the bishopric of Turin, adding to it the title of Archbishop. Here his first object was to destroy the images, which had gained a recent entrance into the churches, and then to abolish every ceremony that he considered incompatible with the simplicity of apostolic teaching. And thus, unmoved by the temptations of ambition as he had been by the seductions of pleasure, Claude continued to combat error, to oppose innovation, and to keep the Church committed to him free from the idolatrous rites and anti-Christian dogmas which were, even then, sapping the foundations of the apostolic faith.

How delightful it must have been to the little flock on the mountains to range themselves under the protecting crook of this faithful shepherd! for the Vaudois are essentially a submissive and loyal people, yielding a ready obedience to authority, and looking on their duty to their rulers as only secondary to that they owe to the laws of their God. In the year 815, this indefatigable servant of God wrote three books on Genesis, and a commentary on St. Matthew's Gospel; in the following year, another on St. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians; and in subsequent periods, treatises on