while they pretended to be ambassadors of these people there were some strangely God, often audaciously insulted the divine delirious, and who fancied they had incredimajesty by their shameful conduct and ble visions; but those of them who were not crimes. Infamous with posterity beyond destitute of all power of reasoning taught others of this senseless tribe, were the names for substance the following doctrines:-(I.) of Lewis Hätzer, Balthazar Hubmeyer, That the church of Christ ought to be free Felix Mantz, Conrad Grebel, Melchior from all sin. (II.) That a community of Hoffmann, George Jacobs, and others; who, goods and universal equality should be. had their abilities been adequate, would introduced. (III.) That all usury, tithes, have involved all Switzerland, Holland, and tributes, should be abolished. (IV.) and Germany, in tumults and wars. Among That the baptism of infants was an invention of the devil. (V.) That all Christians had a right to act as teachers. (VI.) That of course the Christian church had no need of ministers or teachers. (VII.) Neither was there any need of magistrates under the reign of Christ. (VIII.) That God still made known his will to certain persons, by dreams and visions.2 I omit other opinions. It would however betray ignorance or want of candour to deny, that there were others everywhere who held in general the same opinions yet lived more quietly and peaceably, and in whom no great fault can be found except their erroneous opinions and their zeal to disseminate them among the people. Nor do I fear to add, that among the followers not only of these more sober Anabaptists but even of those altogether misguided, there were many persons of honest intentions and of real piety, whom an unsus See the details collected, among others by Ottius, in his Annales Anabaptistici, p. 21, &c. by Hornbeck, Summa Controversiarum, lib. v. p. 332; Mattheus, Analecta Vet. Eoi, tom. iv. p. 629, 677, 679, the recent ed.; Raupach's Austria Evangelica, tom. ii. p. 41; Schelhorn, Acta ad Historiam Eccles. Pertinentia, tom. i. p. 100; Arnold, Kirchen-und Ketzerhistorie, book xvi. chap. xxi. p. 727, &c. Fueslin, in the various documents relating to the Anabaptists which he has inserted in his Beyträge zu der Schweitzerischen Reformationsgeschichte [and more recently Professor Wills, Beyträge zur Geschichte des Anabaptismus in Deutschland nebst wichtigen Urkunden und Beylagen, Nuremb. 1773, 8vo.-Lewis Haetzer, whom some take to be a Bavarian and others a Swiss, was a man of abilities, and well versed especially in the languages. Joachim Vadianus (see Fueslin, vol. v. p. 397) calls him, "Commodissimi ingenii hominem, clarum virum, linguis etiam et admirabili ingenii dexteritate præditum." He lived in the time of the Reformation at Zurich, and aided the Reformers by his discourses and his writings; among other things he translated Ecolampadius Book De Sacramento Eucharistiæ into German in the year 1526. But he afterwards separated from the Reformers and followed his own views in theology, which were often singular, as appears from his writing published between the years 1523 and 1529. Among other works he translated the prophets with the assist-pecting simplicity and a laudle desire to book against the divinity of Christ, which Ambrose reform the church had led to join the party. ance of Hans Denk. He also wrote in the year 1523 a Blaurer, by direction of Zwingli, confuted. He was among the extravagant Anabaptists and was beheaded at Constance in 1529, because he cohabited with many women and perverted the Scriptures to justify his unchastity. - Balthazar Hubmeyer, who sometimes called himself Friedberger, from his native place in Bavaria, is in the above-cited epistle of Vadianus pro nounced, eloquentissimus, and humanissimus vir. Before the Reformation he was for a time preacher in the principal church at Regensburg, where he became suspected on account of some erroneous doctrines, and was obliged to quit the place. Afterwards he preached at Waldshut. But as he allowed himself to be led astray by Thomas Münzer, he was driven from that place also; and fleeing to Zurich he was thrown into prison, but after a three days' discussion with Zwingli he recanted. Yet continuing afterwards enthusiastic, he was expelled the city and retired to Moravia, where he fell into the hands of the Austrian government and was burned alive at Vienna in 1528. His writings are enumerated by Fueslin, Beyträge, vol. v. p. 399, &c.Felix Mantz of Zurich, was there apprehended with others on account of his Anabaptistic doctrines, and was drowned. See Fueslin, Beyträge, vol. v. p. 259, &c. -Grebel was also of Zurich, of a good family and of great talents, but of so great obstinacy that nothing could induce him to change his opinions. Yet he fortunately escaped from prison and afterwards died a natural death.-Melchior Hoffmann was a furrier of Suabia who laboured to disseminate the doctrines of the Anabaptists in the Netherlands, and in Lower Saxony and Livonia, and died in prison at Strasburg in 1533. To enumerate his writings here would be tedious. -Jacobs is called in the documents (see Fucslin's Beyträge, vol. v. p. 265) Georg von Hause Jacobs, genant Blaurock von Chur. He was twice apprehended at Zurich, was beaten with rods, and after twice swearing to keep the peace was banished the country.-To the preceding may be added Hans Denk, who once taught in the school of St. Sebald at Nuremberg; but after his connexion with the Anabaptists he resided chiefly at was 6. While this tumultuous sect spreading itself through nearly all Europe, the emperors, kings, princes, and magistrates resisted them with very severe edicts, and at last with capital punishments. But 3 Basil and at Worms. He taught also the restoration of all things, and aided Hetzer, as already stated, in his translation of the prophets, which was published at Worms, 1527, folio. His smaller pieces were printed a second time, Amsterdam, 1680, 12mo. Several extracts are given by Arnold, Kirchen-und Ketzerhistorie, part iv. sec. ii. No. 31, p. 530, &c. See also Büttinghausen's Beyträge zur Pfälzischen Geschichte, part iii. p. 299, whence we learn that Denk recanted before he died, and that his recantation was published, probably by Ecolampadius.-Schl. [See some additional particulars relative to Haetzer, Hoffmann, Denk, and others, and illustrative of this party generally and their fanatical tenets, in Ranke's Hist. of the Reformation, vol. iii. p. 559, &c. The whole chapter indeed (book vi. chap. ix.) is a very important contribution to the carly history of Anabaptism.-R. These are chiefly collected from the documents published by Fueslin. [Whether they also denied the divinity of Christ and justified polygamy, Fueslin examines in the third volume of his Beyträge, p. 119, and evinces by documents that they did not. Schl. 3 If I do not mistake, it was first in Saxony and in the year 1525, that laws were enacted against this sort of people. And these laws were frequently renewed in the years 1527, 1528, and 1534. See Kapp's Nachlese von Reformations- Urkunden, par. i. p. 176. As the impudence of many of this sect became more bold, Charles V. published severe decrees against them in 1527 and 1529. Ottius, Annales Anabaptist. p. 45. The Swiss at first proceeded very gently against their Anabaptists; but when many of them became more persuaded not only the common people but here also the maxim was fully verified which | certain illiterate and plebeian men, e.g. 7. A shocking example of this is visible in the case of those Anabaptists from Holland who came to Munster, a city of Westphalia, in the year 1533, and there committed deeds which would be scarcely credible were they not so well attested as to compel belief. These infatuated men, whose brains were turned by that dream of a new kingdom of Christ about to be erected on the earth, which bewildered the great body of Anabaptists, having for leaders 3 Corvinus, Narratio de miserabili Monaster. Ana 3 Bockholdt, or Bockelson, alias John of Leyden, who headed them at Munster, ran stark naked in the streets, married eleven wives at the same time to show his approbation of polygamy, and entitled himself King of Sion, all which was but a very small part of the pernicious follies of this mock monarch.-Macl. bapt. obsidione, first published, Wittemb. 1536, and then elsewhere; and the other writers mentioned by 835; add Hamelmann's Historia Renati Evangelii in Urbe Monasterii, in his Opera Genealogico-Historica, p. 1203, &c. The elegant and accurately written Latin elegiac poem of Boland, entitled, Motus Monasteriensis Cologne, 1546, 8vo.; Kersenbroik's Historia Belli ning. tom. ii. p. 377. Gerdes also treats (ibid. tom. Monasteriensis, published by Gerdes, Miscellan. Groii. p. 403) of Bernhard Rotmann, a minister of the gospel at Munster, a man in other respects neither of a bad character nor unlearned, who joined with these Anabaptists and aided them in their mad projects. [For the details of this Anabaptist occupation of Munster and of the shocking scenes enacted there, the English reader may consult Robertson's History of Charles V. book v. vol. iii. p. 67, &c. or still better, Ranke's Hist. of the Reformation, vol. iii. p. 573, &c. Sagittarius, Introd. in Hist. Eccles. tom. i. p. 537 and -R. 4 The scenes of violence, tumult, and sedition which were exhibited in Holland by this odious tribe, were also terrible. They formed the design of reducing the city of Leyden to ashes, but were happily prevented and severely punished. John of Leyden, the Anabaptist king of Munster, had taken it into his head that God had made him a present of the cities of Amsterdam, Deventer, and Wesel, in consequence thereof he sent bishops to these three places to preach his gospel of sedition and carnage. About the beginning of the year 1535, twelve Anabaptists, of whom five were women, assembled at midnight in a private house at Amsterdam. One of them who was a tailor by profession fell into a trance, and after having preached and prayed for the space of four hours, stripped himself naked, threw his clothes into the fire, and commanded all the assembly to do the same, in which he was obeyed without the least reluctance. He then ordered them to follow him through the streets in this state of nature, which they accordingly did, howling and bawling out, "Woe! woe! the wrath of God! the wrath of God! woe to Babylon!" When, after being seized and brought before the magistrates, clothes were offered them to cover their indecency, they refused them obstinately and cried aloud, "We are the naked truth!" When they were brought whither the principles of this school would may readily be conceived, if we consider lead unstable and incautious men; and the manners and the spirit of the man and bence it is not strange that the magistrates the condition of the party at the time he were eager to extirpate the roots of such mischief with fire and sword.' 8. When this miserable sect was in the utmost consternation, partly from the extinction of all their hopes from the men of Munster, and partly from anxiety about their personal safety, while they saw the best as well as the worst among them daily hurried away to certain execution, great consolation and relief were afforded them by Menno Simonis of Friesland, who was once a popish priest and, as he himself confesses, a debauched character. He first covertly and secretly united with the Anabaptists; but afterwards in the year 1536, quitting the sacred office he had hitherto held among the papists, he openly espoused their cause. And now in the year 1537, he listened to the entreaties of several of these people whom he describes as sober, pious persons who had taken no part in the criminal transactions at Munster, though others believe they had been associates of the Westphalian rabble, but had become wiser by the calamities of their brethren and consented to assume the functions of a reli gious teacher among them. From this period to the end of his days, or for about five-and-twenty years, he travelled with his wife and children amid perpetual sufferings and daily perils of his life, over many districts of country-first in West Friesland, the territory of Groningen, and East Friesland, and then in Gelderland, Holland, Brabant, Westphalia, and the German provinces along the shores of the Baltic as far as Livonia; and in this way he gathered an immense number of followers, so that he may justly be considered as almost the common father and bishop of all the Anabaptists, and as the founder of the flourishing sect which has continued down to our times. The causes of this great success to the scaffold, they sang and danced and discovered all the marks of enthusiastic frenzy. These tumults were followed by a regular and deep-laid conspiracy, formed by Van Geelen (an envoy of the mock-king of Munster who had made a very considerable number of 'proselytes) against the magistrates of Amsterdam, with a design to wrest the government of that city out of their hands. This incendiary marched his fanatical troop to the town-house on the day appointed, drums beating, and colours flying, and fixed there his headquarters. He was attacked by the burghers, assisted by some regular troops, and headed by several of the burgomasters of the city. After an obstinate resistance he was surrounded, with his whole troop, who were put to death in the severest and most dreadful manner, to serve as examples to the other branches of the sect, who were exciting commotions of a like nature in Friesland, Groningen, and other provinces and cities in the Netherlands.-Macl. 1 Brandt's Historie de Reformate in de Nedderlande, vol. i. book ii. p. 119, &c. joined them. Menno possessed genius though not much cultivated, as his writings evince, and a natural eloquence. Of learning he had just enough to be esteemed very learned, and almost an oracle, by the raw and undiscerning multitude. Moreover, if we may judge from his words and actions, he was a man of integrity, mild, accommodating, laborious, patient of injuries, and so ardent in his piety as to exemplify in his own life the precepts which he gave to others. A man of such a character would readily obtain followers among any people; but among none more readily than among such as the Anabaptists then were, a people simple, ignorant of all learning, accustomed to teachers who raved and howled rather than instructed them, very often deluded by impostors, worn out with perpetual suffering, and now in constant peril of their lives.2 2 Menno was born, not as many say in 1496, but in Friesland. After being variously tossed about during 1505 and at Witmarsum, a village near Bolswert ir his whole life, he died in 1561 in the duchy of Holstein, Menno has been carefully drawn up by Möller, in his His writings, which are nearly all in the Dutch lan on an estate situated not far from Oldesloe, and belonging to a nobleman who was touched with compassion for the man exposed now to continual plots, and who received both him and his associates under his protection and afforded him an asylum. An account of Cimbria Literata, tom. ii. p. 835, &c. See also Schyn's Historia Mennonit. plenior Deductio cap. vi. p. 116. guage, were published; the most complete edition is, Amsterdam, 1651, folio. One who is disgusted with a and needless repetitions, with great confusion in the style immoderately diffuse and rambling, with frequent thoughts and matter, with pious but extremely languid exhortations, will rise from the perusal of them with but little satisfaction. [A concise history of his life, or rather a development of his religious views drawn up by himself, is found both prefixed to the complete edition of his works (Amsterdam, 1651, fol.), and in the 2d vol. of Schyn's Historia Mennonitar. plenior Deductio, p. 118, &c.--It contains, I. A short and lucid account how and why he forsook popery. II. A short and plain instructions in questions and answers derived from Scripture, for those who would join their community. Menno was born in 1505 at Witmarsum in Friesland. In his 24th year he became a priest of the Romish church in the village of Pinningen. His rector had some learning, and both he and another clergyman under him had some acquaintance with the Scriptures, while Menno had never read them, being afraid they would mislead him. But the thought at length occurred to him as he read mass, whether the bread and the wine could be the real body and blood of Christ. At first, he supposed this thought was a suggestion of the devil, and he often confessed it and sighed and prayed over it, but could not get rid of it. With his fellow-clergymen he daily spent his time in playing, drinking, and other indulgences. At length he took up reading the New Testament, and from that he soon learned that he had hitherto been deceived in regard to the mass; Luther also helped him to the idea, that to disregard human prescriptions did not draw after it eternal death. His examination of the Scriptures carried him farther and farther, and he began to be called an evangelical preacher, and everybody loved him. But when he heard that an honest man was put to death at Lewarden, because he had been rebaptized, Confession of Faith of the Mennonites. III. Concise 9. Menno had struck out a system of doctrine which was much milder and more tolerable than that of the furious and fanatical portion of the Anabaptists; yet perhaps one which was somewhat harsher, though better digested, than that of the wiser and more moderate Anabaptists, who merely wished to see the church restored to its long-lost purity, but had undefined conceptions about it. He therefore condemned the expectation of a new kingdom of Jesus Christ, to be set up in the world by violence and the expulsion of magistrates, which had been the prolific cause of so many seditions and crimes; he condemned the marvellous restitution of the church by a new and extraordinary effusion of the Holy Spirit; he condemned the licentiousness of polygamy and divorce; and he would not endure those who believed that the Holy Spirit descended into the minds of many just as he did at the first establishment of Christianity, and manifested his presence by miracles, prophecies, divine dreams, and visions. The common Anabaptist doctrines in regard to infant baptism, a coming thousand years' reign of Christ before the end of the world, the inadmissibility of magistrates in the Christian church, the prohibition of wars and oaths by Christ, the inutility and the mischief of human learning, these doctrines he re he was at first surprised to hear of a repetition of bap. tism; he went to the Scriptures and he could find nothing said there about infant baptism. He held a discussion on the subject with his rector, who was obliged to concede the same fact. Some ancient wri-tained indeed, but he so corrected and ters taught him that children by such baptism were improved them that they appeared to come cleansed from original sin; but this seemed to him, according to the Scriptures, to militate against the nearer to accordance with the common efficacy of Christ's blood. After this (we give, all tenets of Protestants. This system of relialong, his own account) he turned to Luther; but his assertion that children must be baptized on account of gion was so highly recommended by the their own faith appeared contrary to the Scriptures. nature of the precepts themselves, by the Equally unsatisfactory to him was the opinion of Bucer, that the baptism of infants is necessary in order eloquence of the preacher, and by the cirthat they may be more carefully watched, and be cumstances of the times, that it very easily trained up in the ways of the Lord; and also Bul- gained the assent of most of the Anabaplinger's referring it to a covenant and appealing to circumcision. Not long after that, he was made rector tists. And thus the influence of Menno of his native village, Witmarsum, where he preached caused the Anabaptists of both sorts, after much indeed from the Scriptures, but without being himself made better. In the mean time, he glories in excluding fanatical persons and rejecting having attained to correct views of baptism and of the opinions pernicious to the state, to become Lord's Supper, by the illumination of the Holy Ghost and by frequent perusal of the Scriptures. With the consolidated as it were into one family or disturbances of Munster he was greatly troubled; he community.1 ascribed them to erring zeal, and he opposed them in his sermons and exhortations. Yet he was so much affected by the example of the multitudes who sacrificed themselves for the interests of the party, that he felt more and more distress and shame on account of his own state of mind; he prayed God to aid him, his whole state of mind became changed, and he now taught Christian piety much more purely and effectually. And the discovery which he had made of the corrupt state of the Romish church induced him in the year 1536 utterly to renounce it as well as his priestly office, which he calls his departure from Babylon. The next year, there came to him several godly Anabaptists who most importunately entreated him, in their own name and in that of other devout men of the same faith, to become the teacher of this dispersed and persecuted company. He at length consented, and he remarks on this occasion that he was called to the office of teacher neither by the insurgents of Munster nor by any other turbulent party, but by true professors of Christ and his word, who sought the salvation of all around them and took up their cross. Thenceforth, during eighteen years, amid many perils and discouragements, poverty and want, and often concealed in lurking-places with his wife and children, he discharged the duties of his office; and thereby (says he) hath God in many cities and countries brought his church to such a glorious state, that not only have a multitude of vicious persons been reclaimed, but also the most renowned doctors and the most cruel tyrants have been made to stand confounded and ashamed before those who have suffered with him. To this, which is Menno's own account, other writers add that with unwearied activity in Friesland, Gelderland, Holland, and Brabant, in Westphalia, and generally in northern Germany, as far as Livonia, he either planted and strengthened Anabaptist churches, or reduced them to order and to unanimity, until at last in 1561 he died at Oldesloe in the duchy of Holstein. Translated from Schroeckh's Kirchengeschichte seit der Reformation, vol. v. p. 444, 447.-Mur. 1 These facts show how the famous question concerning the origin of the Mennonites may be readily solved. The Mennonites use every argument they can devise to prevent credence being given to what is taught in innumerable books, that the modern are the descendants of the ancient Anabaptists. See Schyn's Historia Mennonitar. cap. viii. ix. xxi. p. 223, &c. Nor is the reason of their zeal in this matter difficult to ascertain. This timid people, living dispersed among their enemies, are afraid lest the malevolent should take occasion from that relationship to renew those laws against their existence and their safety by which those ancient disturbers of the public peace were put down. At least they hope the severe odium which has long rankled against them will be much diminished, provided they can fully eradicate from the public mind the belief that the Mennonites are the successors of the Anabaptists, or rather are themselves Anabaptists, though reformed and made wiser than their predecessors. But I must candidly own that after carefully comparing what the Mennonites and their antagonists have advanced on this subject, I am unable to determine what the precise point in dispute between them is. In the first place, if the Mennonites wish to maintain that Menno, the founder of the present existing sect, was not infected with those opinions by which the men of Munster and others like them drew upon themselves deserved punishments, and consequently that he did not propose to establish a new church of Christ entirely free from all evil, nor command the abolition of all civil laws and magistrates, nor impose upon himself and others by fanatical dreams, then they will find us all ready to agree with them. All this is readily conceded by those who at the same time contend that there most certainly was an intimate connexion between the ancient and the modern Anabaptists. Again, if the Mennonites would maintain that the churches which have adopted the discipline of Menno down to the present time have been studious of peace and tranquillity, have plotted no insurrections or revo. 10. Menno must have possessed more and other relatives. They likewise required than human power to be able to diffuse obedience to a very austere and difficult peace and good order throughout so discordant a body, and bind together in harmonious bonds men actuated by very different spirits. About the middle of the century therefore a violent dispute arose among the Anabaptists [or Mennonites] respecting excommunication, occasioned chiefly by Leonard Bouwenson and Theodore Philip, and its effects have continued down to the present time. The men just named not only maintained that all transgressors, even those who seriously lamented and deplored their fall, ought to be at once cast out of the church without previous admonition, but also that the excommunicated were to be debarred all social intercourse with their wives, husbands, brothers, sisters, children, lutions to have visions and to hold converse with God; and But (I.) If they would have us believe that none of the Mennonites are by birth and blood descendants of those people who once overwhelmed Germany and other countries with so many calamities, or that none of the furious and fanatical Anabaptists became members of the community which derives its name from Menno, then they may be confuted both by the testimony of Menno himself, who proclaims that he had convinced some of this pestiferous faction, and also by many other proofs. The first Mennonite churches were certainly composed of Anabaptists of both the better sort and the worse. Nor if the Mennonites should admit this (which is true beyond contradiction), would they expose themselves to more infamy than we do, when we admit that our ancestors were blind idolaters? And (II.) We must be equally at variance with them, if they deny that the Mennonites hold any portion at all of those opinions which once betrayed the turbulent and seditious Anabaptists into so many and so enormous crimes. For, not to mention what has long since been remarked by others, that Menno himself styled those Anabaptists of Munster whom his children at this day execrate as pests, his brethren, though with the qualification of erring; I say, not to mention this, it is the fact that the very doctrine concerning the nature of Christ's kingdom or the church of the New Testament, which led the ancient Anabaptists step by step to become furious and open rebels, is not yet wholly eradicated from the minds of the modern Mennonites, although it has gradually become weakened, and in the more moderate has ceased to vegetate or at least has lost its power to do harm. I will not here inquire whether even the more peaceful community of Menno has not at any time been agitated with violent commotions, nor am I disposed to pry into what may be now taking place among its minor sects and parties; for that the larger sects, especially those of North Holland, shun the men who are actuated by a fanatical spirit, is sufficiently evinced by the fact that they most carefully exclude all Quakers from their communion. system of morals. But many of the Anabaptists looked upon this as going too far. And hence very soon the Anabaptists became split into two sects the one more lenient towards transgressors, the other more severe; the one requiring a sordid style of living and very austere morals, the other conceding something to human nature and to the elegances of life. Menno laboured indeed to restore harmony to his community, but discovering no possible way to effect it, he fluctuated as it were during his whole life between those two sects. For at one time he seemed to favour the severer party, and at another the more lax brethren. And this inconstancy in one of so high authority tended to increase not a little the disquictude and commotion among them.1 11. These two large sects of Anabaptists [cr Mennonites] are distinguished by the appellations of the Fine and the Coarse (die Feinen und die Groben-Subtiles et Crassi) i.e. the More Rigid and the More Lax.2 Those called the Fine hold and observe more strictly than the others both the ancient doctrines and the morals and discipline of the Anabaptists; the Coarse depart farther from the original opinions, morals, and discipline of the sect, and approach nearer to those of the Protestants. Mennonites at first were inhabitants of a The greater part of the Coarse or lax region in the North of Holland called Waterland, and hence this whole sect obtained the name of Waterlanders.3 A Sce the history of the contests and controversies among the Mennonites previous to the year 1615, composed by some Mennonite writer and translated from Dutch into German by Jehring, and published, Jena, 1720, 4to; also Rues, Nachrichten von dem Zustande der Mennoniten, Jena, 1743, 8vo. 2 The terms Coarse and Fine are a literal translation of groben and feinen, which are the German denominations used to distinguish these two sects.-The same terms have been introduced among the Protestants in Holland; the Fine denoting a set of people whose extraordinary and sometimes fanatical devotion resembles that of the English Methodists; while the Coarse is applied to the generality of Christians who make no extraordinary pretensions to uncommon degrees of sanctity and devotion.-Macl. 3 See Spanheim, Elenchus Controvers. Theolog. Opp. tom. iii. p. 772. This sect are also called Johannites from John de Ries [Hans de Rys], who in various ways was serviceable to them, and in particular with the aid of Lubbert Gerard in 1580, composed a confession of faith. This confession, which exceeds all the others of the Mennonites in simplicity and soundness, has been often published, and recently by Schyn, in his Historia Mennonitarum, cap. vii. p. 172. It was explained in a copious commentary in 1686, by Peter Joannis, a Netherlander and minister among the Waterlanders. Yet this celebrated confession is said to be only the private confession of that church over which its author presided, and not the general one of the Waterlander church. See Rues, Nachrichten, p. 93, 94. [For Rues asserts that he had seen a document according to which an old minister of the church at Gouda affirmed before |