(Excerpted from History of the Ancient Christians Inhabiting the Valleys of the Alps by Jean Paul Perrin, 2017, ebook)

“They renounced the Church of Rome as mystical Babylon, abhorred the Pope as the “Man of Sin,” and rejected all the traditions of the Papacy as of no authority among Christians.” (Loc 95 of 12269)

“That all God-fathers, and God-mothers, in the baptism of infants, are to be rejected, excepting the parents, who alone ought to present their children, if they are living, and of a suitable character. But that if the parents are dead, or destitute of Christian character, then the children ought to be presented by any who are willing to become responsible for their Christian education.” (Loc 98 of 12269)

“That the true Church consists of all those who have knowledge of the Gospel, and walk according to its principles and rules. That purgatory, transubstantiation, prayers for the dead, and to saints, auricular confession, and all image worship, were all departures from primitive purity and simplicity, and ought all to be rejected with abhorrence.” (Loc 102 of 12269)

“They taught that the clergy were allowed to marry, and that the doctrine of the celibacy of the clergy was a doctrine of devils, leading to enormous moral mischief.” (Loc 109 of 12269)

“These simple hearted pious people little imagined, three hundred years ago, when they were execrated with so much bitterness, and persecuted with so much cruelty, that the time would ever come, when their opinions and practices would be regarded as a model; and an alliance with them claimed as a precious privilege! Yet so it has happened in the all wise providence of God. There is hardly a Protestant denomination of Christians which has not set them up as a kind of exemplar of primitive purity, and boasted of a conformity to their ecclesiastical character.” (Loc 134, 138 of 12269)

“Their grand distinction is this—the Waldensian Churches [never] belonged to Rome. They never submitted to the Papal jurisdiction, and they never assented to its Christian pretensions—having ever denied their usurpations, and denounced their profession of the Gospel as undisguised hypocrisy.” (Loc 312 of 12269)

“The Roman Inquisitors were enraged at the Waldenses for their constancy and perseverance in such sanctity of faith and practice. Therefore, although the mere force of truth did sometimes extort from them the most honorable testimonies on their behalf, yet generally those Inquisitors published the most wicked lies which they could invent against them; and in their criminal processes they also villainously inserted, in their answers and confessions, confessions, crimes of which those guileless Christians never dreamed.” (Loc 381, 384 of 12269)