Crushed with their head: so Waldo's[1] cursèd rout,
And those of Wickliffe[2] here were rooted out,
Their names scarce left.—Sure were the means we chose,
And wrought prevailingly; fire purged the dross
Of those foul heresies, and sovereign steel
Lopped off the infected limbs the church to heal.
Renowned was that French brave, renowned his deed,
A deed for which the day deserves its red
Far more than for a paltry saint that died:
How goodly was the sight! how fine the show
When Paris saw through all its channels flow
The blood of Huguenots; when the full Seine,
Swelled with the flood, its banks with joy o'erran!
He scorned like common murderers to deal
By parcels and piecemeal; he scorned retail
In the trade of death; whole myriads died by the great,[3]
Soon as one single life; so quick their fate,
Their very prayers and wishes came too late.
This a king[4] did: and great and mighty 'twas,
Worthy his high degree, and power and place,
And worthy our religion and our cause.
Unmatched 't had been, had not Maguire arose,
The bold Maguire (who read in modern fame,
Can be a stranger to his worth and name?)
Born to outsin a monarch, born to reign
In guilt, and all competitors disdain:
Dread memory! whose each mention still can make
Pale heretics with trembling horror quake!
- ↑ Peter Waldo, a rich merchant of Lyons, and one of the earliest reformers, erroneously supposed by some writers to be the founder of the Waldenses. He was anathematized by Alexander III. for his opposition to the doctrine of transubstantiation; and, after living in concealment for three years, he retired into Dauphiny, and preached there with great success. He afterwards settled in Bohemia, where he died in 1179.
- ↑ Dr. John Wickliffe. He died in 1385, and his body was dug up forty years afterwards and burned.
- ↑ En gros—by wholesale.
- ↑ Charles IX., who ordered the massacre at Paris in 1572.
