# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1853 08 16_S179
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

179

lic trial lasted four days. At it the prisoners were then permitted to see one another again for the first time, and their meeting was deeply moving. But what was it now that, after so long an investigation, had been brought out against them?

1. That some thirty books and writings, all of religious content, had been found with them;

2. that they had attended the worship of the Swiss church;

3. That they had tried to instruct their housemates in the Gospel;

4. That they had held religious meetings in their house.

Their answers to all these questions were open, plain, courageous, yet modest and full of meekness. Although they confessed everything that they had to confess in accordance with the truth, nevertheless about thirty witnesses were sworn and examined. But what ignorance came to light in these witnesses! One of them affirmed upon oath that the Protestants had only eight commandments instead of ten, and that the Gospel to which they confess themselves proceeded from a certain Bishop Calvin. On the fourth day of the proceedings, the 8th of June, the court, after ten hours' deliberation, gave by 3 votes against 2 the decision that Franzesco Madiai was sentenced to 56 months of penal labor in the house of correction at Voltera, and his wife to 45 months in the prison at Lucca; however, their previous imprisonment from the end of August 1851 was to be reckoned off from this. Besides, they were to pay all the costs of the investigation, and after serving their sentence to remain three years longer under police supervision. — With a trembling voice the judge read the judgment; whether he thought of what he would one day say before the judgment seat of God, to answer for having condemned people whose crime consisted in nothing else than that they held God's Word higher than the word of men?

The condemned were then further informed that they were entitled to appeal to the Court of Cassation. They also made use of this, but this court too confirmed the sentence under the 7th of August. Now there remained only the hope that the Grand Duke, to whose mercy the condemned had turned, might take pity on them; but this hope also has hitherto not been fulfilled, the Grand Duke declaring: It was a matter of conscience with him to let justice (?) take its course herein. —

The condemnation of the Madiai family, as may easily be imagined, aroused great sensation as soon as it became known in England, and people took pains to spread the news of it also in the other Protestant countries, in order to awaken sympathy for the lot of the persecuted. According to the English newspaper "Daily News," the King of Prussia is said to have interceded, through his ambassador, Herr von Reumont, in an autograph letter for the release of the Madiais, and to have asked the same as a favor to be shown to him personally. But the Grand Duke is said to have manifested great indignation that the King of Prussia should meddle in this affair, and to have appealed with great warmth to his right to act in his own states at his own discretion. When thereupon the ambassador replied that as ambassador of a power friendly with Tuscany he considered it his duty to warn the Grand Duke, in the interest of his government, of the injurious consequences of his intolerant policy adopted of late, the Grand Duke is said to have answered him no further, but to have turned the conversation to another subject. Meanwhile it was agreed in England to send a deputation of distinguished Protestants from various countries to the Grand Duke, which was to entreat him for the pardon of the Madiais. For this deputation there were chosen: Count von Roden, Peer of England; Count of Cavan, Peer of Ireland; Arthur Kirmaird, Member of Parliament; Count Agenor of Gasparin and Alex. of St. George from France; de Souterande from Holland; Colonel Tronchin from Switzerland; Baron von Holbeck from Prussia. There was talk that a Würtemberger also should join this deputation; but as this could no longer be arranged in the shortness of time which remained until its departure, they contented themselves with giving to Count St. George, who was passing through Stuttgart, a petition to the Grand Duke on the part of the Evangelical Society, under the 13th of Oct.

What reception the deputation has found is not yet known. Let us hope meanwhile that at Florence too a Gamaliel may be found who will testify: "If the work be of God, ye cannot overthrow it; wherefore refrain from these men, lest haply ye be found even to fight against God." —

So far the report in the Christenbote. According to later news the hard-pressed Madiai family has at last obtained the remission of the sentence imposed, as well as permission to emigrate to America. —

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This report furnishes once more a factual proof that Roman Catholic doctrine and practice also in regard to the prohibition of the Bible for laymen is still wholly the same as it has already been for centuries, although lately a Protestant scholar himself, with reference to that history of persecution, but in manifest contradiction with the facts of it, has asserted the contrary.

Since Gregory VII (in the 11th century) several popes issued ordinances which restricted the reading of the Bible to the laity, but later forbade it altogether. They also appealed in this deceitfully to the sayings of the Bible itself. Thus Pope Innocent III (in the 12th century) says: "Rightly was it once prescribed in the law of God that a beast that touched the mountain (Sinai) should be stoned (Ex. 19:13), lest any simple and unlearned person should presume to touch the height of Holy Scripture or to preach it to others; for it is written: Seek not after a higher station. Therefore the apostle says: Let no one think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but think soberly."

Yea, it was even decreed at the Council of Tarragona (in the 13th century) that he should be held a heretic who was in possession of a Bible and did not deliver it within 8 days to the bishop to be burned; and that accordingly, also at the time of the Reformation, not only Bibles but also their possessors were condemned to the fire, is well known.

But the chief proof that it is really forbidden to Roman Catholic laymen to read the Bible in their mother tongue without permission is found in the ordinance from the time of Pope Pius IV, of the year 1564, which is prefixed to the Index of Forbidden Books and in which it reads literally thus: "Since experience proves that, if the reading of Holy Scripture in the mother tongue is permitted everywhere and without distinction, more harm than profit arises from it because of human presumption, let the judgment of the bishop or inquisitor be followed in this case, who, upon the opinion of the parish priest or confessor, may permit the reading of the Bible translated by a Catholic into the mother tongue to those to whom in their judgment this reading will not be injurious but serviceable to the furtherance of faith and piety, which permission is to be given in writing. But whoever presumes to read or to keep the Bible without such permission cannot, until he delivers it to the Ordinary, receive absolution from sins."

Who does not see herein the antichristian abominations of the papacy? For is it not antichristian to make that which Christ has directly commanded in the Bible, namely, to read the Bible, dependent on the permission of a man? Is it not antichristian to allow the clergy to forbid Bible reading to such as are perhaps not wholly of their faith, when Christ Himself commands His avowed enemies, the unbelieving Jews: Search the Scriptures!? Is it not antichristian to refuse absolution to those who herein obey God rather than men and nevertheless read the Bible, and so to put them under the ban? —

In this ordinance all translations of the Bible in the mother tongue are forbidden to the laity which have not the approval of the clerical