LOISTS, lo'ists: A pantheistic sect of the sixteenth century. The first mention of the sect of the Loists occurs in a letter of Luther's dated Mar. 21, 1525, in which he writes that some " new prophets " from Antwerp had appeared in Wittenberg, and that they put the mind and reason of man on terms of equality with the Holy Ghost. A disputation took place, in Luther's presence, between Melanchthon and the leader of this sect, a slater named Eligius (Loy) Pruystinck; and shortly afterward Luther directed a warning to his own adherents at Antwerp against dangerous "blustering and noisy spirits." Pruystinek was subjected to an examination by the Inquisition at Antwerp (Jan., 1526); he recanted, and was cleared with the sentence of public ecclesiastical penance. Nevertheless his doctrines in the following decades spread not only in Antwerp but also in the district about Cologne, in Brabant, and in Flanders. But an additional investigation ensued in the summer of 1544, ending in the execution of Pruystinck and of six of his followers and completely disbanding their sect. The Loists religious attitude may be defined as a corollary of practical pantheism. Man's intellectual nature is a spiritual substance; in other words, every one possesses the Holy Ghost. Since man's flesh and spirit are thoroughly independent, and with no influence upon each other, the spirit of man incurs no responsibility for the weakness of the flesh; hence the spirit, as such, is sinless. The final goal of man is to vanish into the divine being. The Loists based their doctrines upon forced exegesis of the Bible. There appears to have been no relation .between the Loists and any sects antedating the Reformation, and they seem to have been wholly independent of the Baptists. (They certainly had much in common with the Beghards (q.v.) and the Brethren of the Free Spirit (see Free Spirit, Brethren of the). A. H. N.]

It is fair to suppose that the pantheistic doctrines of the "Libertines," which from 1545 onward were combated notably by Calvin, in the Romance countries took their point of departure from the sect of the Lolsts disbanded at that very time. [David Joris was probably a disciple of Pruystinck, and the latter may have influenced Henry Nicolas, founder of the Family of Love (see Familists; and Antinomians), and through him several of the more recent varieties of Antinomians. A. H. N.]

Herman Haupt.

Bibliography: A valuable collection of sources and history of the sect is given in J. Frederichs, De secte der Loisten of Antwerpsche libertijnen (1525-45), Ghent, 1891; idem, Un lutherien francais devenu libertin spirituel, in Bulletin historique et litteraire de la societe de l'histoire du protestantisme francais, xli (1892), 250-269; idem, La Moralite des libertins spirituels, ib., pp. 502-504; A. Jundt, Hist. du pantheisme populaire au moyen age, pp. 122 sqq., Paris, 1875.