The new community was now organized; and Matthisson ere long exercised over it supreme authority. Prophets who gave themselves out for inspired did not wait for the millennial kingdom, or for the resurrection of the dead, or for the advent of the Saviour. They were quite equal, they thought, to their task. They despised knowledge. They prohibited all intercourse with the _pagans_, that is to say, the evangelicals. Those who received the new baptism indispensable for admission into their imaginary kingdom, and they alone, were saints. Marriages previously solemnized were annulled; laws were abolished on the ground that they were opposed to liberty. All distinctions of rank were suppressed; community of goods was established; and all the property of those who were banished was thrown into a common fund. At the same time, seeing that their first duty was to break with a corrupt world, that irreconcilable enemy of the saints, orders were given to destroy all those evil things of which the men of the world made use. Images, organs, painted windows, clocks, seats adorned with sculptures, musical instruments, and other things of a similar kind, were removed into the market-place, and there solemnly broken to pieces. The masterpieces of the painters of the Westphalian school were not spared. Books and manuscripts, even the rarest, were some of them burnt and others thrown upon dunghills.[516] This was all done, they declared, by divine inspiration. People were at the same time ordered to deliver up all gold, silver, jewels, ornaments, and other precious things. Property was superseded by communism; and any one who failed to bring these superfluities to the public office was put to death. The leading fanatics divided among themselves the fine houses of the canons, the patricians, and the senators, and settled in them in plenty and comfort. A large number of adventurers in quest of fortune, and of fanatics who coveted the good things of the world more than they acknowledged, arrived at Munster from Holland and the neighboring countries. They looked upon it as a fine opportunity, and were eager to have a share of the spoil, and ready enough to lay hands on a large portion of it. To each handicraft some special duty was assigned. The tailors for example, were charged to see that no new form of dress was introduced into the community. These people made it a matter of as much moment to avoid the fashion as other people did to follow it.