All the Humanist party, then the dominant party among the learned men of the day, and among them the best spirits of the nation, were on his side. The stormy and passionate youth, who had hitherto regarded the contest with quiet indifference or contempt, now began tc take an interest in it, and to show that they did so. Ulick von Hutten, their boldest mouthpiece, and politically and nationally Luther's alter ego, openly joined his cause,, Hutten was the most elegant, most polished nmember of the younger school of Humanists, who reverenced Reuchlin and Erasmus as their models.
In July, I, he had reached the highest summit of ambition-he had been crowned by the Emperor as the first German poet. He was an impersonation of the Humanistic spirit; yet a feeling began increasingly to creep over him that there was something unreal in his culture, that he was not true to himself while he spoke and wrote in a foreign tongue, It was entirely in a Humanistic spirit that he said to a monk, on hearing of the doings at Wittenberg, " Devour one another that you may be devoured by yourselves," and then wrote to Hermann von Neuenaar: "My special desire is that our enemies may live as much as possible in discord, and persist in.
Perish all those who hinder the dawning culture, th at the glorious virtues they have so often trodden under foot may at length take root. He wrote to Luther: "I will renounce all my poetic fame, 0 monk, and follow thee like a shield-bearer. Before this Philip Melancthon had, joined Luther, and waS invaluable as a complement to him.
In his case the Humanist preponderated over the theologian Melancthon was of incomparable service in the exposition and translation of the Scriptures, because, with all his immense learning, he put no preconceived theological views into the text. Then he was. The discussion was also a turning-point for Luther in his studies.
It vexed him that he had not been able to say anything against the ecclesiastical laws to which Eck appealed. He now studied the history of the Church, more particularly in recent times. He -mad adcquaintance, during the excitement in which the discussion had. It made a. He still drew a distinction between the Curia and the Ecclesia Romana, which were then really scarcely distinguishable at all.
As he pursued his studies he became more and more opposed to particular dogmas which he had not before specially examined. At Leipzig he had disputed the infallibility of the Pope and the councils; he now disputed the right of the Pope to proclaim laws, to canonise, and to-withhold the cup; he protested against the doctrine of purgatory, and the number of the sacraments, though he had not yet attained to the doctrine of two only.
Luther was continually astonished anew at this unconscious agreement. In o he wrote- to Spalatin: "We are all Hussites without knowing it. Paul and Augustine are IHussites. I am so amazed I know not what to thinks. Although but a few pages, it was the work of an agitator, and -written in Luther's most masterly style.
Its main proposition is that the Romish Curia must be resisted, and the walls which it had built around Germany thrown down, and that it-would especially become the German nobility to take the lead in the conflict. The address produced great excitement; it was useless now to think of silencing the bold monk; but whether it was wise for the Pope to have recourse to the last resort, and excommunicate him, at,the risk of its taking-no effect, was the great question.
Eck, Luther's literary opponent, was guilty of the indiscretion of bringing to Germany the bull which the Pope had reluctantly issued. The Elector Frederic the Wise openly disclaimed obedience to the bull; the university of Wittenberg decidedly took the part of Luther and Carlstadt, which encouraged Luther to venture on the unheard-of step: which he took on the ioth December, He was not the man to go to extremes for the purpose of arousing the passions of the populace; he had no wish to have "Mr.
Omnes, who has no sense," for his master, but he did not shrink from any step which might at a critical moment lay. He resolved to take the monstrous step of publicly burning the papal bull in presence of the professors, the students, and the citizens of Wittenberg.
Luther had shown that, without. Rome had exhausted her weapons; admonition, warning, advice, ban,-not one of them had produced the least effect. The greater the dismay at Rome, the, greater had been the monk's audacity, the more numerous his fol lowers. But one reseource was lef —the temporal- power.
The Election Bond, 3rd July, 5i9o. It was now in the hands of the temporal power of the empire to decide between them. The Church had to look about her for support, and she looked, in the first place, to the arm of the Emperor.
The King of Rome had not only to keep political order, he was, also the guardian of the Church. It was both his right and duty to uphold her authority, to administer her laws, to carry out her decrees. It was therefore not an unusual demand, but, in the existing state of things, quite a natural one.
In the Emperor had carried out the decree of the Church in a similar case. That the imperial power had not interfered before was only caused by the interregnum then existing. From January to June, x, the throne was unoccupied, and after June it was only nominally occupied, for the new Emperor was not yet present in the empire. The position of affairs had not been so advantageous during the latter part of Maximilian's reign as had been hoped at the beginning.
He was but little beloved, and that little because his happy temper and engaging disposition prevented actual disaffection and restrained open ill-will. But a great change was observable. Many things had conduced to it. It was not only that he had injured the domestic interests of this or that dynasty; there were real grounds for discontent.
The Aulic Council, which was to be constituted without him, and to oppose him, had always been repugnant to him he had also only grudgingly tolerated the Imperial Chamber for a time; and both had at length been suffered to fall into disuse. This was all that remained of the great project of reform which was looked for throughout the empire, especially among the upper circles, at the beginning of his reign; and some of the states which had promoted the changes in now reproached him with it.
Another and equally well-founded reproach was that he had made the empire a means of aggrandising his hereAditary power as a Hapsburg; had merely made a tool of it to carry out his purely Austrian plans in Italy and elsewhere. To enforce his claims upon Bohemia and Hungary, thereby to complete the Hapsburg dominions, to become master of Milan in Italy by the aid of the ancient imperial rights, to form the marriage treaty with Spain;-these were the great aims of his policy, and they had nothing whatever to do with the interests of the empire, as they were conceived of by the states and the nation.
His position, therefore, although he knew how to maintain it with skill and prudence, became more and. His relations with the Church were by no means satisfactory in the eyes of the Curia. He knew very well that the empire could not exist unless the Church, in a general sense, ruled Western Europe; but he did not at all approve of the administration of her policy, and by no means submitted unconditionally to the power of the Curia.
The Popes had been so often opposed to him that he did not cherish any good-will towards them; nor did he over. The decree of the Diet of Worms,', by which all independent warfare amongst members of the empire was forbidden, lld the 4 "law of the fist" abolished under pain of ban. It was, indeed, at his instigation that the accusation by the German nation against the Curia had been pqttforth; and, with the approbation of the states, he had proclaimed the edict from Innsbruck Cc against the unspeakable greed of some ecclesiastics, who know no bounds in the acquisition of Church property and benefices.
When the contest at Wittenberg began, he at first looked on with malicious pleasure. He had just then fallen out with Rome on political grounds, and it was a satisfaction to him that she should have the millstone of a monastic controversy hung about her neck. Although he did not anticipate his approaching death, he was anxious to secure to his family the succession to the empire.
His son Philip had met with an early and tragic death, but he had left a son Charles V. If he could succeed, the imperial glory and greatness would be restored in all its mediaeval splendour. The foreign powers, especially France, were against it, and in his isolation in Germany the Emperor had no other ally but Rome to aid him in his projects.
Things were in this position when Cajetan was sent to the Diet at Augsburg. He brought large demands for men and money against the Turks, which the Emperor was willing to grant if the Church would support him. But the scheme entirely miscarried. It was not only that public opinion, led by Ulrich von Hutten, declared loudly against the Papal Legate; the Diet refused his demands, and refused them on the ground that the just grievances of the Germans must first be redressed.
Spiritual princes-brought in petitions against special grievd ances. Thus the Bishop of Liege proved by a long statistical paper that the German benefices became a prey to Roman courtesans. If the spiritual princes spoke in this way, it may be imagined how the Legate's propositions were regarded by the temporal rulers.
Among the circumstances which occasioned this failure, the passiveness of the imperial government respecting the affair of Luther was a principal -one. When the controversy began, the government-was at variance with Rome, and looked on with satisfaction; but when it wished for reconciliation with Rome, and Rome wanted to employ it against Luther, both schemes were frustrated at the Diet. This plan, therefore, did not aid the Emperor in securing the succession for his house.
Shortly after this, in January, 15i9, the Emperor Maximilian died quite suddenly. He was no longer young, but was still so vigorous that his death was quite unexpected. All these circumstances greatly helped forward the Reformation. The imperial power was for months in abeyance, the papal power at least lessened; the regency which now existed did not in any way alter the aspect of affairs. The Count Palatine of the Rhine, with whose house the Emperor had lived in bitter discord, was regent in the south; the Elector Frederic the Wise, in the north and east.
It was plain that no steps would now be taken against Luther. The Elector Palatine was not in the least disposed to burden himself with this troublesome business; the Elector Frederic was the avowed though prudent friend and protector of the monk of Wittenberg. The election of a new emperor was a grave question.
Had the old Elector Frederic, who had vigorously aided the reforms in , and at first maintained a close friendship with the Emperor, had any ambition to be emperor, he would probably have been chosen unanimously. But he was too old, too cool-headed and sober, to put this thorny crown into the scale against his secure position.
After he had declined; there was not one among tile German princes who would have had any chance of being Page 33 FtRANCIS I, 33 elected, nor vws there one among the electors who coveted so burdensome an honour. Outside this circle candidates were not wanting. Two foreigners, Francis I. We often confound the Empire with the Kingdom of Germany, because the latter had for centuries grown up together with the former. But the imperial crown was a universal dignity, and therefore, the actual state of things notwithstanding, it was quite possible that it might one day devolve upon other than a German house.
It was on this ground that France now strove to attain it. France had become a more thoroughly compact and united state than any of its neighbours, and therefore Francis I. He had still various projects on hand. He already enjoyed a European reputation; he had not long before begun his reign with the successful Italian campaign; he had subdued the hitherto unvanquished Swiss at Marignano,' and garrisoned the coveted city of Milan.
These successes had attracted a vast deal of attention; he was looked upon as a great general, though he was in fact, as afterwards appeared, only a brave cavalier, ever ready to risk his own life, but incapable of directing a campaign or even a battle. Charles of Spain had as yet nothing of the kind to show.
He seemed to be indebted for the lustre of his name to his descent from so many great princes. He was not yet even King of Spain. Maximilian's son, the handsome but dissolute Philip, had married Joanna, daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, and Spain and the New World fell to her lot. Joanna seems to have been early subject to melancholy.
She is said to have given her husband a poisoned lovepotion, from jealousy. When Philip soon afterwards died with all the syfiptoms of poisoning, her melancholy passed into madness, from which she never recovered. This Spanish melancholy had momentous results for the house of Hapsburg, for it was transmitted through this ancestress, and has never since disappeared. The earlier Hapsburgs had nothing of it; down to Maximilian they were of an energetic, enterprising temperament, more likely to incur blame for daring rashness than for any tendency to passive melancholy.
Charles was the child of this unhappy marriage. From what was known of his character it was not supposed that he would be likely to vanquish Francis I. Both the fame and the powers of Francis were in their prime; he was a brilliant, if not a weighty personage; he was possessed of showy, thoroughly French talents; he was eloquent; amiable, gallant, a type of the national character, including both its good and bad features.
Francis was overrated, Charles underrated. Charles could not be compared with so brilliant an individual he was a delicate youth of scarcely nineteen, had been reared with difficulty, and had inherited his mother's gloomy, phlegmatic temperament; in spite of his youth, he seemed to have scarcely one youthful trait in his character; he had done nothing for immortality; in his heavy Spanish manners there was not a spark of French savoir-vivre; he had no valiant deeds, and but few gallant adventures to boast of; in short, in every respect he was thrown into the shade by Francis.
This insignificance was partly caused by the melancholy circumstances of his youth, and by the fact that he was always surrounded by powerful men who governed in his stead. He afterwards acquired all that was now wanting to him, and proved himself quite equal to great political projects; indeed, it became evident that he possessed many great political virtues, untiring industry, steady perseverance and patience in a high degree, that he was the man to devote his life to a great enterprise; and the more evident this became, the more did he acquire supremacy over Francis.
But at the time when nothing of all this had been proved, the decision, of course, rested on other grounds. In expenditure and energetic measures to insure election both parties were equal. It cannot be reckoned to a florin how much each spent, but it is certain that neither failed in this respect.
Heavy bags of gold came from France, and we now know that the same came from Austria. The wellknown leaning of Francis towards absolutism was against him. It was known how he treated parliaments in France, how he commanded the levy of illegal taxes under pain of execution: this did not accord with "ancient German liberty.
It was considered, further, that the kingdom and the empire had been united for centuries; that by reason of this union Germany took a foremost place among the nations, which she would no longer hold if the imperial crown were worn by a foreigner.
It was by a true instinct that the nation shrank from the ambitious projects of the French king. By degrees, however, the West German courts were reproached with favouring the French too much, when Frederic the Wise turned the scale; he summed up all the points in Charles's favour, his descent, his ties with the empire, his natural enmity to France, and he openly declared that he should vote for him. The French party vanished, no one knew how. Every one was ashamed to belong to it, and Charles was unanimously elected, although subject to stipulations which showed that the people desired not to let the opportunity slip of obtaining from the new emperor all that had been withheld by the old one.
They made an election contract, or, as it is called in the Northern States, an election bond. Charles was elected on June 28th, 15i9, and on July 3rd the election contract- was settled, which strictly defined the limits of his authority. Hereafter the Emperor was not to employ any-foreign troops in the imperial wars without the consent of the empire; not to convoke any Diet beyond the bounds of the empire; he, was to give the offices of the court and empire to natives of Germany only; no language was to be employed in State transactions but German or Latin; the states of the empire were not to be subject to any jurisdiction beyond the bounds of the empire.
The Emperor was to be the protector of the Church, but was to abolish everything which the Court of Rome had introduced contrary to the concordat with Germany; he was to confirm the sovereign rights of the princes, and to establish an Imperial Chamber. There are three points in this bond which are of special interest. The German empire endeavours to protect its individuality against the foreignerl, tile Spaniard, which afterwards proved to be of great importance.
Then' the Imperial Chamber, formed of the electors, -which Maxi-. Finally, by the clause relating to the ancient concordats between the German empire and the Pope, the empire assumed a position towards him which was quite in accordance with the transactions of the last Diet, but which, in the matter of the existing ecclesiastical controversy, showed more favour to Luther tOan to his opponents. Thus the imperial throne was filled just at the time when Luther was separating himself from the Church.
No one yet knew the intentions or tendencies of the new Emperor; he was like a blank sheet of paper upon which every man inscribed his hopes and wishes. Some expected from him the rescue of the Roman power from pressing danger; others, like Hutten and Luther, the salvation of the nation and the Reformation. Charles took a course of his own, and probably disappointed them all.
A most important accession of power had all at once accrued to the empire. Charles was not an emperor without-territory, and, as so many had been before him, unable from -lack of means to confer dignity on the crown; he brought more to the throne than any emperor had ever done before.
He was the hereditary Prince of Hapsburg, possessed the German-Austrian territories, had established his claims upon Bohemia and Hungary, which formed a territory in the east which even then defined the outlines of thle present Austrian. Besides this, he was heir to Burgundy, which his grandimother brought to the Emperor Maximilian.
It was hard to keep, indeed, but it was a jewel of a possession. No one had ever attained to such power before, and Charleswasdowered with it while yet in his cradle, The mediaval empire once more blazed up in splendour; never before had it had possessions of such magnitude at its disposal; never had a man ruled over it who was so cool and sober a calculator, so little of an enthusiast as. In the last moments before its dissolution, mediaevalism once more put forth all its strength to oppose the spirit of the coming times; yet this colossal power, wielded by such a personage, was not able to turn the world aside from the course it was taking.
Both parties viewed the election of Charles with extravagant hopes. Luther and Hutten, as well as the Curia, indulged in great expectations for their cause, and both parties forgot Charles's standing in relation to the empire. For Charles the imperial throne was only the crowning honour of a position which doubtless received an accession of glory from it, and yet was without it of great importance. His position in the empire, in spite of its splendour, was uncertain; its real significance was dependent on the fluctuations of party feeling among the princes and the people; his crowns, his inherited dominions, were his permanent possessions, without which the imperial crown was but an empty name.
In one scale lay his imperial dignity, in the other his inheritance: should it become necessary to balance them, it could not be but that the latter would outweigh the former. It was in the nature of this empire, composed of various elements, that it must comprise a variety of political sentiments.
It could not be said that these possessions in Italy, Germany, Spain, the Netherlands, in the Mediterranean and beyond the sea, had any natural connection. A government based on any homogeneous national policy was impossible. In Spain Charles was called a German, in Germany a Spaniard, and both were right and both wrong; he was not intimately and nationally connected with any one of his dominions; he could not from policy devote himself to any one: the prescribed construction of the empire forbade it.
The German princes,'therefore, sought to secure themselves against Spanish' influence, and at a later period complained of Spanish tyranny; on the other Land, the Spaniards tried to defend themselves from what they called German influce and tyranny.
That kindly relation of pesonal good. It existed, to a certain extent, between him and the Netherlands. The circumstance of his having been born at Ghent seems, to have inspired him with some affection for it, but he was a foreigner in Spain, and in Germany he understood neither the language nor the spirit of the nation.
All this was'the result of circumstances which Charles could not alter. The fulfilment ofi Huttern's hopes, especially that he would inaugurate his acceptance of the imperial crown by restoring the kingdom of Germany, that at the head of the nation he would'institute reform, and thus win back for Germany her lost political, national, and ecclesiastical rank, was rendered impossible by the conditions of his power.
It was this that occasioned Napoleon I. Napoleon would'have done it, but Charles V. He had no taste for such hazardous games which lead either to immortality or to sudden destruction. His strength lay in patient perseverance, in the energy with which he sought gradually to disentangle perplexing circumstances; but he had nothing of the adventurous spirit which stakes everything on one.
This was the case with Charles V. He regarded the imperial crown as an important lever of his power; and, in the true mediaval spirit, he considered it to be closely connected with the unity of the Church, which he must under all circumstances uphold, however she might be constituted in other respects. From this stand-point he might easily come into collision with both the Pope and the Protestants.
He disgusted the latter when he let them feel his power as Mediaval Emperor for rebelling against the unity of the Church; he would quarrel with Rome whenever her secular interests interfered with his political schemes. In spite of his pronounced Roman Catholic views, he was by no means unconditionally submissive to the policy of the Church. In the course of the last decades Rome had more than ever become a temporal power; Julius II. Rome now paid dearly for having been actuated in her policy solely by worldly motives, like any other state of Italy; for, lamentable as this might be, it was the fact.
It might easily happen that Charles V. Indeed, such a case had just occurred, for Rome had exerted herself against Charles's. They had seen through this at the court of Madrid, and were at no loss for a counter-stroke. On May 12th, I, Manuel, the Emperor's commissioner, wrote to him:.
He had had no real youth, and was wanting in the elasticity and spirits which are characteristic of that period of life. In his circle religious matters were regarded' with great indifference. People permitted themselves to say very bad things about the Church and the Papacy, while they earnestly desired that the people should retain their very useful superstitions, but did not imagine it possible that men's minds could ever be deeply. It was in this that the fundamental error of Charles's policy lay with regard to the great question of the age.
He made his calculations in a wonderful manner; in the long labour of a lifetime he cast up everything figure by figure; but one thing he could not discover, the logarithm for the religious commotions of his time. He could not comprehend them; he thought a monk might be set up like a puppet, and then be suffered to fall down again; he once even imagined that the matter could be settled with a few thousand dollars.
This narrowness of view, combined with his otherwise magnificent diplomatic virtuosoship, is exceedingly remarkable, and it occasioned his fall. It was this that occasioned the greatest power which the world had seen to suffer shipwreck in the tumults of the age stirred up by a single monk. It was with the feeling of his powerlessness against this unknown something that Charles abdicated and went into a monastery. A man may be an eminent personage and have powerful means at his disposal, but if he does not comprehend- the ideas of his time, if he does not with his whole soul take one side or the other, he will be an alien in a world where a man must be either hammer or anvil, and he will not escape the fate of Charles V.
The character and policy of Charles V. A multitude of contradictory ideas and qualities were jumbled together in his-mind. His position as Prince of Burgundy, hereditary Prince of Hapsburg, as King of Spain, and Emperor of Germany, gave him a number of complicated problems tc, solve, and they were decided in favour of one interest'or another, according to the number of the factors.
IHe was never influenced by any but external motiv. Tone of those who approached him with great hopes appreciated the necessities imposed upon him; but for us this complication of circumstances had tragic results. An emperor had appeared once more with a dazzling position in Europe, but his heart was a stranger to the thoughts that were agitating Germany; he did not even understand the language of the nation whose patriots were looking to him for the prosperity of their country; and thus the empire again became the sport of European complications, the fate of the nation was again'enchained to aims and enterpri es which h l nothing to do with her future, Page 42 CHAPTER IV.
The Diet of Worms, Spring of I. Power in France under Francis I. The young Emperor now came to Germany for the. This latter task was peculiarly difficult. On the one hand, the unity of the Catholic Church must be maintained, yet the abusep within her, of which even his own confessor Glapion thought seriously, must be remedied.
On the other hand, the clamorous demands of the Germans must be satisfied. They had been asking for reform for centuries, and it could scarcely be any longer denied; yet it must be so carried out that, if possible, the whole nation should share in the benefit of it: in short, Charles was to carry out reform in such a manner that neither the unity of the Church nor that of the nation should suffer.
Everything else that devolved upon him at the Diet was thrown cormn-. A war with France was threatened, about the old question of claims to Northern Italy: in such a war it would be of the greatest moment for the Emperor to have the Pope, the most distinguished ruler of Italy, on his side. The Church party saw plainly that nothing could be accomplished in Germany without the Emperor, and so they met each other half-way.
It was a case, at this first momentous crisis, in which the domestic interests of the Hapsburg-Spanish house were allowed to triumph over the most sacred interests of the nation. It was a course which bitterly revenged itself on Charles. What would he not have given, nine years later, could he but have bought this moment back! Both parties were then looking to him; both were ready to abide by his decision, if it were practicable and reasonable.
Had he taken the right course, he would have had far more power at his disposal than he could ever acquire by the most dexterous intrigues with Rome. The evil consequences of the error of I cannot be over-estimated. Charles had in the main arrived at a decision before the Diet assembled. The Diet, therefore, was a court whose sentence was ready before the parties had been heard; the Emperor had made up his mind that, to please the Pope, he must put:an end to heresy.
Charles did not perceive that this was impossible, even at the cost of a civil war, for his thoughts were beyond the Alps; he had turned his back upon the German business before he had publicly taken it in hand. From the immense popular interest excited by the citation of the Wittenberg monk, it was plain that the nation cared for nothing somuch as for thlis question.
Luther felt this, and determined -to go to Worms before he knew whether safe-conduct would be granted him or not.. I-e set aside every suggestion of recantation, and was ready joyfully to give his life for his convictions. He wrote to Spalatin, who was negotiating with him on behalf of the Emperor and the Elector:-" If it should ever be that.
I hereby give you my advice and opinion: you may expect everything from me, 6nly not that I shall -flee or recant; T shall not flee, far less recant, so surely as imy Lord Jesus strengthens me, for I can do neither the one nor the other without danger to godliness and the salvation of many. For I have no intention of fleeing, -nor of leaving the Word in danger, but I mean to confess it Aunto death so far as Christ's grace sustains me!
But I am certain that the bloodhounds will not est till they have put nme to death. The juxtaposition of affairs ias this: on the one hand, political calculation, which thought it had taken ever3hing into account, and yet failed; on the other, manly faithfulness to conviction, which did not weigh or calculate, but acted with the feeling that the future depended upon ito The Edict of Worms was torn in pieces a few days after it was issued; the simple man in a cowl, who went to Worms with the feeling thati he would rather die than flee belonged henceforth to-the world's history.
Page 45 e out s couc wth e p ut all itsO 4 The court was conducteed with great pomp, but'all its solemn appas'atus w7as an empty pageant; fobr, however the accused might defend himself, the sentence had been atieady arranged with Rome. On the first days the x 7th of April, ihe style of his defence was embarrassed. The sight - of- this great assemblage of dignitaries of the empire and Church abashed.
He spoke low' often scarcely intelligibly; and it was not till near the close of the second hearing that he regained facility of utterance and the full power of his voice. There was something rustic and unaffected in his mode of speaking; he had nothing of the diplomatic polish which the strangers among the audience might have expected, but his bearing was thorouglly firm and unyielding.
He maintained that nothing but the plain words of Holy Scripture, no-threat nor power should induce him to recant, and exclaimed, "Here I stand; I can do no otherwise; God help rnel Amen. By their advice he took his departure immediately after the hearing at Worms; they did not think it safe- for him to linger the Elector Frederic even thought- it needful to place him in safety by a nocturnal surprise, and to withdraw him for a time from the eyes of the world.
The rest of the Diet was occupied with transactions -of a different kind, and it did not appear as if any- steps would be taken about the heresy, When, on the 25th of May,. This artifice of the Papal Nuncio, Alexander, showed that his party were not sure of their ground, and were obliged to smuggle in a sentence which a fortnight before they could not have hoped to carry.
The decree thus obtained was signed by the Emperor on the 26th of Mayy and pronounced upon Luther, his friends, followers, and patrons, a sentence of ban and double ban, and condemned his WMorks to be burned. The sentence enumerates all Luther's heresies, and then says:" Thus this individual, not a man, but one like the evil one in human form, under a monk's cowl, has gathered together in one stinking mass a number of heretics who have been long concealed, and hold most damnable heresies; and he has even devised some fresh ones under pretence of preaching faith, which he has so assiduously made every one believe, in order that, he may destroy the real true faith, and under the name and guise of evangelical doctrine, put an end to all evangelical peace, and love, and all good order.
In conclusion, measures were taken against the printing and printers of his works. Thus, after a blow had been stru'ck at heresy by the ecclesiastical ban, it was sentenced to death by the secular ban of the empire. The Lutheran heresy was to be exterminated by all the weapons of the temporal power, so it was stated in the edict of the 26th of May.
But the edict shared the fate of the papal bull. Nobody heeded it. Two years later the Diet came to a precisely contrary resolu. The opportunity of x52 did not occur again. It was a misfortune for the Emperor, but it was also a misfortune for our nation; it suffers from it to this day.
The struggle in Northern Italy now began which occupied the Emperor for almost a generation, and completed the estrangement between him and the Germans. These tedious complications were a great help to the Reformation; but.
France was even then beginning to acquire that power and unity as a state which were so fatal to Germany and Europe in the seventeenth century. We linger for a time over the growth of the French power, in order that we may understand the causes of subsequent developments. Both countries had originally belonged to the Carlovingian empire, but both had separated from it at an early period.
The character of the nations differed too -widely. While the tendency of public life in Germany during the'course of centuries has increasingly been towards the manifold forms of individuality, and the old Germanic spirit of liberty has asserted itself, in France we may observe the tendency of the Romanic nations to submit with more facility to great organizations. The consequences of our want of political unity are' too often taken for the causes. That spirit of individuality which is inimical to the State was no less strongly developed among the great men of France in the Middle Ages than among the Germans, and I see no difference between the loyalty of the French citizen class and the loyalty of the German cities to the' Emperor which is at all to the disadvantage of the latter.
But in France the highest powers in the State knew better who were their natural allies than they did in Germany. There was a centralizing tendency in the tastes of the people earlier than there was in Germany. There were, indeed, greater and lesser vassals, even independent princes, in comparison with whom the impotence of the sovereign was painfully obvious, but th'e national characteristics were different from ours, and prevented the divisions of territories and families from destroying unity, as has been the case with us.
After the end of the tenth century came that manly though not highly gifted race of the Capets, who, favoured by fortune, went quietly to work, step by step, to found the monarchy. Germany was also distinguished from France by this, that in the former the principle of election was in favour, which is incompatible with a solid government, while in France a hereditary monarchy was'early established without difficulty. France thus had a people disposed for, and for centuries trained to, monarchical unity, and a hereditary dynasty which therefore had not always, like the German kings, to make a fresh start; then they had long reigns, from forty to fifty years, which were admirably adapted to accustom the people to transitions to new orders of things; and France was much more favourably situated geographically.
It was open on the eastern side; none of the country to the east, from the Rhone to Flanders and Artois, belonged to France till a much later period; but the rest was admirably fitted by nature for one united state, bounded as it was by the Pyrenees on the south, and by the sea on the two other sides, But Germany, which might have had, although she never had, a southern boundary in the Alps, really had a good boundary on the north side only, in the North Sea and the Baltic; on the east and west she always had to guard an.
The Germany of to-day was only conquered late in the Middle Ages, and the Elbe, which now flows through its centre, was then its boundary. Then the position of France, though not a brilliant one, involved no European complications.
C 4 ith and rendered tincertain by the slow processes of the internal. Germany had -to thank her perptu wars with Italy for this -state of things, in which, for whole' generations, the best blood of Germnasy had been shed for no good purpose; and, finally, there was the great conflict with. Eperor'While in the eleventh century Germany was subject to fearful convulsionsr France was pursuing the even tenor of her way, and, unmolested by any foreign or especially Romarr indluence she was in a far blette position for setting her house in order.
The first of te Capets was, like the rest, g. Once only was a pincipality. Charles he Bold, entirely borgot that they were vassals of France, which served, to teach the kings not to depart from their ancient policyo Thus the period of the Crusades found France in'a more settled state than any other country of the Con.
The romantic and adventurous character of it. Ti hus as'early as in the thirteenth century, while the kingdom of Germany,'in perpetual coiflict with the Principalities and the Church, was making. Louis, who as a tavalier and good son of the Church was a genuine Frenchman, was diligently and successfully employed in founding a monarchy which should outlive the storms of time.
Then came the severe test of the long war with England, in which two aristocracies' tore each other to pieces for nothing.. England repeatedly had her kings proclaimed at Paris, and no decisive result took place until the French people were roused and asserted their independence with the sword.
This took place under Charles VII. He was- one of those far-sighted, cautious, agreeable people who accomplish a great deal by patience. After a foreign war which had lasted a century, and had developed into a civil war, a royal dictatorship was most necessary; it gave the State peace, legal protection, power, and unity; and Charles VII.
He did not disgrace his victory over the city of Paris by any acts of revenge: for the first time during this long struggle the supremacy of one resulted in reconciliation to the rest, instead of fresh subjection. The Pragmatic Sanction, which was solemnly confirmed by the French clergy at Bourges in x, secured the national Church of France against illegal gifts of benefices and. At a meeting of the States at Orleans, in , the lawless paid troops of the nobles were disbanded, and the right of maintaining a paid army,.
And all this was amicably accomplished by one man with the aid of the country itself. What Charles VII. Louis IXI. I4I —83 had again t6 defend what his family had laboured so hard to acquire from a revolt of all the great vassals, under the greatest of them, Charles the Bold of Burgundy, in x After suffering defeat at first, Louis triumphed finally over the dynasty: with the help of the Swiss he utterly vanquished Charles and his proud domain.
This at once brought Picardy and Burgundy under his sway, and no one ventured to oppose when he, added Guienne and Provence to the crown. He was utterly unscrupulous as to the means he employed in his struggle with the great nobles; but the citizens and peasantry sided with him, for he confirmed their ancient provincial rights and conferred new privileges on the cities. In one place he was ready to convoke the States; in another he allowed the citizens to meet and choose their own officials; and to the peaceable inhabitants of town and country he gave the benefits of an impartial administration of justice by the parliamentary judges, who could not be dismissed.
In spite of his execrable private character and his utter want of moral greatness, France justly considers him one of the most meritorious founders of her unity as a state. Thus, at the close of the fifteenth century, a powerful monarchy existed in France, not as yet unlimited, but moderated by law and usage: still it was a royal dictatorship of extraordinary power.
Francis I. He had at once distinguished himself on his accession to power by asserting the claims of his predecessors in Italy, gained the victory at Marignano September, 5I15 in a rapid campaign, and took Milan, by which he acquired a more brilliant reputation than he was able to maintain. In his internal policy, all the principles which afterwards actuated the kings and statesmen of France may already. The Church. But Rome did not easily submit to this: having defrauded Germany of her promised liberties, the hope was not given up'of reinstating the- old state of things in France.
It was conceded to Rome that the Gallican Church should give up a portion of her liberties, and the King assumed the right of nomination at the expense of the elective right of the clergy-a privilege which gave him enormous resources for providing for followers, granting favours, and making the Church an institution entrely devoted to himself. Whether this -vas an advantage to the Church we shall see by-and-by. A second innovation was the plan of selling legal and administra tive offices.
Each of the ancient crown lands had a parliament, or superior court, and during the second half of the fifteenth century, in x and x5oIx parliaments were. By introducing the custom of selling places in these parliaments, Francis I. Besides the sale of the judicial places, there was the sale of offices of every sort, the number of which was finmensely increased, to the great advantage of the royal coffers.
The annual income from this source is estimated at four hundred thousand francs. But these novel practices gave rise to opposition, and the parliaments protested. This showved what the royal authority could venture to do even then. Francis told the malcontents that he gave them twenty-four hours to consider, and if they would not then' submit he would have them imprisoned; and so little independent spirit was there, that they actually submitted.
As may be supposed, the relation of Francis to the religious questions of the day was a perfectly simple one: his sentiments on these subjects were as frivolous as those of all thel dignitaries of both Church and State at that period, and his life and morals were a pasquinade upon all religion. He regarded the subject in a purely political light, and said to himsef, " Protestantism, in the shape it takes in France, makes a division in the nation; it destroys the' unity of the monarchy. C lvinism, indeed, has-a strong democratic element in it; it is based upon the principle of self-government and individual independence;, it is therefore' an enemy to be resisted to the utmost.
But this did not prevent Francis from being a warm friend and ally of Protestantism in Germany, though he burnt and persecuted its adherents in France; the policy which suffered no'schism at home found it very judicious to foment it with all its might abroad. Indeed Francis IL was so free from any mediaeval prejudices. On onie point, in spite of its national and dogmatic schisms,.
In face of. When the Turks approached and threatened Vienna, there was a general call to arms, which was eagerly obeyed both by Catholics and Protestants. But for Francis I. The Turkish difficulty wasa millstone which might be hung round the neck of the Hapsburger to insure peace and quiet in the West. The King did indeed bear- the title of Rex Christianissimus, but on this point he had no conscience. The French, who now first broke with the-Middle Ages, have always kept to this policy of setting the Osman upon Germany, that they themselves might grasp at the Rhine.
All the features of. The monarchy, absolute and strictly centralized, is bent upon foreign conquest. The attempt'of Francis 1. He had no delusions. Still the name and glory of it- excited his ambition. It never occurred to him to wish to rule in Germany as he did in France; he did not covet any more intimate connection with the chaotic elements of the German constitution; but it would have been quite enough for him, and would have justified his being a candidate, from the French point of view, to have exercised a little authority as Protector of the Confedera.
This would have made Francis I. Two such powers could not have existed side by side, even had they been less directly brought into contact. France was always striving to obtain a natural boundary on the east and north-east as well as on the south, but Charles V. This alone rendered it certain that a collision would sooner or later take place. The outbreak occurred in Northern Italy. The houses of Valois and Hapsburg made equal claims upon the ancient imperial territories of Milan and Genoa, and this was their first battle-field.
Thus arose the great war of I52I, which neither answered the King's expectations nor added to his fame. The contest began at the end of in Navarra. This campaign is only interesting from the fact that it was at the defence of Pampeluna against the French that Ignatius Loyola received the wound which led to his renouncing this world's chivalry and devoting himself to spiritual warfare.
At first, in x52I and , fortune favoured Charles V. In spite of the faithlessness of the Confederation, which at first placed all its infantry at the disposal of the Emperor and the Pope, and then suffered them to be diverted by French money, the allied armies were everywhere successful.
On the 27th April, , the Swabian vassals, under the imperial Captain George Frundsberg, supported by Spanish and Italian auxiliaries, defeated the Swiss and French troops at Bicocca, and the whole of Milan again came into the hands of Francescb Sforza, who acknowledged the Emperor as feudal sovereign. As the Swiss returned home and the French gave up the campaign for lost, Genoa Page 56 could no longer be heb d l and thus i a few months the Emperor became master of the wo Woe of Northern Italy.
Meanwhile the pos ion of'European affairs had become extremely favourabde fr Charles V. Francis stood quite alone, and was threatened v-h interinal divisions England' sided'with. Leo X. He was a strict and simple monk, brought aonastic discipline, in its best sense, to the Holy See, and in this spirit he was ready to promote, a reform in the Chureh Dogmatically he maintained the old' doctrines of the Church; but upon the necessity for.
The short reign of this pope is especially instructive as bearing -on the question how far it was possible to carry out reform in amd with Rome. In politics the Pope was entirely submissive to his pupil. Francs IL could not hope for any advancement of his cause from this quarter any more than from his arms.
A catastrophe then happened in France itself, which appeared to promise unexampled success to the Emperor. The systemr Qf. In the thirteenth centmary St. Louis had married one of his sons to wealthy heiress, w'ho brought to her husband the territory of Bourbon.
The last of the Bourbons, Duke P. By this marriage he received no less than two pinprcippalities, two duchies, four earldoms, two viscounties, seven consider; able territories, and an almost regal income. It then appeared extremely improbable that of all Francis's sons only Henry II. The character of Charles of Bourbon was entirely different from that of Francis I. Bette' acquainted with serious business, less devoted to the frivolous arts and pleasures of the court, not only a'brave soldier but an experienced general, not a rash Hotspur upon the battle-field like the King, possessing cool, calculating, far-sighted ambition, he was a man whose personal qualities made him greatly his superior.
Favoured at first by the King, he was afterwards neglected, and after the death of his childless wife Susanna they were at open enmity. The Queen-mother, as niece of Duke Peter, wanted to deprive him of his possessions. There were great expectations from such revolts, which, when the system of vassalage was still in its vigour and was supported by a sentiment of historical clanship, were. At first the affair had a formidable aspect, for it appeared as if a long train of retainers would follow the most powerful noble in the kingdom.
Bourbon had promlised ten thousand infantry if the allies would attack the country in ithree places simultaneously. But, in truth, all that resulted from it was that the Emperor acquired in Charles a brave general, who was condemned as a ruler in France from the moment when he called in the aid of foreign arms.
The kingdom gained more than it lost by this circumstance. The whole enterprise which was built upon the revolt failed. Spanish, and Italian troops, into Provence, it was only with difficulty that town after town was taken, and while the assailants were losing precious time over the fruitless siege of Marseilles, France was making immense sacrifices for the very princes against whom the revolt had been made. Thus the failure of this campaign and the awakening of a national instinct in France changed the military spect of affairs in favour of King Francis.
In spite of his victories, the Emperor was not in a position to carry on the war long without a decisive result. He fully experienced the curse of hireling troops. The Swiss, who were dependent on the policy of their cantons, were twice' recalled, desertion affected the rest on a large scale, and nothing availed to prevent it.
The German vassals alone remained true to him, and these were commanded by brave and trusty generals, who did not fail the Emperor even when he was short of money. Under the impression of the recent turn of affairs, Francis I. With these means he had assembled a new and brilliant array, and in the winter of I it had crossed the Alps and advanced into the plains of Lombardy. Francis drove the imperial troops before him, and everything appeared to be in his favour when, on the 24th of February, I, the imperialists resolved to give battle at Pavia, for their only chance'Was starvation or a decisive encounter.
They relied upon the superior generalship of Pescara and Frundsberg, the tough resistance of the German troops, and the fearful effect of their hooked arquebuses; and they were right. The mail-clad French knighthood fought valiantly, Francis at their head, always in the thickest of the fight, and forgetting the part of commander in that of a cavalier. For an hour and a half the combat continued; first the German vassals, from Guelders a:nd Lorraine, in the right wing of the French, were cut down by their imperial countrymen; then the centre, composed of the knights in coats of mail and the Swiss, was broken, and the army thereby almost annihilated; the King himself was taken prisoner, Peace was now inevitable, and Charles V.
He is said to have received the news of the brilliant victory of Pavia with indescribable emotion; the revulsion of feeling affected him deeply. Thus the result of Charles's campaign was entirely different from what the world expected. At the beginning of the contest there was a general opinion that Francis would be the victor. The abilities of the chivalrous King as a commander were greatly overrated, and the means and talents of the youthful Emperor undervalued.
The French had not one victorious day during the whole campaign, and the victor of Marignano was a prisoner in Charles's camp. The five years of war were very decisive for the position of Charles: they, to a certain extent, gave him a place in the world's opinion. It had before been said that he was nothing but the heir of his forefathers; that opinion was now changed. He had certainly had more good fortune than he had shown personal prowess; but in the arrangement of the whole, and in the selection of those under!
He was no longer the insignificant Burgundian prince to whom birth and destiny had assigned an unmerited importance; he now really assumed the dignity of a world-wide empire with which he had previously only seemed to be invested by a strange caprice of fortune. This campaign made a pause, during which the Reformation movement went on in peace, unmolested by any edict of the Church or exercise of imperial power.
V,'he Situation of Germany during the absence of Charles V. In taking this precautionary measure, which Luther does not seem at first to have understood, the Elector was providing against the possibility of things coming to the worst. In the mood in which Germany then was, Luther had in reality little to fear; no one had any inclination to employ the temporal power to enforce the Edict of Worms.
If Luther could not set foot in the enemy's country, he could remain at home without danger. Nevertheless, it was prudent that he should be withdrawn for a time from the eye-s of the world. The idea of a translation into the vernacular was not a new one. A considerable number of' German translations of the Bible might be mentioned; they have all become bibliographical curiosities, and nothing is known of their influence upon the nation.
The Lutheran translation has some special merits. Not that it is free from defects; not that critics, theological and philosophical, have not pointed out a multitude of errors in it —it would be sad if no progress had been made beyond the point reached by Luther and his learned friends by the researches of three hundred years-and yet we have had no translation for three hundzed years which can even dispute the palm with this one.
This is the result of its masterly language. There are iome translations which are as much masterpieces as the originals; a certain congeniality of mind and soul is necessary to reproduce the true tone and spirit of the original. Such is Luther's translation of the Bible. In order faithfully to reproduce the patriarchal simplicity, the homely and childlike character of the Old and New Testaments, to imitate the poetic strains of the prophets and the Psalms, and again the popular straightforwardness of the Gospels, requires a vein of congeniality-the spiritual affinity of a mind which has preserved the simple and honest originality of an unsophisticated people.
This cannot be acquired by all the learning in the world, though it may easily be unlearned in the world and among books. It was precisely these qualifications which Luther possessed. A genuine son of his own people, gifted with all the wealth and depth of the German mind, he could enter into that age of simple national faith; he made its spirit and language his own, and thus acquired the power of translating into German the religious-poetic and poetic-religious mode of expression.
This is nowhere more striking than in the Psalms. Herder's translation is much more poetical, but he sacrificed theology to poetry. Luther had a perfect conception of this part of his task. Few of his readers know by what hard work the task was accomplished. We still have some of his translation in MS. He often struck out a passage as many as fifteen times, until he had found the right expression; and this when he was wrestling with his own tongue.
Then he was convinced that, as a monk and a bookworm, he was unacquainted with many things with which the ancient world was familiar; that he was ignorant of many of the clues which he wanted, and which could not be found in books. He once wrote to Spalatin to ask for the names and descriptions of the precious stones in Revelation'xxi. At another time, that he might be able to describe the slaughter of beasts for sacrifice, he had "some sheep killed for him " by a butcher, that he might learn " what every part of a sheep was called.
He was assisted by a whole consistory of learned men, who, as Mathesius relates, "just like a private Sanhedrim, met for several hours before supper every week in the doctor's monastery. Johann Bugenhagen, Dr. Justus Jonas, Dr. Luther once wrote, when among this circle, "We are working very hard to bring out the Prophets in the mother tongue. Good God! He was right when he once wrote, "I have not yet read any book or letter in which the German language is rightly used.
Nobody takes the pains to write German correctly. Up to this time Germany had a high and a low German dialect. Like the Thuringian race from which he sprang, Luther occupied the boundary-line between the two idioms; the language that he used was neither high nor low German, but a union of the two, forming a common third-the high German as a written language. In his controversial writings L-uther had already written German in so masterly a style that it excited Hutten's lively admiration. Luther taught them that German prose might be written which was not put to shame by the languages of antiquity.
This new intellectual possession secured unity for us on one point at least, at a time when our religious and political unity came to an end, and we have preserved it through the most unhappy period of our history. In the process, they mobilize solidarity as a community-wide immune response to pandemic disease, destitution, and despair.
Two years after completing treatment for tuberculosis at another hospital, he was too weak to travel to the hospital on his own. But as PIH built up a network of community health workers in the district, treatment came to him. Tests confirmed that Louis was suffering from multidrug-resistant tuberculosis MDR-TB , a diagnosis that used to be a death sentence for people living in poor countries. Louis was so sick that he had to be hospitalized for a full year before he was strong enough to go home and healthy enough not to risk infecting his family.
But he still faced another year taking daily doses of potent and debilitating medications. He selected one of the local community health workers, Lea Kawesa, to be his accompagnateur. Then, at sharp, I would give him his medicine. But Lea still visits regularly. And I check the health and nutrition of his neighbors.
They trained us to make a garden so we can grow vegetables and other things. We produce enough to feed ourselves and to earn some money by selling passion fruit. It helps her look and feel younger. And that was before hurricane floodwaters destroyed her home and most of her few belongings. The flood left Rosita homeless, frustrated, and worried.
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