marchings and counter-marchings, his sieges and battles and victories,
until the power of Austria was humbled and northern Germany was
delivered. The history of all war is the same. There is no variety
except to the eye of a military man. Military history is a dreary record
of dangers, sufferings, mistakes, and crimes; occasionally it is
relieved by brilliant feats of courage and genius, which create
enthusiastic admiration, but generally it is monotonous. It has but
little interest except to contemporaries. Who now reads the details of
our last great war? Who has not almost forgotten the names of its
ordinary generals? How sickening the description of the Crusades! The
mind cannot dwell on the conflagrations, the massacres, the starvations,
the desolations, of an invaded country. Few even read a description of
the famous battles of the world, which decided the fate of nations. When
battles and marches are actually taking place, and all is uncertainty,
then there is a vivid curiosity to learn immediate results; but when
wars are ended, we forget the intense excitements which we may have felt
when they were taking place. We gaze with eager interest on a game of
football, but when it is ended we care but little for the victors. It is
only when the remote consequences of great wars are traced by
philosophical historians, revealing the ways of Providence, retribution,
and eternal justice, that interest is enkindled. No book to me is more
dreary and uninteresting than the campaigns of Frederic II., though
painted by the hand of one of the greatest masters of modern times. Even
interest in the details of the battles of Napoleon is absorbed in the
interest we feel in the man,--how he was driven hither and thither by
the Providence he ignored, and made to point a moral to an immortal
tale. All we care about the histories of wars is the general results,
and the principles to be deduced as they bear on the cause of
civilization.
It was fortunate for the fame and the cause of Gustavus that at the very
outset of his career, when he landed in Pomerania, with his small army
of twenty thousand men, the Emperor had been prevailed upon by a
pressure he could not resist, and the intrigues of all the German
princes, to dispense with the services of Wallenstein. Spain, France,
Bavaria,--the whole Electoral College, Catholic as well as
Protestant,--clamored for the discharge of the most unscrupulous general
of modern times. He was detested and feared by everybody. Humanity shed
tears over his exactions and cruelties, while general fears were aroused
that his influence was dangerous to the public peace. Most people
supposed that the war was virtually ended, and that he was therefore no
longer needed.
Loath was Ferdinand to part with the man to whom he was indebted for the
establishment of his throne; and it seems he was also personally
attached to him. Long did he resist expostulations and threats. He felt
as poor Ganganelli felt when called upon by the Bourbon courts of Europe
to annul the charter of the Jesuits. Wallenstein would probably have
been retained by Ferdinand, had this been possible; but the Emperor was
forced to yield to overwhelming importunities. So the dismissal of the
general was decreed at the diet of Worms, and a messenger of the Emperor
delivered to the haughty victor the decree of his sovereign.
Wallenstein was then at the head of one hundred thousand men. Would he
obey the order? Would he retire to private life? Ambitious and
unscrupulous as he was, he knew that no one, however powerful, could
resist an authority universally conceded to be supreme and legitimate.
It was like the recall of a proconsul by the Roman Emperor and Senate:
he could resist for a time, but resistance meant ultimate ruin. He also
knew that he would be recalled, for he was necessary to the Emperor. He
anticipated the successes of Gustavus. He was not prepared to be a
traitor. He would wait his time.
So he resigned his command without a moment's hesitation, and with
apparent cheerfulness. He even loaded the messenger with costly gifts.
He appeared happy to be relieved from labor and responsibility, and
retired at once to his vast Bohemian estates to pursue his favorite
studies in the science of the stars, to enshroud himself in mystery and
gloom, and dazzle his countrymen by the splendor of his life. "His table
was never furnished with less than one hundred covers; none but a noble
of ancient family was intrusted with the office of superintending his
household; an armed guard of fifty men waited in his antechamber; the
ramparts of his castle were lined with sentinels; six barons and as many
knights constantly attended on his person; sixty pages were trained and
supported in his palace, which was decorated with all the wonders of
art, and almost realized the fictions of Eastern luxury." In this
splendid retirement Wallenstein brooded on his wrongs, and waited for
the future.
The dismissal of this able general was a great mistake on the part of
the Emperor. There were left no generals capable of opposing Gustavus.
The supreme command had devolved on Tilly, able but bigoted, and best
known for his remorseless cruelty when Magdeburg was taken by
assault,--the direst tragedy of the war. This city was one of the first
to welcome the invasion of the King of Sweden, and also to adopt the
Protestant religion. It was the most prosperous city in northern
Germany; one of the richest and most populous. Against this mercantile
fortress Tilly directed all his energies, for he detested the spirit of
its people. It was closely invested by the imperial troops, and fell
before Gustavus could advance to relieve it. It was neglected by the
electors of Saxony and Brandenburg, who were timid and pusillanimous,
and it was lulled into false security by its strong position and
defences. Not sufficient preparation for defence had been made by the
citizens, who trusted to its strong walls, and knew that Gustavus was
advancing to relieve it. But unexpectedly it was assaulted in the most
daring and desperate manner, and all was lost. On a Sabbath morning, the
sudden toll of alarm bells, the roar of artillery, the roll of drums
beating to quarter, and the piercing cries of women and children,
mingled with the shouts and execrations of brutal and victorious
soldiers, announced the fate of Magdeburg. Forty thousand people--men,
women, and children--were inhumanly butchered, without necessity,
quarter, compassion, or remorse. So cold and hard is war! This was the
saddest massacre in the history of Germany, and one of the greatest
crimes that a successful general ever committed. History has no
language, and painting no colors to depict the horrors of that dreadful
scene; and the interval of more than two hundred years has not weakened
the impression of its horrors. The sack of Magdeburg stands out in the
annals of war like the siege of Tyre and the fall of Jerusalem.
But it roused the Protestants as from a trance. It united them, as the
massacre of St. Bartholomew united the Huguenots. They marched under the
standard of Gustavus with the same enthusiasm that the Huguenots showed
under Henry IV. at the battle of Ivry. There was now no limit to the
successes of the heroic Swede. The decisive battle of Leipsic, the
passage of the Lech, the defence of Nuremberg, and the great final
victory at Lutzen raised the military fame of Gustavus to a height
unknown since Hannibal led his armies over the Alps, or Caesar
encountered the patrician hosts at the battle of Pharsalia. No victories
were ever more brilliant than his; and they not only gave him a
deathless fame, but broke forever the Austrian fetters. His reputation
as a general was fairly earned. He ranks with Condé, Henry IV., Frederic
the Great, Marlborough, and Wellington; not, perhaps, with Alexander,
Caesar, and Napoleon,--those phenomena of military genius, the exalted
trio who shine amid the glories of the battlefield, as Homer, Dante, and
Shakspeare loom up in fame above other immortal poets.
In two years from the landing of Gustavus Adolphus on the island of
Ruden, near the southern extremity of the Baltic, he expelled a
triumphant enemy from Pomerania, traversed the banks of the Oder,
overran the Duchy of Mecklenburg, ascended the Elbe, delivered Saxony
from the armies of Tilly, crossed the Thuringian forest, entered
Frankfort in triumph, restored the Palatinate to its lawful sovereign,
took possession of some of the strongest fortresses on the Rhine,
overran Bavaria, occupied its capital, crossed the Danube, and then
returned to Saxony, to offer up his life on the plains of Lutzen. There,
on that memorable battlefield, where the descending sun of victory in
later times shed a delusive gleam on the eagles of Napoleon before his
irremediable ruin, did Gustavus encounter the great antagonist of German
liberties, whom the necessities of the Emperor had summoned from
retirement. Wallenstein once more commanded the imperial armies, but
only on conditions which made him virtually independent of his master.
He was generalissimo, with almost unlimited authority, so long as the
war should last; and the Emperor agreed to remove neither the general
himself nor his officers, and gave him principalities and spoils
indefinitely. He was the most powerful subject in Europe, and the
greatest general next to Gustavus. I read of no French or English
general who has been armed with such authority. Cromwell and Napoleon
took it; it was not conferred by legitimate and supreme power. Had
Wallenstein been successful to the end, he might have grasped the
imperial sceptre. Had Gustavus lived, he might have been the dictator
of Germany.
Impatient were both commanders to engage in the contest which each knew
would be decisive. Long did they wait for opportunities. At last, on the
16th of November, 1632, the defenders and the foes of German liberties
arrayed themselves for the great final encounter. The Protestants gained
the day, but Gustavus fell, exclaiming to the murderous soldiers who
demanded his name and quality, "I am the King of Sweden! And I seal this
day, with my blood, the liberties and religion of the German nation."
The death of Gustavus Adolphus in the hour of victory was a shock which
came upon the allies like the loss of the dearest friend. The victory
seemed too dearly purchased. The greatest protector which Protestantism
ever knew had perished, as he himself predicted. Pappenheim, the bravest
of the Austrian generals, also perished; and with him, the flower of
Wallenstein's army. Schiller thinks that Gustavus died fortunately for
his fame; that had he survived the decisive battle of Lutzen, he not
only could have dictated terms to the Emperor, but might have yielded to
the almost irresistible temptation of giving laws to the countries he
had emancipated. But he did not live to be tried. That rarest of all
trials was reserved alone for our Washington to pass through
triumphantly,--to set an example to all countries and ages of the
superiority of moral to intellectual excellence. Gustavus might have
triumphed like Washington, and he might have yielded like Cromwell. We
do not know. This only we know,--that he was not merely the great hero
of the Thirty Years' War, but one of the best men who ever wore a crown;
that he conferred on the Protestants and on civilization an immortal and
inestimable service, and that he is to be regarded as one of the great
benefactors of the world.
The Thirty Years' War loses its dramatic interest after the battle of
Lutzen. The final issue was settled, although the war was carried on
sixteen years longer. It was not till 1648 that the peace of Westphalia
was signed, which guaranteed the liberties of Germany, and established
the balance of power. That famous treaty has also been made the
foundation of all subsequent treaties between the European nations, and
created an era in modern history. It took place after the death of
Richelieu, when Mazarin ruled France in the name of Louis XIV., and
when Charles I. was in the hands of Cromwell.
With the death of Gustavus we also partially lose sight of Wallenstein.
He never afterwards gained victories commensurate with his reputation.
He remained, after the battle of Lutzen, unaccountably inactive in
Bohemia. But if his military fame was tarnished, his pride and power
remained. His military exactions became unendurable, and it is probable
he was a traitor. So unpopular did he become, and so suspicious was the
Emperor, who lost confidence in him, that he was assassinated by the
order of his sovereign. He was too formidable to be removed in any other
way. He probably deserved his fate. Although it was difficult to bring
this great culprit to justice, yet his death is a lesson to traitors.
"There are many ways," said Cicero, "in which a man may die,"--referring
to the august usurper of the Roman world.
I will not dwell on the sixteen remaining years of the Thirty Years'
War. It is too horrible a picture to paint. The desolation and misery
which overwhelmed Germany were most frightful and revolting. The war was
carried on without system or genius. "Expeditions were undertaken
apparently with no other view than to desolate hostile provinces, till
in the end provisions and winter quarters formed the principal object of
the summer campaigns." "Disease, famine, and want of discipline swept
away whole armies before they had seen an enemy." Soldiers deserted the
ranks, and became roving banditti. Law and justice entirely vanished
from the land. Germany, it is asserted by Mitchell, lost probably twelve
millions of people. Before the war, the population was sixteen millions;
at the close of the war, it had dwindled to four millions. The city of
Augsburg at one time had eighty thousand inhabitants; at the close of
the war, it had only eighteen thousand. "No less than thirty thousand
villages and hamlets were destroyed. Peaceful peasants were hunted for
mere sport, like the beasts of the forest. Citizens were nailed up and
fired at like targets. Women were collected into bands, driven like
slaves into camp, and exposed to indignities worse than death. The
fields were allowed to run waste, and forests sprung up and covered
entire districts which before the war had been under full cultivation."
Amid these scenes of misery and ruin, vices were more marked than
calamities. They were carried to the utmost pitch of vulgarity. Both
Austrian and Swedish generals were often so much intoxicated, for days
together, as to be incapable of service. Never was a war attended by so
many horrors. Never was crime more general and disgusting. So terrible
were the desolations, that it took Germany one hundred years to recover
from her losses. It never recovered the morality and religion which
existed in the time of Luther. That war retarded civilization in all the
countries where it raged. It was a moral and physical conflagration.
But there is a God in this world, and the evils were overruled. It is
certain that Protestantism was rescued from extermination on the
continent of Europe. It is clear also that a barrier was erected against
the aggressions of Austria. The Catholic and the Protestant religions
were left unmolested in the countries where they prevailed, and all
religious sects were tolerated. Religious toleration, since the Thirty
Years' War, has been the boast and glory of Germany.
We should feel a sickening melancholy if something for the ultimate good
of the world were not to come from such disasters as filled Germany with
grief and indignation for a whole generation; for the immediate effects
of the Thirty Years' War were more disastrous than those of any war I
have read of in the history of Europe since the fall of the Roman
Empire. In the civil wars of France and England, cities and villages
were generally spared. Civilization in those countries has scarcely ever
been retarded for more than a generation; but it was put back in Germany
for a century. Yet the enormous sacrifice of life and property would
seem to show the high value which Providence places on the great rights
of mankind, in comparison with material prosperity or the lives of men.
What is spiritual is permanent; what is material is transient. The
early history of Christianity is the history of martyrdom. Five millions
of Crusaders perished, that Europe might learn liberality of mind. It
took one hundred years of contention and two revolutions to secure
religious toleration in England. France passed through awful political
hurricanes, in order that feudal injustice might be removed. In like
manner, twelve millions of people perished in Germany, that despotism
might be rebuked.
Fain would we believe that what little was gained proved a savor of life
unto life; that seeds of progress were planted in that unhappy country
which after a lapse of one hundred years would germinate and develop a
higher civilization. What a great Protestant power has arisen in
northern Germany to awe and keep in check not Catholicism merely, but
such a hyperborean giant as Russia in its daring encroachments. But for
Prussia, Russia might have extended her conquests to the south as well
as to the west. But for the Thirty Years' War, no such empire as Prussia
would have been probable, or perhaps possible. But for that dreadful
contest, there might have been to-day only the Catholic religion among
the descendants of the Teutonic barbarians on the continent of Europe.
But for that war, the Austrian Empire might have retained a political
ascendency in Europe until the French Revolution; and such countries as
Sweden and Denmark might have been absorbed in it, as well as Saxony,
Brandenburg, and Hanover. What a terrible thing for Germany would have
been the unbroken and iron despotism of Austria, extending its Briarean
arms into every corner of Europe where the German language is spoken!
What a blow such a despotism would have been to science, literature, and
philosophy! Would Catholic Austria, supreme in Germany, have established
schools, or rewarded literary men? The Jesuits would have flourished and
triumphed from Pomerania to Wallachia; from the Baltic to the Danube.
It may have taken one hundred years for Germany to rally after such
miseries and disasters as I have had time only to allude to, and not
fully to describe; but see how gloriously that country has at last
arisen above all misfortunes! Why may we not predict a noble future for
so brave and honest a people,--the true descendants of those Teutonic
conquerers to whom God gave, nearly two thousand years ago, the
possessions and the lands of the ancient races who had not what the
Germans had,--a soul; the soul which hopes, and the soul which conquers?
The Thirty Years' War proved that liberty is not a dream, nor truth a
defeated power. Liberty cannot be extinguished among such peoples,
though "oceans may overwhelm it and mountains may press it down." It is
the boon of one hundred generations, the water of life distilled from
the tears of unnumbered millions,--the precious legacy of heroes and
martyrs, who in different nations and in different ages, inspired by the
contemplation of its sublime reality, counted not their lives dear unto
them, if by the sacrifice of life this priceless blessing could be
transmitted to posterity.
AUTHORITIES.
Hallenberg's History of Gustavus Adolphus; Fryxell's History of Sweden,
translated by Mary Howitt; Dreysen's Life of Gustavus Adolphus; S.R.
Gardiner's Thirty Years' War; Schiller's Thirty Years' War; Schiller's
Wallenstein, translated by Coleridge; Dr. Foster's Life of Wallenstein;
Colonel Mitchell's Life of Gustavus Adolphus; Lord F. Egerton's Life and
Letters of Wallenstein; Chapman's History of Gustavus Adolphus;
Biographie Universelle; Article in Encyclopaedia Britannica on Sweden;
R.C. Trench's Social Aspects of the Thirty Years' War; Heydenreich's
Life of Gustavus Adolphus.
CARDINAL DE RICHELIEU.
A. D. 1585-1642.
ABSOLUTISM.
Cardinal de Richelieu is an illustration of what can be done for the
prosperity and elevation of a country by a man whom we personally abhor,
and whose character is stained by glaring defects and vices. If there
was a statesman in French history who was pre-eminently unscrupulous,
selfish, tyrannical, and cruel, that statesman was the able and wily
priest who ruled France during the latter years of Louis XIII. And yet
it would be difficult to find a ruler who has rendered more signal
services to the state or to the monarch whom he served. He extricated
France from the perils of anarchy, and laid the foundation for the
grandeur of the monarchy under Louis XIV. It was his mission to create a
strong government, when only a strong government could save the kingdom
from disintegration; so that absolutism, much as we detest it, seems to
have been one of the needed forces of the seventeenth century. It was
needed in France, to restrain the rapacity and curtail the overgrown
power of feudal nobles, whose cabals and treasons were fatal to the
interests of law and order.