[Sidenote: [1517-1556 A.D.]]
Soon after the death of Ximenes, Charles [who as the emperor is known
as Charles V but as King Charles I of Spain] made his public entry,
with great pomp, into Valladolid, whither he had summoned the cortes of
Castile. Though he assumed on all occasions the name of king, that title
had never been acknowledged in the cortes. The Spaniards, considering
Juana as possessed of the sole right to the crown, and no example of a
son’s having enjoyed the title of king during the life of his parents
occurring in their history, the cortes discovered all that scrupulous
respect for ancient forms and that aversion to innovation which are
conspicuous in popular assemblies.
The presence, however, of their prince, the address, the artifices, and
the threats of his ministers, prevailed on them at last to proclaim him
king, in conjunction with his mother, whose name they appointed to be
placed before that of her son in all public acts. But when they made this
concession, they declared that if, at any future period, Juana should
recover the exercise of reason, the whole authority should return into
her hands. At the same time, they voted a free gift of 600,000 ducats[77]
to be paid in three years, a sum more considerable than had ever been
granted to any former monarch.
[Sidenote: [1517-1518 A.D.]]
Notwithstanding this obsequiousness of the cortes to the will of the
king, the most violent symptoms of dissatisfaction with his government
began to break out in the kingdom. Chièvres had acquired over the
mind of the young monarch the ascendant not only of a tutor, but of
a parent. Charles seemed to have no sentiments but those which his
minister inspired, and scarcely uttered a word but what he put into his
mouth. He was constantly surrounded by Flemings; no person got access
to him without their permission; nor was any admitted to audience but
in their presence. As he spoke the Spanish language very imperfectly,
his answers were always extremely short, and often delivered with
hesitation. Unfortunately for Charles, his favourites were unworthy
of his confidence. To amass wealth seems to have been their only aim;
and as they had reason to fear that either their master’s good sense
or the indignation of the Spaniards might soon abridge their power,
they hastened to improve the present opportunity, and their avarice
was the more rapacious because they expected their authority to be of
no longer duration. All honours, offices, and benefices were either
engrossed by the Flemings or publicly sold by them. Chièvres, his wife,
and Sauvage, whom Charles, on the death of Ximenes, had imprudently
raised to be chancellor of Castile, vied with each other in all the
refinements of extortion and venality. Not only the Spanish historians,
who, from resentment, may be suspected of exaggeration, but Peter Martyr
Angleria[b] [or de Anghierra], an Italian, who resided at that time in
the court of Spain, and was under no temptation to deceive the persons
to whom his letters are addressed, gives a description which is almost
incredible, of the insatiable and shameless covetousness of the Flemings.
According to Angleria’s calculation, which he asserts to be extremely
moderate, they remitted into the Low Countries, in the space of ten
months, no less a sum than 1,100,000 ducats. The nomination of William
de Croy, Chièvres’ nephew, a young man not of canonical age, to the
archbishopric of Toledo, exasperated the Spaniards more than all these
exactions.
Charles, leaving Castile thus disgusted with his administration, set
out for Saragossa, the capital of Aragon, that he might be present
in the cortes of that kingdom. On his way thither, he took leave of
his brother Ferdinand, whom he sent into Germany on the pretence of
visiting their grandfather, Maximilian, in his old age. To this prudent
precaution Charles owed the preservation of his Spanish dominions. During
the violent commotions which arose there soon after this period, the
Spaniards would infallibly have offered the crown to a prince who was
the darling of the whole nation; nor did Ferdinand want ambition nor
councillors that might have prompted him to accept of the offer.
The Aragonese had not hitherto acknowledged Charles as king, nor would
they allow the cortes to be assembled in his name, but in that of the
justicia, to whom, during an interregnum, this privilege belonged.
After long delays, however, and with much difficulty, he persuaded the
members to confer on him the title of king, in conjunction with his
mother. At the same time, he bound himself by that solemn oath, which the
Aragonese exacted of their kings, never to violate any of their rights
or liberties. When a donative was demanded, the members were still more
intractable; many months elapsed before they would agree to grant Charles
200,000 ducats, and that sum they appropriated so strictly for paying
debts of the crown, which had long been forgotten, that a very small part
of it came into the king’s hands. What had happened in Castile taught
them caution, and determined them rather to satisfy the claims of their
fellow-citizens, how obsolete soever, than to furnish strangers the means
of enriching themselves with the spoils of their country.
From Aragon, Charles proceeded to Catalonia, where he wasted much time,
encountered more difficulties, and gained less money. The Flemings
were now become so odious to every province in Spain by their exactions
that the desire of mortifying them, and of disappointing their avarice,
augmented the jealousy with which a free people usually conduct their
deliberations. Segovia, Toledo, Seville, and several other cities of the
first rank entered into a confederacy for the defence of their rights and
privileges; and, notwithstanding the silence of the nobility, who, on
this occasion, discovered neither the public spirit nor the resolution
which became their order, the confederates laid before the king a full
view of the state of the kingdom, and of the maladministration of his
favourites. The preferment of strangers, the exportation of the current
coin, the increase of taxes, were the grievances of which they chiefly
complained; and of these they demanded redress with that boldness which
is natural to a free people. These remonstrances, presented at first
at Saragossa, and renewed afterwards at Barcelona, Charles treated
with great neglect. The confederacy, however, of these cities, at this
juncture, was the beginning of that famous union among the commons
[_comuneros_] of Castile, which not long after threw the kingdom into
such violent convulsions as shook the throne, and almost overturned the
constitution.
KING CHARLES BECOMES EMPEROR
[Sidenote: [1518-1519 A.D.]]
Soon after Charles’ arrival at Barcelona, he received the account of an
event which interested him much more than the murmurs of the Castilians
or the scruples of the cortes of Catalonia. This was the death of the
emperor Maximilian--an occurrence of small importance in itself, for he
was a prince conspicuous neither for his virtues, nor his power, nor his
abilities; but rendered by its consequences more memorable than any that
had happened during several ages. It broke that profound and universal
peace which then reigned in the Christian world; it excited a rivalship
between two princes, which threw all Europe into agitation, and kindled
wars more general, and of longer duration, than had hitherto been known
in modern times.
The revolution occasioned by the expedition of the French king Charles
VIII, into Italy, had inspired the European princes with new ideas
concerning the importance of the imperial dignity. The claims of the
empire upon some of the Italian states were numerous; its jurisdiction
over others was extensive; and though the former had been almost
abandoned, and the latter seldom exercised, under princes of slender
abilities and of little influence, it was obvious that, in the hands
of an emperor possessed of power or of genius, they might be employed
as engines for stretching his dominion over the greater part of that
country. Even Maximilian, feeble and unsteady as his conduct always was,
had availed himself of the infinite pretensions of the empire, and had
reaped advantage from every war and every negotiation in Italy during
his reign. These considerations, added to the dignity of the station,
confessedly the first among Christian princes, and to the rights inherent
in the office, which, if exerted with vigour, were far from being
inconsiderable, rendered the imperial crown more than ever an object of
ambition.
Not long before his death, Maximilian had discovered great solicitude
to preserve this dignity in the Austrian family, and to procure the
king of Spain to be chosen his successor. But he himself, having never
been crowned by the pope, a ceremony deemed essential in that age, was
considered only as emperor “elect.” Though historians have not attended
to that distinction, neither the Italian nor the German chancery
bestowed any other title upon him than that of king of the Romans;
and no example occurring in history of any person’s being chosen a
successor to a king of the Romans, the Germans, always tenacious of their
forms, and unwilling to confer upon Charles an office for which their
constitution knew no name, obstinately refused to gratify Maximilian
in that point. By his death, this difficulty was at once removed, and
Charles openly aspired to that dignity which his grandfather attempted,
without success, to secure for him. At the same time Francis I, a
powerful rival, entered the lists against him; and the attention of all
Europe was fixed upon this competition, no less illustrious from the
high rank of the candidates than from the importance of the prize for
which they contended. Each of them urged his pretensions with sanguine
expectations, and with no unpromising prospect of success. Charles
considered the imperial crown as belonging to him of right, from its
long continuance in the Austrian line; he knew that none of the German
princes possessed power or influence enough to appear as his antagonist;
he flattered himself that no consideration would induce the natives of
Germany to exalt any foreign prince to a dignity which during so many
ages had been deemed peculiar to their own nation; and, least of all,
that they would confer this honour upon Francis I, the sovereign of a
people whose genius, and laws, and manners differed so widely from those
of the Germans that it was hardly possible to establish any cordial union
between them. He did not, however, trust the success of his cause to this
alone. Great sums of money were remitted from Spain; all the refinements
and artifices of negotiation were employed; and a considerable body of
troops, kept on foot at that time by the states of the circle of Swabia,
was secretly taken into his pay. The venal were gained by presents; the
objections of the more scrupulous were answered or eluded; some feeble
princes were threatened or overawed.
[Illustration: A SPANISH GENTLEMAN, EARLY SIXTEENTH CENTURY]
On the 28th of June, five months and ten days after the death of
Maximilian, this important contest, which had held all Europe in
suspense, was decided. Six of the electors had already declared for the
king of Spain; and the archbishop of Treves, the only firm adherent to
the French interest, having at last joined his brethren, Charles was,
by the unanimous voice of the electoral college, raised to the imperial
throne. The important intelligence of his election was conveyed in nine
days from Frankfort to Barcelona, where Charles was still detained by the
obstinacy of the Catalan cortes, which had not hitherto brought to an
issue any of the affairs which came before it. He received the account
with the joy natural to a young and aspiring mind, on an accession of
power and dignity which raised him so far above the other princes of
Europe. Then it was that those vast prospects, which allured him during
his whole administration, began to open; and from this era we may date
the formation, and are able to trace the gradual progress, of a grand
system of enterprising ambition, which renders the history of his reign
so worthy of attention.
[Sidenote: [1519-1520 A.D.]]
A trivial circumstance first discovered the effects of this great
elevation upon the mind of Charles. In all the public writs which he
now issued as king of Spain, he assumed the title of “majesty,” and
required it from his subjects as a mark of their respect. Before that
time, all the monarchs of Europe were satisfied with the appellation of
“highness,” or “grace”; but the vanity of other courts soon led them to
imitate the example of the Spanish. The epithet of majesty is no longer
a mark of pre-eminence. The most inconsiderable monarchs in Europe enjoy
it, and the arrogance of the greater potentates has invented no higher
denomination.
The Spaniards were far from viewing the promotion of their king to the
imperial throne with the same satisfaction which he himself felt. To be
deprived of the presence of their sovereign, and to be subjected to the
government of a viceroy and his council, a species of administration
often oppressive and always disagreeable, were the immediate and
necessary consequences of this new dignity. To see the blood of their
countrymen shed in quarrels wherein the nation had no concern; to behold
its treasures wasted in supporting the splendour of a foreign title;
to be plunged in the chaos of Italian and German politics were effects
of this event almost as unavoidable. From all these considerations
they concluded that nothing could have happened more pernicious to the
Spanish nation; and the fortitude and public spirit of their ancestors,
who, in the cortes of Castile, prohibited Alfonso the Wise [the Learned]
from leaving the kingdom, in order to receive the imperial crown, were
often mentioned with the highest praise, and pronounced to be extremely
worthy of imitation at this juncture. But Charles, without regarding the
sentiments or murmurs of his Spanish subjects, accepted of the imperial
dignity which the count palatine, at the head of a solemn embassy,
offered him in the name of the electors; and declared his intention of
setting out soon for Germany, in order to take possession of it. This
was the more necessary, because, according to the forms of the German
constitution, he could not, before the ceremony of a public coronation,
exercise any act of jurisdiction or authority.
Their certain knowledge of this resolution augmented so much the disgust
of the Spaniards that a sullen and refractory spirit prevailed among
persons of all ranks. The pope having granted the king the tenths of
all ecclesiastical benefices in Castile, to assist him in carrying on
war with greater vigour against the Turks, a convocation of the clergy
unanimously refused to levy that sum, upon pretence that it ought never
to be exacted but at those times when Christendom was actually invaded
by the infidels; and though Leo, in order to support his authority, laid
the kingdom under an interdict, so little regard was paid to a censure
which was universally deemed unjust, that Charles himself applied to have
it taken off. Thus the Spanish clergy, besides their merit in opposing
the usurpations of the pope, and disregarding the influence of the crown,
gained the exemption which they had claimed.
The commotions which arose in the kingdom of Valencia, annexed to the
crown of Aragon, were more formidable, and produced more dangerous and
lasting effects. A seditious monk, having by his sermons excited the
citizens of Valencia, the capital city, to take arms, and to punish
certain criminals in a tumultuary manner, the people, pleased with this
exercise of power and with such a discovery of their own importance, not
only refused to lay down their arms, but formed themselves into troops
and companies, that they might be regularly trained to martial exercises.
To obtain some security against the oppression of the grandees was the
motive of this association, and proved a powerful bond of union; for as
the aristocratical privileges and independence were more complete in
Valencia than in any other of the Spanish kingdoms, the nobles, being
scarcely accountable for their conduct to any superior, treated the
people not only as vassals but as slaves. They were alarmed, however, at
the progress of this unexpected insurrection, as it might encourage the
people to attempt shaking off the yoke altogether; but as they could not
repress them without taking arms, it became necessary to have recourse to
the emperor, and to desire his permission to attack them (1520).
At the same time the people made choice of deputies to represent their
grievances, and to implore the protection of their sovereign. Happily
for the latter, they arrived at court when Charles was exasperated to a
high degree against the nobility. As he was eager to visit Germany, where
his presence became every day more necessary, and his Flemish courtiers
were still more impatient to return into their native country, that they
might carry thither the spoils which they had amassed in Castile, it
was impossible for him to hold the cortes of Valencia in person. He had
for that reason empowered the cardinal Adrian to represent him in that
assembly, and in his name to receive their oath of allegiance, to confirm
their privileges with the usual solemnities, and to demand of them a free
gift.
But the Valencian nobles, who considered this measure as an indignity to
their country, which was no less entitled than his other kingdoms to the
honour of their sovereign’s presence, declared that, by the fundamental
laws of the constitution, they could neither acknowledge as king a person
who was absent, nor grant him any subsidy; and to this declaration they
adhered with a haughty and inflexible obstinacy. Charles, piqued by
their behaviour, decided in favour of the people, and rashly authorised
them to continue in arms. Their deputies returned in triumph, and were
received by their fellow-citizens as the deliverers of their country. The
insolence of the multitude increasing with their success, they expelled
all the nobles out of the city, committed the government to magistrates
of their own election, and entered into an association, distinguished by
the name of _germandada_ or “brotherhood,” which proved the source not
only of the wildest disorders but of the most fatal calamities in that
kingdom.[c]
CHARLES’ STRUGGLE WITH THE CORTES
[Sidenote: [1520 A.D.]]
At this period it was Charles’ misfortune to make enemies on every
side. As the constitution of Valencia required that he should be
present, to fulfil the compact with his people, he should, doubtless,
have hastened thither, and, by yielding prompt obedience to the laws,
have removed all pretext for rebellion. The same imprudence, the same
disregard of established custom, made him summon the cortes of Castile
and Leon to meet him at Santiago; a thing never before attempted by the
most arbitrary of his predecessors. To the murmurs produced by this
innovation, the ministers paid no attention: on the contrary, they did
all they could to fan the flame of discontent, by interfering in the
return of the deputies, and by bribing such as they could not nominate to
submit in everything to the royal will.
Toledo displaced the deputies whom it had chosen, and nominated others
more submissive to the popular voice. It next prevailed on some other
towns to join in insisting on the following concessions: that the king
should not leave Spain; that he should require no subsidy; that, instead
of conferring dignities on foreigners, he should deprive the possessors
of those which they actually held; that no money, under any pretext
whatever, should leave the kingdom; that offices should cease to be
venal; and that the cortes should be assembled, according to ancient
custom, in some town of Leon or Castile, not in an angle of Galicia.
Most of these demands were reasonable enough; but the first two were
insulting, and all were sure to be highly unpalatable to the court. The
deputies who bore them waited on Charles, now at Valladolid, on his
way to Galicia, and with some difficulty obtained an audience. He told
them, however, that he was in too much haste to take the subject into
consideration; but that, if they would meet him near Tordesillas, he
would commune with them. To Tordesillas they accordingly repaired; but
a report being maliciously spread in Valladolid that he was not only
about to leave the kingdom, but to take away his mother, the populace
were excited to the highest pitch. A Portuguese lace-maker mischievously
ascended the tower of a church, the bell of which was never sounded
except on extraordinary occasions, and rang with such good-will that six
thousand men were speedily under arms.
It was immediately resolved that all the Flemings should be put to
death; but the intended victims had timely intimation of their danger,
and with the king fled at midnight, the rain descending in torrents,
to Tordesillas, where they arrived at daybreak. The authorities of
Valladolid showed great activity in the apprehension of the ringleaders
in the riot, and a few were punished; but the king, who was naturally
clement, ordered the remainder to be liberated. He now hastened towards
Galicia, the Toledan deputies closely following him, and at every town
requesting an audience; but he refused to see them until they reached
Santiago.
On the first day of April, 1520, the states were opened in the convent of
San Francisco. The speech from the throne laid stress on the necessity
of the king’s immediate voyage to Germany; on the expenses with which
it would be attended, as well as on that which had been incurred in
preparations for war with the infidels; and ended by demanding a
gratuity. For a moment the deputies were silent; but those of Salamanca
rose, and protested that they could not take the accustomed oath of
allegiance unless the king would comply with the demands which had been
presented to him. They were immediately supported by a deputy of Toledo,
who asserted that, rather than consent to anything prejudicial, either
to the city he represented or to the kingdom, he would sacrifice his
life. Emboldened by the example, the delegates of Seville, Cordova,
Zamora, Toro, and Avila joined with the three, and the business of the
assembly was for some days interrupted. Nothing can better show the
degraded state in which the cortes were held, and the power which the
crown had been accustomed to exercise over the proceedings--debates were
unknown among them--than the next step of the king: it was no less than
to order the Toledan deputies, the most violent of the party, to leave
the court. In vain did they petition: they were compelled to obey. When
the news reached Toledo, the population was in an uproar; and their anger
still further inflamed by the arrest of two of their magistrates, Juan
de Padilla, and Ferdinand Davalos. Whether a royal order was sent for
the arrest, or a citation for the appearance of both, is doubtful: the
mob opposed its execution; and would have murdered the corregidor, the
alcalde, and alguacil mayor, had not all three contrived to escape. The
fortress and gates, with the government of the city, were now seized by
the mob, and the royal officers expelled. The example was imitated by
the whole kingdom of Murcia. When intelligence of these events reached
Santiago, the king proposed to march on Toledo, and inflict a summary
vengeance on that city; but his ministers--fearing that if he remained
any longer in Spain he would risk the imperial crown, some members of the
diet having already threatened to proceed to a second election--dissuaded
him from his purpose. The states were now transferred to Corunna, where,
with some reluctance,--so effectually had the royal influence been
exercised in the interim,--a considerable subsidy was granted to the
monarch. The great cities, however, refused to sanction it; and even
the few deputies who voted it accompanied it by requests exceedingly
obnoxious to the court. Anxious to take possession of the brilliant
dignity which awaited him, and perhaps to escape from so troubled a
kingdom, Charles closed the cortes, and prepared to embark. He left the
regency of Castile to Cardinal Adrian; of Aragon, to Don Juan de Lanuza;
of Valencia, to the count de Melito; and he intrusted the command of
the troops to approved officers. The choice of Adrian, a foreigner, was
peculiarly offensive to the nobles and deputies at court: they solicited
another; but Charles, who generally adhered to his plans with uncommon
tenacity, refused to change. In May he embarked, and proceeded to
England, to concert with Henry VIII the means of humbling the power of
the French king.
REVOLT OF THE GERMANEROS AND THE COMUNEROS[78]
The departure of the king was not likely to assuage the turbulence of the
times. If the opposition, so long as it was constitutionally exercised,
was just, and even laudable, it had now degenerated into rebellion, and
patriotism been succeeded by schemes of personal ambition. In Toledo,
Padilla, by pretending to follow the popular current, guided it at his
will: his wife, Doña Maria Pacheco, who had greater talents and even
greater ambition than himself, headed the popular processions, and by her
presence authorised some revolting scenes. From Murcia the governor, the
marquis de los Velez, had been expelled, and a royal officer, who had
been sent to institute proceedings against the guilty, compelled to flee
for his life, followed by eight thousand of the combined rebels.
The example of these great places was too attractive to remain
inoperative. Segovia immediately rose, and hung two of the magistrates.
The mob were, above all, anxious to murder their deputies, of whom
both had agreed to the subsidy at Corunna; but one of them, wisely
distrustful of their intention, had not returned: the other, who returned
at midnight, was dragged along the streets to the place of execution.
The monks of San Francisco issued from their cloisters, with the holy
sacrament: the interference was unavailing; nor was it without difficulty
that permission could be obtained for a confessor to attend him. A monk
approached, and though the office was speedily performed, loud murmurs
were raised, by the murderous herd, at the time so unnecessarily lost.
They again seized the rope, dragged the deputy along, and, though he was
dead before they reached the gallows, hung him on the same tree that had
proved fatal to two preceding victims.
Though Valladolid was honoured with the abode of Adrian and the council
of regency, the rabble rose to put the deputies to death; and when these,
too, had the good fortune to escape, even the cardinal was arrested,
but, as it appears, soon released, through the interposition of the
nobles and clergy. Burgos was still more criminal. Unable to find the
bishop or his brethren, individuals peculiarly obnoxious, the rioters,
headed by a cutler, burned a house in which many valuable archives were
consumed. They next proceeded in search of a royal favourite, whose house
shared the same fate. He was overtaken, dragged from the church where
he had sought sanctuary, brought to Burgos, and committed to prison,
where he immediately died from the effect of the blows he had received.
Not satisfied with taking his life, they dragged his corpse through the
city, and suspended it, the head downwards, from the public gallows. The
arrival at Madrid of a royal magistrate, said to be proceeding to Toledo
to try the rebels, raised the rioters, who swore to take his life; and,
as he was fortunate enough to escape, they deposed the magistrates,
elected others, seized all the arms they could find, and summoned the
governor of the Alcazar to remit that fortress into their hands; but he
had fidelity enough to set them at defiance. The siege was prosecuted:
a mine was sprung, the gallant handful of defenders was destroyed, and
the place capitulated. Finally, at Avila, Guadalajara, and Siguenza,
the legitimate authority was overthrown; brute force, murder, rape, and
plunder reigned in its stead.
The rebellious communities agreed to act in concert for the common
cause, and to send their representatives to Avila, to hold a sort of
national cortes. Accordingly, Toledo, Madrid, Guadalajara, Soria, Murcia,
Cuenca, Segovia, Avila, Salamanca, Toro, Zamora, Leon, Valladolid,
Burgos, and Ciudad Rodrigo, successively and within short intervals,
joined their respective deputies, while from several of these places
troops daily arrived. For some time, however, nothing important was
attempted: the royalist general, Fonseca, was too busily occupied in
raising troops to assail Segovia; and Ronquillo was too weak to take the
field. The weakness of the regent, who in fear of violence expressed his
disapprobation of the hostilities commenced by Fonseca, redoubled their
audacity. Anarchy was now at its height.
QUEEN JUANA RELEASED
The next proceeding of the rebels was distinguished for more boldness,
and for something like originality. At the head of the troops furnished
by Toledo, Medina del Campo, and other places, and accompanied by two
other chiefs, Padilla proceeded to Tordesillas to gain possession of the
imbecile Juana. He demanded and obtained an audience, expatiated on the
evils which had befallen the kingdom since the death of the Catholic
sovereigns, her parents, and said that her son had abandoned the kingdom
to its fate; he ended by informing her that he placed the troops of
Toledo, Madrid, and Segovia at her disposal. For a moment the queen
seemed to have regained the use of her faculties; she replied that she
had never before heard of her father’s death; that if she had, she would
not have permitted the disorders which prevailed; that she desired the
weal of the kingdom, and that on Padilla, in quality of captain-general,
she devolved the duty of restoring the public tranquillity. Her rational
manner of discourse made the deputies hope that she had been restored
to sanity; they did homage to her as their sovereign queen; and in her
name the representatives of the confederation were brought from Avila to
Tordesillas. By issuing all decrees in her name and by her authority,
they hoped to give legitimacy to their own.
But she almost instantly relapsed into her former lethargy, a
circumstance, however, which they carefully concealed from the world.
Emboldened by the success of their enterprise, and by the number of
armed men who daily joined them, they now resolved to subvert the power
of regent and council, and even to arrest the members. Padilla arrived
with twelve hundred men. The cardinal now prepared to flee; the gates
were shut on him; and he was detained as a sort of hostage for the safety
of the rebel chiefs. In a few days, however, he assumed a disguise and
silently escaped. His first step was to acquaint his master with the
events which had happened. On their side, the confederates, with an
impudence unparalleled in all history, attempted in the same manner to
justify what they had done.
[Illustration: A SPANISH GENTLEWOMAN OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY]
Charles V was in a difficult position: the hostility of the Lutherans,
the rivalry of Francis I, the disturbances which threatened to afflict
Italy, and the preparations of the Grand Turk, rendered it impossible for
him to revisit Spain, even though his absence endangered the security of
that crown. In this emergency he associated Velasco the constable and
Henry the admiral of Castile in the regency with Adrian, and wrote to all
the revolted communities calling on them to obey the laws and to restore
tranquillity, promising to return the moment his pressing affairs would
allow him. To dispose them in his favour he renounced the subsidy which
had been voted him at Corunna, and promised that no benefices should be
conferred on foreigners. His letters, however, had for some time little
effect on the majority of the confederates, who declared that they were
dictated by insincerity.
In this critical position of the royal cause, it was fortunate
that Aragon, Catalonia, and most of Andalusia stood aloof from the
confederation. Aragon, indeed, was subsequently troubled for a moment,
through an organised opposition to the viceroyalty of Lanuza; but
tranquillity was restored without much difficulty. Seville, Cordova,
Xeres, and Granada either returned, without condescending to open, the
proposals of that body, or reproached it for its excesses. The rebellious
towns no less persevered in their career of violence. It was evident that
nothing less than civil war could decide the problem, whether the king
or the mob should exercise the government. The constable began to act
with vigour, to collect his own vassals, and to summon all who held for
the sovereign and the laws to join him; and he borrowed money from Dom
Emmanuel, of Portugal, to support his levies. The cardinal too seemed
to awake from his imbecile inactivity; and the admiral went from place
to place to rouse the sparks of slumbering loyalty. The result showed
what might have been accomplished earlier by an active combination of
the royalist party; about eight thousand well-armed men soon repaired to
Rio Seco. The extent of the preparations and the expostulations of the
constables prevailed on Burgos to withdraw from the confederacy. On their
side the assembly at Tordesillas vigorously prepared for the struggle,
and placed Don Pedro Giron at the head of the rebel forces, among the
ranks of which was the bishop of Zamora, with nine hundred men, of whom
four hundred were ecclesiastics.
[Sidenote: [1520-1521 A.D.]]
With eleven thousand men Don Pedro advanced towards Rio Seco, took
and pillaged Tordehumos, without any molestation from the royalists,
who were waiting for a reinforcement under the count de Haro. On the
junction of that nobleman, who was raised to the command, the numbers
were about equal; but for some time the royalists were unwilling to begin
the attack. Don Pedro fell back to Villapando, and by this imprudent
step exposed Tordesillas, which, with the queen, Juana, was invested
and stormed by the count. He was already disgusted with the cause he
advocated, and he soon abandoned it for that of the king: his place was
supplied by Don Juan de Padilla.
While a desultory warfare followed, generally favourable to the
royalists, Valencia [the headquarters of the Germania] was the undivided
prey of anarchy; deeds were committed which threw into the shade the
horrors of Castile and Leon. The thirteen syndics first endeavoured to
oppose the entrance of the viceroy: and when this was found impossible,
they artfully misrepresented his actions, organised a determined
opposition to his authority, overawed the administration of justice,
rescued the most notorious criminals from execution, openly attacked his
house, and at length expelled him from the city. The consequences, not in
the capital only, but in the towns, might have been easily anticipated.
All who were hostile to the present order of things were pursued with
vindictive rage: they were even sacrificed at the altar, their wives
violated, their children put to death before their eyes, the priests
themselves dragged from their sanctuary, and the holy sacraments trodden
under foot. In short, there was no species of crime left uncommitted.
But, fortunately for humanity, evil has its climax as well as good, and
the descent in the former case is even more rapid than in the latter.
Some of the rebel leaders returned to their duty; and the count de Haro
advanced against Padilla, who was intrenched in Torre Lobaton, but who
fled on the approach of the royalists. The count pursued, overtook, and
in a short time entirely defeated the rebels near Villalar, April, 1521;
Padilla himself, with two other generals, being among the prisoners.
All three were speedily condemned and executed. Terrified by this blow,
Valladolid sued for and obtained its pardon. Medina del Campo, Segovia,
Avila, Salamanca, Zamora, and other places of less note, followed the
example. The prior of St. John, who had been sent to chastise the
inhabitants of Toledo, defeated the bishop of Zamora, who had ventured to
oppose him, and was precipitately driven into the city. For the bishop’s
devotion to the popular cause, the people escorted him in triumph to
the cathedral, and placed him under the archiepiscopal canopy; but
intelligence arriving of Padilla’s defeat, he soon afterwards fled from
the city.
Doña Maria Pacheco, the widow of Padilla, a woman of commanding talents,
of desperate courage, and of little principle, succeeded to the unbounded
authority of her husband. Her character will be best understood by an
anecdote: Two Biscayan brothers, suspected of ill will towards her
husband, were summoned to appear before her in the Alcazar; scarcely
had they crossed the threshold of the fortress when they fell under the
daggers of her creatures: the corpses were first thrown into the river,
and then dragged through the streets by children. In the meantime the
prior of St. John invested the city, from which sorties were frequently
made, with various success. She confined the canons of Toledo, who
refused to rob the church at her requisition, during two days and nights
to the chapter-house, allowing them neither food nor bed; and there they
must doubtless have remained until starvation had released them from
her persecution, had they not submitted. But her despotic reign was
approaching its end. The loss of thirteen hundred men in a desperate
sortie so humbled the inhabitants that all submitted except a determined
number, who retired with her into the Alcazar. Soon afterwards it was
compelled to submit, but the heroic Doña Maria effected her escape into
Portugal, where she passed her remaining days in great poverty.
The success of the royalists in Leon and Castile had little effect on
the desperate rebels of Valencia. That city, like other towns of the
kingdom, continued in the hands of a furious mob, who loudly proclaimed
that no clergy should be maintained, no taxes hereafter paid, no civil
government supported, since all were violations of natural liberty.
Hearing that one of their leaders was defeated at Oropesa by the duke of
Segorbe, and that the viceroy had convoked the ban and arrière-ban of the
nobles, the fanatics left the capital to exterminate all their enemies.
Four thousand of them furiously assailed several towns which continued
faithful to the king; one-half of them were annihilated near Murviedro by
the same duke; but, to counterbalance this check, another army of rebels
defeated the viceroy in person near Jativa. The ferocity of the victors
knew no bounds: they had bigotry enough to force the Moors whom they had
conquered to receive baptism, but after the ceremony they massacred six
hundred; saying that possibly the converts might relapse, and that it was
better at once to send them to heaven, while in a regenerated state.
The viceroy now solicited aid from the regents of Castile; it was
immediately sent; the royalists took the field in greater numbers, and
with greater confidence of success. Fortress after fortress was reduced.
The rapidity of these successes so frightened even the rebels of the
capital that they sued for pardon; it was granted by the viceroy on
the consideration that they would surrender their arms, and in future
conform to the laws. In an incredibly short period all the fortified
places submitted. The confederation was forever destroyed in Valencia;
and, though it lingered for a while in the Balearic Isles, where it raged
almost as furiously as on the continent, it was at length extirpated
through the valour of the royalists.
[Sidenote: [1519-1524 A.D.]]
These troubled scenes were not the only evil experienced by the Spaniards
at this season: they were afflicted by that of foreign invasion. Knowing
that the forces of the kingdom were occupied in extinguishing the flames
of rebellion, the French king thought this a favourable opportunity of
vindicating the claim of Henry d’Albret to the throne of Navarre. A
formidable army advanced under André de Foix, seized on St. Jean Pied de
Pont, passed by Roncesvalles, invested and took Pamplona,[79] and the
country, as it had no fortresses to defend it, became the easy prey of
the enemy. Had the French been satisfied with this success, and erected
fortresses to defend their conquest, the throne of Navarre might have
been restored; but the general, in accordance, as is believed, with an
understanding with the rebels of the confederation, invaded Castile and
invested Logroño. The place made a gallant defence so as to allow the
duke of Najera to advance with reinforcements. On his approach, the
French were signally defeated--six thousand of their number remaining on
the field, their artillery lost, and many officers captured, among whom
was the general-in-chief, André de Foix; probably a still greater number
perished in the pursuit. The kingdom was regained with greater facility
than it had been lost. No sooner did Francis hear of this signal failure
than, anxious to vindicate the honour of his arms, he despatched a second
army, under the grand admiral Bonnivet. The invaders took Fuenterrabia;
but on the approach of Don Bertram de la Cueva, they were driven back
with serious loss. In 1524 Fuenterrabia was recovered by the emperor.
In July, 1522, the emperor, whose presence had been so often requested
by the royalists, arrived in Spain. Early in the same year the cardinal
Adrian had been invested with the pontifical crown. Having visited
his mother at Tordesillas, Charles hastened to Valladolid, where his
presence was naturally dreaded. It was expected by all that summary
justice would be inflicted on those who had taken a prominent part in
the recent disturbances; but clemency was the basis of his character,
and on this occasion he exercised it to an extent, perhaps, unparalleled
in history. He caused proclamation to be made that, with the exception
of about eighty, all individuals concerned in the recent rebellion were
freely pardoned, that all proceedings should cease, that all preceding
condemnations should be revoked, and all who had suffered from the
judgments of the tribunals should be restored to their possessions and
honours. And of the eighty thus excepted, very few suffered.[80]
This conduct was truly imperial: it necessarily made a deep impression
on the hearts of the people; and, as he had gained policy by experience,
the deference which he now paid to native customs, the preference which
he gave to native habits, the care with which he identified his interests
and views with those of the Spaniards did the rest, and enabled him to
exercise an ascendency over his subjects which few of his predecessors
had ever possessed.[d]
THE MOORS UNDER CHARLES V
[Sidenote: [1521-1527 A.D.]]
From the coming of Charles V to the imperial throne, the history of Spain
became that of Europe. Events assumed such enormous proportions that the
details of interior administration, police, and government lost much of
their importance. The fate of the peninsula was no longer to be decided
within the peninsula itself. Spain by its position could not be the
centre of the vast empire of Charles V; it could only be an annex. Since
the suicide of the Castilian communes at Villalar, all life had passed to
the outside. Charles became a stranger to his hereditary states; he did
not visit them for twenty years except to demand money from them.
Incessant war, which was stifled at one place only to break out in
another, weighed heavily on all Spain, which paid the cost without
reaping the fruits. Treasure from the New World traversed without
stopping in her, and fabulous duties were imposed on all handiwork and
provisions. American gold, peninsular revenues, the commerce of the Low
Countries, all were swallowed up in this bottomless gulf. Half Europe
ruined and exhausted itself to help Charles V to subdue the other half,
and after twenty years’ struggle this dream of European dictatorship was
no nearer being realised than at the beginning.
[Illustration: GRENADA, FROM THE FOUNTAIN OF HAZELNUTS]
The Moors, expelled from Granada, or forced by a hypocritical conversion
to buy the right of remaining, had ceased to give the government serious
anxiety. Religious unity reigned, in appearance at least, in Andalusia,
now impoverished by the exile of her most industrious inhabitants. But
it was not the same in the kingdom of Valencia. We have seen the sad
dénouement of that insurrection, sister to that of the _comuneros_
of Castile. There, also, revolt had been quenched in blood; but deep
bitterness rankled in men’s hearts. The people, oppressed by the nobles,
leagued against them with the royal power, and impatiently awaited the
hour of vengeance. Their hatred fell on the Moors, numerous in this
country, who, finding no shelter save on the nobles’ land, had, in the
struggle, espoused the cause of their suzerains. Popular irritation left
them, to save their lives, no refuge but baptism. The new converts,
lip- but not heart-Christians, bought from their overlords the right to
renounce this semblance of Christianity, to return to the rites of Islam,
which in reality they had never abjured. But the Inquisition watched them
keenly. The relapsed were summoned to re-enter the pale of the church
within thirty days under penalty of death and confiscation. The Moors,
instead of obeying, had recourse to arms and took refuge in the Sierra de
Bernia. There they maintained their position for some months, but hunger,
threats, and, above all, promises, decided them to submit.
And yet heroic attachment to the faith of their fathers drove this
unhappy people again to disobey, at the peril of their lives.
Then the last blow fell. An imperial decree ordered all Moors of both
sexes, who had not embraced Christianity, to quit Valencia before the
end of December, and Spain before the end of January. The only port
designated to them was that of Corunna. This port, the most distant of
all, offered a double advantage--that of keeping them far from Africa,
and making them spend all their money on the journey.
[Sidenote: [1527-1530 A.D.]]
Conquered, like their Andalusian brothers, by the iron necessity which
bound them, the Valencian Moors resigned themselves to baptism. The
neophytes were so numerous that it was found necessary to sprinkle
them collectively with the cleansing water. Spain enthusiastically
applauded this mockery of baptism. “But,” adds Sandoval,[f] in one of
those avowals, good to hear, which he in his candour makes, “there were
then at Valencia twenty-two thousand houses inhabited by Christians and
twenty-six thousand by Moors, and of these latter, there were not six
who received baptism willingly.” The Moors in the country, less broken
to the yoke than those of the towns, fortified themselves in the Sierra
de Espadan, near Segorbe. There, they defended themselves with success
against the troops which attacked them.
But one day, at Chilches, they pillaged the church and carried off with
them the holy sacrament. At the rumours of this sacrilege the entire
country rose. A crusade was preached by the legate, and indulgences
were granted as in the time of the holy wars. Volunteers flocked from
all parts eager to gain heaven and plunder. Selim, chief of the Moors,
displayed in this little-noted struggle talents worthy of a more vast
theatre. The war dragged on, until the emperor brought with him from
the Low Countries a corps of 4,000 Germans. The Moors, attacked on four
sides at once and driven from every position, were conquered, leaving
two thousand men on the field. The rest ended by yielding at discretion.
The conquerors had sustained considerable loss, but all was forgotten
in the joys of victory. The leaders of the insurrection suffered death;
the rest, disarmed, were put under strict surveillance, saw the mosques
closed, the holy books burned, and, after a useless and last resistance,
their only safety in baptism.
A fresh revolt of the Andalusian Moors in 1530 attested how precarious
was the liberty of worship granted them. We see them this time extending
a hand to their African brothers, more disposed than ever to succour
them. Barbarossa, happy in finding this gate of entry into the peninsula,
sent thirty-six vessels from Algiers with land troops. The Africans,
reunited with the Andalusian Moors, intrenched themselves in the Sierra
de Perdona, and repulsed the Spaniards who came to attack them. But soon,
convinced that the revolt offered nothing for the future, they offered
their Andalusian brothers to transport them, with all their goods, to the
African coast, and more than seventy thousand went to seek in Algeria the
liberty refused them in Spain.[e]
Into the interminable wars of this sovereign--in other words, into his
transactions as emperor of Germany--this chapter cannot enter. Those
in Italy, Germany, and France, must be sought in the histories of
those countries. We may mention that of two expeditions to the African
coast, to humble, if not to extirpate, the Mohammedan pirates, one was
successful, the other disastrous--the latter a casualty occasioned by
a tempest; that he compelled the Grand Turk, who penetrated into the
centre of Europe, to retreat; and that at the battle of Pavia he made
his great rival, Francis I, prisoner. His behaviour to that monarch was
neither dignified nor liberal: anxious to derive the utmost advantage
from circumstances, he exacted, as the price of liberation, conditions
which, after long hesitation, Francis signed, but with a protest that
they should not be binding. Accordingly, the French monarch was no sooner
in his own dominions than he openly evaded them, and again tried the
fortunes of war; but he could never--not even by his alliance with the
Lutherans and the Turks--obtain any advantage over his great rival.
[Sidenote: [1525-1556 A.D.]]
In 1525 Charles married the princess Isabella, sister of João III king
of Portugal. The issue of this union was, besides two daughters, the
infante Philip, born 1527, destined to be no less famous than himself.
For this son he endeavoured to procure the imperial crown of Germany, but
his brother Ferdinand, who had been elected king of the Romans, would
not forego the dignity, nor would the electors themselves favour the
pretensions of the young prince. In 1554, however, he procured for Philip
the hand of the English princess Mary; and that the marriage ceremony
might be performed with more splendour, he invested him with the regal
title by abdicating in his favour his Italian possessions--the kingdom of
Naples and the duchy of Milan. This was not enough: he was preparing to
abdicate the whole of his immense dominions, and to retire forever from
the world.
CHARLES RETIRES FROM THE WORLD
From the very prime of life the emperor appears to have meditated his
retreat from the world. In 1554, the death of his mother, queen Juana,
made him decide on the immediate fulfilment of his long-cherished
project. For this step, indeed, other reasons might be given. Though
only fifty-six, his frame was greatly enfeebled--the result alike of
constitutional weakness, and of incessant activity; and he was subject to
grievous attacks of the gout, no less than to other acute pains. In such
a state, where the least exertion naturally augmented his infirmities, we
may easily conceive that empire could afford him little gratification,
and that life itself must be a burden. That, in the hope of some
alleviation, he should wish to resign his load of “sceptred care,”
has nothing to create surprise. Having concluded a truce with Henry,
the successor of Francis--a truce, however, which the perfidy of the
Frenchman and the ambition of the pope rendered of short duration--and
recalled Philip from England, the emperor assembled at Brussels the
states of the Netherlands (October, 1555). There, amidst the most
imposing solemnity ever witnessed since the days of the Roman cæsars, he
resigned the sovereignty of the Low Countries, which he had inherited
from his father, the archduke Philip, into the hands of his son. In a
few weeks after this august ceremony, Charles, in one no less imposing,
resigned the crown of Spain and the dominions dependent on it both in
the Old and New worlds. The imperial crown he still retained, with the
view of once more negotiating with his brother Ferdinand in behalf of
his son; but in a few months afterwards he despatched the instrument
of resignation from the place which he had chosen for his retreat, the
monastery of San Yuste, or St. Justus, one of the most secluded and
delightful situations in Estremadura.[d]
It was necessary to ascend to the times of Diocletian, to find an example
of a similar abdication of empire, on so deliberate and extensive a
scale, and the great English historian of the Roman Empire has compared
the two acts with each other. But there seems a vast difference between
the cases. Both emperors were distinguished soldiers; both were merciless
persecutors of defenceless Christians; both exchanged unbounded empire
for absolute seclusion. But Diocletian was born in the lowest abyss of
human degradation--a slave and the son of a slave. For such a man, after
having reached the highest pinnacle of human greatness, voluntarily to
descend from power, seems an act of far greater magnanimity than the
retreat of Charles.
[Sidenote: [1556 A.D.]]
Born in the purple, having exercised unlimited authority from his
boyhood, and having worn from his cradle so many crowns and coronets,
the German emperor might well be supposed to have learned to estimate
them at their proper value. Contemporary minds were busy, however, to
discover the hidden motives which could have influenced him, and the
world, even yet, has hardly ceased to wonder. Yet it would have been more
wonderful, considering the emperor’s character, had he remained. The end
had not crowned the work; it not unreasonably discrowned the workman.
The earlier, and indeed the greater part of his career, had been one
unbroken procession of triumphs. The cherished dream of his grandfather,
and of his own youth, to add the pope’s triple crown to the rest of
the hereditary possessions of his family, he had indeed been obliged
to resign. He had too much practical Flemish sense to indulge long in
chimeras, but he had achieved the empire over formidable rivals, and he
had successively not only conquered, but captured almost every potentate
who had arrayed himself in arms against him. Clement and Francis, the
dukes and landgrafs of Cleves, Hesse, Saxony, and Brunswick, he had bound
to his chariot wheels; forcing many to eat the bread of humiliation and
captivity, during long and weary years. But the concluding portion of his
reign had reversed all its previous glories. His whole career had been
a failure. He had been defeated, after all, in most of his projects. He
had humbled Francis, but Henry had most signally avenged his father. He
had trampled upon Philip of Hesse and Frederick of Saxony; but it had
been reserved for one of that German race, which he characterised as
“dreamy, drunken, and incapable of intrigue,” to outwit the man who had
outwitted all the world, and to drive before him, in ignominious flight,
the conqueror of the nations.
While he was preparing to crush, forever, the Protestant church, with the
arms which a bench of bishops were forging, lo! the rapid and desperate
Maurice, with long red beard streaming like a meteor in the wind, dashing
through the mountain passes, at the head of his Lancers--arguments more
convincing than all the dogmas of Granvella! Disguised as an old woman,
the emperor had attempted on the 6th of April, 1552, to escape in a
peasant’s wagon, from Innsbruck into Flanders. Saved for the time by the
mediation of Ferdinand, he had, a few weeks later, after his troops had
been defeated by Maurice at Füssen, again fled at midnight of the 22nd of
May, almost unattended, sick in body and soul, in the midst of thunder,
lightning, and rain, along the difficult Alpine passes from Innsbruck
into Carinthia. His pupil had permitted his escape, only because, in his
own language, “for such a bird he had no convenient cage.” The imprisoned
princes now owed their liberation, not to the emperor’s clemency, but
to his panic. The Peace of Passau, in the following August, crushed
the whole fabric of the emperor’s toil, and laid the foundation of the
Protestant church.
On the other hand, the man who had dealt with Rome as if the pope, not
he, had been the vassal, was compelled to witness, before he departed,
the insolence of a pontiff who took a special pride in insulting and
humbling his house, and trampling upon the pride of Charles, Philip,
and Ferdinand. In France, too, the disastrous siege of Metz had taught
him that in the imperial zodiac the fatal sign of Cancer had been
reached. The figure of a crab, with the words “_plus citra_,” instead of
his proud motto of “_plus ultra_,” scrawled on the walls where he had
resided during that dismal epoch, avenged more deeply, perhaps, than the
jester thought, the previous misfortunes of France. The Grand Turk, too,
Suleiman the Magnificent, possessed most of Hungary, and held at that
moment a fleet ready to sail against Naples, in co-operation with the
pope and France. Thus the infidel, the Protestant, and the holy church
were all combined together to crush him. Towards all the great powers
of the earth he stood, not in the attitude of a conqueror, but of a
disappointed, baffled, defeated potentate. Moreover, he had been foiled
long before in his earnest attempts to secure the imperial throne for
Philip.
[Illustration: A SPANISH CAVALIER OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY]
[Sidenote: [1556-1558 A.D.]]
Had the emperor continued to live and reign, he would have found
himself likewise engaged in mortal combat with that great religious
movement in the Netherlands, which he would not have been able many
years longer to suppress, and which he left as a legacy of blood and
fire to his successor. Born in the same year with his century, Charles
was a decrepit, exhausted man at fifty-five, while that glorious age,
in which humanity was to burst forever the cerements in which it had
so long been buried, was but awakening to a consciousness of its
strength. Disappointed in his schemes, broken in his fortunes with income
anticipated, estates mortgaged, all his affairs in confusion; failing
in mental powers, and with a constitution hopelessly shattered--it was
time for him to retire. He showed his keenness in recognising the fact
that neither his power nor his glory would be increased, should he lag
superfluous on the stage when mortification instead of applause was
likely to be his portion. His frame was indeed but a wreck. Forty years
of unexampled gluttony had done their work. He was a victim to gout,
asthma, dyspepsia, gravel. He was crippled in the neck, arms, knees, and
hands. He was troubled with chronic cutaneous eruptions. His appetite
remained, while his stomach, unable longer to perform the task still
imposed upon it, occasioned him constant suffering. Physiologists, who
know how important a part this organ plays in the affairs of life, will
perhaps see in this physical condition of the emperor a sufficient
explanation, if explanation were required, of his descent from the
throne. The resolution to abdicate before his death had been long a
settled scheme with him. It had been formally agreed between himself and
the empress that they should separate at the approach of old age, and
pass the remainder of their lives in a convent and a monastery. He wished
to put a little space of religious contemplation between the active
portion of his life and the grave.
The romantic picture of his philosophical retirement at Yuste,
painted originally by Sandoval[f] and Siguenza,[g] reproduced by the
fascinating pencil of Strada,[o] and imitated in frequent succession
by authors of every age and country, is unfortunately but a sketch
of fancy. The investigations of modern writers have entirely thrown
down the scaffolding on which the airy fabric, so delightful to poets
and moralists, reposed. The departing emperor stands no longer in a
transparency robed in shining garments. His transfiguration is at an
end. Every action, almost every moment of his retirement, accurately
chronicled by those who shared his solitude, have been placed before our
eyes, in the most felicitous manner, by able and brilliant writers.[81]
The emperor, shorn of the philosophical robe in which he had been
conventionally arrayed for three centuries, shivers now in the cold air
of reality.
So far from his having immersed himself in profound and pious
contemplation, below the current of the world’s events, his thoughts,
on the contrary, never were for a moment diverted from the political
surface of the times. He read nothing but despatches; he wrote or
dictated interminable ones in reply, as dull and prolix as any which
ever came from his pen. He manifested a succession of emotions at the
course of contemporary affairs, as intense and as varied as if the
world still rested in his palm. He was, in truth, essentially a man of
action. He had neither the taste nor talents which make a man great
in retirement. Not a lofty thought, not a generous sentiment, not a
profound or acute suggestion in his retreat has been recorded from his
lips. The epigrams which had been invented for him by fabulists have
been all taken away, and nothing has been substituted, save a few dull
jests exchanged with stupid friars. So far from having entertained and
even expressed that sentiment of religious toleration for which he was
said to have been condemned as a heretic by the Inquisition, and for
which Philip was ridiculously reported to have ordered his father’s
body to be burned, and his ashes scattered to the winds, he became in
retreat the bigot effectually, which during his reign he had only been
conventionally. Bitter regrets that he should have kept his word to
Luther, as if he had not broken faith enough to reflect upon in his
retirement; stern self-reproach for omitting to put to death, while he
had him in his power, the man who had caused all the mischief of the age;
fierce instructions thundered from his retreat to the inquisitors to
hasten the execution of all heretics--including particularly his ancient
friends, preachers and almoners, Cazalla and Constantine de Fuente;
furious exhortations to Philip--as if Philip needed a prompter in such
a work--that he should set himself to “cutting out the root of heresy
with rigour and rude chastisement”--such explosions of savage bigotry as
these, alternating with exhibitions of revolting gluttony, with surfeits
of sardine omelettes, Estremadura sausages, eel pies, pickled partridges,
fat capons, quince syrups, iced beer, and flagons of Rhenish, relieved
by copious draughts of senna and rhubarb, to which his horror-stricken
doctor doomed him as he ate--compose a spectacle less attractive to
the imagination than the ancient portrait of the cloistered Charles.
Unfortunately it was the one which was painted from life.[m]
Charles died September 20th, 1558, not long after a rehearsal of his
own obsequies which it was his whim to experience. He was buried in the
monastery, but twelve years later his son Philip II removed the remains
to the family tombs in the Escorial. Before leaving the reign of Charles
V, the major part of which is left to the volume of German history, we
may quote an estimate of his administration as it affected Spain.[a]
DE MARIANI’S REVIEW OF THE INFLUENCE OF CHARLES V ON SPAIN
[Sidenote: [1517-1556 A.D.]]
Charles had been brought up by Adrian of Utrecht, later on
inquisitor-general and afterwards pope. His first minister was Cardinal
Ximenes de Cisneros, also inquisitor-general, the same who condemned
52,552 Spaniards, of whom 3,554 were burned. Thus Charles, by his
upbringing and the counsels he received as soon as he became king, was
imbued wholly with religious fanaticism and political tyranny. He was not
long in showing himself an apt pupil of the two inquisitors.
In spite of the inquisitorial hecatombs which spread terror through
Europe, there still existed men who defended public liberty. The last
accents of a perishing liberty echoed in the words addressed by the
cortes to Charles: “Remember, seigneur,” said they to the haughty prince,
“that a king is servant to his subjects.”
Charles hearkened to this and vowed silently never to forget it, but he
refrained from throwing it back into the face of this proud plebiscite,
and contented himself with sowing corruption as much as terror. He
succeeded in enervating popular energy, and gradually drew away into
Flanders the vital part of the nation, there to destroy by force
municipal liberties, while he confided the task of annihilating those of
Spain to the grand inquisitor-general Adrian and the regent.
What astonishing activity, what wonderful audacity were the Spaniards now
possessed with! Rest seemed impossible to these impetuous organisations;
and not being able to fight at home, they hastened after Columbus. In
1510 the Castilian banner was hoisted at Darien by Vasco Nuñez Balboa, in
1519 it was planted in Mexico by Ferdinand Cortes, and in 1524 in Peru
by Pizarro. Intrepid warriors, their audacity, their religious yet cruel
fanaticism strike us with astonishment, and even their crimes cannot
wholly suppress our admiration. In those far-off lands whose limits
were yet unknown, the first conquerors lacked space. They seemed to be
condemned by heaven to cut one another’s throats in expiation of their
crimes.
The forced humility which Charles V had shown before the cortes of
Valladolid weighed on his despotic heart. In haste to give the lie to
those words, “The king is the servant of his people,” he threw aside his
mask as soon as he felt strong enough to aim a blow at liberty. However,
the Spaniards were not yet accustomed to his attempted tyranny. They rose
in protest against this audacious violation of the oath. The perjured
deputies were the first victims to popular justice.
A civil war seemed inevitable, the future of Spanish public liberty to
hang on the fate of arms. Padilla put himself at the head of the members
of the communes, but the isolation of the provinces, the want of a bond
of communication between the various parties in the nation made this
sublime attempt ineffectual. The privileged classes, save the bishop
of Zamora, followed the orders of the Inquisition. Padilla, martyr to
liberty, lost his head on the scaffold, and with him perished Castilian
liberty.
In that very hour when Charles V was stifling resistance to despotism in
the blood of the last representative of popular power, a new adversary
was springing up in Germany. Luther lifted up his already powerful voice
in the Diet of Worms, braved both pope and emperor, shook the Catholic
faith, and developed that principle of reform which would, later on,
separate the empire from the Roman church. In that same year then
(1521) liberty, perishing in Spain, was reborn in Germany. So these two
great figures in history, fighting sternly in Germany, appeared at the
appointed day in the world’s theatre--one to destroy, the other to found
liberty. One, emperor and king, a great warrior, an eminent politician,
exercising most incontestable preponderance, conqueror at Pavia, master
of Italy, feared by the Turks whom he had crushed, gave himself up
to every despotic inspiration. He fulfilled the execrable mission of
overthrowing liberty wherever his arm could reach. After thirty years
of warfare, in which cunning, hypocrisy, and courage were alternately
employed, Charles fell under the burden of sterile glory. His star had
paled before Maurice of Saxony at Innsbruck, and before Henry II in the
bishoprics. Reduced in 1552 to treat with his enemies at Passau, he whom
the Diet of Frankfort had elected leader of Christianity militant ruined
Spain, ravished her liberty and ended by hiding his discouragement and
ennui in the depths of a cloister. He abdicated the Spanish throne in
favour of his son, the imperial sceptre was committed to his brother, and
Charles left nothing to posterity but the germ of all the evils developed
by his successors.
Charles V filled the world with his glory, his name, and colossal power,
yet never thought of creating a Spanish administration. If he wished to
concentrate supreme power in his own hands, it was certainly not with any
thought of improving the lot of his people, but only to wield a stronger
instrument of tyranny. Surrounded by strangers, he never knew the needs
of Spain nor cared to. All was sterile under his iron hand; slow to act,
Charles never revoked a decision. Neither force nor danger could draw
from him any concession. “I am naturally inclined to persist obstinately
in my good ideas,” he said one day to Contarini. “Sire,” answered the
other, “to persist in good ideas is not obstinacy, but firmness.” The
emperor interrupted him, “But I also persist in bad ones.” In 1520, the
taxes were so exorbitant that the towns declared they would have to
increase the crown revenues without fixing new contributions, and without
burdening, as they put it, the king’s conscience. This result, added
the towns, would easily be attained if the prince would regulate his
expenses by his revenue. The Catholic king spent 12,000 maravedis each
day. Charles spent 150,000. Ordinary contributions did not suffice, but
the cortes were opposed to new exactions. They would only vote subsidies
after the redress of wrongs. In the cortes of Corunna of 1520, Charles
found an obstinate resistance to voting for taxes. He triumphed, however,
and soon rid himself of this embarrassing obstacle, and in 1528 forced
the cortes to vote for subsidies before answering their demands. He
dismissed the cortes of 1529 which opposed the fixing of new taxes; and
again at Toledo, in 1538, he encountered opposition to his inroads.
Charles obtained an order from the pope to raise taxes on church goods.
Among other concessions made to him by Rome was the Cruzada bull
(authorising consumption of bacon and eggs on fast days). Commerce and
industry were terribly crippled. In 1526, Charles had recourse to his
wife’s portion to defray war expenses; in 1527, his army not having
received its pay, set out to ask the pope for that which the emperor
did not give. In 1529, Charles, not being able to go to Italy for want
of funds, ceded to Portugal for a large sum the Castilian rights in the
Moluccas. He sold the fortresses of Florence and Leghorn for 150,000
ducats to Cosmo de’ Medici. In a little more he would have sold the pope
the states of Milan and Siena. When all these resources were exhausted
he had recourse to foreign loans. The uncertainty of public credit, the
urgency of present needs obliged him to pay interest of ten, twenty, and
fifty per cent. Is not this like the Spain of to-day--swallowing up the
state revenues in advance?
By 1550, Charles had mortgaged the whole of his revenues--those of
Castile for 800,000 ducats on the 920,000 they yielded; those of Naples
and Sicily for 700,000 on the 800,000 which formed the revenue. Those
of Milan, amounting to 400,000 ducats, were entirely mortgaged, also a
large part of the Flemish revenues. All this without counting the sums
coming from America, the amount of which has been so disputed that it is
difficult to fix the value, but which must have been very considerable.
These usurious transactions ruined the country; their insufficiency
compelled the emperor to make fresh demands for money, but no one would
take his bond. Then foreigners, the only ones who would do so, acquired
privileges which killed native commerce and industry. Thus the lenders
had permission to export articles that Spaniards were forbidden to send
abroad. They held also a monopoly for importations. Nearly all the home
and Indian commerce came by these means into the hands of foreigners.
All appeals were useless, the growing necessities of the prince made him
deaf to the just complaints of his people. Thus there was no interior
organisation, no real government under the military despotism of the
first prince of the house of Habsburg. Charles V destroyed public
liberty, corrupted the nobility, tyrannised, oppressed the people,
destroyed industry and commerce, and lived only by expedients and
usurious contracts. A strong, intelligent administration would have
augmented the state revenue, by promoting general prosperity. Charles V
abandoned Spain to all the vice, all the excess of avaricious despotism
which dried up the sources of national prosperity.[n]
FOOTNOTES
[77] [The ducat may be taken as valuing approximately at 9_s._ 6_d._
or $2.30; it being remembered that gold purchased then much more
than now--the usual theory being that it had seven times its present
purchasing power.]
[78] [The name _germaneros_ was given to the rebels of Valencia who were
organised into a “brotherhood” or _germania_, a word closely allied in
sound and meaning to the Castilian _hermandad_ or “brotherhood.” The name
_comuneros_ is simply the Castilian for “commoners.”]
[79] In the defence of Pamplona the celebrated Ignatius de Loyola
received a wound in his leg. During his illness he resolved, if his life
were spared, to found the order of Jesuits, both for the destruction
of Lutheranism, and for the propagation of the Catholic religion among
distant nations. See in an earlier volume the chapter on Monasticism.
[80] The warlike bishop of Zamora was confined to the prison of Simancas;
there he committed a murder, and was hanged for it--a fit ending for so
stormy and unprincipled a life.
[81] See Stirling,[h] Bakhuyzen van den Brink,[i] the works of Mignet[j]
and Pichot,[k] and particularly the publication of M. Gachard,[l] in
which last work the subject may be considered to have been fairly
exhausted, and in which the text of Siguenza[g] and of the anonymous
manuscript discovered by M. Bakhuyzen, in the _greffe_ of the court of
appeals at Brussels, are placed in full before the reader, so far as they
bear on the vexed question as to the celebration by the emperor of his
own obsequies.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]