GUSTAVUS IN GERMANY.—CONTINUED.
The battle of Breitenfield marks an important epoch in history.
Ferdinand had a dream of annexing all northern Europe to the Holy Roman
Empire. When he failed at Stralsund he saw the limit of his northern
stretch; at Breitenfield he knew the limitations of his army. This
battle really restored to freedom and to Protestantism all northern
Europe.
It marks an era in military affairs. Gustavus had practiced his army in
great flexibility, or mobility, and this quality had triumphed over
weight and numbers. Colonel Munro says: "Oh! would to God I had once
again such a leader to fight such another day in this old quarrel, and
though I died standing, I should be persuaded I died well."
The united forces of the Emperor and the Catholic League were broken.
Gustavus now reaped the benefit of all his smaller conquests. Of the
great Imperial army but two thousand remained, with Tilly old,
discouraged and discredited. The peasantry fell upon Tilly's retreating
army and almost annihilated it. On every side rang the words of a rude
song of the period, "Fly, Tilly, fly!" It was howled and hissed and
yelled by the peasantry till he had fled far southward. Tilly was
heartbroken as much by the hate shown his men in retreat as by the
disasters of the battlefield.
Gustavus now had full liberty to go wherever he desired. Richelieu
expected the King of Sweden to march at once to Vienna. The Elector of
Saxony urged the same course. When Oxenstiern came, soon after this, on
a short visit and met his king at Mainz he said plainly: "I would rather
have proffered my congratulations at Vienna." But the king thought
differently; he knew the wily electors who might at any time stab him in
the back, and he doubtless understood Ferdinand's hereditary position,
that, though driven from Vienna he would have the heart loyalty of all
Catholics and many Protestants as Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, and
Gustavus believed such a course would greatly protract the war.
Gustavus said, "First pure, then peaceable;" so as he passed through the
country having churches rebuilt, property restored, and above all,
restoring hope and courage to the desolated provinces, he was everywhere
hailed as a friend and deliverer, and just for a short time in the lull
after the battle, it looked as if his work were really done.
Even after this great battle he continued to preserve perfect
discipline; every morning public prayer was offered to God, and
Gustavus, with bared head stood before his victorious army leading them
in a hymn of thanksgiving. What an object-lesson in godliness it was
alike to the pious and the impious, not alone for that age, but for all
time to come.
The defeat of the Imperialists at Breitenfield settled the fate of the
Edict of Restitution. At Vienna pious Catholics wondered "if God had
indeed turned Lutheran."
At Halle, Gustavus divided his army. He sent the Elector of Saxony into
Bohemia, which was most anxious to shake off the Imperial yoke. The King
of Sweden may have remembered that Bohemia was Ferdinand's crown lands
and the Elector of Saxony would by that act forever exclude himself from
Ferdinand's favor and be most fully committed to the perpetual alliance
with Sweden. Gustavus himself undertook to march over all western
Germany and to crush out the Catholic League in its different centers.
Even the Catholics who had been so badly treated by Tilly's army, seeing
the good conduct of the Swedish troops, came out to meet Gustavus and
greeted him as the liberator of the country. His march through Thuringia
and Franconia to the Main and the Rhine reads like a triumphal
procession.
The Duke of Saxe-Weimar now joined forces with Gustavus. He proved to be
a skillful general and was useful in many ways, especially because of
his familiarity with the country.
As Gustavus approached Wurzburg the Catholic bishop of that city, so
noted for his persecution of Protestants, fled and left his people to
the mercy of the invaders. The city surrendered without any resistance.
The king considered that as the country had been abandoned by its rulers
the sovereignty became his, so he appointed a cabinet, one-half of whose
members were Protestants. He restored to the Protestants their churches
and encouraged the Catholics to attend their own churches, and to put
them in repair. Only those who refused to submit were severely dealt
with. He was really the first prince who understood religious
toleration. In every place he claimed that as God's dealing is personal
to each individual, each person should have liberty of conscience.
On one occasion when a Catholic town had been captured, his officers
suggested that here he could revenge Magdeburg. The king answered, "I
have come to break the chains of slavery and not to forge new ones. Let
them live as they have done hitherto."
Gustavus now made a triumphal march, loved and respected by both
Catholics and Protestants, through the garden spot of Germany. After
resting his weary troops in the rich district of Wurzburg, he continued
his march to Frankfort-on-the-Main, which opened her gates at the first
summons. Gustavus crossed the Rhine at Oppenheim and on December 20th he
entered Mainz, having cleared the Palatinate of its Spanish garrison.
The Elector of Saxony and General Armin invaded Bohemia and occupied
Prague. Gustavus now commanded from the Arctic Ocean to the Alps, and
from the Rhine to the Moldau. He encamped at Main with an army of twenty
thousand men. All the Protestant princes here paid him court. It was his
plan to form a Corpus Evangelicum, or Union, under the protection of
Sweden, which would include what is now called Germany and all
Scandinavia.
France was much disconcerted by these Swedish victories. It was all
right to curtail the pretensions of the House of Hapsburg, but to the
eyes of Richelieu it would be a much worse fate for a new Emperor of
Germany to bear the name of Gustavus than to let the Hapsburgs have
undue sway.
Richelieu now insisted that Gustavus must come to an understanding with
the Catholic League of southern Germany. Gustavus refused to surrender
his conquests till the League saw that Maximilian of Bavaria, who was
the head of the League, was disarmed. Richelieu at that broke his
alliance with Gustavus and renewed his alliance with the Emperor. This
was quite equivalent to a declaration of war. Richelieu declared himself
the protector of the Catholic princes. They again took heart and brought
together their armies in behalf of Austria.
The Jesuits who were at the Protestant courts succeeded in again
stirring up the envy and jealousy of those weak northern Protestant
German Electors. The Elector of Saxony now went back in heart, if not in
force, to Austria.
Gustavus had felt that this would occur, and this was the main reason he
had not pushed his triumph to Vienna. He now quickly conquered
Franconia. Frankfort-on-the-Main, instead of opening her gates in
welcome at his approach, wanted a parley. This city had received special
commercial advantages from the Empire, and now they feared if Gustavus
were well received they would lose their celebrated fairs. When summoned
to surrender they sent a deputation to the King of Sweden explaining
these conditions and hoping he would not urge compliance with his
demands.
Gustavus was justly indignant. He said: "I am very much astonished that
when the liberties of Germany and the Protestant religion are at stake
the citizens of Frankfort talk of annual fairs, and postpone for
temporal interests the great cause of their country and their
conscience." He continued: "I have managed to find the keys of every
town and fortress from the Island of Rugen to the Main, and I know where
to find the key of Frankfort. The safety of Germany and the freedom of
the Protestant faith are the sole objects of my invasion. Conscious of
the justice of the cause, I am determined not to allow any object to
impede my progress. I am well aware that the inhabitants of Frankfort
wish to stretch out only a finger to me, but I must have the whole hand
to grasp."
With his army he escorted the deputies back to the city, and in full
battle array awaited the decision of the city. The gates were
immediately opened and the entire army marched through the old imperial
city, making a magnificent procession conducted in wonderful order. Here
again the Protestant princes came to offer congratulations, to secure
favors, or to appease his indignation at their heavy apathy. It was in
Frankfort that the crown was yet voted upon, and placed on the one
selected as head of the Holy Roman Empire.
Queen Eleanor Marie here visited him in company with Chancellor
Oxenstiern. Neither of them approved of the brilliant court surrounding
Gustavus, and the queen, with the swift intuitive knowledge which God
gives to good women, felt that underneath all these protestations these
Protestant princes had envy and jealousy in their hearts. Oxenstiern,
that keen judge of men, came to the same conclusions. The king felt
these things himself, and felt, also, that these princes, so divided
among themselves, had little religion worth defending. He occasionally
broke out in public, showing his surprise and pain at the attitude of
their minds. On one occasion he said: "I wish to make peace if I am
offered honorable conditions, such as will secure the welfare of the
Protestant princes and their oppressed subjects, for whose sake I have
undertaken this war and shed my blood. But I shall never conclude a
peace by which the honor of Protestant princes would be sacrificed,
their unhappy subjects bear an iron yoke, and our religion compromised."
George, Landgrave of Hesse Darmstadt, professed great friendship for the
king, but secretly kept up a continued intercourse with the Emperor. On
one occasion, when an unusual number of traitors happened to be among
his guests, Gustavus said to George of Hesse Darmstadt: "If the Emperor
does not care for me I shall not care for him. You may inform him of
this, for I know you are well disposed towards his majesty." The
landgrave was greatly confused by this unexpected thrust and stammered
some excuse, but Gustavus continued: "He who receives $30,000.00 a year
has indeed a reason to be the Emperor's friend. Were I to make such a
present to anyone he must have well deserved it. It would be easy for me
to enter into negotiations did I not consider the danger to those who
have assisted me in this war for the restoration of the true religion."
That which the friends of Gustavus most feared was assassination. He
suddenly awoke one night and found an armed man who proved to be a
Catholic priest of Antwerp in his room. Jesuits were sent through the
country to circulate calumnies against him. In Menz public prayer was
offered for him, and at the same time an assassin was paid to take his
life.
At Vienna on two successive days all Catholics were urged to pray for
the successful execution of a project which God and one man knew, and on
which the welfare of the Roman Church depended.
Gustavus well knew of all these things, but he declared that he could
not live shut up in a box, and he urged that when he should be called to
his account God would raise up another leader, that it was the cause and
not the individual that God was leading to victory.
The entire Catholic world was now clamoring that Richelieu was
misrepresenting France by being the friend of Gustavus, an enemy of the
Catholic Church. Richelieu tried to persuade the Catholic League to
complete neutrality, and leave Ferdinand and Gustavus to fight it out,
Richelieu's sole object being to limit the ruling house of Austria.
Gustavus now plainly saw that no reconciliation was possible between the
Catholic League and the Protestant Union, if the latter could be said to
exist. He saw that German princes desired to settle with him on a money
basis like a hireling, to give him no representation for Pomerania in
the Diet, that their envy and jealousy at his success was greater than
their love for Protestantism, and that they really preferred the House
of Austria Catholic than him as a Protestant ruler, and that they were
too jealous of each other to secure a Protestant Union if it were to be
under the protection of Sweden. So in order to arrange with Richelieu
for neutrality towards Bavaria he required that the League cease from
all hostilities, that they call in all troops belonging to the League
from the Emperor's army, from all conquered towns and from the
Protestant territory. He also insisted on the reduction of their army,
the exclusion of the Imperial troops from their territory, the
restoration of all property taken from Protestants, the concession of
religious liberty, and the expulsion of the Jesuits.
In order to arrange for the treaty to be fully considered, Gustavus had
agreed for a cessation of hostilities for two weeks, so that Richelieu
might induce the Elector of Bavaria to accept the conditions. But while
the French commissioner was assuring Gustavus of the favorable progress
of these negotiations an intercepted letter between the Elector and
Pappenheim, the commanding general of the Austrian army, showed that the
Elector had no other object in causing the delay than the better
preparation for continued war. Thereupon Gustavus notified Richelieu of
his treachery, with word that he would now invade Bavaria.
When the Pope, Urban VIII., heard of this he said: "The King of Sweden
would commit a great imprudence if he advanced anywhere before crushing
Maximilian." The Catholic League was never able to induce this Pope to
make any public anathemas against Gustavus, for the Pope knew that the
Hapsburgs were striving for personal and family aggrandizement under the
pretence of fighting for the Church. He also knew that religious liberty
prevailed wherever Gustavus conquered.
Gustavus' rest was interrupted by hearing that Tilly was ravaging
Franconia, and was marching on Nuremberg. He hastened to meet Tilly, who
retreated towards the Danube.
Gustavus entered Nuremberg March 21st, 1632, supported by his staff and
a company of cavalry. He left his army at Fürth, a short distance from
the city. His generals and the Protestant princes whose country he had
delivered rode with him through the streets of that ancient city. The
magistrates offered him the keys of the city, and the people made a
great demonstration of rejoicing. The ringing of the bells, the firing
of many cannon and the welcoming shouts of the grateful people stirred
the heart of Gustavus Adolphus so that he showed great emotion. His fine
appearance, his pleasing personality, his cordial manners completely won
the hearts of the people of Nuremberg.
At his hotel he received the presents sent by the town. These consisted
of money and two cannon with ammunition for his army, also two silver
globes of the famous Nuremberg workmanship. The king addressed the
waiting people. His words were put into a circular and sent throughout
the country. He said: "I thank you and the city for these valuable
presents. In return I can wish you nothing better than perseverance in
the evangelical faith. May nothing turn you from it, neither threats nor
promises nor any passion to which human nature is liable. You have given
me the emblems of heaven and earth. May the riches of earth not make you
forgetful of the still more precious treasures of heaven. I ask for you
this grace of God. We have cunning, wicked and powerful enemies. All
their thoughts are bent on the destruction of Protestantism. Apparently
they seek peace, but peace would indeed prove fatal to you, to all
Protestants, and ruinous to many millions of souls.
"God has entrusted you with the administration of a rich and powerful
city. I do not doubt of your governing it so that you need not fear the
account which will one day be required of you before God's tribunal.
Your city, encompassed with dangers and persecutions, has as yet been
miraculously preserved. I have myself been not less miraculously
preserved since arriving in these countries. I had expected to see the
end of the world rather than your city. In the misfortunes which have
befallen your brethren, and in your own sufferings, God intended to make
you feel and acknowledge what great sinners we all are.
"It is for your sake, for the defence of the gospel, that I have left my
peaceful native land and have come to these disturbed countries. It is
for this cause I have sacrificed the resources of my poor subjects,
their blood, exposed my life and renounced domestic happiness. I shall
do all that the grace of God will give me strength to do. On your side,
learn to suffer for a short time if it is necessary for our holy cause.
Remain faithful to it. God will bless you. He will increase your city
and make it prosperous, and your renown will spread everywhere. Let us
together praise, magnify and glorify God here on earth, and in heaven
forever."
After dinner the king left the city amid the enthusiastic admiration of
the people. His pictures were scattered throughout the country, poems
were written wherein he was likened to Moses, to Joshua, to Gideon, to
David, and even to Judas Maccabeus, the deliverer of his nation,
showing, at least, that the people knew well their Bible history.
The signal for Gustavus to leave that part of the country was the sudden
advance of Tilly against Gustavus Horn, one of the Swedish generals.
Tilly compelled General Horn to evacuate the bishopric of Bamberg.
Gustavus pursued the Imperialists into Bavaria, forced the passage of
the Danube at Donauwörth, where Tilly's forces retreated under a galling
artillery fire from the Swedish batteries. The conquest of Donauwörth
made the king controller of the Danube, and only the small River Lech
kept him from the States of Maximilian, who seems to have been about all
that was left of the Catholic League.
The Lech is usually a small stream, but the melting snow in the Tyrol
mountains had made it a raging torrent. Tilly's forces were in a
strongly fortified camp protected by this roaring current, so that the
position was impregnable. The armies were within speaking distance of
each other. As the king rode along the bank he called to the sentinel on
the opposite side, "Good morning, sir. Where is old Tilly?" "Praise God,
he is in his quarters at Main," said the man, then added, "Where is the
king, comrade?" "He is in his quarters, too," said Gustavus. "What! you
don't mean to say he has got any quarters, do you?" "Oh, yes. Come over
here yourself and you shall have excellent quarters."
It was just that spirit of humor which endeared Gustavus to his polyglot
army. Gustavus rode up and down the bank reconnoitering. He soon
observed that the side on which his army was located was considerably
higher than the other side, so he arranged three batteries with
seventy-two field pieces, keeping up a ruinous cross fire on the
Bavarians. While this was going on the king's army built a bridge across
the Lech. They kept the Bavarians very busy on account of the
destructive fire of the artillery, and they made a great smoke with wet
straw and wet wood so that their work was concealed for some time from
General Tilly. Gustavus fired over sixty guns with his own hands and
seemed to be everywhere among his men cheering and directing them.
General Tilly, though a much older man, would not leave the opposite
bank of the river; no danger from that cross fire could drive him from
his post, and there he was mortally wounded and carried from the field.
The Bavarians gave way and the dying Tilly advised Maximilian to
retreat. So before a single one of Gustavus' army had crossed the river
Maximilian broke camp and retreated to Neuburg and to Ingolstadt.
When Gustavus arrived in their vacated camp he said, "Had I been a
Bavarian, though a cannon ball had carried away my beard and chin, never
would I have abandoned a position like this and laid open my territory
to my enemies." Gustavus could now have gone through Bavaria, but he
greatly desired to relieve Augsburg, whose very name is dear to the
Protestant world. He entered Augsburg on April 14th, 1632, and found
every Protestant church closed. He found that the Edict of Restitution
had here been enforced with great severity, its administration had been
entrusted to a most bigoted Catholic, and the Protestants had been
outraged in their feelings in the birthplace of their confession of
faith. The King expelled the Bavarian soldiers and put Protestant
magistrates in command of the city.
Then Gustavus, his staff and leading officers, went to Saint Ann's
Church, which with many others he restored to the Protestant faith. His
chaplain, Dr. Fabricus, preached from Ps. 12:5—"For the oppression of
the poor, for the sighing of the needy, now will I arise, saith the
Lord. I will set him in safety from him that puffeth at him." The
citizens were filled with emotion as they sang again the songs of Zion.
Dr. Fabricus gave thanks for their great deliverance, and the whole
congregation chanted the words of the psalms—"Bless the Lord, O my soul,
and forget not all His benefits." "The Lord executeth righteousness and
judgment for all that are oppressed."
The citizens spent several days in rejoicing, but Gustavus felt that he
must follow up the pursuit of the Bavarian army, and did not stay longer
to assist in celebrating their deliverance.