LATER HISTORY OF THE THIRTY YEARS' WAR.
After the death of Gustavus the Great, Chancellor Oxenstiern became
commander-in-chief; he was also chosen chief of the League of the
Protestant Princes against Austria. Oxenstiern was as earnest as
Gustavus, but the great genius and experience of the Christian soldier,
the large wisdom and sincere honesty of the great king were all missing,
and made the remainder of the war only a bloody record, with little of
the heroic, except the heroism of a steadfast standing to an unpleasant
delegated duty.
Wallenstein soon recruited a new army, but he now began to be distrusted
by both sides.[5] He failed to carry out the Edict of Restitution. He
appointed Protestants to good positions in the army.
Footnote 5:
Read Schiller's "Drama of Wallenstein."
Proofs yet exist that he was negotiating with Oxenstiern. Count Schlick
openly said: "Wallenstein is playing a double game." He received a
messenger from Richelieu. He was aiming first for the crown of Bohemia,
and it is believed that his astrologers had told him that the stars
proclaimed he would yet be Emperor of Germany. Ferdinand had long
watched him through spies, but Wallenstein, surrounded by his great
generals, was not easy to take in case he should not choose to submit to
arrest. Wallenstein had entered into a bond of friendship with about
thirty of his officers, who promised to be faithful unto death to him,
but even while the astrologer was telling him of coming triumph, an
Imperial proclamation declared that Wallenstein had been found guilty of
treasonable conspiracy, dismissed from the service and his officers
forbidden to take any orders whatever from him.
Wallenstein went to the strong fortress of Eyer in Bohemia, followed by
a good-sized army. Here he hoped to maintain himself till he could close
negotiations with the Duke of Weimar, with the Swedes and with
Richelieu, and carry his army to the other side. But the Emperor was
prepared before he made the proclamation.
Only four of the thirty officers remained true to him; in spite of their
written oaths of allegiance that they would sacrifice their estates and
shed their heart's blood for him. The Emperor offered a reward for him
dead or alive. These false friends proposed a great banquet in his
honor. The banquet lasted late into the night, while they drank to the
general's health and toasted him in fair speech. Suddenly a company of
ruffians burst into the hall, and, with the assistance of the traitors,
the four friends of Wallenstein were assassinated. The general had
retired to rest, not being well. Hearing the confusion he rose, dressed
and prepared for the worst. Suddenly the tramp of many feet were heard,
the door was burst open, and Devereau, at the head of thirty men, cried:
"Are you the villain who would betray our Emperor?" Wallenstein, like a
brave man, opened his arms wide, receiving in the breast his mortal
wound.
His vast property was confiscated and divided among his betrayers, all
of whom received offices, honors and wealth. Twenty-four lower officers
who were his friends fled, but were captured and beheaded at Pilsen. He
had a strong personal following. His soldiers laughed at being known as
Protestant, Catholic, German or foreigners; they declared they were
Wallensteiners. He cared for neither friend nor foe, but led his robber
band from State to State till it was laid waste, then moved on to the
next, leaving devastation in his wake.
The fifth and last period of the war was now entered upon, known as the
French-Swedish War. Richelieu made the Rhine the frontier of France, and
concluded an open alliance with Sweden.
Ferdinand II. now died, after having made his son Roman king. This
greatly angered Duke Maximilian, Richelieu and Pope Urban VIII., who had
other plans for that throne. Ferdinand died unmourned, after causing as
great sorrow as any human being who ever lived. During the remaining
eleven years before the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, Ferdinand III.
would gladly have made peace, but Germany was so defenceless that she
was simply in the hands of France and Sweden, one contending for, the
other against the Edict of Restitution, but the awful story of rapine,
murder, pestilence and death of those eleven years need not be told
here. (See Schiller's "Thirty Years' War.")
What was Christian Germany doing all this time? It kept the faith; it
sought consolation in God's word; it wrote the deep spiritual hymns of
the Church, hymns which have comforted the sorrowing from that day to
this.
The negotiations for peace extended over four years. While diplomats in
comfortable rooms were bickering over terms, armies were fighting,
soldiers dying, people starving, and utter misery prevailing. The
parties who had to subscribe to the peace were France, Sweden, the
Emperor, the various German States and princes, Frederick William, who
afterward became known as the great Elector of Brandenburg, Denmark,
Venice, Spain, Switzerland, England and the Netherlands. Sweden did not
receive Pomerania, which she demanded, but secured Western Pomerania,
with Rugen, Stettin and a few other places, and an indemnity of five
million thalers. But what was that to her loss?
The Treaty of Westphalia, in 1648, declared that the treaties of Passau
and Augsburg were confirmed. The Edict of Restitution was canceled. The
great Supreme Court of the Empire was to be half Protestant and half
Catholic. It legalized the break which had been made by Luther and the
other reformers. It gave liberty of conscience to the Protestant part of
Europe.
Against the Treaty of Westphalia the Pope of Rome made an earnest
protest that does not at this distance of time and place seem important.
This protest, however, was the pontifical declaration that in spite of
the treaty of Augsburg, Rome had never abandoned and never intends to
abandon the claim made by Gregory VIII., Innocent III., Bonifacius VIII.
and their successors, that the Pope of Rome is the supreme and exclusive
source of all ecclesiastical and political authority in all the world.
All the wars, murders, intrigues, massacres and apparent victories of
Charles V., Ferdinand II., of Philip II. of Spain, of Alva in the
Netherlands, the half Roman policy of Charles I. of England, came to
dire judgment in the Peace of Westphalia, and Catholic and Protestant
learned the deep lesson of religious toleration.
It took Luther, Calvin, Knox, Latimer, Ridley, Cranmer, Gustavus
Adolphus and Cromwell, the Huguenots of France, and all God's faithful
plain people of many nations to bring about the religious toleration we
now enjoy.
Sweden practically saved religious liberty to the world. So far this has
been her greatest contribution to history. Protestantism everywhere
means liberty of conscience, Romanism everywhere means absolutism.
Chancellor Oxenstiern, next to Gustavus, deserves the honors of that
war. By his great statesmanship and unfaltering dignity he secured
religious toleration, which was the chief thing fought for, and secured
a fair share of land and money for his impoverished country.
When the Thirty Years' War ended, not one of the great men who began it
was alive. Emperor Ferdinand II., King Christian II., Gustavus the
Great, Wallenstein, Tilly, Pappenheim, James I. of England, and
Richelieu, had all gone to give an account of the deeds done in the
body. For a whole century the remains of burned and ruined towns,
villages and desolated homes and farms marked the sorrows of the
cruelest long war of history.
In the Peace of Westphalia, 1648, ecclesiastical property was determined
by possession in 1624 (six years after the war began), and liberty of
conscience granted to the Protestants. This treaty was decided by France
and Sweden, and in many respects it bore hard on Germany. It was from
rights granted in this treaty that Louis XIV. treated Germany as a
vassal province, and that Napoleon I. brought the Empire to a close.[6]
The House of Hapsburg began to see the necessity of changing the title
of Emperor of Austria, though it kept the shell without the soul for one
hundred and forty years after the Peace of Westphalia. There was a
growing expectation that the young Elector of Brandenburg might become
the real ruler of northern Germany.
Footnote 6:
In the year 1800, Francis I. took the title Emperor of Austria.
Oxenstiern, supported by a cabinet, ruled over Sweden till Christina,
the daughter of Gustavus, in her eighteenth year, became Queen of
Sweden. This mannish queen was jealous of the fame of the old
Chancellor, and dishonored herself by dishonoring him. It is quite
possible that she was slightly insane. She scattered the crown property,
gave costly gifts to unworthy people, and at last she was in a measure
forced to abdicate in favor of her cousin, one of the Vasa family.
Having lost the love and respect of her subjects, she soon left Sweden
in masculine attire under the name of Count Dohna. She first went to
Brussels, and later to Italy. It had been known for some time that she
was greatly influenced by the Spanish minister at her court, and at
Innsbruck she openly joined the Roman Church, and was rechristened
Alexandria.
She made her way to Rome, was well received at the Vatican by the Pope.
In time she began to regret her course, and in 1666 and again in 1667
she returned to Sweden in the vain hope of regaining her crown. In 1668
she laid claim to the crown of Poland. Returning to Rome, she died in
1689, old, poor, neglected, at the age of sixty-three, and was buried in
St. Peter's Cathedral.
Christina was succeeded by Charles X. of Sweden.[7] He proved to be a
good ruler. The family of Vasa remained on the Swedish throne till 1810,
when, the Vasa family having no suitable heirs, the throne was offered
to Field Marshal Bernadotte, a famous general under Napoleon I., whose
favor was supposed to be secured by this act. Bernadotte became a
Lutheran under the title of Charles John, sometimes spoken of as Charles
XIV. In 1814 Norway entered into a union with Sweden which continued
until 1905.
Footnote 7:
Charles X. was son of John Cassimer, of Palatinate Zwerbrucken, and
Catherine, granddaughter of Gustavus I.
Charles XI. was succeeded by his son (in 1844), known as Oscar I., who
lived until 1859, when the Crown Prince Charles, who, on account of the
bad health of the king, had been acting as regent, now became king of
the two countries under the name of Charles XV.; he was succeeded by his
brother, the honored Oscar II., September 18th, 1872, and ruled till
December 8th, 1907.
It is not too much to say that Oscar II. was the best loved monarch of
his generation. It fell to his fate to assent to the loss of his
Norwegian crown, but the magnanimous manner in which he did this gained
more world-wide admiration than most rulers acquire by conquering an
empire.
It is interesting to know that the only scion of royalty of the Napoleon
dynasty now on a throne is the King of Sweden, through the family of
poor, deeply wounded Josephine. Eugene de Beauharnaise, son of
Josephine, married Augusta of Bavaria, their daughter became the wife of
Oscar I., whose grandson, Gustavus V., who came to the throne December
8th, 1907, now most ably rules over the Swedish people.
Scandinavia has produced great men in every walk of life, but the
proudest name that portion of the world has yet inscribed among the
Imperishables is that of
GUSTAVUS THE GREAT.
TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES
1. Silently corrected simple spelling, grammar, and typographical
errors.
2. Retained anachronistic and non-standard spellings as printed.
3. Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.