The dream of bliss became a nightmare. As the tide of Protestantism
ebbed and flowed in various parts of the Holy Roman Empire, so the
fortunes of the Brethren ebbed and flowed in the old home of their
fathers. We have seen how the Brethren rose to prosperity and power.
We have now to see what brought about their ruin. It was nothing in the
moral character of the Brethren themselves. It was purely and simply
their geographical position. If Bohemia had only been an island, as
Shakespeare seems to have thought it was, it is more than likely that
the Church of the Brethren would have flourished there down to the
present day. But Bohemia lay in the very heart of European politics; the
King was always a member of the House of Austria; the House of Austria
was the champion of the Catholic faith, and the Brethren now were
crushed to powder in the midst of that mighty European conflict known as
the Thirty Years' War. We note briefly the main stages of the process.
The first cause was the rising power of the Jesuits. For the last fifty
years these zealous men had been quietly extending their influence in
the country. They had built a magnificent college in Prague. They had
established a number of schools for the common people. They had obtained
positions as tutors in noble families. They went about from village to
village, preaching, sometimes in the village churches and sometimes
in the open air; and one of their number, Wenzel Sturm, had written an
exhaustive treatise denouncing the doctrines of the Brethren. But now
these Jesuits used more violent measures. They attacked the Brethren
in hot, abusive language. They declared that the wives of Protestant
ministers were whores. They denounced their children as bastards.
They declared that it was better to have the devil in the house than a
Protestant woman. And the more they preached, and the more they wrote,
the keener the party feeling in Bohemia grew.
The next cause was the Letter of Majesty itself. As soon as that Letter
was closely examined, a flaw was found in the crystal. We come to
what has been called the "Church Building Difficulty." It was clearly
provided in one clause of the Letter of Majesty that the Protestants
should have perfect liberty to build churches on all Royal estates. But
now arose the difficult question, what were Royal estates? What about
Roman Catholic Church estates? What about estates held by Catholic
officials as tenants of the King? Were these Royal estates or were
they not? There were two opinions on the subject. According to the
Protestants they were; according to the Jesuits they were not; and now
the Jesuits used this argument to influence the action of Matthias, the
next King of Bohemia. The dispute soon came to blows. At Klostergrab
the land belonged to the Catholic Archbishop of Prague; at Brunau it
belonged to the Abbot of Brunau; and yet, on each of these estates, the
Protestants had churches. They believed, of course, that they were in
the right. They regarded those estates as Royal estates. They had no
desire to break the law of the land. But now the Catholics began
to force the pace. At Brunau the Abbot interfered and turned the
Protestants out of the church. At Klostergrab the church was pulled
down, and the wood of which it was built was used as firewood; and in
each case the new King, Matthias, took the Catholic side. The truth
is, Matthias openly broke the Letter. He broke it on unquestioned Royal
estates. He expelled Protestant ministers from their pulpits, and put
Catholics in their place. His officers burst into Protestant churches
and interrupted the services; and, in open defiance of the law of the
land, the priests drove Protestants with dogs and scourges to the
Mass, and thrust the wafer down their mouths. What right, said the
Protestants, had the Catholics to do these things? The Jesuits had an
amazing answer ready. For two reasons, they held, the Letter of Majesty
was invalid. It was invalid because it had been obtained by force, and
invalid because it had not been sanctioned by the Pope. What peace could
there be with these conflicting views? It is clear that a storm was
brewing.
The third cause was the famous dispute about the Kingship. As Matthias
was growing old and feeble, it was time to choose his successor; and
Matthias, therefore, summoned a Diet, and informed the Estates, to their
great surprise, that all they had to do now was to accept as King
his adopted son, Ferdinand Archduke of Styria. At first the Diet was
thunderstruck. They had met to choose their own King. They intended
to choose a Protestant, and now they were commanded to choose this
Ferdinand, the most zealous Catholic in Europe. And yet, for some
mysterious reason, the Diet actually yielded. They surrendered their
elective rights; they accepted Ferdinand as King, and thus, at the most
critical and dangerous point in the whole history of the country, they
allowed a Catholic devotee to become the ruler of a Protestant people.
For that fatal mistake they had soon to pay in full. Some say they were
frightened by threats; some say that the Diet was summoned in a hurry,
and that only a few attended. The truth is, they were completely
outwitted. At this point the Protestant nobles of Bohemia showed that
fatal lack of prompt and united action which was soon to fill the whole
land with all the horrors of war. In vain Budowa raised a vehement
protest. He found but few to support him. If the Protestants desired
peace and good order in Bohemia, they ought to have insisted upon their
rights and elected a Protestant King; and now, in Ferdinand, they had
accepted a man who was pledged to fight for the Church of Rome with
every breath of his body. He was a man of fervent piety. He was a pupil
of the Jesuits. He regarded himself as the divinely appointed champion
of the Catholic faith. He had already stamped out the Protestants in
Styria. He had a strong will and a clear conception of what he regarded
as his duty. He would rather, he declared, beg his bread from door to
door, with his family clinging affectionately around him, than allow
a single Protestant in his dominions. "I would rather," he said, "rule
over a wilderness than over heretics." But what about his oath to
observe the Letter of Majesty? Should he take the oath or not? If he
took it he would be untrue to his conscience; if he refused he could
never be crowned King of Bohemia. He consulted his friends the Jesuits.
They soon eased his conscience. It was wicked, they said, of Rudolph
II. to sign such a monstrous document; but it was not wicked for the
new King to take the oath to keep it. And, therefore, Ferdinand took the
oath, and was crowned King of Bohemia. "We shall now see," said a lady
at the ceremony, "whether the Protestants are to rule the Catholics or
the Catholics the Protestants."
She was right. Forthwith the Protestants realised their blunder, and
made desperate efforts to recover the ground they had lost. Now was the
time for the Twenty-four Defenders to arise and do their duty; now was
the time, now or never, to make the Letter no longer a grinning mockery.
They began by acting strictly according to law. They had been empowered
to summon representatives of the Protestant Estates. They summoned their
assembly, prepared a petition, and sent it off to Matthias. He replied
that their assembly was illegal. He refused to remedy their grievances.
The Defenders were goaded to fury. At their head was a violent man,
Henry Thurn. He resolved on open rebellion. He would have the new King
Ferdinand dethroned and have his two councillors, Martinic and Slawata,
put to death. It was the 23rd of May, 1618. At an early hour on that
fatal day, the Protestant Convention met in the Hradschin, and then,
a little later, the fiery Thurn sallied out with a body of armed
supporters, arrived at the Royal Castle, and forced his way into the
Regent's Chamber, where the King's Councillors were assembled. There, in
a corner, by the stove sat Martinic and Slawata. There, in that Regent's
Chamber, began the cause of all the woe that followed. There was struck
the first blow of the Thirty Years' War. As Thurn and his henchmen stood
in the presence of the two men, who, in their opinion, had done the most
to poison the mind of Matthias, they felt that the decisive moment
had come. The interview was stormy. Voices rang in wild confusion. The
Protestant spokesman was Paul von Rican. He accused Martinic and Slawata
of two great crimes. They had openly broken the Letter of Majesty, and
had dictated King Matthias's last reply. He appealed to his supporters
crowded into the corridor outside.
"Aye, aye," shouted the crowd.
"Into the Black Tower with them," said some.
"Nay, nay," said Rupow, a member of the Brethren's Church, "out of the
window with them, in the good old Bohemian fashion."
At this signal, agreed upon before, Martinic was dragged to the window.
He begged for a father confessor.
"Commend thy soul to God," said someone. "Are we to allow any Jesuit
scoundrels here?"
"Jesus! Mary!" he screamed.
He was flung headlong from the window. He clutched at the window-sill.
A blow came down on his hands. He had to leave go, and down he fell,
seventy feet, into the moat below.
"Let us see," said someone, "whether his Mary will help him."
He fell on a heap of soft rubbish. He scrambled away with only a wound
in the head.
"By God," said one of the speakers, "his Mary has helped him."
At this point the conspirators appear to have lost their heads. As
Martinic had not been killed by his fall, it was absurd to treat Slawata
in the same way; and yet they now flung him out of the window, and his
secretary Fabricius after him. Not one of the three was killed, not one
was even maimed for life, and through the country the rumour spread that
all three had been delivered by the Virgin Mary.
>From that moment war was inevitable. As the details of the struggle do
not concern us, it will be enough to state here that the Defenders now,
in slipshod fashion, began to take a variety of measures to maintain the
Protestant cause. They formed a national Board of Thirty Directors. They
assessed new taxes to maintain the war, but never took the trouble to
collect them. They relied more on outside help than on their own united
action. They deposed Ferdinand II.; they elected Frederick, Elector
Palatine, and son-in-law of James I. of England, as King of Bohemia; and
they ordered the Jesuits out of the kingdom. There was a strange scene
in Prague when these Jesuits departed. They formed in procession in
the streets, and, clad in black, marched off with bowed heads and loud
wailings; and when their houses were examined they were found full of
gunpowder and arms. For the moment the Protestants of Prague were wild
with joy. In the great Cathedral they pulled off the ornaments and
destroyed costly pictures. What part did the Brethren play in these
abominations? We do not know. At this tragic point in their fateful
story our evidence is so lamentably scanty that it is absolutely
impossible to say what part they played in the revolution. But one thing
at least we know without a doubt. We know that the Catholics were now
united and the Protestants quarrelling with each other; we know that
Ferdinand was prompt and vigorous, and the new King Frederick stupid and
slack; and we know, finally, that the Catholic army, commanded by the
famous general Tilly, was far superior to the Protestant army under
Christian of Anhalt. At last the Catholic army appeared before the walls
of Prague. The battle of the White Hill was fought (November 8th, 1620).
The new King, in the city, was entertaining some ambassadors to dinner.
The Protestant army was routed, the new King fled from the country, and
once again Bohemia lay crushed under the heel of the conqueror.
At this time the heel of the conqueror consisted in a certain Prince
Lichtenstein. He was made regent of Prague, and was entrusted with the
duty of restoring the country to order. He set about his work in a cool
and methodical manner. He cleared the rabble out of the streets. He
recalled the Jesuits. He ordered the Brethren out of the kingdom. He put
a Roman Catholic Priest into every church in Prague; and then he made
the strange announcement that all the rebels, as they were called, would
be freely pardoned, and invited the leading Protestant nobles to appear
before him at Prague. They walked into the trap like flies into a
cobweb. If the nobles had only cared to do so, they might all have
escaped after the battle of the White Hill; for Tilly, the victorious
general, had purposely given them time to do so. But for some reason
they nearly all preferred to stay. And now Lichtenstein had them in his
grasp. He had forty-seven leaders arrested in one night. He imprisoned
them in the castle tower, had them tried and condemned, obtained the
approval of Ferdinand, and then, while some were pardoned, informed the
remaining twenty-seven that they had two days in which to prepare for
death. They were to die on June 21st. Among those leaders about a dozen
were Brethren. We have arrived at the last act of the tragedy. We have
seen the grim drama develop, and when the curtain falls the stage will
be covered with corpses and blood.