the troops of the elector. In vain they looked for the host of angels
which Münzer had promised would come to their aid. Not the glimpse of an
angel's wing appeared in the sky. Münzer himself took to flight, and his
infatuated followers, their blind courage vanished, fell an easy prey to
the swords of the soldiers.
The greater part of the peasant horde were slain, while Münzer, who had
concealed himself from pursuit in the loft of a house in Frankenhausen,
was quickly discovered, dragged forth, put to the rack, and beheaded,
his death putting an end to that first phase of the Anabaptist outbreak.
[Illustration: OLD HOUSES AT MÜNSTER.]
After this event, several years passed during which the Anabaptists kept
quiet, though their sect increased. Then came one of the most remarkable
religious revolts which history records. Persecution in Germany had
caused many of the new sectarians to emigrate to the Netherlands, where
their preachings were effective, and many new members were gained. But
the persecution instigated by Charles V. against heretics in the
Netherlands fell heavily upon them and gave rise to a new emigration,
great numbers of the Anabaptists now seeking the town of Münster, the
capital of Westphalia. The citizens of this town had expelled their
bishop, and had in consequence been treated with great severity by
Luther, in his effort to keep the cause of religious reform separate
from politics. The new-comers were received with enthusiasm, and the
people of Münster quickly fell under the influence of two of their
fanatical preachers, John Matthiesen, a baker, of Harlem, and John
Bockhold, or Bockelson, a tailor, of Leyden.
Münster soon became the seat of an extraordinary outburst of profligacy,
fanaticism, and folly. The Anabaptists took possession of the town,
drove out all its wealthy citizens, elected two of themselves--a
clothier named Knipperdolling and one Krechting--as burgomasters, and
started off in a remarkable career of self-government under Anabaptist
auspices.
A community of property was the first measure inaugurated. Every person
was required to deposit all his possessions, in gold, silver, and other
articles of value, in a public treasury, which fell under the control of
Bockelson, who soon made himself lord of the city. All the images,
pictures, ornaments, and books of the churches, except their Bibles,
were publicly burned. All persons were obliged to eat together at public
tables, all made to work according to their strength and without regard
to their former station, and a general condition of communism was
established. Bockelson gave himself out as a prophet, and quickly gained
such influence over the people that they were ready to support him in
the utmost excesses of folly and profligacy.
One of the earliest steps taken was to authorize each man to possess
several wives, the number of women who had sought Münster being six
times greater than the men. John Bockelson set the example by marrying
three at once. His licentious example was quickly followed by others,
and for a full year the town continued a scene of unbridled profligacy
and mad license. One of John's partisans, claiming to have received a
divine communication, saluted him as monarch of the whole globe, the
"King of Righteousness," his title of royalty being "John of Leyden,"
and declared that heaven had chosen him to restore the throne of David.
Twenty-eight apostles were selected and sent out, charged to preach the
new gospel to the whole earth and to bring its inhabitants to
acknowledge the divinely-commissioned king. Their success was not
great, however. Wherever they came they were seized and immediately
executed, the earth showing itself very unwilling to accept John of
Leyden as its king.
In August, 1534, an army, led by Francis of Waldeck, the expelled
bishop, who was supported by the landgrave of Hesse and several other
princes, advanced and laid siege to the city, which the Anabaptists
defended with furious zeal. In the first assault, which was made on
August 30, the assailants were repulsed with severe loss. They then
settled down to the slower but safer process of siege, considering it
easier to starve out than to fight out their enthusiastic opponents.
One of the two leaders of the citizens, John Matthiesen, made a sortie
against the troops with only thirty followers, filled with the idea that
he was a second Gideon, and that God would come to his aid to defeat the
oppressors of His chosen people. The aid expected did not come, and
Matthiesen and his followers were all cut down. His death left John of
Leyden supreme. He claimed absolute authority in the new "Zion,"
received daily fresh visions from heaven, which his followers implicitly
believed and obeyed, and indulged in wild excesses which only the insane
enthusiasm of his followers kept them from viewing with disgust. Among
his mad freaks was that of running around the streets naked, shouting,
"The King of Zion is come." His lieutenant Knipperdolling, not to be
outdone in fanaticism, followed his example, shouting, "Every high place
shall be brought low." Immediately the mob assailed the churches and
pulled down all the steeples. Those who ventured to resist the monarch's
decrees were summarily dealt with, the block and axe, with
Knipperdolling as headsman, quickly disposing of all doubters and
rebels.
Such was the doom of Elizabeth, one of the prophet's wives, who declared
that she could not believe that God had condemned so many people to die
of hunger while their king was living in abundance. John beheaded her
with his own hands in the market-place, and then, in insane frenzy,
danced around her body in company with his other wives. Her loss was
speedily repaired. The angels were kept busy in picking out new wives
for the inspired tailor, till in the end he had seventeen in all, one of
whom, Divara by name, gained great influence by her spirit and beauty.
While all this was going on within the city, the army of besiegers lay
encamped about it, waiting patiently till famine should subdue the
stubborn courage of the citizens. Numbers of nobles flocked thither by
way of pastime, in the absence of any other wars to engage their
attention. Nor were the citizens without aid from a distance. Parties of
their brethren from Holland and Friesland sought to relieve them, but in
vain. All their attempts were repelled, and the siege grew straiter than
ever.
The defence from within was stubborn, women and boys being enlisted in
the service. The boys stood between the men and fired arrows effectively
at the besiegers. The women poured lime and melted pitch upon their
heads. So obstinate was the resistance that the city might have held out
for years but for the pinch of famine. The effect of this was
temporarily obviated by driving all the old men and the women who could
be spared beyond the walls; but despite this the grim figure of
starvation came daily nearer and nearer, and the day of surrender or
death steadily approached.
A year at length went by, the famine growing in virulence with the
passing of the days. Hundreds perished of starvation, yet still the
people held out with a fanatical courage that defied assault, still
their king kept up their courage by divine revelations, and still he
contrived to keep himself sufficiently supplied with food amid his
starving dupes.
At length the end came. Some of the despairing citizens betrayed the
town by night to the enemy. On the night of June 25, 1535, two of them
opened the gates to the bishop's army, and a sanguinary scene ensued.
The betrayed citizens defended themselves desperately, and were not
vanquished until great numbers of them had fallen and the work of famine
had been largely completed by the sword. John of Leyden was made
prisoner, together with his two chief men,--Knipperdolling, his
executioner, and Krechting, his chancellor,--they being reserved for a
slower and more painful fate.
For six months they were carried through Germany, enclosed in iron
cages, and exhibited as monsters to the people. Then they were taken
back to Münster, where they were cruelly tortured, and at length put to
death by piercing their hearts with red-hot daggers.
Their bodies were placed in iron cages, and suspended on the front of
the church of St. Lambert, in the market-place of Münster, while the
Catholic worship was re-established in that city. The cages, and the
instruments of torture, are still preserved, probably as salutary
examples to fanatics, or as interesting mementos of Münster's past
history.
The Münster madness was the end of trouble with the Anabaptists. They
continued to exist, in a quieter fashion, some of them that fled from
persecution in Germany and Holland finding themselves exposed to almost
as severe a persecution in England. As a sect they have long since
vanished, while the only trace of their influence is to be seen in those
recent sects that hold the doctrine of adult baptism.
The history of mankind presents no parallel tale to that we have told.
It was an instance of insanity placed in power, of lunacy ruling over
ignorance and fanaticism; and the doings of John of Leyden in Münster
may be presented as an example alike of the mad extremes to which
unquestioned power is apt to lead, and the vast capabilities of faith
and trust which exist in uneducated man.
_THE FORTUNES OF WALLENSTEIN._
[Illustration: WALLENSTEIN.]
Wallenstein was in power, Wallenstein the mysterious, the ambitious, the
victorious; soldier of fortune and arbiter of empires; reader of the
stars and ally of the powers of darkness; poor by birth and rich by
marriage and imperial favor; an extraordinary man, surrounded by mystery
and silence, victorious through ability and audacity, rising from
obscurity to be master of the emperor, and falling at length by the hand
of assassination. In person he was tall and thin, in countenance sallow
and lowering, his eyes small and piercing, his forehead high and
commanding, his hair short and bristling, his expression dark and
sinister. Fortune was his deity, ambition ruled him with the sway of a
tyrant; he was born with the conquering instinct, and in the end handed
over all Germany, bound and captive, to his imperial master, and retired
to brood new conquests.
Albert von Wallenstein was Bohemian by birth, Prague being his native
city. His parents were Lutherans, but they died, and he was educated as
a Catholic. He travelled with an astrologer, and was taught cabalistic
lore and the secrets of the stars, which he ever after believed to
control his destiny. His fortune began in his marriage to an aged but
very wealthy widow, who almost put an end to his career by
administering to him a love-potion. He had already served in the army,
fought against the Turks in Hungary, and with his wife's money raised a
regiment for the wars in Bohemia. A second marriage with a rich countess
added to his wealth; he purchased, at a fifth of their value, about
sixty estates of the exiled Bohemian nobility, and paid for them in
debased coin; the emperor, in recognition of his services, made him Duke
of Friedland, in which alone there were nine towns and fifty-seven
castles and villages; his wealth, through these marriages, purchases,
and gifts, steadily increased till he became enormously rich, and the
wealthiest man in Germany, next to the emperor.
This extraordinary man was born in an extraordinary time, a period
admirably calculated for the exercise of his talents, and sadly suited
to the suffering of mankind in consequence. It was the period of the
frightful conflict known as the Thirty Years' War. A century had passed
since the Diet of Worms, in which Protestantism first boldly lifted its
head against Catholicism. During that period the new religious doctrines
had gained a firm footing in Germany. Charles V. had done his utmost to
put them down, and, discouraged by his failure, had abdicated the
throne. In his retreat he is said to have amused his leisure in seeking
to make two watches go precisely alike. The effort proved as vain as
that to make two people think alike, and he exclaimed, "Not even two
watches, with similar works, can I make to agree, and yet, fool that I
was, I thought I should be able to control like the works of a watch
different nations, living under diverse skies, in different climes, and
speaking varied languages." Those who followed him were to meet with a
similar result.
The second effort to put down Protestantism by arms began in 1618, and
led to that frightful outbreak of human virulence, the Thirty Years'
War, which made Germany a desert, but left religion as it found it. The
emperor, Ferdinand II., a rigid Catholic, bitterly opposed to the spread
of Protestantism, had ordered the demolition of two new churches built
by the Bohemian Protestants. His order led to instant hostilities. Count
Thurn, a fierce Bohemian nobleman, had the emperor's representatives,
Slawata and Martinitz by name, flung out of the window of the
council-chamber in Prague, a height of seventy or more feet, and their
secretary Fabricius flung after them. It was a terrible fall, but they
escaped, for a pile of litter and old papers lay below. Fabricius fell
on Martinitz, and, polite to the last, begged his pardon for coming down
upon him so rudely. This act of violence, which occurred on May 23,
1618, is looked upon as the true beginning of the dreadful war.
Matters moved rapidly. Bohemia was conquered by the imperial armies, its
nobles exiled or executed, its religion suppressed. This victory gained,
an effort was made to suppress Lutheranism in Upper Austria. It led to a
revolt, and soon the whole country was in a flame of war. Tilly and
Pappenheim, the imperial commanders, swept all before them, until they
suddenly found themselves opposed by a man their equal in ability, Count
Mansfeld, who had played an active part in the Bohemian wars.
A diminutive, deformed, sickly-looking man was Mansfeld, but he had the
soul of a soldier in his small frame. No sooner was his standard raised
than the Protestants flocked to it, and he quickly found himself at the
head of twenty thousand men. But as the powerful princes failed to
support him he was compelled to subsist his troops by pillage, an
example which was followed by all the leaders during that dreadful
contest.
And now began a frightful struggle, a game of war on the chess-board of
a nation, in which the people were the helpless pawns and suffered alike
from friends and foes. Neither side gained any decisive victory, but
both sides plundered and ravaged, the savage soldiery, unrestrained and
unrestrainable, committing cruel excesses wherever they came.
Such was the state of affairs which preceded the appearance of
Wallenstein on the field of action. The soldiers led by Tilly were those
of the Catholic League; Ferdinand, the emperor, had no troops of his own
in the field; Wallenstein, discontented that the war should be going on
without him, offered to raise an imperial army, paying the most of its
expenses himself, but stipulating, in return, that he should have
unlimited control. The emperor granted all his demands, and made him
Duke of Friedland as a preliminary reward, Wallenstein agreeing to raise
ten thousand men.
No sooner was his standard raised than crowds flocked to it, and an army
of forty thousand soldiers of fortune were soon ready to follow him to
plunder and victory. His fame as a soldier, and the free pillage which
he promised, had proved irresistible inducements to war-loving
adventurers of all nations and creeds. In a few months the army was
raised and fully equipped, and in the autumn of 1625 took the field,
growing as it marched.
Christian IV., the Lutheran king of Denmark, had joined in the war, and
Tilly, jealous of Wallenstein, vigorously sought to overcome his new
adversaries before his rival could reach the field of conflict. He
succeeded, too, in great measure, reducing many of the Protestant towns
and routing the army of the Danish king.
Meanwhile, Wallenstein came on, his army growing until sixty thousand
men--a wild and undisciplined horde--followed his banners. Mansfeld, who
had received reinforcements from England and Holland, opposed him, but
was too weak to face him successfully in the field. He was defeated on
the bridge of Dessau, and marched rapidly into Silesia, whither
Wallenstein, much to his chagrin, was compelled to follow him.
From Silesia, Mansfeld marched into Hungary, still pursued by
Wallenstein. Here he was badly received, because he had not brought the
money expected by the king. His retreat cut off, and without the means
of procuring supplies in that remote country, the valiant warrior found
himself at the end of his resources. Return was impossible, for
Wallenstein occupied the roads. In the end he was forced to sell his
artillery and ammunition, disband his army, and proceed southward
towards Venice, whence he hoped to reach England and procure a new
supply of funds. But on arriving at the village of Urakowitz, in Bosnia,
his strength, worn out by incessant struggles and fatigues, gave way,
and the noble warrior, the last hope of Protestantism in Germany, as it
seemed, breathed his last, a disheartened fugitive.
On feeling the approach of death, he had himself clothed in his military
coat, and his sword buckled to his side. Thus equipped, and standing
between two friends, who supported him upright, the brave Mansfeld
breathed his last. His death left his cause almost without a supporter,
for the same year his friend, Duke Christian of Brunswick, expired, and
with them the Protestants lost their only able leaders; King Christian
of Denmark, their principal successor, being greatly wanting in the
requisites of military genius.
Ferdinand seemed triumphant and the cause of his opponents lost. All
opposition, for the time, was at an end. Tilly, whose purposes were the
complete restoration of Catholicism in Germany, held the provinces
conquered by him with an iron hand. Wallenstein, who seemingly had in
view the weakening of the power of the League and the raising of the
emperor to absolutism, broke down all opposition before his irresistible
march.
His army had gradually increased till it numbered one hundred thousand
men,--a host which it cost him nothing to support, for it subsisted on
the devastated country. He advanced through Silesia, driving all his
enemies before him; marched into Holstein, in order to force the King of
Denmark to leave Germany; invaded and devastated Jutland and Silesia;
and added to his immense estate the duchy of Sagan and the whole of
Mecklenburg, which latter was given him by the emperor in payment of his
share of the expenses of the war. This raised him to the rank of prince.
As for Denmark, he proposed to get rid of its king and have Ferdinand
elected in his stead.
The career of this incomprehensible man had been strangely successful.
Not a shadow of reverse had met him. What he really intended no one
knew. As his enemies decreased he increased his forces. Was it the
absolutism of the emperor or of himself that he sought? Several of the
princes appealed to Ferdinand to relieve their dominions from the
oppressive burden of war, but the emperor was weaker than his general,
and dared not act against him. The whole of north Germany lay prostrate
beneath the powerful warrior, and obeyed his slightest nod. He lived in
a style of pomp and ostentation far beyond that of the emperor himself.
His officers imitated him in extravagance. Even his soldiers lived in
luxury. To support this lavish display many thousands of human beings
languished in misery, starvation threatened whole provinces, and
destitution everywhere prevailed.
From Mecklenburg, Wallenstein fixed his ambitious eyes on Pomerania,
which territory he grew desirous of adding to his dominions. Here was an
important commercial city, Stralsund, a member of the Hanseatic League,
and one which enjoyed the privilege of self-government. It had
contributed freely to the expenses of the imperial army, but
Wallenstein, in furtherance of his designs upon Pomerania, now
determined to place in it a garrison of his own troops.
This was an interference with their vested rights which roused the wrath
of the citizens of Stralsund. They refused to receive the troops sent
them: Wallenstein, incensed, determined to teach the insolent burghers a
lesson, and bade General Arnim to march against and lay siege to the
place, doubting not that it would be quickly at his mercy.
He was destined to a disappointment. Stralsund was to put the first
check upon his uniformly successful career. The citizens defended their
walls with obstinate courage. Troops, ammunition, and provisions were
sent them from Denmark and Sweden, and they continued to oppose a
successful resistance to every effort to reduce them.
This unlooked for perversity of the Stralsunders filled the soul of
Wallenstein with rage. It seemed to him unexampled insolence that these
merchants should dare defy his conquering troops. "Even if this
Stralsund be linked by chains to the very heavens above," he declared,
"still I swear it shall fall!"
He advanced in person against the city and assailed it with his whole
army, bringing all the resources at his command to bear against its
walls. But with heroic courage the citizens held their own. Weeks
passed, while he continued to thunder upon it with shot and shell. The
Stralsunders thundered back. His most furious assaults were met by them
with a desperate valor which in time left his ranks twelve thousand men
short. In the end, to his unutterable chagrin, he was forced to raise
the siege and march away, leaving the valiant burghers lords of their
homes.
The war now seemingly came to its conclusion. The King of Denmark asked
for peace, which the emperor granted, and terms were signed at Lübeck on
May 12, 1629. The contest was, for the time being, at an end, for there
was no longer any one to oppose the emperor. For twelve years it had
continued, its ravages turning rich provinces into deserts, and making
beggars and fugitives of wealthy citizens. The opposition of the
Protestants was at an end, and there were but two disturbing elements of
the seemingly pacific situation.
One of these was the purpose which the Catholic party soon showed to
suppress Protestantism and bring what they considered the heretical
provinces again under the dominion of the pope. The other was the army
of Wallenstein, whose intolerable tyranny over friends and foes alike
had now passed the bounds of endurance. From all sides complaints
reached the emperor's ears, charges of pillage, burnings, outrages, and
shameful oppressions of every sort inflicted by the imperial troops upon
the inhabitants of the land. So many were the complaints that it was
impossible to disregard them. The whole body of princes--every one of
whom cordially hated Wallenstein--joined in the outcry, and in the end
Ferdinand, with some hesitation, yielded to their wishes, and bade the
general to disband his forces.
Would he obey? That was next to be seen. The mighty chief was in a
position to defy princes and emperor if he chose. The plundering bands
who followed him were his own, not the emperor's soldiers; they knew but
one master and were ready to obey his slightest word; had he given the
order to advance upon Vienna and drive the emperor himself from his
throne, there is no question but that they would have obeyed. As may be
imagined, then, the response of Wallenstein was awaited in fear and
anxiety. Should ambition counsel him to revolution, the very foundations
of the empire might be shaken. What, then, was the delight of princes
and people when word came that he had accepted the emperor's command
without a word, and at once ordered the disbanding of his troops.
The stars were perhaps responsible for this. Astrology was his passion,
and the planetary conjunctions seemed then to be in favor of submission.
The man was superstitious, with all his clear-sighted ability, and
permitted himself to be governed by influences which have long since
lost their force upon men's minds.