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THE THIRTY YEARS WAR - BOOK V.
THE THIRTY YEARS WAR - BOOK V. FREDERICH SCHILLER THE WORKS
OF
FREDERICK SCHILLER
Translated from the German
Illustrated
HISTORY OF THE THIRTY YEARS' WAR IN GERMANY.
BOOK V.
Wallenstein's death rendered necessary the appointment of a new
generalissimo; and the Emperor yielded at last to the advice of the
Spaniards to raise his son Ferdinand King of Hungary to that dignity.
Under him Count Gallas commanded who performed the functions of
commander-in-chief while the prince brought to this post nothing but
his name and dignity. A considerable force was soon assembled under
Ferdinand; the Duke of Lorraine brought up a considerable body of
auxiliaries in person and the Cardinal Infante joined him from Italy
with 10000 men. In order to drive the enemy from the Danube the new
general undertook the enterprise in which his predecessor had failed
the siege of Ratisbon. In vain did Duke Bernard of Weimar penetrate
into the interior of Bavaria with a view to draw the enemy from the
town; Ferdinand continued to press the siege with vigour and the city
after a most obstinate resistance was obliged to open its gates to him.
Donauwerth soon shared the same fate and Nordlingen in Swabia was now
invested. The loss of so many of the imperial cities was severely felt
by the Swedish party; as the friendship of these towns had so largely
contributed to the success of their arms indifference to their fate
would have been inexcusable. It would have been an indelible disgrace
had they deserted their confederates in their need and abandoned them
to the revenge of an implacable conqueror. Moved by these
considerations the Swedish army under the command of Horn and Bernard
of Weimar advanced upon Nordlingen determined to relieve it even at
the expense of a battle.
The undertaking was a dangerous one for in numbers the enemy was
greatly superior to that of the Swedes. There was also a further reason
for avoiding a battle at present; the enemy's force was likely soon to
divide the Italian troops being destined for the Netherlands. In the
mean time such a position might be taken up as to cover Nordlingen
and cut off their supplies. All these grounds were strongly urged by
Gustavus Horn in the Swedish council of war; but his remonstrances were
disregarded by men who intoxicated by a long career of success mistook
the suggestions of prudence for the voice of timidity. Overborne by the
superior influence of Duke Bernard Gustavus Horn was compelled to risk
a contest whose unfavourable issue a dark foreboding seemed already to
announce. The fate of the battle depended upon the possession of a
height which commanded the imperial camp. An attempt to occupy it
during the night failed as the tedious transport of the artillery
through woods and hollow ways delayed the arrival of the troops. When
the Swedes arrived about midnight they found the heights in possession
of the enemy strongly entrenched. They waited therefore for
daybreak to carry them by storm. Their impetuous courage surmounted
every obstacle; the entrenchments which were in the form of a crescent
were successfully scaled by each of the two brigades appointed to the
service; but as they entered at the same moment from opposite sides
they met and threw each other into confusion. At this unfortunate
moment a barrel of powder blew up and created the greatest disorder
among the Swedes. The imperial cavalry charged upon their broken ranks
and the flight became universal. No persuasion on the part of their
general could induce the fugitives to renew the assault.
He resolved therefore in order to carry this important post to lead
fresh troops to the attack. But in the interim some Spanish regiments
had marched in and every attempt to gain it was repulsed by their
heroic intrepidity. One of the duke's own regiments advanced seven
times and was as often driven back. The disadvantage of not occupying
this post in time was quickly and sensibly felt. The fire of the
enemy's artillery from the heights caused such slaughter in the
adjacent wing of the Swedes that Horn who commanded there was forced
to give orders to retire. Instead of being able to cover the retreat of
his colleague and to check the pursuit of the enemy Duke Bernard
overpowered by numbers was himself driven into the plain where his
routed cavalry spread confusion among Horn's brigade and rendered the
defeat complete. Almost the entire infantry were killed or taken
prisoners. More than 12000 men remained dead upon the field of battle;
80 field pieces about 4000 waggons and 300 standards and colours fell
into the hands of the Imperialists. Horn himself with three other
generals were taken prisoners. Duke Bernard with difficulty saved a
feeble remnant of his army which joined him at Frankfort.
The defeat at Nordlingen cost the Swedish Chancellor the second
sleepless night he had passed in Germany.--[The first was occasioned by
the death of Gustavus Adolphus.]--The consequences of this disaster were
terrible. The Swedes had lost by it at once their superiority in the
field and with it the confidence of their confederates which they had
gained solely by their previous military success. A dangerous division
threatened the Protestant Confederation with ruin. Consternation and
terror seized upon the whole party; while the Papists arose with
exulting triumph from the deep humiliation into which they had sunk.
Swabia and the adjacent circles first felt the consequences of the
defeat of Nordlingen; and Wirtemberg in particular was overrun by the
conquering army. All the members of the League of Heilbronn trembled at
the prospect of the Emperor's revenge; those who could fled to
Strasburg while the helpless free cities awaited their fate with alarm.
A little more of moderation towards the conquered would have quickly
reduced all the weaker states under the Emperor's authority; but the
severity which was practised even against those who voluntarily
surrendered drove the rest to despair and roused them to a vigorous
resistance.
In this perplexity all looked to Oxenstiern for counsel and assistance;
Oxenstiern applied for both to the German States. Troops were wanted;
money likewise to raise new levies and to pay to the old the arrears
which the men were clamorously demanding. Oxenstiern addressed himself
to the Elector of Saxony; but he shamefully abandoned the Swedish cause
to negociate for a separate peace with the Emperor at Pirna. He
solicited aid from the Lower Saxon States; but they long wearied of the
Swedish pretensions and demands for money now thought only of
themselves; and George Duke of Lunenburg in place of flying to the
assistance of Upper Germany laid siege to Minden with the intention of
keeping possession of it for himself. Abandoned by his German allies
the chancellor exerted himself to obtain the assistance of foreign
powers. England Holland and Venice were applied to for troops and
money; and driven to the last extremity the chancellor reluctantly
resolved to take the disagreeable step which he had so long avoided and
to throw himself under the protection of France.
The moment had at last arrived which Richelieu had long waited for with
impatience. Nothing he was aware but the impossibility of saving
themselves by any other means could induce the Protestant States in
Germany to support the pretensions of France upon Alsace. This extreme
necessity had now arrived; the assistance of that power was
indispensable and she was resolved to be well paid for the active part
which she was about to take in the German war. Full of lustre and
dignity it now came upon the political stage. Oxenstiern who felt
little reluctance in bestowing the rights and possessions of the empire
had already ceded the fortress of Philipsburg and the other long
coveted places. The Protestants of Upper Germany now in their own
names sent a special embassy to Richelieu requesting him to take
Alsace the fortress of Breyssach which was still to be recovered from
the enemy and all the places upon the Upper Rhine which were the keys
of Germany under the protection of France. What was implied by French
protection had been seen in the conduct of France towards the bishoprics
of Metz Toul and Verdun which it had held for centuries against the
rightful owners. Treves was already in the possession of French
garrisons; Lorraine was in a manner conquered as it might at any time
be overrun by an army and could not alone and with its own strength
withstand its formidable neighbour. France now entertained the hope of
adding Alsace to its large and numerous possessions and--since a
treaty was soon to be concluded with the Dutch for the partition of the
Spanish Netherlands--the prospect of making the Rhine its natural
boundary towards Germany. Thus shamefully were the rights of Germany
sacrificed by the German States to this treacherous and grasping power
which under the mask of a disinterested friendship aimed only at its
own aggrandizement; and while it boldly claimed the honourable title of
a Protectress was solely occupied with promoting its own schemes and
advancing its own interests amid the general confusion.
In return for these important cessions France engaged to effect a
diversion in favour of the Swedes by commencing hostilities against the
Spaniards; and if this should lead to an open breach with the Emperor
to maintain an army upon the German side of the Rhine which was to act
in conjunction with the Swedes and Germans against Austria. For a war
with Spain the Spaniards themselves soon afforded the desired pretext.
Making an inroad from the Netherlands upon the city of Treves they cut
in pieces the French garrison; and in open violation of the law of
nations made prisoner the Elector who had placed himself under the
protection of France and carried him into Flanders. When the Cardinal
Infante as Viceroy of the Spanish Netherlands refused satisfaction for
these injuries and delayed to restore the prince to liberty Richelieu
after the old custom formally proclaimed war at Brussels by a herald
and the war was at once opened by three different armies in Milan in
the Valteline and in Flanders. The French minister was less anxious to
commence hostilities with the Emperor which promised fewer advantages
and threatened greater difficulties. A fourth army however was
detached across the Rhine into Germany under the command of Cardinal
Lavalette which was to act in conjunction with Duke Bernard against
the Emperor without a previous declaration of war.
A heavier blow for the Swedes than even the defeat of Nordlingen was
the reconciliation of the Elector of Saxony with the Emperor. After
many fruitless attempts both to bring about and to prevent it it was at
last effected in 1634 at Pirna and the following year reduced into a
formal treaty of peace at Prague. The Elector of Saxony had always
viewed with jealousy the pretensions of the Swedes in Germany; and his
aversion to this foreign power which now gave laws within the Empire
had grown with every fresh requisition that Oxenstiern was obliged to
make upon the German states. This ill feeling was kept alive by the
Spanish court who laboured earnestly to effect a peace between Saxony
and the Emperor. Wearied with the calamities of a long and destructive
contest which had selected Saxony above all others for its theatre;
grieved by the miseries which both friend and foe inflicted upon his
subjects and seduced by the tempting propositions of the House of
Austria the Elector at last abandoned the common cause and caring
little for the fate of his confederates or the liberties of Germany
thought only of securing his own advantages even at the expense of the
whole body.
In fact the misery of Germany had risen to such a height that all
clamorously vociferated for peace; and even the most disadvantageous
pacification would have been hailed as a blessing from heaven. The
plains which formerly had been thronged with a happy and industrious
population where nature had lavished her choicest gifts and plenty and
prosperity had reigned were now a wild and desolate wilderness. The
fields abandoned by the industrious husbandman lay waste and
uncultivated; and no sooner had the young crops given the promise of a
smiling harvest than a single march destroyed the labours of a year
and blasted the last hope of an afflicted peasantry. Burnt castles
wasted fields villages in ashes were to be seen extending far and wide
on all sides while the ruined peasantry had no resource left but to
swell the horde of incendiaries and fearfully to retaliate upon their
fellows who had hitherto been spared the miseries which they themselves
had suffered. The only safeguard against oppression was to become an
oppressor. The towns groaned under the licentiousness of undisciplined
and plundering garrisons who seized and wasted the property of the
citizens and under the license of their position committed the most
remorseless devastation and cruelty. If the march of an army converted
whole provinces into deserts if others were impoverished by winter
quarters or exhausted by contributions these still were but passing
evils and the industry of a year might efface the miseries of a few
months. But there was no relief for those who had a garrison within
their walls or in the neighbourhood; even the change of fortune could
not improve their unfortunate fate since the victor trod in the steps
of the vanquished and friends were not more merciful than enemies. The
neglected farms the destruction of the crops and the numerous armies
which overran the exhausted country were inevitably followed by
scarcity and the high price of provisions which in the later years was
still further increased by a general failure in the crops. The crowding
together of men in camps and quarters--want upon one side and excess
on the other occasioned contagious distempers which were more fatal
than even the sword. In this long and general confusion all the bonds
of social life were broken up;--respect for the rights of their fellow
men the fear of the laws purity of morals honour and religion were
laid aside where might ruled supreme with iron sceptre. Under the
shelter of anarchy and impunity every vice flourished and men became
as wild as the country. No station was too dignified for outrage no
property too holy for rapine and avarice. In a word the soldier
reigned supreme; and that most brutal of despots often made his own
officer feel his power. The leader of an army was a far more important
person within any country where he appeared than its lawful governor
who was frequently obliged to fly before him into his own castles for
safety. Germany swarmed with these petty tyrants and the country
suffered equally from its enemies and its protectors. These wounds
rankled the deeper when the unhappy victims recollected that Germany
was sacrificed to the ambition of foreign powers who for their own
ends prolonged the miseries of war. Germany bled under the scourge to
extend the conquests and influence of Sweden; and the torch of discord
was kept alive within the Empire that the services of Richelieu might
be rendered indispensable in France.
But in truth it was not merely interested voices which opposed a
peace; and if both Sweden and the German states were anxious from
corrupt motives to prolong the conflict they were seconded in their
views by sound policy. After the defeat of Nordlingen an equitable
peace was not to be expected from the Emperor; and this being the case
was it not too great a sacrifice after seventeen years of war with all
its miseries to abandon the contest not only without advantage but
even with loss? What would avail so much bloodshed if all was to
remain as it had been; if their rights and pretensions were neither
larger nor safer; if all that had been won with so much difficulty was
to be surrendered for a peace at any cost? Would it not be better to
endure for two or three years more the burdens they had borne so long
and to reap at last some recompense for twenty years of suffering?
Neither was it doubtful that peace might at last be obtained on
favourable terms if only the Swedes and the German Protestants should
continue united in the cabinet and in the field and pursued their
common interests with a reciprocal sympathy and zeal. Their divisions
alone had rendered the enemy formidable and protracted the acquisition
of a lasting and general peace. And this great evil the Elector of
Saxony had brought upon the Protestant cause by concluding a separate
treaty with Austria.
He indeed had commenced his negociations with the Emperor even before
the battle of Nordlingen; and the unfortunate issue of that battle only
accelerated their conclusion. By it all his confidence in the Swedes
was lost; and it was even doubted whether they would ever recover from
the blow. The jealousies among their generals the insubordination of
the army and the exhaustion of the Swedish kingdom shut out any
reasonable prospect of effective assistance on their part. The Elector
hastened therefore to profit by the Emperor's magnanimity who even
after the battle of Nordlingen did not recall the conditions previously
offered. While Oxenstiern who had assembled the estates in Frankfort
made further demands upon them and him the Emperor on the contrary
made concessions; and therefore it required no long consideration to
decide between them.
In the mean time however he was anxious to escape the charge of
sacrificing the common cause and attending only to his own interests.
All the German states and even the Swedes were publicly invited to
become parties to this peace although Saxony and the Emperor were the
only powers who deliberated upon it and who assumed the right to give
law to Germany. By this self-appointed tribunal the grievances of the
Protestants were discussed their rights and privileges decided and
even the fate of religions determined without the presence of those who
were most deeply interested in it. Between them a general peace was
resolved on and it was to be enforced by an imperial army of execution
as a formal decree of the Empire. Whoever opposed it was to be treated
as a public enemy; and thus contrary to their rights the states were
to be compelled to acknowledge a law in the passing of which they had
no share. Thus even in form the pacification at Prague was an
arbitrary measure; nor was it less so in its contents. The Edict of
Restitution had been the chief cause of dispute between the Elector and
the Emperor; and therefore it was first considered in their
deliberations. Without formally annulling it it was determined by the
treaty of Prague that all the ecclesiastical domains holding
immediately of the Empire and among the mediate ones those which had
been seized by the Protestants subsequently to the treaty at Passau
should for forty years remain in the same position as they had been in
before the Edict of Restitution but without any formal decision of the
diet to that effect. Before the expiration of this term a commission
composed of equal numbers of both religions should proceed to settle
the matter peaceably and according to law; and if this commission should
be unable to come to a decision each party should remain in possession
of the rights which it had exercised before the Edict of Restitution.
This arrangement therefore far from removing the grounds of
dissension only suspended the dispute for a time; and this article of
the treaty of Prague only covered the embers of a future war.
The archbishopric of Magdeburg remained in possession of Prince Augustus
of Saxony and Halberstadt in that of the Archduke Leopold William.
Four estates were taken from the territory of Magdeburg and given to
Saxony for which the Administrator of Magdeburg Christian William of
Brandenburg was otherwise to be indemnified. The Dukes of Mecklenburg
upon acceding to this treaty were to be acknowledged as rightful
possessors of their territories in which the magnanimity of Gustavus
Adolphus had long ago reinstated them. Donauwerth recovered its
liberties. The important claims of the heirs of the Palatine however
important it might be for the Protestant cause not to lose this
electorate vote in the diet were passed over in consequence of the
animosity subsisting between the Lutherans and the Calvinists. All the
conquests which in the course of the war had been made by the German
states or by the League and the Emperor were to be mutually restored;
all which had been appropriated by the foreign powers of France and
Sweden was to be forcibly wrested from them by the united powers. The
troops of the contracting parties were to be formed into one imperial
army which supported and paid by the Empire was by force of arms to
carry into execution the covenants of the treaty.
As the peace of Prague was intended to serve as a general law of the
Empire those points which did not immediately affect the latter
formed the subject of a separate treaty. By it Lusatia was ceded to
the Elector of Saxony as a fief of Bohemia and special articles
guaranteed the freedom of religion of this country and of Silesia.
All the Protestant states were invited to accede to the treaty of
Prague and on that condition were to benefit by the amnesty. The
princes of Wurtemberg and Baden whose territories the Emperor was
already in possession of and which he was not disposed to restore
unconditionally; and such vassals of Austria as had borne arms against
their sovereign; and those states which under the direction of
Oxenstiern composed the council of the Upper German Circle were
excluded from the treaty--not so much with the view of continuing the
war against them as of compelling them to purchase peace at a dearer
rate. Their territories were to be retained in pledge till every thing
should be restored to its former footing. Such was the treaty of
Prague. Equal justice however towards all might perhaps have
restored confidence between the head of the Empire and its members--
between the Protestants and the Roman Catholics--between the Reformed
and the Lutheran party; and the Swedes abandoned by all their allies
would in all probability have been driven from Germany with disgrace.
But this inequality strengthened in those who were more severely
treated the spirit of mistrust and opposition and made it an easier
task for the Swedes to keep alive the flame of war and to maintain a
party in Germany.
The peace of Prague as might have been expected was received with very
various feelings throughout Germany. The attempt to conciliate both
parties had rendered it obnoxious to both. The Protestants complained
of the restraints imposed upon them; the Roman Catholics thought that
these hated sectaries had been favoured at the expense of the true
church. In the opinion of the latter the church had been deprived of
its inalienable rights by the concession to the Protestants of forty
years' undisturbed possession of the ecclesiastical benefices; while the
former murmured that the interests of the Protestant church had been
betrayed because toleration had not been granted to their
co-religionists in the Austrian dominions. But no one was so bitterly
reproached as the Elector of Saxony who was publicly denounced as a
deserter a traitor to religion and the liberties of the Empire and a
confederate of the Emperor.
In the mean time he consoled himself with the triumph of seeing most of
the Protestant states compelled by necessity to embrace this peace. The
Elector of Brandenburg Duke William of Weimar the princes of Anhalt
the dukes of Mecklenburg the dukes of Brunswick Lunenburg the Hanse
towns and most of the imperial cities acceded to it. The Landgrave
William of Hesse long wavered or affected to do so in order to gain
time and to regulate his measures by the course of events. He had
conquered several fertile provinces of Westphalia and derived from them
principally the means of continuing the war; these by the terms of the
treaty he was bound to restore. Bernard Duke of Weimar whose states
as yet existed only on paper as a belligerent power was not affected
by the treaty but as a general was so materially; and in either view
he must equally be disposed to reject it. His whole riches consisted in
his bravery his possessions in his sword. War alone gave him greatness
and importance and war alone could realize the projects which his
ambition suggested.
But of all who declaimed against the treaty of Prague none were so loud
in their clamours as the Swedes and none had so much reason for their
opposition. Invited to Germany by the Germans themselves the champions
of the Protestant Church and the freedom of the States which they had
defended with so much bloodshed and with the sacred life of their king
they now saw themselves suddenly and shamefully abandoned disappointed
in all their hopes without reward and without gratitude driven from the
empire for which they had toiled and bled and exposed to the ridicule
of the enemy by the very princes who owed every thing to them. No
satisfaction no indemnification for the expenses which they had
incurred no equivalent for the conquests which they were to leave
behind them was provided by the treaty of Prague. They were to be
dismissed poorer than they came or if they resisted to be expelled by
the very powers who had invited them. The Elector of Saxony at last
spoke of a pecuniary indemnification and mentioned the small sum of two
millions five hundred thousand florins; but the Swedes had already
expended considerably more and this disgraceful equivalent in money was
both contrary to their true interests and injurious to their pride.
"The Electors of Bavaria and Saxony" replied Oxenstiern "have been
paid for their services which as vassals they were bound to render
the Emperor with the possession of important provinces; and shall we
who have sacrificed our king for Germany be dismissed with the
miserable sum of 2500000 florins?" The disappointment of their
expectations was the more severe because the Swedes had calculated upon
being recompensed with the Duchy of Pomerania the present possessor of
which was old and without heirs. But the succession of this territory
was confirmed by the treaty of Prague to the Elector of Brandenburg; and
all the neighbouring powers declared against allowing the Swedes to
obtain a footing within the empire.
Never in the whole course of the war had the prospects of the Swedes
looked more gloomy than in the year 1635 immediately after the
conclusion of the treaty of Prague. Many of their allies particularly
among the free cities abandoned them to benefit by the peace; others
were compelled to accede to it by the victorious arms of the Emperor.
Augsburg subdued by famine surrendered under the severest conditions;
Wurtzburg and Coburg were lost to the Austrians. The League of
Heilbronn was formally dissolved. Nearly the whole of Upper Germany
the chief seat of the Swedish power was reduced under the Emperor.
Saxony on the strength of the treaty of Prague demanded the evacuation
of Thuringia Halberstadt and Magdeburg. Philipsburg the military
depot of France was surprised by the Austrians with all the stores it
contained; and this severe loss checked the activity of France. To
complete the embarrassments of Sweden the truce with Poland was drawing
to a close. To support a war at the same time with Poland and in
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