A History of The Inquisition of The Middle Ages Volume II Part 17

For a month the struggle continued, and no human soul ever bore itself with loftier fort.i.tude or sweeter or humbler charity. He asked for a confessor, and intimated that he would prefer Stephen Palecz, the enemy who had hounded him to the death. Palecz came and heard his confession, and then urged him to abjure, saying that he ought not to mind the humiliation. "The humiliation of condemnation and burning is greater,"

replied Huss, "how then can I fear humiliation? But advise me: what would you do if you knew for certain that you did not hold the errors imputed to you? Would you abjure?" Palecz burst into tears and could only stammer, "It is difficult." He wept again freely when Huss begged his pardon for harsh words used in the heat of strife, and especially for calling him a falsifier. Another confessor was sent to him, who listened to him kindly and gave him absolution without insisting on preliminary abjuration, which was a most irregular concession--indeed, almost incredible. Many others were allowed to visit him in the hope of persuading him to confess and recant. One learned doctor urged his submission, saying, "If the council told me I had but one eye, I would confess it to be so, though I know I have two," but Huss was impervious to such example. An Englishman adduced the precedent of the English doctors who had, without exception, abjured the heresies of Wickliff when required to do so; but when Huss offered to swear that he had never held or taught the heresies imputed to him, and that he would never hold or teach them, his baffled advisers withdrew.[528]

The most formidable effort, however, was of an official character. At the final hearing of June 8, Cardinal Zabarella had promised him that a recantation in a form strictly limited would be submitted to him, and the promise was fulfilled in a paper skilfully drawn up, so as to satisfy his scruples. It represented him as protesting anew that much had been imputed to him which he had never believed, but that nevertheless he submitted himself in everything to the correction and orders of the council in abjuring, revoking, and retracting, and in accepting whatever merciful penance the council might prescribe for his salvation. Carefully as this was phrased to elude the difficulty, Huss rejected it without hesitation. In some matters, he said, he would be denying the truth, in others he would be perjuring himself. It were better to die than to fall into the hands of the Lord in the effort to escape momentary suffering. Then one of the fathers of the council--supposed to be the Cardinal of Ostia, the highest in rank of the Sacred College--addressed him as his "dearest and most cherished brother," with the most honeyed persuasiveness, begging him not to confide too absolutely in his own judgment. In making the abjuration it will not be he that condemns truth, but the council; as for perjury, if perjury there be, it will fall on the heads of those who exact it. Yet Huss was not to be enticed with such allurements; he could not quiet his conscience with casuistry such as this, and he deliberately chose death.

In daily expectation of the dreadful sentence, he quietly put his simple affairs in order. Peter Mladenowic, the notary, had rendered him zealous service and should be paid out of his sixty grossi. His little debts were to be settled, and his books, apparently his only other property, were to be distributed. Kind remembrances were sent to his numerous friends, and they were told if they had learned any good of him to hold fast to it; if they had seen in him aught reprehensible to cast it aside. It was not that he was insensible, for he describes in moving terms the mental conflicts and agony which he endured in his hopeless prison, expecting each day to be led forth to an agonizing death, but the spirit rose superior to the flesh and remained victor in the struggle. Solicitous to retain the good opinion of his disciples, he managed to transmit to them, on June 18, a copy of the articles proved against him, together with a report of what his defence had been. Of those drawn from his writings he retracted none, although many he declared to be false and garbled. Those alleged against him by witnesses he mostly a.s.serted to be lies, and he pathetically concluded, "It only remains for me to abjure and revoke and undergo fearful penance or to burn. May the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost grant me the spirit of wisdom and fort.i.tude to persevere to the end and to escape the snares of Satan!"[529]

In hope of his weakening, the end was postponed until the approaching departure of Sigismund rendered further delay impossible. Yet effort was not abandoned till the last. On July 1 a deputation of prelates endeavored to persuade him that he could reasonably recant, but he handed them a written confession calling G.o.d to witness that he had never taught many of the articles; as for the rest, if there were error in them he detested it, but he could not abjure any of them. Puzzled by his unexpected tenacity of purpose, and earnestly desirous of avoiding the catastrophe, a final and unprecedented concession was agreed upon.

On July 5 Zabarella and Peter d'Ailly sent for him and offered to let him deny the heresies proved by witnesses if he would abjure those extracted from his books. This was, in fact, an abandonment of all inquisitorial precedent, but Huss had persistently declared that most of the latter were fraudulently drawn, so as to attribute to him errors which he had never held, and he was immovable. As a last resource, later in the same day, Sigismund sent his friends John of Chlum and Wenceslas of Duba, with four bishops, to ask him whether he would persevere or recant, but his answer was as firm as ever. To the friendly adjuration of John of Chlum he replied with tears that he would willingly revoke anything in which he could be proved to have erred. The bishops p.r.o.nounced him obstinate in error and left him.[530]

Thus the extraordinary efforts of the council to save itself and him were vain, and nothing remained but the inevitable final act of the tragedy. The next day, July 6, saw the most gorgeous _auto de fe_ on record. The cathedral of Constance was crowded with Sigismund and his n.o.bles, the great officers of the empire with their insignia, the prelates in their splendid robes. While ma.s.s was sung, Huss, as an excommunicate, was kept waiting at the door; when brought in he was placed on an elevated bench by a table on which stood a coffer containing priestly vestments. After some preliminaries, including a sermon by the Bishop of Lodi, in which he a.s.sured Sigismund that the events of that day would confer on him immortal glory, the articles of which Huss was convicted were recited. In vain he protested that he believed in transubstantiation and in the validity of the sacrament in polluted hands. He was ordered to hold his tongue, and on his persisting the beadles were told to silence him, but in spite of this he continued to utter protests. The sentence was then read in the name of the council, condemning him both for his written errors and those which had been proved by witnesses. He was declared a pertinacious and incorrigible heretic who did not desire to return to the Church; his books were ordered to be burned, and himself to be degraded from the priesthood and abandoned to the secular court. Seven bishops arrayed him in priestly garb and warned him to recant while yet there was time.

He turned to the crowd, and with broken voice declared that he could not confess the errors which he had never entertained, lest he should lie to G.o.d, when the bishops interrupted him, crying that they had waited long enough, for he was obstinate in his heresy. He was degraded in the usual manner, stripped of his sacerdotal vestments, his fingers sc.r.a.ped; but when the tonsure was to be disposed of an absurd quarrel arose among the bishops as to whether the head should be shaved with a razor or the tonsure be destroyed with scissors. Scissors won the day, and a cross was cut in his hair. Then on his head was placed a conical paper cap, a cubit in height, adorned with painted devils and the inscription, "This is the heresiarch." In accordance with the universal custom no proceedings by the secular authorities were regarded as necessary. As soon as the ecclesiastical court had p.r.o.nounced him a heretic and handed him over, the laws against heresy operated of themselves. Sigismund, it is true, might have delayed the execution for six days, but this would have been so unusual as to have excited most unfavorable comment. There had already been afforded ample opportunity for resipiscence, and the convict could always still recant up to the lighting of the f.a.gots.

Nothing could reasonably be hoped from further postponement, and Sigismund's approaching departure counselled prompt.i.tude. He therefore briefly ordered the Palsgrave Louis to take charge of the culprit and to do to him as to a heretic. Louis called to Hans Hazen, the imperial vogt of Constance, "Vogt, take him as judged of both of us and burn him as a heretic." Then he was led forth, and the council calmly turned to other business, unconscious that it had performed the most momentous act of the century.[531]

The place of execution was a meadow near the river, to which he was conducted by two thousand armed men, with Palsgrave Louis at their head, and a vast crowd, including many n.o.bles, prelates, and cardinals.

The route followed was circuitous, in order that he might be carried past the episcopal palace, in front of which his books were burning, whereat he smiled. Pity from man there was none to look for, but he sought comfort on high, repeating to himself, "Christ Jesus, Son of the living G.o.d, have mercy upon me!" and when he came in sight of the stake he fell on his knees and prayed. He was asked if he wished to confess, and said that he would gladly do so if there were s.p.a.ce. A wide circle was formed, and Ulrich Schorand, who, according to custom, had been providently empowered to take advantage of any final weakening, came forward, saying, "Dear sir and master, if you will recant your unbelief of heresy, for which you must suffer, I will willingly hear your confession; but if you will not, you know right well that, according to canon law, no one can administer the sacrament to a heretic." To this Huss answered, "It is not necessary: I am no mortal sinner." His paper crown fell off and he smiled as his guards replaced it. He desired to take leave of his keepers, and when they were brought to him he thanked them for their kindness, saying that they had been to him rather brothers than jailers. Then he commenced to address the crowd in German, telling them that he suffered for errors which he did not hold, sworn to by perjured witnesses; but this could not be permitted, and he was cut short. When bound to the stake and two cartloads of f.a.gots and straw were piled up around him the palsgrave and vogt for the last time adjured him to abjure. Even yet he could have saved himself, but he only repeated that he had been convicted by false witnesses of errors never entertained by him. They clapped their hands and then withdrew, and the executioners applied the fire. Twice Huss was heard to exclaim, "Christ Jesus, Son of the living G.o.d, have mercy upon me!" then a wind springing up and blowing the flames and smoke into his face checked further utterance, but his head was seen to shake and his lips to move while one might twice or thrice recite a paternoster. The tragedy was over; the sorely-tried soul had escaped from its tormentors, and the bitterest enemies of the reformer could not refuse to him the praise that no philosopher of old had faced death with more composure than he had shown in his dreadful extremity. No faltering of the voice had betrayed an internal struggle. Palsgrave Louis, seeing Huss's mantle on the arm of one of the executioners, ordered it thrown into the flames lest it should be reverenced as a relic, and promised the man to compensate him. With the same view the body was carefully reduced to ashes and thrown into the Rhine, and even the earth around the stake was dug up and carted off; yet the Bohemians long hovered around the spot and carried home fragments of the neighboring clay, which they reverenced as relics of their martyr. The next day thanks were returned to G.o.d, in a solemn procession in which figured Sigismund and his queen, the princes and n.o.bles, nineteen cardinals, two patriarchs, seventy-seven bishops, and all the clergy of the council. A few days later Sigismund, who had delayed his departure for Spain to see the matter concluded, left Constance, feeling that his work was done.[532]

The long-continued teaching of the Church, that persistent heresy was the one crime for which there could be no pardon or excuse, seemed to deprive even the wisest and purest of all power of reasoning where it was concerned. There was no hesitation in admitting that the pestilent heresy of the Hussites was caused by the simoniacal corruptions of the Roman curia, whereby many Christian souls were led to eternal perdition, and that it could not be eradicated until a thorough reformation was effected. Yet in place of drawing from this the necessary deduction, the feeling of the council is reflected by its historian in the blasphemous representation of Christ as recording with satisfaction the hideous details of the execution, and as saying that the wicked soul of the heretic commenced in temporal flame the torment which it would suffer through eternity in h.e.l.l. The trial, in fact, had been conducted in accordance with the universally received practice in such cases, the only exceptions being in favor of the accused. If the result was inevitable, it was the fault of the system and not of the judges, and their consciences might well feel satisfied.[533]

Great was the disgust of the orthodox when they learned that this pious view of the matter was not entertained in Prague, and it required the most positive a.s.surances of eye-witnesses to make them believe the incredible fact that, from king to peasant in Bohemia, there was practical unanimity in the belief that he who had been condemned and executed as a heretic was a martyr; that the popular songs sung in the streets represented him as one who had shed his blood for Christ, and that he was inserted in the calendar of saints, with his feast on July 6, the day of his execution. The good fathers, however, were not long in finding, from indubitable evidence, that they had made a grave mistake as to the Bohemian temper, and that they had only succeeded in inflaming the disease which they had sought to eradicate. As soon as the defiance excited in Bohemia could be learned in Constance, the council made haste to write, July 26, to the authorities there, protesting that Huss and Jerome of Prague had been treated with all tenderness, that the persistent heresy of the former had forced his delivery to the secular court for judgment, and that all similar heretics would be treated in the same manner. The Bohemians were exhorted to justify, by similar persecution, the good opinion of their orthodoxy which the council had formed from the report of the Bishop of Litomysl, whose popular name of Iron John sufficiently indicates his inflexibility. This good opinion was not sustained when a protest was received from the barons of Bohemia and Moravia, hastily drawn up as soon as the news of the execution had reached them--a protest which the council promptly ordered to be burned.

Its letter of July 26 led to the convocation of a national a.s.sembly, in which an address was framed and received the signatures of nearly five hundred barons, knights, and gentlemen. In this they a.s.serted their belief in Huss's purity and orthodoxy; that he had unjustly been put to death without confession or lawful conviction; that Jerome they supposed had shared the same fate; that the defamation of the kingdom for heresy was the work of liars, and that any one who a.s.serted it, saving Sigismund, lied in his throat, was the vilest of traitors and the worst of heretics, and as such they would prosecute him before the future pope. A more dangerous symptom of rebellion was a pledge signed by the magnates, agreeing that all priests should be allowed to preach freely the truths of Scripture, that no bishop should be permitted to interfere with them unless they taught errors, and that no excommunications or interdicts from abroad should be received or observed.[534]

This was firing at long range with no result but mutual exacerbation, and it was probably the stimulus of Bohemian disaffection which led the council about this time to act vigorously in the case of Jerome of Prague, whom the Bohemian n.o.bles had erroneously believed to have shared the fate of Huss.

Jerome of Prague stands before us as one of those meteoric natures which would be dismissed by the student as half mythical, if the substantial facts which are on record did not fix the details of his career with an exactness leaving no room for doubt. Born at Prague, his early training was received at a time when men's minds were beginning to waver in the confusion of the Great Schism, and under the impulsion of the Wickliffite writings. About the year 1400 he was brought under the influence of Huss, and thereafter he continued to be the steadfast adherent and supporter of the great protestant against the corruptions of the Church. Already, at Paris, Cologne, Heidelberg, and Cracow--at all of which he had been decorated with the honors of the universities--he had disturbed the philosophic calm of the schools with his subtleties on the theory of universals; at Paris, indeed, the disturbance had gone so far that John Gerson, the chancellor of the university, had driven him forth, perhaps retaining a grudge which explains his zeal in the prosecution of his old antagonist. His restless spirit left scarce a region of the known civilized world unvisited. At Oxford, attracted by the reputation of Wickliff, he had copied with his own hand the Dialogus and the Trialogus, and had carried those outpourings of revolt to Prague, where they added fresh fuel to the rapidly rising fires of Bohemian insubordination. On a second visit he had been seized as a heretic, and had escaped through the intervention of the University of Prague. In Palestine he had trodden in the footsteps of the Saviour and had bent in reverence at the Holy Sepulchre. In Lithuania he had sought to convert the heathen. In Russia he had endeavored to win over the schismatic Greek. In Poland and Hungary he had scattered the doctrines of Wickliff and Huss. Driven out of Hungary, in 1410, he was arrested and thrown in prison in Vienna, by the papal inquisitor and episcopal official, for teaching Hussitism and infecting with it the university of that city. His trial was commenced and a day was set for its hearing, prior to which he was allowed his liberty on his oath not to leave the city, under pain of excommunication. Claiming that an extorted oath was of no force, he escaped, and from Olmutz wrote a free-and-easy letter to the Bishop of Pa.s.sau, suggesting that the prosecutors and witnesses may be sent to Prague, where the trial can be finished. The excommunication, indeed, followed him to Prague, but in the tumultuous condition of Bohemia it gave him no trouble, though the University of Vienna wrote to the University of Prague that by remaining more than a year under the excommunication he had incurred the guilt of heresy, for which he ought to be condemned; and meanwhile the converts whom he had made in Vienna continued to give occupation to the Inquisition, and the university which interfered in their behalf incurred the suspicion of heresy. In the stirring events which followed, his restless and aggressive spirit would not allow him to be inactive, and the popular impression of his reckless audacity is shown in the story of his hanging the papal bulls of indulgence around the neck of a strumpet and carrying her to the place where they were to be burned. In 1413 he again visited Poland, where in a short time he succeeded in causing an unprecedented excitement, and was speedily sent back to Prague. His whole life had been spent in intellectual digladiation, from his youthful philosophic contests to the maturer struggles with the overwhelming forces of the hierarchy. A layman, not in holy orders and unfurnished with priestly gown and tonsure, he had preached to admiring crowds of Majjars, Poles, and Czechs; nor was he wholly unskilled in the use of the arms of the flesh. On his trial he admitted that he had once been drawn into a quarrel with some monks in a monastery, when two of them attacked him with swords, and he defended himself successfully with a weapon hastily s.n.a.t.c.hed from the hand of a bystander. His enemies, indeed, accused him of having, on another occasion, drawn a dagger on a Dominican friar, and of having been only prevented by force from stabbing him to the death.

All of his contemporaries bear testimony to his wonderful powers. His commanding presence, his glittering eyes, his sable hair and flowing beard, his deep and impressive voice, his persuasive accents, enabled him to throw his influence over all with whom he came in contact; while his miraculous stores of learning, his unmatched readiness, and the subtlety of his intellect, rendered him an enemy of the Church only one degree less dangerous than the steadfast and irreproachable Huss.[535]

Jerome had watched from Prague the fate of his friend with daily increasing anxiety, and when the rupture between pope and council seemed to promise immunity for the opponents of hierarchical corruption he could not resist the temptation to aid in his rescue, and to a.s.sist in what appeared to be the approaching overthrow of the evils which he had so long combated. April 4, 1415, he came secretly to Constance, but speedily found how groundless were his hopes and how dangerous was the atmosphere of the place. Christann of Prachaticz, one of Huss's chief disciples, had recently ventured to visit Constance, had been arrested, and articles of accusation had been presented against him, when on the intervention of the Bohemian amba.s.sadors he had been liberated under oath to present himself when summoned--an oath which he had forfeited by promptly escaping to Bohemia. Jerome contented himself with posting a notice on the walls affirming the orthodoxy of Huss; he withdrew at once to Ueberlingen and asked for a safe-conduct. The response was ambiguous, but, like a moth hovering around the fatal candle-flame, he returned to Constance, where, April 7, he affixed another notice on the church doors addressed to Sigismund and the council. It stated that he had come of his own free will to answer all accusations of heresy, and if convicted he was ready to endure the penalty, but he asked a safe-conduct in coming and going, and if incarcerated or treated with violence during his stay the council would be committing injustice of which he could not suspect so many learned and wise men. This senseless bravado is only to be explained by his erratic temperament, and it did not prevent him from taking precautions as to his safety. He suddenly changed his mind, and on April 9, after obtaining from the Bohemians at Constance testimonial letters, he escaped from the city, none too soon, for the officials were in search of his lodgings, which they discovered a few days after at the Gutjar, in St. Paul Street, where in his haste he had left behind him the significant memento of a sword. This time he no longer trifled with fate, but travelled rapidly towards Bohemia. At Hirsau, however, his impetuous temper led him into a discussion in which he stigmatized the council as a synagogue of Satan. He was seized April 24, and the papers found upon him betrayed him. John of Bavaria threw him into the castle of Sulzbach, notified the council of his capture, and in obedience to its commands he was forthwith carried thither in chains.[536]

Meanwhile the council had responded to his appeal by publishing, April 18, a formal inquisitorial citation summoning him, as a suspected and defamed heretic, the suppression of whom was its chief duty, to appear for trial within fifteen days, in default of which he would be proceeded against in contumacy. A safe-conduct was offered him, but it was expressly declared subject to the exigencies of the faith. Unaware of his capture, on May 2 a new citation was published and his trial as contumacious was ordered, and this was repeated on the 4th. On May 24 his captors brought him to the city loaded with chains, and took him to the Franciscan convent, where a tumultuous congregation of the council greeted his arrival. Here Gerson gratified his rancor against his old opponent, loudly berating him for having taught falsely at Paris, Heidelberg, and Cologne, and the rectors of the two latter universities corroborated the accusations. His replies were sharp and ready, but were drowned in the roar of fresh charges, mingled with shouts of "Burn him!

Burn him!" Thence he was carried to a dungeon in the Cemetery of St.

Paul, where he was chained hand and foot to a bench too high for him to sit on, and for two days he was fed on bread and water, until his friends ascertained his place of imprisonment and made interest with the jailer to give him better food. He soon fell dangerously sick and asked for a confessor, after which he was less rigorously fettered, but he never left the prison except for audience and execution.[537]

Stephen Palecz, Michael de Causis, and the rest were ready with their accusations, nor could there be difficulty in acc.u.mulating a ma.s.s of testimony sufficient to convict twenty such men as Jerome. His trial proceeded according to the regular inquisitorial process, the commissioners finding him much more learned and skilful than Huss; but, brilliant as was his defence when under examination, his nervous temperament unfitted him to bear, like Huss, the long-protracted agony.

Sometimes with dialectic subtlety he turned his examiners to ridicule, at others he vacillated between obduracy and submission. Finally he weakened under the strain, while the rebellious att.i.tude of the Bohemians doubtless led the council to increase the pressure. On September 11 he was brought before the a.s.sembly, where he read a long and elaborate recantation. Huss's sweetness of temper, he said, had attracted him, and his earnest exposition of Scripture truths had led him to believe that such a man could not teach heresy. He could not believe that the thirty articles condemned by the council were really Huss's, until he had obtained a book in Huss's own hand-writing, and on comparing them article by article he found them to be so. He therefore spontaneously and of free will condemned them, some of them as heretical, others as erroneous, others as scandalous. He also condemned the forty-five articles of Wickliff; he submitted himself wholly to the council, he condemned whatever it condemned, and he asked for fitting penance to be a.s.signed him. He did not even shrink from a deeper degradation. He wrote to Bohemia that Huss had been justly executed, that he had become convinced of his friend's errors and could not defend them.[538]

This was not a strictly formal abjuration such as was customarily required of prisoners of the Inquisition, yet it might have sufficed. It was read before a private congregation of the council, and some more public humiliation was needed. At the next general session, therefore, September 23, Jerome was placed in the pulpit, where he repeated his recantation, with an explanation of an expression in it, adding a recantation of his theory of Universals, and winding up by a solemn oath of abjuration in which he invoked an eternal anathema on all who wandered from the faith and on himself if he should do so. He had been told that he would not be allowed to return to Bohemia, but might select some Swabian monastery in which to reside, on condition that he should write home, over his hand and seal, that his teaching and that of Huss were false and not to be followed. This he promised to do, as, indeed, he had already done, but he was remanded to his prison, though his treatment was somewhat less harsh than before.[539]

Had the council been wise, it would have treated him as leniently as possible. A dishonored apostate, his power of evil was gone, and generosity would have been policy. The canons, however, prescribed harsh prison for converted heretics, whose conversion was always regarded as doubtful, and the a.s.sembled fathers were too bigoted to be wise. The zealots converted the apostate to a martyr, whose steadfast constancy redeemed his temporary weakness, and regained for him the forfeited influence over the imagination of his disciples.

His remorse was not long in showing itself. Stephen Palecz, Michael de Causis, and his other enemies who were still hovering around his prison, soon got wind of his self-accusation. John Gerson, whose hostility seems to have been insatiable, readily made himself their mouthpiece, and in a learned dissertation on the essentials of revocations called the attention of the council, October 29, to the unsatisfactory character of that of Jerome. Some Carmelites, apparently arriving from Prague, furnished new accusations, and demands were made that he be required to answer additional articles. Some of the Cardinals, Zabarella, Pierre d'Ailly, Giordano Orsini, Antonio da Aquileia, on the other hand, labored with the council to procure his liberation, but on being actively opposed by the Germans and Bohemians and accused of receiving bribes from the heretics and King Wenceslas, they abandoned the hopeless defence. Accordingly, February 24, 1416, a new commission was appointed to hold an inquisition on him. The whole ground was gone over again in examining him, from the Wickliffite heresies to his exciting rebellion in Prague and contumaciously enduring the excommunication incurred in Vienna. April 27 the commissioners made their report, and the _Promotor Haereticae Pravitatis_, or prosecutor for heresy, accompanied it with a long indictment enumerating his offences.

Jerome, resolved on death, had recovered his audacity; he not only, in spite of his recantation, denied that he was a heretic, but complained of unjust imprisonment and claimed to be indemnified for expenses and damages. His marvellous dialectical dexterity had evidently nonplussed the slower intellects of his examiners, who had found themselves unable to cope with his subtlety, for the council was asked, in conclusion, to diminish the diet on which he was described as feasting gluttonously, and by judicious starvation, the proper torment of heretics, to bring him to submission. Moreover, authority was asked to use torture and to force him to answer definitely yes or no to all questions as to his belief. If then he continues contumaciously to deny what has been or may be proved against him, he is to be handed over to the secular arm, in accordance with the canon law, as a pertinacious and incorrigible heretic. Thus with Jerome, as with Huss, the invariable principle of inquisitorial procedure was applied, that the denial of heretical opinions was simply an evidence and an aggravation of guilt.[540]

In this case, more than in that of Huss, the council seems to have taken upon itself the part of an inquisitorial tribunal, with its commissioners simply as examiners to take testimony, possibly because Jerome had refused to accept them as judges on account of enmity towards him. There is no evidence that it consented to the superfluous infamy of torturing, or even of starving its victim. The commissioners were left to their own devices as to extracting a confession, and May 9 they made another report of the whole case from beginning to end, for what object is not apparent, unless to demonstrate their helplessness. Having thus wearied them out, Jerome finally promised to answer categorically before the council. Perhaps it was curiosity to hear him, perhaps the precedent set in the case of Huss weighed with the fathers. The concession was made to him, and at a general session held May 23 he was brought in and the oath was offered to him. He refused to take it, saying that he would do so if he would be allowed to speak freely, but if he was only to say yes or no he would not. As the articles were read over he remained silent as to a portion, while to the rest he answered affirmatively or negatively, occasionally making a distinction, and answering with admirable readiness the clamors and interruptions which a.s.sailed him from all sides. The day wore away in this, and the completion of the hearing was adjourned till the 26th. Again the same scene occurred till the series of articles was exhausted, when the chief of the commissioners, John, Patriarch of Constantinople, summed up, saying that Jerome was convicted of fourfold heresy; but as he had repeatedly asked to be heard he should be allowed to speak, in order to silence absurd reflections on the council; moreover, if he was prepared to confess and repent, he still would be received to mercy, but if obdurate, justice must take its course.[541]

Of the scene which followed we have a vivid account in a letter to Leonardo Aretino from Poggio Bracciolini, who attended the council as apostolic secretary. Poggio had already been profoundly impressed with the quickness and readiness of a man who for three hundred and forty days had lain in the filth and squalor of a noisome dungeon, but now he breaks forth in unqualified admiration--"He stood fearless, undaunted, not merely despising death, but longing for it, like another Cato. O man worthy of eternal remembrance among men! If he held beliefs contrary to the rules of the Church I do not praise him, but I admire his learning, his knowledge of so many things, his eloquence, and the subtlety of his answers." In the midst of that turbulent and noisy crowd, his eloquence was so great that Poggio evidently thinks he would have been acquitted had he not courted death.[542]

His address was a most skilful vindication, gliding with seemingly careless negligence over the dangerous spots in his career--for his whole life had been made the subject of indictment--and giving most plausible explanations of that which could not be suppressed, as though the Bohemian troubles had been solely due to political differences. As for his recantation, his judges had promised him kindly treatment if he would throw himself on the mercy of the council. He was but a man, with a human dread of a dreadful death by fire; he had weakly yielded to persuasion, he had abjured, he had written to Bohemia as required, he had condemned the teaching of John Huss. Here he rose to the full height of his manly and self-devoted eloquence. Huss was a just and holy man, to whom he would cleave to the last; no sin that he had ever committed so weighed upon his conscience as his cowardly abjuration, which now he solemnly revoked. Wickliff had written with a profounder truth than any man before him, and dread of the stake alone could have induced him to condemn such a master, saving only the doctrine on the sacrament, of which he could not approve. Then he burst forth into a ringing invective on the vices of the clergy, and especially of the Roman curia, which had stimulated Wickliff and Huss to their efforts for reform. The good fathers of the council might be stunned for a moment by the fierce self-sacrifice of the man who thus deliberately threw away his life, but they soon recovered themselves, and quietly a.s.signed the following Sat.u.r.day for his definite sentence. Although, as a self-confessed relapsed, he was ent.i.tled to no further consideration, they proposed, with unusual mercy, to give him four days to reconsider and repent, but he had been addressing an audience far beyond the narrow walls of the Cathedral of Constance, and his words were seeds which sprouted forth in armed warriors.[543]

On May 30 the final acts of the tragedy were hurried through; the council a.s.sembled early, and by ten o'clock Jerome was at the stake.

After the ma.s.s, the Bishop of Lodi preached a sermon. He had been selected to perform the same office at the condemnation of Huss, and the brutality of his triumph over the unfortunate prisoner on this occasion even exceeded his former effort. The charity and tenderness with which Jerome had been treated ought to have softened his heart, even had the recollection of his crimes failed to do so. A comparison was drawn between the favor shown him and the severity customary with suspected heretics. "You were not tortured--I wish you had been, for it would have forced you to vomit forth all your errors; such treatment would have opened your eyes, which guilt had closed." The n.o.bles present were called upon to mark how Huss and Jerome, two base-born men, plebeians of the lowest rank and unknown origin, had dared to trouble the n.o.ble kingdom of Bohemia, and what evils had sprung from the presumption of those two peasants. Then Jerome in a few dignified sentences replied, a.s.serting his conscientiousness and deploring his condemnation of Wickliff and Huss. Cardinal Zabarella, he said, was winning him over when his judges were changed and he would not plead to new ones. His abjuration was read to him; he acknowledged it; he said it had been extorted by the dread of fire. Then the prosecutor asked for a definite sentence in writing against him, and the head commissioner, John of Constantinople, read a long one condemning him as a supporter of Wickliff and Huss, and ending with the declaration that he was a relapsed heretic and anathematized excommunicate. To this the council unanimously responded "_Placet_." There was no pretence of asking mercy for him. He was handed over to the secular power with a command that it should do its duty under the sentence rendered. Not being in orders, there was no ceremony of degradation to be performed, but a tall paper crown with painted devils was brought. He tossed his cap among the prelates and put on the crown, saying, "Our Lord Jesus Christ, when about to die for me, wore a crown of thorns. In place of that, I gladly bear this for his sake," and with this he was hurried off to execution on the same spot where Huss had suffered.[544]

The details of the execution were much the same, except that Jerome was stripped and a cloth tied around his loins. He sang the Creed and a litany, and when his voice could no longer be heard in the flames his lips were still seen to move as though praying to himself; after his beard was burned off, a blister the size of an egg was seen to form itself, showing that he still was alive, and his agony was unusually prolonged, through his extraordinary strength and vitality. One eye-witness says that he shrieked awfully, but other unfriendly witnesses declare that he continued praying till his voice was checked by the fire, and Poggio, who was present, was much impressed with his cheerful courage to the last. When bound to the stake, the executioner offered to light the fire from behind, where he could not see it, but he refused: "Come forward," he said, "and light the fire where I can see it. Had I feared this, I would not have been here." aeneas Sylvius likewise couples him with Huss for the unsurpa.s.sed constancy of his death. After it was over, his bedding, shoes, cap, and all his personal effects were brought from his dungeon and thrown upon the pile, that no relic of him might be left, and the ashes were cast into the Rhine.[545]

It only remained to secure the submission of John of Chlum, the courageous defender of Huss. He had remained in Constance and was in the power of the council. What means were adopted for his abas.e.m.e.nt do not appear, but, on July 1, he swore to maintain the faith, admitted that Huss and Jerome had suffered justly, and desired letters of his declaration to be made, that he might send them to Bohemia.[546]

CHAPTER VIII.

THE HUSSITES.

The Council of Constance, after eighteen months of labor, had disposed of Huss and Jerome. The methods employed had been the only ones known to the Church, the only ones possible to the council. Two centuries earlier the corruptions of the Church were recognized as the cause and excuse of the revolt of the Albigenses and Waldenses, but the revolt was ruthlessly put down without an effective effort to remove the cause. Now again unchecked corruption had produced another revolt and the same policy was followed--to leave untouched the profitable abuses and punish those who refused to tolerate them, and who rejected the principles out of which such abuses inevitably sprang. The council could do no otherwise; the traditions of procedure established in the subjugation of the Albigenses and the succeeding heresies furnished the only precedent and machinery through which it could act. Again a religious revolt had been provoked, and again that revolt was nursed and intensified till its only recognized cure lay in the sword of the crusader.

The prelates and doctors a.s.sembled in Constance could not hesitate for a moment as to their duty. Canon law and inquisitorial practice had long established the principle that the only way to meet heresy--and opposition to the const.i.tuted authorities of the Church was heresy--was by force, as soon as argument was found ineffective. The disobedient son of the Church who would not submit was to be cast out, after due admonition, and casting out meant that he should have in this world a wholesome foretaste of the wrath to come, in order to serve as an edifying example. Accordingly the council addressed itself, as a matter of course, to the task of widening the breach with Bohemia, of consolidating and intensifying the indignation caused by the execution of Huss and Jerome, and to stigmatizing as heresy the belief which was now professed by the majority of Bohemians.

The council had proposed to follow up the execution of Huss by an immediate application of inquisitorial methods to the whole Bohemian kingdom, but, at the instance of John, Bishop of Litomysl, it had commenced by the expedient of giving notice in its letter of July 26, 1415. This, as we have seen, only added to the exasperation of Bohemia, and on August 31 it issued to Bishop John letters commissioning him with inquisitorial powers to suppress all heresy in Bohemia; if he could not perform his office in safety elsewhere he was authorized to summon all suspect to his episcopal seat at Litomysl. Wenceslas dutifully issued to him a safe-conduct, but the irate Bohemians were already ravaging his territories, and he consulted prudence in not venturing his person there. The canons evidently could not be enforced amid a people so exasperated; so, on September 23, after listening to the recantation of Jerome, the council tried a further expedient, by a decree appointing John, Patriarch of Constantinople, and John, Bishop of Senlis, as commissioners (or, rather, inquisitors) to try all Hussite heretics.

They were empowered to summon all heretics or suspects to appear before them in the Roman curia by public edict, to be posted in the places frequented by such heretics, or in the neighboring territories if it were dangerous to attempt it at the residences of the accused, and such edicts might be either general in character or special. This was strictly according to rule, and if the object had been to secure the legal condemnation _in absentia_ of the ma.s.s of the Bohemian nation, it was well adapted for the purpose; but as the nation was seething in revolt, and was venerating Huss and Jerome with as much ardor as was shown in Rome to St. Peter and St. Paul, its only effect was to strengthen the hands of the extremists. This was seen when, on December 30, 1415, an address was delivered to the council, signed by four hundred and fifty Bohemian n.o.bles, reiterating their complaints of the execution of Huss, and withdrawing themselves from all obedience. This hardy challenge was accepted February 20, 1416, by citing all the signers and other supporters of Huss and Wickliff to appear before the council within fifty days and answer to the charge of heresy, in default of which they were to be proceeded against as contumacious. As it was not safe to serve this citation on them personally, or, indeed, anywhere in Bohemia, it was ordered to be affixed on the church doors at Constance, Ratisbon, Vienna, and Pa.s.sau. This was followed up with all the legal forms; the citations were affixed to the church doors, and record made in Constance May 5, in Pa.s.sau May 3, in Vienna May 10, and in Ratisbon June 14, 21, and 24. On June 3 the offenders were declared to be in contumacy, and on September 4 the further prosecution of the matter was intrusted to John of Constantinople.[547]

Here the affair seems to have dropped, for it had long been evident that the inquisitorial methods were of no avail when the accused const.i.tuted the great body of a nation. As early as March 27, 1416, the council had, without waiting to see the result of its judicial proceedings, resolved to appeal to force, if yet there was sufficient zeal for orthodoxy in Bohemia to render such appeal successful. The fanatic John of Litomysl was armed with legatine powers, and despatched with letters to the lords of Hazemburg, John of Michaelsburg, and other barons known as opponents of the popular cause. The council recited in moving terms its patience and tenderness in dealing with Huss, who had perished merely through his own hardness of heart. In spite of this, his followers had addressed to the council libellous and defamatory letters, affording a spectacle at once horrible and ludicrous. Heresy is constantly spreading and contaminating the land, priests and monks are despoiled, expelled, beaten, and slain. The barons are therefore summoned, in conjunction with the legate, to banish and exterminate all these persecutors, regardless of friendship and kinship. Bishop John's mission was a failure, in spite of letters written by Sigismund, March 21 and 30, in which he thanked the Catholic n.o.bles for their devotion, and warned the Hussite magnates that, if they persisted, Christendom would be banded against them in a crusade. The University of Prague responded, May 23, with a public declaration, certifying to the unblemished orthodoxy and supereminent merits of Huss. His whole life spent among them had been without a flaw; his learning and eloquence had been equalled by his charity and humility; he was in all things a man of surpa.s.sing sanct.i.ty, who sought to restore the Church to its primitive virtue and simplicity.

Jerome, also, whom the university seems to have supposed already executed, was similarly lauded for his learning and strict Catholic orthodoxy, and was declared to have in death triumphed gloriously over his enemies. In this the university represented with moderation the prevailing opinion in Bohemia. The more earnest disciples did not hesitate to declare that the Pa.s.sion of Christ was the only martyrdom fit to be compared with that of Huss.[548]

There was evidently no middle term which could reconcile conflicting opinions so firmly entertained; and, as the Catholic n.o.bles of Bohemia could not be stimulated to undertake a devastating civil war, the council naturally turned to Sigismund. In December, 1416, a doleful epistle was addressed to him, complaining that the execution of Huss and Jerome, in place of repressing heresy, had rendered it more violent than ever. As though men condemned to Satan by the Church were the chosen of G.o.d, the two heretics were venerated as saints and martyrs, their pictures shrined in the churches, and their names invoked in ma.s.ses. The faithful clergy were driven out, and their lot rendered more miserable than that of Jews. The barons and n.o.bles refuse obedience to the mandates of the council, and will not allow them to be published.

Communion in both elements is taught to be necessary to salvation, and is everywhere practised. Sigismund is therefore requested to do his duty, and reduce by force these rebellious heretics. Sigismund replied that he had forwarded the doc.u.ment to Wenceslas, and that if the latter had not power to suppress the heretics he would a.s.sist him with all his force. Sigismund was in no position to undertake the task, but after waiting for nine months he saw an opportunity of attacking his brother, who had been utterly powerless to control the storm. In a circular letter of September 3, 1417, addressed to the faithful in Bohemia, he drew a moving picture of the excesses committed on the Bohemian clergy, compelled by Neronian tortures to abjure their faith. His brother was suspected of favoring the heretics, as no one could conceive that such wickedness could be committed under so powerful a king without his connivance, and the council had decided to proceed against him, but had consented to delay at the instance of Sigismund, who for three years had been strenuously endeavoring to avert the prosecution. He warns every one, in conclusion, not to aid the heresy, but to exert themselves for its suppression.[549]

Shortly after this, November 11, 1417, the weary schism was closed by the election to the papacy of Martin V. Under the impulsion of a capable and resolute pontiff, who, as Cardinal Ottone Colonna, had, in 1411, condemned and excommunicated Huss, the reunited Church pressed eagerly forward to render the conflict inevitable. In February, 1418, the council published a series of twenty-four articles as its ultimatum.

King Wenceslas must swear to suppress the heresy of Wickliff and Huss.

Minute directions were given to restore the old order of things throughout Bohemia; priests and Catholics who had been driven out were to be reinstated and compensated; image and relic worship to be resumed, and the rites of the Church observed. All infected with heresy were to abjure it, while their leading doctors, John Jessenitz, Jacobel of Mies, Simon of Rokyzana, and six others, were to betake themselves to Rome for trial. Communion in both elements was to be specially abjured, and all who held the doctrines of Wickliff and Huss, or regarded Huss and Jerome as holy men, were to be burned as relapsed heretics; that is, without opportunity of recantation or hope of pardon. Finally, every one was required to lend a.s.sistance to the episcopal officials when called upon, under pain of punishment as fautors of heresy. It was simply the application of existing laws, as we have so many times already seen them brought to bear on offending communities. To enforce it, Sigismund promised to visit the rebellious region with four bishops and an inquisitor, and to burn all who would not recant.[550]

This was speedily followed, February 22, 1418, by a bull of Martin V., addressed to the prelates and inquisitors, not only of Bohemia and Moravia, but of the surrounding territories, Pa.s.sau, Salzburg, Ratisbon, Bamberg, Misnia, Silesia, and Poland. The pope expressed his grief and surprise that the heretics had not been brought to repentance by the miserable deaths of Huss and Jerome, but had been excited by the devil to yet greater sins. The prelates and inquisitors were ordered to track them out and deliver them to the secular arm; and such as proved themselves remiss in the work were to be removed, and replaced with more energetic successors. Secular potentates were commanded to seize and hold in chains all heretics, and to punish them duly when convicted, and a long series of instructions was given as to trials, penalties, and confiscations, in strict accordance with the inquisitorial practice which had so long been current. If this was intended to give countenance to Sigismund's promised expedition it proved useless, for the royal promise ended as Sigismund's were wont to do, and the next we hear of him is a letter of December, 1418, to Wenceslas, threatening that unlucky monarch with a crusade if he shall not suppress heresy.[551]

The glimpse into the condition of Bohemia afforded by these doc.u.ments is, perhaps, somewhat highly colored, yet on the whole not incorrect.

The kingdom was almost wholly withdrawn from obedience to the Church, although the German miners in the mountains of Kuttenberg were already slaying the native heretics. The Wickliffite doctrines adopted by Huss were triumphant, and the pressure of central authority being removed, men were naturally using the unaccustomed liberty to develop further and further the ruling hostility to the sacerdotal system. Utraquism, or communion in both elements, had been received with a frenzy of welcome which seems almost inexplicable; it aroused universal enthusiasm, which was only stimulated by the interdict p.r.o.nounced on it by Archbishop Conrad, November 1, 1415, and repeated February 1, 1416. When, in 1417, the University of Prague issued a solemn declaration in its favor and p.r.o.nounced void any human ordinance modifying the command of Christ and the custom of the early Church, it speedily became the distinguishing mark which separated the Hussite from the Catholic. Other innovations had already been introduced, and it was impossible that all should agree on the bounds to be set between conservatism and progress. As early as 1416 Christann of Prachat.i.tz remonstrated with Wenceslas Coranda for denying purgatory and the utility of prayers for the dead and the suffrages of saints, for refusing adoration to the Virgin, for casting out relics and images, for administering the Eucharist to newly-baptized infants, for discarding all rites and ceremonies, and reducing the Church to the simplicity of primitive times. Others taught that divine service could be celebrated anywhere as well as in consecrated churches; that baptism could be performed by laymen in ponds and running streams. Already there was forming the sect which, in carrying out the views of Wickliff, came to be known as Taborites. The more conservative element, which adopted the name of Calixtins, or Utraquists, satisfied with what had been acquired, endeavored to set bounds to the zeal which threatened to remove all the ancient landmarks.

Parties were beginning to range themselves, and on January 25, 1417, probably not long before its declaration in favor of Utraquism, the University issued a letter reciting that there were frequent disputes as to the existence of purgatory and the use of benedictions and other church observances; to put an end to these it p.r.o.nounced obligatory on all to believe in purgatory and in the utility of suffrages, prayers, and alms for the dead, of images of Christ and the saints, of incensing, aspersions, bell-ringing, the kiss of peace, of benediction of the holy font, salt, water, wax, fire, palms, eggs, cheese, and other eatables.

Any one teaching otherwise was not to be listened to until he should prove the truth of his doctrine to the satisfaction of the University.

In September, 1418, it was obliged to renew the declaration, with the addition of condemning the doctrines which p.r.o.nounced against all oaths, judicial executions, and sacraments administered by sinful priests, showing that Waldensian tenets were making rapid progress among the Taborites.[552]

All this indicates the questions which were occupying men's minds and the differences which were establishing themselves. Opinions were too strongly held, and mutual toleration was too little understood for peaceful discussion, and excitement daily grew higher, leading to tumults and bloodshed. In the spirit of unrest which was abroad, men and women of the more advanced views from all parts of the kingdom began a.s.sembling on a mountain near Bechin, to which they gave the name of Tabor, where they received the sacrament in both kinds. These a.s.semblages were larger on feast days, and on the day of Mary Magdalen, July 22, 1419, the mult.i.tude was computed at forty thousand. Numbers gave courage, and there was even talk of deposing King Wenceslas and replacing him with Nicholas Lord of Hussinetz, whose popularity had been increased by his banishment for advocating their cause with the monarch.

From this they were dissuaded by their chief spiritual leader, the priest Wenceslas Coranda, who pointed out that as the king was an indolent drunkard, permitting them to do what they liked, they would scarce benefit themselves by a change. The abandonment of this project, however, did not a.s.sure peace. On July 30 there was a tumult in the Neustadt of Prague; at command of the king, the authorities endeavored to prevent the progress of a procession bearing the sacrament; the people rose, and under the lead of John Ziska, whose fiery zeal and cool audacity were rapidly bringing him to the front, they rushed into the town-hall and cast out of the windows such of the magistrates as they found there, who were promptly slain by the mob below. The agitation and alarm caused by this affair brought on King Wenceslas an attack of paralysis, of which he died August 15.[553]

Feeble as had been the royal authority, it yet had served as a restraint upon the hostile sects eager to tear each other to pieces. With the death of the king the untamable pa.s.sions burst forth. Two days afterwards the churches and convents were mobbed, the images and organs were broken, and those in which the cup had been refused to the laity were the objects of special vengeance. Priests and monks were taken prisoners, and within a few days the Dominican and Carthusian convents were burned. Queen Sophia endeavored, in vain, to maintain order with such of the barons as remained loyal; civil war broke forth, until, on November 13, the queen concluded with the cities of Prague a truce to last until April 23, 1420, the queen promising to maintain the law of G.o.d and communion in both elements, while the citizens pledged themselves to refrain from image-breaking and the destruction of convents. Mutual exasperation, however, was too great to be restrained.

Ziska came to Prague and destroyed churches and monasteries in the city and neighborhood; Queen Sophia laid siege to Pilsen; a neighborhood war broke out in which shocking cruelties were perpetrated on both sides; German miners of Caurzim and Kuttenberg threw into abandoned mines all the Calixtins on whom they could lay their hands, and some Bavarians who were coming to the a.s.sistance of Rackzo of Ryzmberg tied to a tree and burned the priest Naakvasa, a zealous Calixtin. Ziska was not behindhand in this, and in burning convents not infrequently allowed the monks to share the fate of their buildings. In the desultory war which raged everywhere both sides cut off the hands and feet of prisoners.[554]

Sigismund was now the lawful King of Bohemia, and he came to claim his inheritance. As a preliminary step he sent envoys to Prague offering to leave the use of the cup as it had been under Wenceslas, to call a general a.s.sembly of the nation, and after consultation to refer any questions to the Holy See. A meeting of the barons and clergy was held which agreed to accept the terms. On Christmas Day, 1419, he came to Brunn, and thither flocked the magnates and representatives of the cities to tender their allegiance. The envoys of Prague, it is true, persisted in using the cup, and there was an interdict in consequence placed on Brunn during their stay, but when he ordered them to remove the chains from the streets of Prague, and destroy the fortifications which they had raised against the castle, there was no refusal, and on their return, January 3, 1420, his commands were obeyed. His natural faithlessness soon showed itself. He changed all the castellans and officials who were favorable to the Hussites; the Catholics who had fled or been expelled returned and commenced to triumph over their enemies; and a royal edict was issued, in obedience to the decrees of Constance, commanding all those in authority to exterminate the Wickliffites and Hussites and those who used the sacramental cup. Still, the kingdom made no sign of organized opposition to him, except that the provident Ziska and his followers, seeing the wrath to come, diligently set to work to fortify Mount Tabor. Strong by nature, it soon was made virtually impregnable, and for a generation it remained the stronghold of the extremists who became renowned throughout the world as Taborites. Mostly peasant-folk, they showed to the chivalry of Europe what could be done by freemen, animated by religious zeal and race hatred; their rustic wagons made a rampart which the most valiant knights learned not to a.s.sail; armed sometimes only with iron-shod flails, the hardy zealots did not hesitate to throw themselves upon the best-appointed troops, and often bore them down with the sheer weight of the attack. Wild and undisciplined, they were often cruel, but their fanatic courage rendered them a terror to all Germany.[555]

Nothing, probably, could have averted an eventual explosion; but, for the moment, it seemed that Sigismund was about to enter on peaceable possession of his kingdom, and any subsequent rebellion would have been attempted under great disadvantages. Suddenly, however, an act of inconsiderate and gratuitous fanaticism set all Bohemia aflame. Some trouble in Silesia had called Sigismund to Breslau, where he was joined by a papal legate armed by Martin V. with power to proclaim a crusade with Holy Land indulgences. John Krasa, a merchant of Prague, who chanced to be there, talked over boldly about the innocence of Huss; he was arrested, persisted in his faith, and was condemned by the legate and prelates who were with Sigismund to be dragged by the heels at a horse's tail to the place of execution and burned. While lying in prison he was joined by Nicholas of Bethlehem, a student of Prague, who had been sent by the city to Sigismund to offer to receive him if he would not interfere with the use of the cup to the laity. In place of listening to him he was tried as a heretic and thrown into prison to await the result. Krasa encouraged him to endure to the last, and both were brought forth on March 15, 1420, to undergo the punishment. As the feet of Nicholas were about to be attached to the horse, his courage gave way and he recanted. Krasa was undaunted; the legate followed him, as he was dragged to the place of execution, exhorting him to repent, but in vain; he was attached half-dead to the stake and duly burned. Two days later, March 17, the legate proclaimed the crusade. The die was cast; the Church so willed it, and a new Albigensian war was inevitable.[556]

There was wavering no longer in Bohemia. The events at Breslau united all, with the exception of a few barons and such Germans as were left, in resistance against Sigismund. The preachers thundered against him as the Red Dragon of the Apocalypse. By April 3 the citizens of Utraquist Prague had bound themselves by a solemn oath with the Taborites to defend themselves against him to the last, and were busy in preparations to sustain a siege. Sigismund's forces were wholly inadequate for the conquest of a virtually united kingdom. After an advance to Kuttenberg he was forced to withdraw and await the a.s.sembling of the crusade, which took long to organize, and did not burst in its fury over Bohemia until the following year, 1421. It was on a scale to crush all resistance. In its ma.s.s of one hundred and fifty thousand men all Europe was represented, from Russia to Spain and from Sicily to England. The reunited Church aroused all Christendom to stamp out the revolt, and the treasures of salvation were poured lavishly forth to exterminate those who dared to maintain the innocence of Huss and Jerome, and to take the Eucharist as all Christians had done until within two hundred years. The war was waged with desperation. Five times during 1421 the crusaders invaded Bohemia, and five times they were beaten back disastrously. The gain to the faith was scarce perceptible, for Sigismund stripped the churches of all their precious ornaments, declaring that he was not impelled by lack of reverence, but by a prudent desire to prevent their falling into the hands of the Hussites. Both sides perpetrated cruelties happily unknown save in the ferocity of religious wars. During the siege of Prague all Bohemians captured were burned as heretics whether they used the cup or not; and on July 19 the besieged demanded of the magistrates sixteen German prisoners, whom they took outside of the walls and burned in hogsheads in full sight of the invading army. We can estimate the mercilessness of the strife when it was reckoned among the good deeds of George, Bishop of Pa.s.sau, who accompanied Albert of Austria, that by his intercession he saved the lives of many Bohemian captives.[557]