[1] Frederick, Count of the Palatinate, was called the "Winter King," probably because he came to Prague one winter and left the next one.
CHAPTER XII
Is another long one, but the last of A Terrace in Prague. It tells little about Kings of Bohemia, and more about Jesuits and the work they left behind to mark the influence they wielded. There are churches and statues of their erection, but you are left to decide for yourself whether you like those works or not. Several historic figures appear on the scene: Tilly, Waldstein, Königsmark the Swedish General, and his chaplain, Dr. Klee. Mention is also made of some Britons, among them one with the homely name of Brown, an honest soldier who lies buried here in Prague. A tale of a supernatural event. A further talk of the river and about excursions. Finally, an attempt at an epilogue.
OU will, I hope, agree with me that a man who sits upon a terrace and writes about the things he sees and what he thinks about them is entitled to bring his observations to a close whenever he considers it fit to do so. That point is now within reach. From the first I warned you that this is not a guide-book, and therefore not under the obligation of giving you a full and detailed catalogue of all the sights of Prague and how to see them. There is little more that I propose to tell you, it being my object to entice you out here to see for yourself. I will wait for you on my terrace, if you like, and while waiting will cast a final glance round the scene that has, I confess, acquired a strong hold of me.
The Hradšany, seen on a dull, chill day, always recalls to me what I have read about those days since the Bohemians lost their all on the White Mountain, until they broke free again only a few years ago. On dull days the long, plain, featureless walls of the Hradšany seem the very expression of life under the later Habsburg Kings of Bohemia. They were, on the whole, worthy, well-meaning sovereigns, their chief trouble being, it would seem, a hereditary incapacity for seeing any point of view but that to which their forbears, Jesuit-trained, and of limited outlook, had educated them. They were quite impervious to new ideas, very tenacious of old ones, and fully convinced of their own divine right. The Habsburg line of policy towards Bohemia was laid down by Ferdinand II—or shall I say for that monarch?—at the Te Deum sung in St. Stephen's Cathedral, at Vienna, to celebrate the victory of Rome over Bohemia's religious freedom. It would seem as if the King had moulded his policy on the text of the sermon preached by Brother Sabrinus, the Capuchin friar, on that occasion: "Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; Thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel." In carrying out this policy the King of Bohemia was ably assisted by the Jesuits. This congregation had been introduced into Bohemia by a former Ferdinand whose acquaintance we have made; the Jesuits had therefore stores of useful local knowledge at their command when they set about complementing the material victory won on the White Mountain by a spiritual conquest. The first thing was to re-establish Roman ritual, and the church chosen for this act was St. Martin's-in-the-Wall, where, as I have told you, the Sacrament was first given in both kinds by Jacobelius in 1414. Then it was thought fit to remove the statue of King George Podiebrad from the west front of the Tyn Church. The effigy showed this national hero pointing with his drawn sword towards the chalice above his head, of which he had been such a valiant defender.
Then followed persecution, exile, imprisonment and corporal punishment, in addition to the turmoil and sufferings of the Thirty Years' War. Ferdinand's father-confessor was a Jesuit, Lamormain, and under the latter's guidance Bohemia was being brought back to the fold, while elsewhere in Europe men like Tilly and Waldstein, whom Schiller preferred to call Wallenstein, were taking their part in the Catholic Reformation, with striking results, the sack of cities and the devastation of whole countries.