The popular feeling in Bohemia was strongly in favour of Charles, as against his father. Indeed, so hated had the latter become, that, when he was shortly after afflicted with blindness, many Bohemians considered that this suffering was a judgment upon him for his cruelty and oppression. He therefore considered it advisable to accept these terms; and Charles’s position was made still easier by the friendship of Pope Clement VI., who, while anxious to conciliate the friendship of John, was keenly alive to the desirability of securing to his side the national sentiment of Bohemia. He therefore raised the Church of Prague into an archbishopric, emancipating it entirely from the archbishopric of Mainz; and he also conceded that often disputed demand for the use of the Slavonic ritual in the monasteries of Bohemia.
Indeed, both John and Clement had a very special reason for desiring to keep the popular young prince in friendly alliance with them. The ambition, which John had once cherished on his own behalf, had now been turned into a desire for the exaltation of his son. For different reasons both the King and the Pope were now eager for the overthrow of Louis of Bavaria; and they heartily agreed that Charles was the most hopeful candidate for the Imperial throne. The other Electors were equally ready for this change; and in July, 1346, Charles was chosen Holy Roman Emperor. Such a step could not long fail to produce dangerous results; but, before the opponents of the new Emperor were prepared for action, the attention of Europe was distracted from their quarrels by a war between England and France. John eagerly rushed to the support of his old ally; and, in August, 1346, he died fighting at the battle of Crecy—a death much admired by the readers of romances, and an infinite relief to the oppressed Bohemians.
VI.
REIGN OF CHARLES IV.
(1346-1378.)
In writing the life of men who have played a great part in the affairs of the world, it is generally possible to find some hint in the earlier periods of their life of a preparation for the important work which has distinguished their later years. In the case of Charles IV. this link seems at first sight exceptionally difficult to find. He had been torn away from his mother’s influence in his earliest childhood; treated with exceptional harshness, at that tender age, by his father; kept away so long from the country which he was afterwards to govern, that when he first returned to it he had completely forgotten the Bohemian language; suddenly thrust into a partial government of the country, at the age of seventeen; regarded by his father and those who surrounded him with the utmost suspicion, and snatched away from the government when he was just beginning to get a firm hold of it. Then he was dragged into Italian wars with which he had little sympathy, and where men seemed to fight as much with poison as with swords; a witness of his father’s dissolute life, and surrounded by evil companions; and, to crown all his difficulties, when he had attained to full manhood, but had not yet become king of Bohemia, he had been suddenly raised to the highest dignity in Europe. Such was the preparation which Charles had received for the government of a kingdom which required special knowledge, special sympathies, and somewhat exclusive care.