The Neighbourhood of Saltzbourg is not disagreeable; and though the Valley in which the City lies is pretty much inclosed with Mountains, yet it presents several Objects that are pleasing to the Sight.
The Archbishop has two Pleasure-Houses, viz. Cleisheim and Heilbron, which are both of them beautiful and magnificent. Heilbron especially is worth seeing on account of its fine Waters and Cascades.
I hope to write to you speedily from Venice, and perhaps you will hear from me when I come to Inspruc; but this will depend on the Stay I shall make there, and on the departure of the Post.
POSTSCRIPT.
Since the year 1730, that this Letter was wrote, great Revolutions have happened in the Archbishoprick of Saltzbourg, with regard to Religion; for about 22,000 Persons have abandoned this Country, together with their Estates and their Fortunes, and declared themselves of the Lutheran Communion; which is very strange, and almost inconceivable! For in short, those People never knew any Clergy but their own Priests, they lived in a Country where there was no Controversy about Religion, because all the Inhabitants were reckon'd staunch Catholics, by consequence those People could not be instructed; and even the greatest part of them could not read, but were bred up in such gross Ignorance that they scarce knew the Principles of Christianity. Therefore how could these poor People know that they were in an Error?
I am not ignorant that at the beginning of the pretended Reformation, there were Saltzburghers that followed the Doctrines of Luther, such as Staupitz, Abbot of St. Peter's at Saltzbourg; Paul Speratus, a Preacher in the Cathedral of this City; and several others. But Lutheranism was thought to be quite suppressed in this Province, when it seem'd all on a sudden to take deeper Root than ever; tho', as I said before, I can't conceive how it should happen. Is it possible that the Archbishop, the Curates
and Priests should take so little care of what ought to have been most dear to them, I mean the Salvation of Souls, as that so many Thousands of People should pass with them for good Romans, at the same time that they abhorred Rome and its Precepts? For in short, I suppose, and believe too, that there have ever been Protestants in this Country, since the pretended Reformation; it being not in the power of Man to destroy a Religion when once it has had Followers in a Country; but the Difficulty is, how those Sectaries should subsist there, without the Knowledge of an ecclesiastical Sovereign; and how it was possible for them, not only to subsist, but even to multiply, and the Priests and Archbishop not perceive it. Ought not the Curates to know the Sentiments of their Parishioners by Confession? Ought they not to acquaint the Archbishop their Head of it? and ought not this Prelate and his Priests to endeavour to reclaim those that go astray, by the Example of a lively Faith, and by charitable Exhortations, and from a Compassion for their Error, diligently to oppose the Propagation of it? But all this has been neglected: The Priests, and their Archbishop, knew not there was a Fire, 'till 'twas too late to put it out; and instead of the Good-nature, Compassion, and Charity, which like Water were necessary to extinguish it, they pour'd in the Oil of Hatred and Violence, and abandoned themselves to their furious Zeal. The haughty, rigid, and severe Archbishop, forgetting that he was both a Father and an Archbishop, and giving way to the Violence of his Temper, has for ever lost those Souls which he might have hoped to reclaim, by Instructions truly pastoral, and treating them as Children led astray; whereas this Prelate, by using the contrary Method, has caused a great many Persons to declare themselves Protestants, who would have died in the Bosom of the Church, if the proper Remedies had been employed, to bring them back to it.
But I am persuaded that among the Emigrants of Saltzbourg, there is a vast number who made Religion only a Cloak to leave their Country, in hopes of bettering their Fortunes elsewhere, and who were seduced by the ensnaring Temptation of throwing off the Yoak of Submission. Be this as it will, those unfortunate Subjects, like the Jews, are spread into divers Countries, as Germany, Holland, and Prussia, where the King, I must confess, (as much a Catholic as I am) has received them with a Charity and Generosity perfectly christian and royal; his Majesty having grudg'd neither Care nor Expence to convince the World that as France is the Asylum of unfortunate Kings, so the Dominions of Prussia are the Refuge of oppressed Subjects.