that time the case, so many heterogeneous elements were combined, yet both the contending parties were sufficiently strong not to succumb easily in the contest. It is this fact which ultimately established the necessity of a cordial and permanent religious peace, and caused that necessity to be so universally acknowledged. But this very equality of numbers, and still more the active interference of almost all the great continental powers in the contest, rendered it at first more obstinate and lasting. Never was there a religious war, so widely extended and so complicated in its operations, so protracted in duration, and entailing misery on so many generations. That period of thirty years’ havoc, in which the early civilization, and the noblest energies of Germany were destroyed, forms in history the great wall of separation between the ancient Germany, which in the middle age was the most powerful, flourishing, and wealthy country in Europe, and the new Germany of recent and happier times, which is now gradually recovering from her long exhaustion and general desolation, and rising again into light and life from the sepulchral darkness—the night of death, to which her ancient disputes had consigned her.
We can be little astonished at the origin of this war—indeed it is almost a matter of surprise that hostilities did not break out sooner; and the very fact that external warfare was so long suppressed, may account for the violence
and animosity of the first conflict. The first religious peace was in reality a mere truce—another prolonged interim which still left many debateable points, that with the most honest intentions in both parties it was extremely difficult, and almost impossible to settle by a peaceful and equitable adjustment. Where so much combustible matter existed, the merest accident might enkindle a conflagration. This first occurred in Bohemia, where the old insurrection of the Hussites had been put down by force—(the only way in which on its first outbreak, it could have been suppressed) but where as it now appeared that no vital remedy had been applied to the roots of the disorder, much diseased and inflammable matter yet remained. Still the revolt of Bohemia was not the only cause or subject of a war, which some historians have considered rather as a complicated series of wars, partially varying in their object. The whole country—the age itself seemed involved in warfare; and war appeared as the permanent policy, the ruling spirit, the inveterate habit, and natural necessity of mankind. As a masterly hand[11] has seized and pourtrayed many events and incidents—many scenes and acts of this great tragedy—the religious feelings, and steadfast and inflexible character of the Emperor Ferdinand II.—the high military glory and conquests of the
Swedish monarch Gustavus Adolphus—and the genius and disastrous fate of the General Wallenstein;—it is unnecessary to dwell at any length on these great historical recollections, though the subject is inexhaustible in itself. The peace which was the fruit of a high and imperious necessity, is in the point of view we here take, of far greater interest.
With respect to indemnities, the treaty of Westphalia did not differ from any other treaty of general peace, in which lands and parcels of land are to be allotted, and even secularized, but where the number of claimants exceeds the portions of allotment. Considered, too, as a treaty which restored, and fixed on a firm basis, the peace of the German Empire, the treaty of Westphalia did not depend in this, as in other respects, on the force of its own articles, but on the general system of European policy—on the principle of the balance of power which regulated that policy—a principle which then, and still more in later times, this treaty has much contributed to diffuse and extend. But it is as a solemn pact of religious peace, that I wish here particularly to consider the treaty of Westphalia—as the final conclusion of all religious wars (and in this respect it has never been materially violated)—as a lasting covenant of religious freedom, whose main principle continues deeply implanted in the German mind, while the two other relations in which this treaty remained so incomplete, have for the most part
lost their practical interest. When we contemplate, too, this treaty as a noble labour of equity—the successful work of unwearied industry, it has no parallel among preceding treaties of peace; and hence it has become the basis of the international law of Europe, and the textbook of diplomatic science in modern times even down to our own days. Hence its long, undisturbed duration. The nations—the age itself blessed it as the termination of their long calamities; but far greater has been its influence on after-times. The religious peace which it established, has become in modern times a national habitude—a second nature to the German people; for here and no where else must we look for its high historical destination. It may be said that this, like every other peace where the question of right remains the subject of dispute, is only a truce—another mere interim—but it is a sacred and eternal truce—a divine interim—that is to say, an intermediate state of peace to last till God shall pronounce his final and unfailing award. Of little moment to the philosopher, who considers this religious peace in its vast bearings on the past, the present, and the momentous future, is the reflection of the Jurist how far, and under what restrictions this treaty in the altered circumstances of recent times, can be considered as really valid and politically binding. For more than any other treaty, has this solemn pact of religious peace been interwoven with life, and become a reality. And
when we take a wide survey of the world, and include the future in our prospective ken, we may say, that now that most of the separate articles of this treaty have lost their value, and are no longer susceptible of execution, the general spirit and object—the high import of this religious peace are much nearer their fulfilment than formerly, when the practical application of this treaty to particular cases was solely considered. For that outward, but lasting covenant of religious peace—that holy truce and interim forms the prelude and introduction to another, higher, far more comprehensive, spiritual and divine peace, for which our age—the epoch of a mighty regeneration—is irrevocably destined. For how can Christianity, that is to say, eternal truth itself, be for ever torn by divisions? The solution of the great problem of the last three hundred years is by no means complicated, if we understand it in this sense, but extremely simple. For, if as it is the object of all true and elevated philosophy to prove, faith and science are really and essentially one, faith will be restored to its former unity, and then the schism between faith and science will cease.
Even as regards the political relations of the present times, this great, fundamental treaty of peace has become a new Christian basis of international law; for the spirit of Christianity requires that where absolute justice, which is rarely attainable, cannot be found, a system of peaceable and equitable compromise should
before all things be preferred. And hence this treaty has, for all succeeding times, stamped the pacific and conservative policy of the great German power of Austria. In France and England, indeed, religious wars afterwards occurred; but they were merely the last agitations—the after-pains of that fearful period of convulsive labour. These commotions were soon allayed; and the example and precedent of this great religious pacification in Germany, highly and universally admired as it was, caused the principle of religious toleration to be tacitly acknowledged as one which religion and necessity alike prescribed for the imitation of all Europe.
Among the last and most frightful consequences of the general revolution in the church, was the calamitous execution of King Charles the First, which for the sake of order, I have previously adverted to, and which took place a year after the establishment of the great religious peace in Germany, and was followed forty years afterwards by the great national peace of England—the final settlement of the British constitution. Among the lamentable events which occurred at that period in France, was the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, the last, and comparatively speaking, the most solid and durable of the treaties of religious peace made in that country—a revocation which can by no means astonish us, since this edict, destitute of all internal and external guarantees, and which emanated solely from absolute power, could not offer