The bishops, thinking their victory secure, at length undertook to justify their silence in the Diet of 1530, and to refute the apology which the evangelical ministers had then presented. Eliæ was entrusted with the drawing up of the plea. ‘These new preachers,’ said the prelates, ‘transform the Christian Church and give it a new shape. The predecessors of Luther are Eunomius, Manichæus, Jovinianus, Vigilantius, the Waldenses, Wycliffe, Hus, and others of the same species, all damnable heretics. Consider how many princes, nobles, kingdoms, countries and towns have loyally adhered to the true Christian faith. You are called to make your choice between these Catholic nobles and excommunicated heretics. Decide for yourselves; make use in this case of the same understanding which you apply to the things of this world.’[[348]]
The Protestants on their part were not backward. They discharged, volley after volley, their polemical pamphlets, sometimes theological, sometimes popular, after the manner of Ulrich von Hutten or Hans Sachs. Imaginations were stimulated, tempers were heated, and the country swarmed with treatises, parables, and sarcastic sayings. While Peter Larssen, professor at Malmoe, made a serious attack on ‘the sentence of banishment against the ministers of the Word of God,’ a Dialogue on the Mass represented it as a sick man abandoned by his physicians and breathing his last. A satirical piece on superstitious vigils exposed the notorious impositions of the priests. One Hundred and Seventy Questions, with answers, elucidated various points of Christian doctrine. A Conversation between Peter Smid and Adzer Bauer, which was not wanting in wit, stigmatized purgatory, confession, feast-days, holy water, tapers and other abuses of the papal church. Finally, a Dance of Death, one of the favorite themes of the sixteenth century, brought on the stage terrified popes, bishops, and canons, all trembling at the sight of Death, while the evangelical ministers joyfully went forward to meet him.[[349]]
Certain grave occurrences fraught with danger could not but have a greater influence than these satires in putting an end to the strife and in giving Denmark a new impulse.
Invasion Of The Lubeckers.
Lübeck, one of the Hanse Towns, at this time a rich and powerful place, was discontented with the Danish government because it did not grant to its ships sufficiently exclusive privileges. Desirous of profiting by the weakness which was the consequence of the interregnum, the Lübeckers resolved, in 1534, to invade the kingdom, under the pretext of reinstating Christian II. on the throne. A leader must be found, and Lübeck applied to the Count of Oldenburg, a kinsman of the unfortunate prisoner, an able man, ready in action, ambitious, and a zealous Protestant, though little worthy of the name. Christian had still numerous partisans, and his restoration to the throne appeared to the Danes to be a way of escape from a long and troublous interregnum. The emperor, Christian’s brother-in-law, and the king of England favored the enterprise. The Count of Oldenburg raised troops in Germany, invaded Holstein, and then returning to Lübeck, embarked on board a fleet of twenty-one vessels, well supplied by the Lübeckers with men and munitions of war, and set sail for Denmark, which at this time had no king, no army, and hardly a council. He made a descent on Zealand, took possession of Roeskilde, deposed Bishop Roennov, the friend of King Frederick and of his son, and appointed in his stead Archbishop Troll, the faithful servant of Christian II. After making himself master of the Sound, he marched on Copenhagen which opened its gates to him; subjugated the whole of Zealand, and convoked at Ringsted a Diet the members of which took the oath of allegiance to Christian II. Oldenburg’s profession of Protestantism drew the townsmen to his side. It was otherwise with the nobility, who had caused Christian to be put in prison and now trembled at the thought of his liberation. The Lords of the kingdom, therefore, in alarm, shut themselves up in their castles. Oldenburg dispatched troops against them, an excited mob followed, and on reaching any of these aristocratic abodes, gave themselves up to brutal rage. Many of the nobles found themselves compelled by violence to join the invader, and they stammered out with trembling an oath of fidelity to Christian, their cruel and formidable foe. Roennov, who played the weathercock in politics as well as in religion, was among the first to take the oath; and his bishopric was restored to him. The Count gave Troll, by way of compensation, the bishopric of Fionia. The people of Malmoe, persuaded by the Lübeckers, had already placed the government under arrest, and had demolished the citadel built by Frederick. Oldenburg crossed the Sound, entered Scandinavia, and went with a numerous escort of troops and of people to Liber hill, near the primatial town of Lund, where the kings of Denmark were accustomed to receive the homage of their States. He called upon the crowd around him to acknowledge Christian II. They responded with joyous acclamations. Ere long, the islands of Moen, Falster, Laaland and Langeland were conquered, and Oldenburg was master of the greater part of Denmark.[[350]]
Escape Of The King’s Friends.
Meanwhile, the friends of the late king and of the Reformation, and particularly the Grand Master of the kingdom, the noble Magnus Gjoë, had betaken themselves to Jutland, where they would be nearer to Frederick’s eldest son. They were followed by the nobles, the bishops, and all the enemies of Christian II., who in a state of despair made their escape furtively into Jutland, a district remote from the storm which was ravaging the island of Zealand and terrified them. The young duke John, no longer feeling himself safe in Fionia, assumed the guise of a peasant, his whole suite doing the same, and thus rapidly crossed the Little Belt. The feeble Roennov, once more facing about as he so often did, likewise reached Jutland in the suite of the bishops his friends. Such members of the Diet as were present in Jutland, being determined to provide for the safety of the realm by energetic measures, assembled first at Skanderborg, on the lake of Mos, a little below Aarhuus; and afterwards at Rye, several leagues distant, on the edge of a forest near the lake of Juul. A multitude of the gentry, of the townsmen, and of peasants had quitted their castles, their shops, and their rye fields, that they might sooner learn what this assembly would resolve on. The bishops, concerned only about their own power, had obstinately insisted on having a child for king; and a factious spirit had clouded the judgment of the nobles. But now the danger was displayed in all its vastness, the veil was rent, the revolt would inevitably spread in Jutland, and then it would be all up with the ancient kingdom, which would fall a prey to greedy tradesmen and to a furious populace, and would be given over to the sanguinary revenges of an implacable king. What might not the terrible author of the massacre at Stockholm be expected to do, if the Lübeckers should rescue him from the dungeon which shut him in, and should place him on the throne?[[351]]
In crises of this kind there is one man predestined to save his countrymen. In this case it was the noble Magnus Gjoë. He rose and argued before the Diet that if the crown had been unhesitatingly given to the eldest son of the deceased king, the great calamities which now overwhelmed the kingdom would have been averted. He added that the only means of saving it at this hour was a speedy recourse to that prince. ‘Most honorable lords,’ said he, ‘the salvation of our country now depends upon the resolution which you are about to adopt.’ All the lay members applauded this speech and proposed that without delay they should call the duke to the throne of his father. But the prelates were indifferent to any calamities but their own. ‘The safety of the Church,’ they said, ‘forbids our making choice of a heretical prince.’ Violent debates now began. It was to no purpose that representations were made to the priests that they were risking the sacrifice of the country to their idle chimeras; their obstinacy only grew stronger.
While there was one assembly within the hall, there was a far more numerous one outside. An immense crowd surrounded the Diet and waited impatiently to see whether the country was to be saved or lost. They pressed about the doors to learn the result of the deliberations and wondered that they did not come to an end. Ere long, suspecting what happened, these impatient men made their way into the hall and exclaimed that it would not do to wait till the enemy fell upon those who were still able to defend their country before appointing the only leader who could save them. They asserted that the caprice of the bishops had already cost the loss of half the kingdom, and declared that if the duke was not that instant elected, those who opposed it should pay dear for their resistance. The prelates began to tremble. They sat silent, gloomy, and irresolute. Dread, however, of the tyrant’s return brought them to a decision. They stammered out some excuses, they spoke of their zeal for religion, and they added that if the nobles were determined to elect the duke, they had only to do so on their own responsibility; that as for themselves they would be content with the receipt of their tithes and the maintenance of their own privileges and those of their Church. No sooner had they spoken than the young Christian was proclaimed king by the Diet; and the multitudes within and without the hall responded to the announcement of this election with acclamations of joy. It was on the 4th July, 1534, that this important step was taken.