It was a serious blunder to divide an army under the eyes of Gustavus. Early on the morning of November 16 the Swedish king was in front of Wallenstein's position at Lützen. He knew well that, if there was to be a battle at all, he must be the assailant. Wallenstein would not stir. Behind ditches and entrenchments, ready armed, his heavy squares lay immovably, waiting for the enemy, like the Russians at the Alma or the English at Waterloo. A fog lay thick upon the ground. The Swedish army gathered early to their morning prayer, summoned by the sounds of Luther's hymn tune, "God is a strong tower," floating on the heavy air from the brazen lips of a trumpet. The king himself joined in the morning hymn, "Fear not, little flock." Then, as if with forebodings of the coming slaughter, others sung of "Jesus the Saviour, who was the conqueror of death." Gustavus thrust aside the armour which was offered him. Since he had received a wound, not long before, he felt uncomfortable in it. Unprotected, he mounted on his horse, and rode about the ranks encouraging the men.
§ 5. Attack of the Swedes, and death of the king.
At eleven the mist cleared away, and the sun shone out. The king gave his last orders to his generals. Then, looking to heaven, "Now," he said, "in God's name, Jesus, give us to-day to fight for the honour of thy holy name." Then, waving his sword over his head, he cried out, "Forwards!" The whole line advanced, Gustavus riding at the head of the cavalry at the right. After a fierce struggle, the enemy's lines were broken through everywhere. But Wallenstein was not yet mastered. Bringing up his reserves, he drove back the Swedish infantry in the centre. Gustavus, when he heard the news, flew to the rescue. In all other affairs of life he knew better than most men how to temper daring with discretion. In the battle-field he flung prudence to the winds. The horsemen, whom he had ordered to follow him, struggled in vain to keep up with the long strides of their master's horse. The fog came down thickly once more, and the king, left almost alone in the darkness, dashed unawares into a regiment of the enemy's cuirassiers. One shot passed through his horse's neck. A second shattered his left arm. Turning round to ask one of those who still followed him to help him out of the fight, a third shot struck him in the back, and he fell heavily to the ground. A youth of eighteen, who alone was left by his side, strove to lift him up and to bear him off. But the wounded man was too heavy for him. The cuirassiers rode up and asked who was there. "I was the King of Sweden," murmured the king, as the young man returned no answer, and the horseman shot him through the head, and put an end to his pain.
§ 6. Defeat of Wallenstein.
Bernard of Weimar took up the command. On the other side Pappenheim, having received orders to return, hurried back from Halle. But he brought only his cavalry with him. It would be many hours before his foot could retrace their weary steps. The Swedes, when they heard that their beloved king had fallen, burnt with ardour to revenge him. A terrible struggle ensued. Hour after hour the battle swayed backwards and forwards. In one of the Swedish regiments only one man out of six left the fight unhurt. Pappenheim, the dashing and the brave, whose word was ever for fight, the Blücher of the seventeenth century, was struck down. At the battle of the White Hill he had lain long upon the field senseless from his wounds, and had told those who were around him when he awakened that he had come back from Purgatory. This time there was no awakening for him. The infantry which in his lifetime he had commanded so gallantly, came up as the winter sun was setting. But they came too late to retrieve the fight. Wallenstein, defeated at last, gave orders for retreat.
§ 7. The loss of Gustavus irreparable.
The hand which alone could gather the results of victory was lying powerless. The work of destruction was practically complete. The Edict of Restitution was dead, and the Protestant administrators were again ruling in the northern bishoprics. The Empire was practically dead, and the princes and people of Germany, if they were looking for order at all, must seek it under other forms than those which had been imposed upon them in consequence of the victories of Tilly and Wallenstein. It is in vain to speculate whether Gustavus could have done anything towards the work of reconstruction. Like Cromwell, to whom, in many respects, he bore a close resemblance, he had begun to discover that it was harder to build than to destroy, and that it was easier to keep sheep than to govern men. Perhaps even to him the difficulties would have been insuperable. The centrifugal force was too strong amongst the German princes to make it easy to bind them together. He had experienced this in Saxony. He had experienced it at Nüremberg. To build up a Corpus Evangelicorum was like weaving ropes of sand.
§ 8. What were his purposes?
And Gustavus was not even more than half a German by birth; politically he was not a German at all. In his own mind he could not help thinking first of Sweden. In the minds of others the suspicion that he was so thinking was certain to arise. He clung firmly to his demand for Pomerania as a bulwark for Sweden's interests in the Baltic. Next to that came the Corpus Evangelicorum, the league of German Protestant cities and princes to stand up against the renewal of the overpowering tyranny of the Emperor. If his scheme had been carried out Gustavus would have been a nobler Napoleon, with a confederation, not of the Rhine, but of the Baltic, around him. For, stranger as he was, he was bound by his religious sympathies to his Protestant brethren in Germany. The words which he spoke at Nüremberg to the princes, telling them how well off he might be at home, were conceived in the very spirit of the Homeric Achilles, when the hardness of the work he had undertaken and the ingratitude of men revealed itself to him. Like Achilles, he dearly loved war, with its excitement and danger, for its own sake. But he desired more than the glory of a conqueror. The establishment of Protestantism in Europe as a power safe from attack by reason of its own strength was the cause for which he found it worth while to live, and for which, besides and beyond the greatness of his own Swedish nation, he was ready to die. It may be that, after all, he was "happy in the opportunity of his death."