Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, "Germany" to "Gibson, William" / Volume 11, Slice 8

by Various

Before the suppression of this rising the Reichsregiment had met with very indifferent success in its efforts to govern Germany. Meeting at Nuremberg early in 1522 it voted some slight assistance for the campaign against the invading The Reichsregiment. Turks, but the proposals put forward for raising the necessary funds aroused much opposition, an opposition which came mainly from the large and important cities. The citizens appealed to Charles V., who was in Spain, and after some hesitation the emperor decided against the Reichsregiment. Under such disheartening conditions it is not surprising that this body was totally unable to cope with Sickingen’s insurrection, and that a few weeks after its meeting at Nuremberg in 1524 it succumbed to a series of attacks and disappeared from the history of Germany. But the Reichsregiment had taken one step, although this was of a negative character. It had shown some sympathy with the reformers and had declined to put the edict of Worms into immediate execution. Hardly less lukewarm, the imperial diet ordered the edict to be enforced, but only as far as possible, and meanwhile the possibilities of accommodation between the two great religious parties were becoming more and more remote. A national assembly to decide the questions at issue was announced to meet at Spires, but the emperor forbade this gathering. Then the Romanists, under the guidance of Cardinal Campeggio and the archduke Ferdinand, met at Regensburg and decided to take strong and aggressive measures to destroy Lutheranism, while, on the other hand, representatives of the cities met at Spires and at Ulm, and asserted their intention of forwarding and protecting the teaching of the reformed doctrines. All over the country and through all classes of the people men were falling into line on one side or the other, and everything was thus ready for a long and bitter religious war.

During these years the religious and political ideas of the Reformation were rapidly gaining ground, and, aided by a vigorous and violent polemic literature, opposition to Rome was growing on every side. Instigated by George of Saxony Progress of the Reformation. the Romanist princes formed a defensive league at Dessau in 1525; the reforming princes took a similar step at Gotha in 1526. Such were the prevailing conditions when the diet met at Spires in June 1526 and those who were still loyal to the Roman Church clamoured for repressive measures. But on this occasion the reformers were decidedly in the ascendant. Important ecclesiastical reforms were approved, and instructions forbidding all innovations and calling upon the diet to execute the edict of Worms, sent by the emperor from Spain, were brushed aside on the ground that in the preceding March when this letter was written Charles and the pope were at peace, while now they were at war. Before its dissolution the diet promulgated a decree providing that, pending the assembly of a national council, each prince should order the ecclesiastical affairs of his own state in accordance with his own conscience, a striking victory for the reformers and incidentally for separatist ideas. The three years which elapsed between this diet and another important diet which met in the same city are full of incident. Guided by Luther and Melanchthon, the principal states and cities in which the ideas of the reformers prevailed—electoral Saxony, Brandenburg, Hesse and the Rhenish Palatinate, Strassburg, Nuremberg, Ulm and Augsburg—began to carry out measures of church reform. The Romanists saw the significance of this movement and, fortunately for them, were able to profit by the dissensions which were breaking out in the ranks of their opponents, especially the doctrinal differences between the followers of Luther and those of Zwingli. Persecutions for heresy had begun, the feeling between the two great religious parties being further embittered by some revelations made by Otto von Pack (q.v.) to Philip of Hesse. Pack’s stories, which concerned the existence of a powerful league for the purpose of making war upon the reformers, were proved to be false, but the soreness occasioned thereby remained. The diet met in February 1529 and soon received orders from the emperor to repeal the decree of 1526. The supporters of the older faith were now predominant and, although they were inclined to adopt a somewhat haughty attitude towards Charles, they were not averse from taking strong measures against the reformers. The decree of the diet, formulated in April, forbade the reformers to make further religious changes, while the toleration which was conceded to Romanists in Lutheran states was withheld from Lutherans in Romanist states. This decree was strongly resented by the reforming princes and cities. They drew up a formal protest against it (hence the name “Protestant”), which they presented to the archduke Ferdinand, setting forward the somewhat novel theory that the decree of 1526 could not be annulled by a succeeding diet unless both the parties concerned assented thereto. By this decree they declared their firm intention to abide.

The untiring efforts of Philip of Hesse to unite the two wings of the Protestant forces met with very little success, and the famous conference at Marburg in the autumn of 1529, for which he was responsible, revealed the fact that it The diet of Augsburg. was practically impossible for the Lutherans and the Zwinglians to act together even when threatened by a common danger, while a little later the alliance between the Lutheran states of north Germany and the Zwinglian cities of the south was destroyed by differences upon points of doctrine. In 1530 the emperor, flushed with success in Italy and at peace with his foreign foes, came to Germany with the express intention of putting an end to heresy. In June he opened the diet at Augsburg, and here the Lutherans submitted a summary of their doctrines, afterwards called the Augsburg Confession. Drawn up by Melanchthon, this pronouncement was intended to widen the breach between the Lutherans and the Zwinglians, and to narrow that between the Lutherans and the Romanists; from this time it was regarded as the chief standard of the Lutheran faith. Four Zwinglian cities, Strassburg, Constance, Lindau and Memmingen, replied with a confession of their own and the Romanists also drew up an answer. The period of negotiation which followed served only to show that no accommodation was possible. Charles himself made no serious effort to understand the controversy; he was resolved, whether the Lutherans had right on their side or not, that they should submit, and he did not doubt but that he would be able to awe them into submission by an unwonted display of power. But to his surprise the Lutheran princes who attended the diet refused to give way. They were, however, outnumbered by their enemies, and it was the Romanist majority which dictated the terms of the decree, which was laid before the diet in September, enjoining a return to religious conformity within seven months. The Protestant princes could only present a formal protest and leave Augsburg. Finally the decree of the diet, promulgated in November, ordered the execution of the edict of Worms, the restoration of all church property, and the maintenance of the jurisdiction of the bishops. The duty of enforcing the decree was especially entrusted to the Reichskammergericht; thus by the processes of law the Protestant princes were to be deprived of much of their property, and it seemed probable that if they did not submit the emperor would have recourse to arms.

For the present, however, fresh difficulties with France and an invasion by the Turks, who had besieged Vienna with an immense army in the autumn of 1529, forced Charles to mask his designs. Meanwhile some of the Lutherans, The league of Schmalkalden. angered and alarmed by the decisions of the Reichskammergericht, abandoned the idea that resistance to the imperial authority was unlawful and, meeting in December 1530, laid the foundation of the important league of Schmalkalden, among the first members of the confederation being the rulers of Saxony and Hesse and the cities of Bremen and Magdeburg. The league was soon joined by other strong cities, among them Strassburg, Ulm, Constance, Lübeck and Goslar; but it was not until after the defeat and death of Zwingli at Kappel in October 1531 that it was further strengthened by the adhesion of those towns which had hitherto looked for leadership to the Swiss reformer. About this time the military forces of the league were organized, their heads being the elector of Saxony and the landgrave of Hesse. But the league had a political as well as a religious aspect. It was an alliance between the enemies of the house of Habsburg, and on this side it gained the support of the duke of Bavaria and treated with Francis I. of France. To this its rapid growth was partly due, but more perhaps to the fact that the Reformation in Germany was above all things a popular movement, and thus many princes who would not have seceded from the Roman Church of their own accord were compelled to do so from political motives. They had been strong enough to undermine the imperial power; they were not strong enough to resist the pressure put upon them by a majority of their subjects. It was early in 1532, when faced with the necessity of resisting the Turkish advance, that Charles met the diet at Regensburg. He must have men and money for this purpose even at the price of an arrangement with the Protestants. But the Lutherans were absent from the diet, and the Romanists, although they voted help, displayed a very uncompromising temper towards their religious foes. Under these circumstances the emperor took the matter into his own hands, and his negotiations with the Protestants resulted in July 1532 in the religious peace of Nuremberg, a measure which granted temporary toleration to the Lutherans and which was repeatedly confirmed in the following years. Charles’s reward was substantial and immediate. His subjects vied with each other in hurrying soldiers to his standard, and in a few weeks the great Turkish host was in full retreat.

While the probability of an alliance between Pope Clement VII. and Francis I. of France, together with other international complications, prevented the emperor from following up his victory over the Turks, or from reducing the Internal affairs of Germany. dissenters from the Roman religion to obedience, Protestantism was making substantial progress in the states, notably in Anhalt and in Pomerania, and in the cities, and in January 1534 the Protestant princes were bold enough to declare that they did not regard the decisions of the Reichskammergericht as binding upon them. About this time Germany witnessed three events of some importance. Through the energy of Philip of Hesse, who was aided by Francis I., Ulrich of Württemberg was forcibly restored to his duchy. The members of the Romanist league recently founded at Halle would not help the Habsburgs, and in June 1534, by the treaty of Cadan, King Ferdinand was forced to recognize the restoration as a fait accompli; at the same time he was compelled to promise that he would stop all proceedings of the Reichskammergericht against the members of the league of Schmalkalden. The two other events were less favourable for the new religion, or rather for its orthodox manifestations. After a struggle, the Anabaptists obtained control of Münster and for a short time governed the town in accordance with their own peculiar ideas, while at Lübeck, under the burgomaster Jürgen Wullenweber, a democratic government was also established. But the bishop of Münster and his friends crushed the one movement, and after interfering in the affairs of Denmark the Lübeckers were compelled to revert to their former mode of government. The outbreak of the war between the Empire and France in 1536 almost coincided with the enlargement of the league of Schmalkalden, the existence of which was prolonged for ten years. All the states and cities which subscribed to the confession of Augsburg were admitted to it, and thus a large number of Protestants, including the duchies of Württemberg and Pomerania and the cities of Augsburg and Frankfort, secured a needful protection against the decrees of the Reichskammergericht, which the league again repudiated. Among the new members of the confederation was Christian III., king of Denmark. About the same time (May 1536) an agreement between the Lutherans and the Zwinglians was arranged by Martin Bucer, and was embodied in a document called the Concord of Wittenberg, and for the present the growing dissensions between the heads of the league, John Frederick, elector of Saxony, and Philip of Hesse, were checked. Thus strengthened the Protestant princes declared against the proposed general council at Mantua, while as a counterpoise to the league of Schmalkalden the imperial envoy, Mathias Held (d. 1563), persuaded the Romanist princes in June 1538 to form the league of Nuremberg. But, although he had made a truce with France at Nice in this very month, Charles V. was more conciliatory than some of his representatives, and at Frankfort in April 1539 he came to terms with the Protestants, not, however, granting to them all their demands. In 1539, too, the Protestants received a great accession of strength, the Lutheran prince Henry succeeding his Romanist brother George as duke of Saxony. Ducal Saxony was thus completely won for the reformed faith, and under the politic elector Joachim II. the same doctrines made rapid advances in Brandenburg. Thus practically all North Germany was united in supporting the Protestant cause.

In 1542, when Charles V. was again involved in war with France and Turkey, who were helped by Sweden, Denmark and Scotland, the league of Schmalkalden took advantage of his occupations to drive its stubborn foe, Henry, Successes of the Protestants. duke of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, from his duchy and to enthrone Protestantism completely therein. But this was not the only victory gained by the Protestants about this time. The citizens of Regensburg accepted their doctrines, which also made considerable progress in the Palatinate and in Austria, while the archbishop of Cologne, Hermann von Wied, and William, duke of Gelderland, Cleves and Juliers, announced their secession from the Roman religion. The Protestants were now at the height of their power, but their ascendancy was about to be destroyed, and that rather by the folly and imprudence of their leaders than by the skill and valour of their foes. The unity and the power of the league of Schmalkalden Their defeats. were being undermined by two important events, the bigamy of Philip of Hesse, which for political reasons was condoned by the Lutheran divines, and the dissensions between John Frederick, the ruler of electoral, and Maurice, the new ruler of ducal Saxony. To save himself from the consequences of his double marriage, which had provided him with powerful enemies, Philip in June 1541 came to terms with the emperor, who thus managed to spike the guns of the league of Schmalkalden, although the strength of this confederation did not fail until after the campaign against Henry of Brunswick. But while on the whole the fortunes of the European war, both in the east and in the west, were unfavourable to the imperialists, Charles V. found time in 1543 to lead a powerful force against William of Gelderland, who had joined the circle of his foreign foes. William was completely crushed; Gelderland was added to the hereditary lands of the Habsburgs, while the league of Schmalkalden impotently watched the proceedings. This happened about a year after war between the two branches of the Saxon house had only been averted by the mediation of Luther and of Philip of Hesse. The emperor, however, was unable, or unwilling, to make a more general attack on the Protestants. In accordance with the promises made to them at Frankfort in 1539, conferences between the leaders of the two religious parties were held at Hagenau, at Worms and at Regensburg, but they were practically futile. The diets at Regensburg and at Nuremberg gave very little aid for the wars, and did nothing to solve the religious difficulties which were growing more acute with repeated delays. At the diet of Spires in 1544 Charles purchased military assistance from the Protestants by making lavish promises to them. With a new army he marched against the French, but suddenly in September 1544 he concluded the treaty of Crépy with Francis I. and left himself free to begin a new chapter in the history of Germany.

Charles was now nearly ready to crush the Protestants, whose influence and teaching had divided Germany and weakened the imperial power, and were now endangering the supremacy of the Habsburgs in the Netherlands and Victory of Charles over the league of Schmalkalden. in Alsace. His plan was to bring about the meeting of a general council to make the necessary reforms in the church, and then at whatever cost to compel the Protestants to abide by its decisions. While Pope Paul III., somewhat reluctantly, summoned the council which ultimately met at Trent, Charles made vigorous preparations for war. Having made peace with the Turks in October 1545 he began to secure allies. Assistance was promised by the pope; the emperor purchased the neutrality of Duke William of Bavaria, and at a high price the active aid of Maurice of Saxony; he managed to detach from the league of Schmalkalden those members who were without any enthusiasm for the Protestant cause and also those who were too timid to enter upon a serious struggle. Meanwhile the league was inactive. Its chiefs differed on questions of policy, one section believing that the emperor did not intend to proceed to extremities, and for some time no measures were taken to meet the coming peril. At last, in June 1546, during the meeting of the diet at Regensburg, Philip and John Frederick of Saxony realized the extent of the danger and began to muster their forces. They were still much more powerful than the emperor, but they did not work well together, or with Sebastian Schärtlin von Burtenbach, who led their troops in South Germany. In July 1546 they were placed under the imperial ban, and the war began in the valley of the Danube. Charles was aided by soldiers hurried from Italy and the Netherlands, but he did not gain any substantial successes until after October 1546, when his ally Maurice invaded electoral Saxony and forced John Frederick to march northwards to its defence. The Lutheran cities of southern and central Germany, among them Strassburg, Augsburg, Ulm and Frankfort, now submitted to the emperor, while Ulrich of Württemberg and the elector palatine of the Rhine, Frederick II., followed their example. Having restored Roman Catholicism in the archbishopric of Cologne and seen Henry of Brunswick settled in his duchy early in 1547, Charles led his men against his principal enemies, Philip of Hesse and John Frederick, who had quickly succeeded in driving Maurice from his electorate. At Mühlberg in April 1547 he overtook the army of the Saxon elector. His victory was complete. John Frederick was taken prisoner, and a little later Philip of Hesse, after vainly prolonging the struggle, was induced to surrender. The rising in the other parts of northern Germany was also put down, and the two leaders of political Lutheranism were prisoners in the emperor’s hands.

Unable to shake the allegiance of John Frederick to the Lutheran faith, Charles kept him and Philip of Hesse in captivity and began to take advantage of his triumph, although Magdeburg was still offering a stubborn resistance The “Interim.” to his allies. By the capitulation of Wittenberg the electorate of Saxony was transferred to Maurice, and in the mood of a conqueror the emperor met the diet at Augsburg in September 1547. His proposals to strengthen and reform the administration of Germany were, however, not acceptable to the princes, and the main one was not pressed; but the Netherlands were brought under the protection of the Empire and some minor reforms were carried through. A serious quarrel with the pope, who had moved the council from Trent to Bologna, only increased the determination of Charles to establish religious conformity. In consultation with both Romanist and Lutheran divines a confession of faith called the Interim was drawn up; this was in the nature of a compromise and was issued as an edict in May 1548, but owing to the opposition of the Romanist princes it was not made binding upon them, only upon the Lutherans. There was some resistance to the Interim, but force was employed against Augsburg and other recalcitrant cities, and soon it was generally accepted. Thus all Germany seemed to lie at the emperor’s feet. The Reformation had enabled him to deal with the princes and the imperial cities in a fashion such as no sovereign had dealt with them for three centuries.

Being now at the height of his power Charles wished to secure the succession to the imperial throne to his son Philip, afterwards Philip II. of Spain. This intention produced The imperial succession. dissensions among the Habsburgs, especially between the emperor and his brother Ferdinand, and other causes were at work, moreover, to undermine the former’s position. The Romanist princes were becoming alarmed at his predominance, the Protestant princes resented his arbitrary measures and disliked the harsh treatment meted out to John Frederick and to Philip of Hesse; all alike, irritated by the presence of Spanish soldiers in their midst, objected strongly to take Philip for their king and to any extension of Spanish influence in Germany. Turkey and France were again threatening war, and although the council had returned to Trent it seemed less likely than ever to satisfy the Protestants. The The revolt of Maurice of Saxony. general discontent found expression in the person of Maurice of Saxony, a son-in-law of Philip of Hesse, whose services to Charles against the league of Schmalkalden had made him very unpopular in his own country. Caring little or nothing about doctrinal disputes, but a great deal about increasing his own importance, Maurice now took the lead in plotting against the emperor. He entered into an alliance with John, margrave of Brandenburg-Cüstrin, with another Hohenzollern prince, Albert Alcibiades of Bayreuth, and with other Lutheran leaders, and also with Henry II. of France, who eagerly seized this opportunity of profiting by the dissensions in the Empire and who stipulated for a definite reward. Charles knew something of these proceedings, but his recent victory had thrown him partly off his guard. The treaty with France was signed in January 1552; in March Henry II. invaded Germany as the protector of her liberties, while Maurice seized Augsburg and marched towards Innsbruck, where the emperor was residing, with the intention of making him a prisoner. An attempt at accommodation failed; Charles fled into Carinthia; and at one stroke all the advantages which he had gained by his triumph at Mühlberg were lost. Masters of the situation, Maurice and his associates met their opponents at Passau in May 1552 and arranged terms of peace, although the emperor did not assent to them until July. The two captive princes were released, but the main point agreed upon was that a diet should be called for the purpose of settling the religious difficulty, and that in the meantime the Lutherans were to enjoy full religious liberty.