CHAPTER IV.
Monotonously did the death wail sound in the chronicles and records of fellow-sufferers. Where thousands were saved, millions were ruined and destroyed. The war was destructive of house, wealth, and life, alike in town and country. Manifold was the work of the destroying forces, but a higher force was unceasingly at work to ward off final ruin.
It is a marvellous circumstance, that in the same year in which the war in Germany expired, the interest of the people in public affairs was so far developed as to originate the first newspapers. In matters of faith, moral feeling and the judgments of individuals had for a century worked, but in politics it was only rarely and feebly that serious diversity of opinion was ventured to be expressed by private individuals. It was just when the recruiting drums of the princes were beating at every muster-place that public opinion began its first political struggle in the press. On an important social question, the intellectual leaders of the people rose up against the immorality of their own Sovereigns. We shall endeavour here briefly to exhibit the course of public opinion, and show what was stirred up and carried away by it during the war. It may more especially be discovered in the literature of the flying-sheets, which contended for and against the Bohemian King, condemned theKipperandWipper, and did homage to the great Gustavus Adolphus, but at last became itself, like the nation, meagre and powerless.
It was after the beginning of the sixteenth century that the people began to receive news through the press, in a double form. One of these forms was a single sheet printed on one side, almost always ornamented with a woodcut, and after the sixteenth century, with a copper-plate engraving, under which the explanatory text was generally rendered in verse. In these flying leaves were communicated the appearances in the heavens, and comets; very soon also battles by land and sea, portraitures of the celebrities of the day, and the like. Much of the good humour, and coarse jests of the Reformation time are to be found in them. The art of the wood carver was in constant activity, and we find many characteristic peculiarities of the talents of the great painters impressed upon it. The other form was that of pamphlets, especially in quarto, frequently also ornamented with woodcuts. They gave information of every novelty; coronations, battles, and newly discovered countries; by them every striking event flitted through the country. After the Reformation, they increased enormously in number. All printing-houses gave birth to them under the titles of newspapers, advices, reports, and couriers. Besides these, there were the small controversial writings of the Reformers, sermons, discourses, and songs. Very soon also the Princes began to make use of the invention of printing, to inform the public of their quarrels, and to gain partisans. Private individuals whose rights were injured contended with their opponents, whether city magistrates or foreign rulers, in pamphlets. During the whole of the sixteenth century the aim of the small, not theological, literature, was first to impart news, and afterwards to serve the interests of individuals or princes, or to make known the views of those in power. The opinions of individuals upon political affairs were principally conveyed in a form which was then considered particularly ingenious, as pasquinades or dialogues. These small news sheets were innumerable, and their spread was rapid; after the Reformation it became a separate branch of industry. The booksellers, or as they were then called, stationers, who offered these newspapers for sale in their shops and stalls, and introduced them to the markets of foreign cities, made a dangerous competition with the printers, bookbinders, and illuminators. Important newspapers were everywhere pirated. Along the great trade and post roads, more particularly of the Rhine and southern Germany, certain trading and printing establishments made special gains from the communication of the daily news; for example, Wendelin Borsch, at the Tiler's Hut in Nuremberg, about 1571, Michael Enzinger at Cologne, at the end of the century, and others. These sheets at first were published very irregularly, but they already contained a correspondence from different cities, in which not only political, but mercantile intelligence was given.[32]At last, in 1612, appeared here and there separate newspaper sheets in numbers, and in a certain degree of continuity. Meanwhile it had been long the custom of the merchants to make such communications to their mercantile friends with some regularity, so that there already existed news-writers who were in the habit of forwarding written newspapers. This method of spreading intelligence had come to Germany from Italy. In Venice, from the year 1536, there wereNotizie Scritte, written news in successive series, which continued there till the French Revolution. There also, appeared the first regular newspaper shortly before 1600, which it is stated took the name ofGazzettafrom a little coin which was the cost of the single numbers.
Soon after, the German newspapers began to appear regularly. In 1615 the first weekly newspaper was published at Frankfort-on-the-Maine, by Egenolf Emmel, bookseller and printer. In opposition to which, in 1616, the Imperial deputy postmaster Johann van der Brighden, published a competing paper called 'Political Notices.' From these two undertakings resulted the oldest German newspapers, the 'Frankfort Journal,' and the 'Oberpostamts Zeitung.'
But these and other weekly papers were for a long time, only news sheets in which opinions on the facts communicated were carefully withheld. The great stream of public opinion still continued for two centuries to run in the old direction; the flying leaves and occasional brochures.
At the beginning of the war even the distant readers were compelled to be violent partisans. Everywhere appeared controversial writings, opinions, councils, and deliberations. The nation was rent into large parties by this intellectual strife, and it is instructive to see how the writings of the disputants stand in exact relation to the success which their party had achieved. Till the battle of the Weissen Berge nine tenths of all the narratives and controversial writings are Protestant; they reached full a thousand in number. Hatred to the Jesuits blazed fiercely; bitter was the rancour against the Emperor, and incessant were the cautions against the League. After Prague, Strasburg was the centre of their warlike activity. Whilst at Prague the libel-writer von Rörig, asHuss-redivius, made his voice heard vehemently in many 'Political Discourses' against his adversary Sturm: themagistersof Strasburg, after the fashion of Boccalini, made accusations against the same opponent, before Apollo and the high court of Parnassus; but their Apollo had to deliver human and explicit oracles. The answers in defence are cautious and uncertain, as during the whole war the Catholic party were generally not a match for the Protestants in the serious warfare of the pen. But the speedy flight of the new King of Bohemia suddenly changed the physiognomy of the literary market. The secret writings obtained as booty from the Bohemian party were published by their opponents; and about these bulky quartos there raged for years a battle of petty flying-sheets. Revengeful, and joyfully triumphant, the Imperialists sounded their pæan. It is true that in their brochures there was still some moderation, for they were obliged to spare the Lutheran Saxons; but so much the more irritably did they attack the enemy, in countless pictorial sheets and satirical verses. Endless and merciless were the satires on the fugitive winter King, he, the proud and witless one, with his wife and children, were depicted in every kind of pitiful situation, seeking their bread, departing in bad waggons, and digging a grave for themselves.
This strife was interrupted by another, which will ever be of high interest. It was the storm of the German press against the "KipperandWipper."
Of all the terrors at the beginning of the war, nothing gave such vague apprehension to the people, as the sudden depreciation of the coinage. To the fancy of the suffering generation, the evil became so much the greater, as in the gloomy frame of mind of that period it appeared to occur suddenly, and everywhere roused the most frightful passions, discord in families, and hatred and strife between debtors and creditors, leaving behind, hunger, poverty, beggary, and immorality. It made honourable citizens gamblers, drunkards, and profligates, it drove preachers and schoolmasters from their offices, brought opulent families to beggary, plunged every government into miserable confusion, and threatened the dwellers in cities, in a thickly populated country, with famine.
It was the third year of the war; its flames had already carried destruction over Bohemia and the Palatinate, and the ruins were still glowing, on which the Imperial troops erected the cross of the old faith. A sultry atmosphere loured over the country; throughout the empire, in every class, men armed themselves, and anxiety for the future pervaded all. But intercourse with the provinces in which the war was at first located, was then comparatively small. The countries exposed to its fury were, with the exception of the Palatinate, provinces belonging to the Emperor; and on the Elbe and lower Rhine, in Thuringia, Franconia, and the territories of lower Saxony, it was still a question whether the danger was approaching home. In August, 1621, the peasant had the prospect of a moderate harvest; in trade and commerce there was some degree of stagnation, but there was much of that excited eagerness which is the natural offspring of a great defensive movement, and manly youths were more allured than intimidated by the wild conduct of the soldiery. It had indeed been long remarked, that there was something unusual about the money which circulated in the country. The good heavy Imperial coin became more and more scarce, in its place much new money was current, badly coined, and of a red colour. The increasing rise in the price of foreign goods appeared still more strange. Everything became dearer. Whoever wished to make a present to a godchild, or to pay foreign tradesmen, had to give an increasingagiofor his old pure Joachim's thaler. But in the local trade, betwixt town and country, the extensive new coinage was taken without hesitation, indeed it was exchanged or bartered with an increased activity. The mass of the people did not observe that the different kinds of coin with which it was the custom to pay, became in their hands, worthless lead; but the sharper ones, who had an inkling of the state of things, became, for the most part, accomplices in the dishonest usury of the Princes. It may be distinctly perceived how the people came to a knowledge of their situation, and we still feel dismayed at the sudden terror, anguish, and despair of the masses, and are struck by the anxieties and manly indignation of the thoughtful; and in reading the old narratives, we still feel somewhat of the indignation with which the guilty were regarded. When we consider the many wonderful errors of public opinion at that time, and the well-meaning zeal of individuals who gave good counsel, we may be permitted in this period of calamity and humiliation, to feel a proud satisfaction at the sagacity with which even then, some men of the people discovered the ground of the evil, and, in one of the most difficult national questions, found the right answer, and by it a remedy, at least for the worst misfortunes. Before we attempt to give a picture of the "KipperandWipper" years, we must make some remarks on the coining of that period.
In the olden time, all technical dexterity was environed with dignity, secrecy, and an apparatus of forms. Nothing is more characteristic of the peculiarity of the German nature, than its virtuosoship; even the most monotonous handicraft was ennobled by an abundance of lively additions. As soon as the spirit of the artisan was excited by the genial pleasure of creating, his imagination was occupied with images and symbols, and he turned his skill dexterously to high, nay even to holy things. What we have described as applicable to all the handicrafts of the middle ages, was so especially to the art of coining. A feeling of his self-importance was strong in the coiner; the work itself, the handling of the precious metals fresh from the fire, was considered ennobling. The obscure chemical processes, which were surrounded, through alchemy, with a wilderness of fantastic forms, had a far more imposing effect upon the workers, than can be understood by the rational fabricators of our century. To this was added the responsibility of the service. When the coiner took the assay weight out of its beautiful capsule, and placed the little acorn cup on the artistically worked assay balance, in order to weigh the remnant in it, he did this with a certain consciousness of superiority over his fellow-citizens.[33]When he purified the silver assay from lead in the cupel, and the liquid silver first overflowed, shining with delicate prismatic colours, and then, the variegated stream being rent, the bright gleam of the silver passed like lightning through the molten mass, this silver gleam filled him with reverential astonishment, and he felt himself in the midst of the mysterious creations of the spirits of nature, which, whilst he feared, he was yet able to control by the art of his handicraft, as far as his knowledge reached. After that period, in the order of things, the coiners formed themselves into a close corporation, with masters, associates, and apprentices, and held jealously to their privileges. Whoever was desirous of stamping the Holy Roman Imperial coin was first obliged to give proof of his free and honourable lineage, to do lowly service for four years, during this period to wear, according to custom, a fool's cap, and to allow himself to be punished and beaten when inexpert or in the wrong; then at last he was admitted to the business of coining, and entered as an associate in the brotherhood of Imperial coiners.
But these strict regulations, which were again confirmed to the brotherhood by the Emperor Maximilian II., in 1571, had even then ceased to have the effect of making the corporation honourable and upright. Equally inefficient were the attempts at control, by the decisions of the Imperial Diet and the Sovereigns. At the inspection of every piece of coin the master of the mint had with him a warden, who proved the texture and weight of the coin. The ten Circles of the Empire held yearly approbation days, in order, mutually, to compare their coin and to reject the bad; every Circle was to be represented by a warden-general; for every Circle an appointed number of mints were established, in which the lesser rulers were to have their money specially coined: but all these regulations were only imperfectly carried out.
There were undoubtedly some Sovereigns and mint-masters then in the country who were faithful, but they were few in number; and generally a mint-master, who was considered capable by a German Circle, and worked in a legal mint, was concerned in many strange practices. It was difficult to exercise control over these imperfect coining proceedings; the temptations were great, and morality in general much lower than now. From the Sovereign down to the understrapper and Jewish purveyor, every one concerned in coining deceived the other. The Sovereign allowed the master of the mint for a series of years to work and become rich; he perhaps permitted in silence the coin of the country to be debased, in order at the right moment to proceed against the guilty, from whom then he squeezed out by pressure, like a sponge, all that they had sucked up for many years drop by drop. It did not avail them that they had long quitted the service, for after many years greedy justice would reach them: but the mint-master, who was not in the convenient position of the lion, to be able to secure his booty by a single stroke of the paw, was in the habit of industriously overreaching his masters, the purveyors, nay even his cashiers, the associates, and the apprentices, not to mention the public. The other assistants did no better; every man's hand was against the other, and the curse, which according to the proverb lies on the gold of the German dwarf, appears in the seventeenth century to have depraved all who transmuted the shining metal into money. The common method of transacting the business was as follows.
The master of the mint purchased the metal, defrayed the costs of the stamping, and paid a tax to the Sovereign for every Cologne mark which he struck, which it appears amounted generally to about four good groschen: but he had to pay dear for fine silver, and the wages and other accessories were continually rising in price. If he paid the tax, from one to two thousand marks, weekly to the lord of the mint, he concealed from him the fifty marks which he had struck over and above, and retained the tax upon them for himself; furthermore, he was a sharp coiner, that is to say, he deducted from the money about half a grain in the amount of silver required by the law; he always struck a hundred marks in weight, two ounces too light, which was remarked by no one, and when he knew that the money was to be sent directly into foreign countries, especially to Poland, he was bolder in deducting from the weight. His dealings with the purveyors who procured the metal for him, were not more upright. There was carried on then, throughout the whole of Germany, a secret traffic, which was severely prohibited by the law, and traced with much sagacity by the gate-keepers of the cities, a traffic in false money. What was acquired by the soldier as booty, or stolen by the thief from the church, was smelted by the receivers of stolen goods into flat cakes or conical masses, which in the language of the trade were called "ingots" and "kings;" whatever was clipped from the money in diminishing the proper quantity of silver, or had otherwise to be carefully consigned under a false name, was poured out of the smelting crucible over moist birchen-twigs, and thus granulated: but besides this, by being incessantly bought up, the good coin was exchanged for bad, the small money-changers, most of them wandering Jews, journeyed from village to village far across the frontiers of the German Empire, and collected, as the ragmen do now, their wares from the soldiers, countrymen, and beggars. All the medals of distinguished persons, all coats-of-arms and inscriptions, horse and man, wolves, sheep and bears, thalers and hellers, the saints of Cologne and Treves, and the medallions of the heretic Luther, were bought up for the mint, collected and exchanged. The concealed wares were then packed into a vessel with ginger, pepper, and tartar, and paid toll duty as white lead, wrapped up in bales of cloth and frankincense. There were travelling waggons with false bottoms, which were specially prepared for such transports. A still better safeguard was an ecclesiastic as a travelling companion; but the best of all was a trumpeter, who gave the trader the appearance of being a prince's courier. If it happened that a distinguished lord was travelling towards the same country, it was expedient to bribe him, for he and his suite, their waggons and horses, were never examined at the city gates. Sometimes the agent disguised himself as a distinguished lord or soldier, and caused the burden to be conveyed by the trooper's horses or his servants. Sometimes the mint-master was obliged to travel to the frontier to meet the agent, under the pretext of paying a visit to some friend. Then the costly goods were carried far from the dwellings of men, across lonely heaths, or through the clearings of a wood, from one hand to another, on a merchant's parole.
Meanwhile the petty Jewish dealer carried at night, along byways over the frontier, his wallet full of old groschen, in the twofold fear of robbers and of the guardians of the law. The wallet, the broad-brimmed hat, and the yellow cloth border to the coat, the mark of a Jew of the Empire, was frequently seen at the mint. There existed between the dealer and the mint-master a confidential business connection, certainly not without a mental reservation; for it occasionally happened to the Jew that false thalers were found in one of the hundred marks which he delivered in thalers, or that the wallet together with the coin had become moist during the journey, which added some half-ounces to their weight, or that fine white sand became mingled with the granulated silver, and was weighed with it. For this the mint-master indemnified himself, by hanging the scales so that one side of the beam was shorter than the other, by causing the scales to spring up and descend slowly, notwithstanding the perpendicular position of the balance, in order to make the wares some half-ounces lighter, or by falsifying the weights altogether. What the masters did not do, the apprentices of the mint ventured upon. However cautious the purveyor might be during the smelting assay, they understood how to mix copper dust with the silver already weighed, in order to make the assay worse than it really was. Such was the state of the traffic even at those mints where there was still some respect for the law.
Besides the licensed coiners, there were others in most of the ten Circles, of easier conscience and bolder practice; not exactly false coiners in our sense of the term, although this was carried on with great recklessness; but nobles and corporations who had the right of coining, and prized it highly as a source of income; for, contrary to the Imperial decrees, which imposed upon them the duty of having their money coined in one of the approved mints of the Circle, they coined actively in their own territory. Sometimes they let their right of coining for a year's rent, nay, they even disposed of their mints to other princes as a speculation. These irregular coining places were called hedge mints, and in them a systematic corruption of money took place. No inquiry was made as to the right of the coiners; whoever knew how to manage fire and metal, engaged in this kind of work. There was little regard for the prescribed fineness of texture, and weight of the money; it was coined with false stamps, and the head of the ruler, with the date of a better period, were stamped on light coin; nay, in regular false coining, the stamps of foreign mints were often counterfeited. The brightness of the new coin was removed by tartar or lead water; and all this took place under the protection of the Sovereign. The disposal of the money thus coined required all the cunning and circumspection of the agents, and a line of industry was in this way formed, which we may presume occupied many intermediate hands. Thundering decrees had been fulminated for seventy years at the Imperial Diets and Assemblages of the circles, against the hedge mints, but without success. Indeed, after the introduction of good Imperial money, they became more numerous and active, for the work paid better.
Such was the state of things even before the year 1618. The sovereigns, small and great, required more and more money. Then some of the Princes of the Empire--the Brunswickers, alas! were among the first--began to outdo the proceedings of the most notorious of the hedge mints; they caused the coin of the country, both heavy and light, to be struck of a bad mixture of silver and copper, instead of silver, and soon it was only copper silvered. At last, as for example at Leipzig, a small angular coin was issued by the city, no longer of copper, which was of higher value, but of pure tin. This discovery of making money at little cost spread like a pestilence. From both of the Circles of Saxony it spread to those of the Rhine and Southern Germany. Hundreds of new mints were established. Wherever a ruined tower appeared firm enough for a forge and bellows, wherever there was abundance of wood for burning, and a road to bring good money to the mint and carry away bad, there a band of coiners nestled. Electors and nobles, ecclesiastical communities and cities outvied each other in making copper money; even the people were infected with it. For a century the art of making gold, and treasure digging had occupied the fancies of the people; now the happy time appeared to have arrived, when every fish-kettle could be turned into silver in the coiners' scales. A mania for money-making began. Pure silver and old silver gilt became continually and strikingly dearer in mercantile traffic, so that at last it was necessary to pay four, five or more new gulden for one old silver gulden, and the price of goods and the necessaries of life slowly rose; but that signified little to the multitude, so long as the new money, the production of which seemed to increase without end, was willingly taken. The nation, already excited, became at last madly intoxicated. Every one thought they had the opportunity of becoming rich without labour; all applied themselves to trafficking in money. The merchant had money dealings with the artisan, the artisan with the peasant. A general craving, chaffering, and overreaching prevailed. The modern swindling in funds and on 'Change, gives only a weak notion of the proceedings of that time. Whoever had debts hastened to pay them; whoever could get money from an accommodating coiner, in exchange for an old brewing vessel,[34]could buy therewith house and fields; whoever had to pay wages, salaries, or fees, found it convenient to do so in plated copper. There was little work done in the cities, and only for very high pay. Whoever had any old thalers, gold gulden, or other good Imperial money lying in their chests as a store in case of need, as was then the case with almost every one, drew out his treasure and was delighted to exchange it for new money, as the old thalers, in a most remarkable way, appeared to be worth four, nay even six and ten times as much as formerly. That was a jolly time. If wine and beer were dearer than usual, they were not so in the same proportion as the old silver money. Part of the gains were jovially spent in the public-house. Every one was disposed to give, in those times. The Saxon cities readily agreed, at the Diet at Torgau, to a great addition to the land tax, as money was to be obtained everywhere in superfluity. People also were very ready to contract debts, for money was offered everywhere, and business could be done with it on favourable conditions; great obligations therefore were undertaken on all sides. Thus a powerful stream carried away the people to destruction.
But a counter stream arose, first gentle, then continually stronger. Those were first to complain who had to live on a fixed income, the parish priests most loudly, the schoolmasters and poor misanthropes most bitterly. Those who had formerly lived respectably on two hundred gulden, good Imperial coin, now only received two hundred light gulden, and if, as often undoubtedly happened, the salary of some were raised about a quarter in amount, they could not even with this addition defray half, nay even the fourth part, of the necessary expenses. Upon this unprecedented occasion the ecclesiastics referred to the Bible, and found there an indisputable objection to all hedge minting, and began to preach from their pulpits against light money. The schoolmasters starved in the villages as long as they could, then ran away and increased the train of vagabonds, beggars, and soldiers; the servants next became discontented. The wages, which averaged ten gulden a year, hardly sufficed to pay for their shoes. In every house there were quarrels between them and their masters and mistresses. Men and maid-servants ran away, the men enlisted and the maids endeavoured to set up for themselves. Meanwhile the youths dispersed from the schools and universities, few parents among the citizens being sufficiently well off to be able to support their sons entirely during the period of education. There were however a multitude of scholarships founded by benevolent people for poor students. The value of these now suddenly vanished, the credit of the poor scholars in foreign towns was soon exhausted, many found it impossible to maintain themselves; they sank under poverty and the temptations of that bloody period. We may still read in the autobiographies of many respectable theologians, what distress they then suffered. One supported life in Vienna, by cutting daily his master's tallies for a four-penny loaf; another was able to earn eighteen batz[35]in the week, by giving lessons, the whole of which he was obliged to spend on dry bread.
There was increasing discontent. First among the capitalists who lived on the interest of the money which they had lent, which was then in middle Germany five, or occasionally six, per cent. For a time they were much envied as wealthy people, but now their receipts were often hardly sufficient to maintain life. They had lent thousands of good Imperial thalers, and now a creditor would pay them on the nail a thousand thalers in new money. They demanded back their good old money; they squabbled and laid their complaints before the courts; but the money which they had received back bore the image of the Sovereign and the old mark of value; it was legally stamped money, and the debtor could in justice allege that he had received similar money, both as interest and capital and for labour. Thus there arose numberless lawsuits; and the lawyers were in great perplexity. At last the cities and even the Sovereigns were embarrassed. They had willingly issued the new money, and many of them had coined it recklessly. But now for all their taxes and imposts they obtained only bad money, a hundred pounds of plated copper instead of a hundred pounds of silver, at the same time everything had become dear, even to them, and a portion of their expenses had to be paid in good silver. Then the governments attempted to assist themselves by new frauds. First they endeavoured to retain the good money by compulsion; now they suddenly lowered the value of their own money, and again threatened punishment and compulsion to all who gave less value for it. But the false money still continued to sink under the regulated value. Then some governments refused to take for the payment of taxes and imposts, the money of their own country which they themselves had coined. They declined taking back what they had stamped in the last year. Now for the first time the people discovered the whole danger of their position. A general storm broke loose against the new money; it sank even in daily traffic to a tenth of its nominal value. The new hedge mints were cried down as nests of the devil; the mint-masters and their agents, the money-changers, and whoever else dealt in money concerns, were the general objects of detestation. Then it was that they obtained in Germany the popular names ofKipperandWipper. These are Lower Saxon words:kippencomes equally from the fraudulent weighing, as from the clipping of the money; andwippenfrom throwing the heavy money out of the scales.[36]Satirical songs were sung about them; it was supposed that their names were heard in the call of the quail, and the mob cried out after them "kippe di wipp," as they did "hep" after the Jews. In many places the people combined together and stormed their dwellings. For many a year after the terrors of the long war, it was considered a disgrace to have acquired money in theKipper-time. Everywhere disorders and tumults arose; the bakers would no longer bake, and their shops were destroyed; the butchers would no longer slaughter, on account of the prescribed tax; the miners, soldiers, and students raged about in a state of wild uproar; the city communities, deep in debt, became bankrupt, as for example the wealthy Leipzig. The old joints of the burgher societies cracked and threatened to burst asunder. The small literature urged on and excited the temper of the public mind, and was itself still further excited by the increasing discontent. The street songs began it, and the pictorial flying-sheets followed. TheKipperswere unweariedly portrayed with the flames of hell round their heads, their feet standing on an insecure ball, surrounded by numerous gloomy emblems, amongst which the cord and the lurking raven were not absent; or in their mints collecting and carrying off money, and in contrast to them the poor, begging; the different classes were depicted, soldiers, citizens, widows and orphans, paying to the money-changers their hard earnings; the jaws of hell appeared open, and the changers were assiduously shoved down by devils; all this was adorned, according to the taste of the times, with allegorical figures and Latin devices, made comprehensible to every one by indignant couplets in German.
As among the people, so also among the educated, a fierce storm began to rage. The parish priests were loud in their invectives and denunciations, not only from the pulpit but also in flying-sheets. A brochure literature began, which swelled up like a sea. One of the first that was written against the new money was by W. Andreas Lampe, pastor at Halle. In a powerful treatise, 'On the last brood and fruit of the devil, Leipzig, 1621,' he proved, by numerous citations from the Old and New Testament, that all trades and professions in the world, even that of an executioner, were by divine ordinance; but theKipperwas of the devil, whereupon he characterizes in some cutting passages the mischief which they had caused. He had to suffer severe trials, and though he loyally spared the authorities, yet he was threatened with proceedings, so that he found it necessary to obtain from the sheriffs' court at Halle a justification. He was soon followed by many of his clerical brethren. The controversial writings of these ecclesiastics appear to us clumsy productions; but it is well to examine them with attention, for the Protestant priesthood are always representatives of the cultivation and the rectitude of the people.
The preachers exorcised the evil one, and the theological faculty soon followed with the heavy artillery of their Latin arguments, and how bitter was the priestly anger, was shown for example by the consistory of Wittemberg, when they refused the Lord's Supper and honourable burial to the Kippers. Lastly we have the lawyers with their questions, informations, detailed opinions on coining and recapitulations. The answers which they gave in thick brochures were almost always very diffuse, and their arguments frequently subtile; still they were necessary, for the disputes concerningmeumandtuumbetween creditor and debtor appeared interminable, and numberless lawsuits threatened to prolong insupportably the sufferings of the people. The principal subjects of investigation were, whether those who had lent good money were to be repaid capital and interest in light money; and again, whether those who had lent light money had a claim for the repayment of the full capital in good money. It must be remarked here that, in many cases which the law and the acuteness of lawyers did not reach, the dispute was ended by that true feeling of equity which was inherent in the people. For when the governments were generally bad, and legal justice was very costly and difficult to be obtained, much had to be accomplished by the practical sense of individuals. A little flying leaf, in which is related how the sound common sense of the village magistrate administered justice, was certainly not less useful than a massive half-Latin, half-German "Informatio."
In the flood of paper, which gives us information concerning the excitement of that period, there are certain sheets which more especially arrest our attention--the utterances of educated and experienced men, who know how to tell shortly and effectively in a popular form, from whence it all arose. Some of these flying-sheets, written at different periods of the Thirty years' war, have been preserved to us, in which we may even now behold with admiration, both energy of character, power of language, and genuine statesmanlike discernment. In vain do we inquire for the name of the author. We will only mention here one of these writings. Its title is, 'Expurgatio, or Vindication of the poorKipperandWipper, given by Kniphardum Wipperium, 1622. Fragfurt.'
The author has chosen the valiant Lampe as the object of his attack, as the cautious zeal of the Saxon ecclesiastic whose distinguished colleagues were accused of being Wippers--for example, the notorious court preacher Hoe, the subservient tool of the Elector--had excited the indignation of a powerful mind. A manly judgment, and a very just democratic tone appears in the strong expressions of this writing. We may judge of its peculiar tenour from the following passages:--
"I have never yet seen a single penny, and much less an inferior coin, on which was to be found the names, arms, or stamp ofKipperandWipper, still less any inscription from the new quail call,kippediwipp. But one may truly see thereupon a well-known stamp or image, and theKipperorWipperwill not appear even in the smallest letter of the alphabet.
"But if Herr Magister does not rightly understand the matter, let him ask who has bought the old saucepans at the highest price, in order to assist the coining; having done so, Herr Magister will truly learn who has coined the copper and tin money. For truly so many old pans in which so much good gruel or millet pap has been made, and so many coppers in which so much good beer has been brewed, are melted down and coined, and this not by the vulgarKipper, but by theArch kipper. For the others have no regale to coin, and if they, like the blood and deer hounds, have scented and hunted out such things, they have done so by the command of others, and thus are not to be so severely condemned as those (let them call themselves what they may) who have the regalie, and misuse it to the perceptible damage of the German States.
"No one now-a-days will bell the cat, or, like John the Baptist, tell the truth to Herod. Every one heaps abuse upon the poor rogues, theKippersandWippers, who nevertheless do not carry on this business by their own authority, for all that they do takes place with the knowledge, consent, and approbation of the government. And alas, they have now-a-days many competitors. For as soon as any one gets a penny or a groschen that is a little better than another, he forthwith makes with it usurious profit. Therefore, as experience teaches, it comes to pass as follows: the doctors abandon their invalids and think far more of usury than of Hippocrates and Galen; the lawyers forget their legal documents, lay aside their practice, and taking usury in hand, let who will peruse Bartholus and Balbus. The same is also done by other men of learning, who study arithmetic more than rhetoric and philosophy; the merchants, shop-keepers, and other traders acquire nowadays their greatest gains by their hardwares which are marked by the mint stamp.
"From this we may perceive that the 'unhanged, thievish, oath-forgetting, dishonourable,'KippersandWippers, though not indeed to be quite exculpated, are not so much to be condemned as if they were thecausa principalisof the ruin of the German States. I have, alas! assuredly great fears, that if once there is a delivery to the devil or hangman, theKippersandWippers, changers and usurers, Jews and Jew associates, helpers and helpers' helpers, one thief with another, will all be hurled off to the devil, or be hung up at the same time together, like yonder host with his companions. Yet with a difference. For their principals and patrons will justly have the prerogative and pre-eminence, and indeed some of them have been already sent there beforehand. The others will shortly follow to the above-mentioned place, and it will then avail nothing on this journey downward, whether one treats them withcarminaorcrimina, whether one passes judgment on them as criminals, or gives them laudatory poems--facilis descensus Averni--they will easily find the way, for they need no good fortune for that; the devil will couple them all with one cord, be the rogues ever so big.Fiat."
It is not improbable that a similar view of their social prospects in another world was impressed upon the rulers from many quarters. At all events, even they discovered that they could only be saved by the most speedy help; nothing would avail them but the reduction and hasty withdrawal of the new coinage, and a return to the good old Imperial coin. Thus the first fears of the princes and cities caused them to depreciate their new money, and to make use of these verdicts in order to express their abhorrence--not of very old date--of the bad coin, and they forthwith had the coin stamped honourably of due weight and alloy, as prescribed by the Imperial law. In order to put a stop to the excessive increase of prices, they hastened to put forth a tariff of goods and wages, which decided the highest price to be permitted. It is clear that this latter remedy could not be of more lasting use than the famous edict of Diocletian, thirteen hundred years before. The compulsion which, for example, it exercised over the city weekly markets, day labourers, and guilds, was only a temporary help for restoring the overflowing stream to its old bed.
This state of intoxication, terror, and fury was followed by a dreary reaction. Men gazed on one another as after a great pestilence. Those who had rested secure in their opulence had sunk into ruin. Many worthless adventurers now strutted, as persons of distinction, in velvet and silk. The whole nation had become poorer. There had not been any great war for a long time, and many millions in silver and gold, the savings of the inferior classes, had been inherited in city and village from father to son; the greater part of these savings had vanished in the bad times; it had been squandered on carousals, frittered away on trifles, and at last expended for daily food. But this was not the greatest evil; it was a still greater, that at this time the citizen, and countryman had been forcibly torn from the path of their honest daily labour. Frivolity, an unsettled existence, and a reckless egotism, had taken possession of them. The destroying powers of war had sent forth their evil spirits to loosen the firm links of burgher society, and to accustom a peaceful, upright, and laborious people to the sufferings and mal-practices of an army which shortly overran all Germany.
The period from 1621 to 1623 was henceforth called the "Kipper and Wipper" time. The confusion, the excitement, the trafficking, and the flying-sheet literature lasted till the year 1625. The lessons which the princes had learnt from the consequences of their flagitious actions did not avail them against later temptations. Even at the end of the seventeenth century it seems to have been impossible for them entirely to avoid hedge mints, and the continual recurrence of a depreciation of money.
Whilst Tilly was conquering Lower Saxony, and Wallenstein made great havoc in Northern Germany, small literature flowed in an under-current. After every engagement, and every capture of a city, there appeared copper engravings, with a text which described the position of the troops and the appearance of the city; irregular newspapers, and songs of lament conveyed the information of the advance of the Imperialists, and the destruction of the Mansfelders. In the midst of all this the people were dismayed by terrible decrees of the Emperor, who now from his secure position threw over the evangelicals, or compelled them by force to return to his Church, in spite of the fruitless intercessions of the Elector of Saxony. The Elector at last authorized the publication of a defence of the Augsburg confession, against the attacks of the Catholic theologians; this comprehensive work, called, 'The necessary Defence of the Apple of the Eye,' written in 1628, called forth immediately a theological war; both opponents and allies hastened in crowds to the field. 'Spectacles for the Evangelical Apple of the Eye;' 'A sharp round Eye on the Romish Pope;' 'Who has struck the Calf in the Eye? The Catholic Oculist or Coucher;' 'Venetian Spectacles on Lutheran Nose,' &c. These are specimens of the defiant titles of the most readable of the controversial writings. But this literary strife was drowned in the burst of loud outcries against Wallenstein, which pierced from Pomerania through all the German States, on account of the battle near Stralsund, and his shameful conduct towards the Pomeranian Duke and his country, and finally the horrible ill treatment of the men and women of Pasewalk. Again these lamentations changed into a shout of joy from all the Protestants. Again hope and confidence revived; this time it was a man, whom the nation, with the genuine German longing to love and honour, welcomed with shouts of jubilee. What had been wanting to the Germans for a century, came to them from the North, an idol and a hero. But he was a foreigner.
Much of that halo of light still surrounds the figure of Gustavus Adolphus, which distinguished him in the eyes of his cotemporaries so immeasurably above all other generals and princes. It is not his victories, nor his knightly death, nor the circumstance that he appeared as the last help to a despairing people, which makes him the one prominent figure in the long struggle. It was the magic of his great nature, as he rode over the field of battle, firm, self-contained, and as confident as unerring; from head to foot he was dignity, decision, and nervous energy. If one examines more nearly, one is astonished at the strong contrasts which combined in this character to form an admirable unity. No General was more systematic, fertile in plans, or greater in the science of war. Discipline in the army, order in the commissariat, a firm basis, and secure lines of retreat in every strategical operation, these were the requisites he brought with him to the conduct of the German War. But even he, the powerful prince of war, was driven by an irresistible necessity from his good system, but with the whole power of his being he incessantly stemmed the tide of the wild marauding war that raged around him. And yet this same systematic man bore within him a rash spirit of daring against the greatest hazards; his bearing in the battle was wonderfully elevated, like that of a noble battle steed. His eyes lighted up, his figure became more lofty, and a smile played on his countenance. Again, how wonderful appears to men, the union in him of frank honesty and wary policy, of upright piety and worldly wisdom, of high-minded self-sacrifice and reckless ambition, of heartfelt humanity and stern severity! And all this was enlivened by an inward confidence and freedom of mind, which enabled him to look in a humorous point of view on the distracted condition of the decaying Princes of the country. The irresistible power which he exercised over all who came under his influence, consisted principally in the freshness of his nature, his surpassing good humour, and where it was necessary, an ironical bonhomie. The way in which he managed the proud and wavering Princes, and the hesitating cities of the Protestant party, was not to be surpassed; he was never weary of exciting them to war, and alliance; he ever reverted to the same theme, whether to the Envoy of the Brandenburger, or when flattering the Nurembergers, or chiding the Frankforters.
He was closely allied, both by race and faith, to the Northern Germans; but he was a foreigner. This was thoroughly and constantly felt by the Princes. It was not alone distrust of his superior power which, till the bitterest necessity compelled them to union, kept aloof from him the irresolute, but it was the discovery in him of a new master; they revolted at the idea of this mighty non-German power, which so suddenly and threateningly arose in the empire. There was still to be found in a few of them somewhat of Luther's national idea of the empire. They had no hesitation in negotiating with France, Denmark, the Netherlands, nay with the unreliable Bethlem Gabor; all these were outside the Empire. Within its boundaries there was the fanatical Emperor and his insupportable General; they were new people to them, who might pass away as rapidly as they had become great; but the sovereignty of the German Empire was old, and they were the pillars of it. This conception was no longer in accordance with the highest policy, for the German Emperor had become the most mortal enemy of the German Empire. But such a feeling is not deserving of contempt; and the nation as well as most of the Princes, felt to the heart's core that their quarrel with the Emperor was in fact a domestic one, in which foreigners should have no concern. But the people, blinded by their delight in the dazzling heroism of the Protestant King, lost sight of these considerations. For two years public opinion paid homage to him, as it has never done since, except to the Great Frederic of Prussia. Every word, every little anecdote was carried from city to city, and loud acclamations greeted every success of his arms. It was not only the zealous Protestants who thus felt; even in the Catholic armies and in the states of the League, the scorn was quickly silenced which had been called forth by the landing of the "Snow King," and the number of his admirers continually increased. Many characteristic traits of him are preserved to us; almost every conversation that he had with Germans, gives an opportunity of discovering something of his nature. We will give here a short conversation, after his landing in Pomerania, recorded by a clever negotiator.
The Elector of Brandenburg had sent his plenipotentiary, Von Wilmersdorff, to persuade the King to conclude an armistice with the Emperor; he further wished to negotiate a peace between them, although Wallenstein had already deprived him of his dominions, and the Emperor had shown him every kind of disregard. The conversation of the King with the Envoy gives a good picture of his method of negotiating. He is here concise, firm, and straightforward, in spite of some mental reservation; and so perfectly self-possessed that he can allow his lively temperament to break forth without danger. The Envoy relates as follows:--
"After his Kingly Majesty had listened graciously to me, though when I came to the proposition of an armistice he rather smiled, he, no one being present, answered me circumstantially.
"'I had expected a different kind of embassy from my loving cousin; that is to say, that he would rather have come to meet me and united himself with me for his own welfare; and not that my loving cousin should be so weak as to lose this opportunity so providentially sent by God. My loving cousin will not comprehend the clear and evident intentions of his enemies; he does not discern the difference between pretexts and truth, nor consider that when this pretence shall cease, that is to say, when they have no longer anything more to fear from me, another will soon be found to establish himself in my loving cousin's country.
"'I had not expected that my loving cousin would have been so much terrified at the war as to remain inactive notwithstanding all the consequences to himself. Or does not my cousin yet know, that the intention of the Emperor and his allies is not to desist till the evangelical religion is entirely rooted out of the empire? my loving cousin must be prepared either to deny his religion or abandon his country. Does he think that anything else can be obtained by prayers, entreaties, or the like means? For God's sake let him reflect a little, and for once takemascula consilia. You see how this excellent prince the Duke of Pomerania was in the most innocent way,--having really committed no offence but only peaceably drunk his beer,--brought into the most lamentable condition, and how wonderfully he was saved under God's providence,fato quodam necessario--for he was constrained to do so--by making terms with me. What he did from necessity my loving cousin may do willingly.
"'I cannot withdraw,jacta est alea, transivimus Rubiconem. I do not seek my own advantage in this business; I gain nought but the security of my kingdom; beyond this I have nothing but expenses, trouble, labour, and danger to body and soul. They have occasioned me enough; in the first place they have twice sent help to my enemies the Poles, and endeavoured to drive me away; then they have endeavoured to possess themselves of the harbours of the Baltic, whereby I could well perceive what their intentions towards me were. My loving cousin the Elector is in a similar case, and it is now time that he should open his eyes and give up somewhat of his easy life, that he may no longer be a Stadtholder of the Emperor, nay even an Imperial servant in his own country: "Qui se fait brebis le loup le mange."
"'This is now precisely the best opportunity, when your country is free from Imperial soldiers, to garrison and defend your fortresses. If you will not do this, deliver over one to me, if it be only Küstrin, I will defend it, and you may then remain in the inactivity which your Prince so dearly loves.
"'What other will you do? For I declare to you distinctly, I will not hear of neutrality, my loving cousin must be either friend or foe. When I come to your frontier you must show yourselves either cold or warm. This is a struggle between God and the devil; if my loving cousin will hold to God, let him unite with me; but if he would rather hold to the devil, he must henceforth fight against me,tertium non dabitur, of that he may be assured.
"'Take this commission upon you to inform my loving cousin secretly of it, for I have none with me whom I can spare to send to him. If my loving cousin will treat with me, I will see if I can go to him myself; but with his present arrangements I will have nothing to do.
"'My loving cousin trusts neither in God nor to his good friends. It has gone ill with him therefore in Prussia and this country. I am the devoted servant of my loving cousin, and love him from my heart: my sword shall be at his service, and it shall preserve him in his sovereignty and to his people, but he must do his part also.
"'My loving cousin has great interest in this dukedom of Pomerania; this will I also defend for his advantage, but on the same condition as in the book of Ruth the next inheritor is commanded to take Ruth for his wife, so must my loving cousin take to him this Ruth; that is, unite himself with me in this righteous business if he wishes to inherit the country. If not, I here declare that he shall never obtain it.
"'I am not disinclined to peace, and have conformed myself to it contentedly. I know well that the chances of war are doubtful; I have experienced that, in the many years in which I have carried on war with various fortune. But as I have now, by God's grace, come so far, no one can counsel me to withdraw, not even the Emperor himself if he were to make use of his reason.
"'I might perhaps allow of an armistice for a month. It may appear fitting to me that my loving cousin should mediate. But he must place himself in a position, arms in hand, otherwise all his mediation will avail nothing. Some of the Hanse towns are ready to unite with me. I only wait for some one in the Empire to put himself prominently at the head. What might not the electors of Saxony and Brandenburg together with these cities, accomplish? Would to God that there were a Maurice!'
"Thereupon I replied that I had no commands from his Electoral Highness to confer with his Majesty, touching an armed alliance. But in my poor opinion, I doubted much whether his Electoral Highness would be able to come to an understanding without detriment to his honour and truth,salvo honore et fide sua.
"Then his Majesty interposed promptly: 'Yes, they will honour you when they have deprived you of your land and people. The Imperialists will keep faith with you as they have kept the capitulation.'
"I: 'It is necessary to look to the future, and consider how all will fall to ruin if the undertaking does not prosper.'
"The King: 'That will happen if you remain inactive, and would have done so already if I had not come. My loving cousin ought to do as I have done, and commend the result to God. I have not lain on a bed for fourteen days. I might have spared myself this trouble and sat at home with my wife if I had had no greater considerations.'
"I: 'As your Kingly Majesty is content that his Electoral Highness should become mediator, you must at least allow his Electoral Highness to remain neutral.'
"The King: 'Yes, till I come to his country. Such an idea is mere chaff, which the wind raises and blows away.What kind of a thing is that Neutrality? I do not understand it!'
"I: 'Yet your Kingly Majesty understood it well in Prussia, where you yourself suggested it to his Electoral Highness and to the city of Dantzic.'
"The King: 'Not to the Elector, but certainly to the city of Dantzic, for it was to my advantage.'
"After this he returned again to the subject of the Duke of Pomerania, saying that the good prince had been well content with him. He would have restored him Stralsund, Rügen, Usedom, Wollin, and all the rest. The Duke had desired that his Majesty should be his father. 'But I,' said his Majesty, 'answered, I would rather be his son, as he has no children.'
"Thereupon I answered: 'Yes, Kingly Majesty, that might very well be, if his Electoral Highness could only maintain the law of primogeniture in Pomerania.'
"The King: 'Yes, that may be very easily maintained by my loving cousin; but he must defend it, and not, like Esau, sell it for a mess of pottage.'"
Thus far goes the narrative.
When the great King, the lord of half Germany, sank into the dust in battle, the wail of lamentation broke forth in all the Protestant territories. Funeral services were performed in the towns and country, endless elegies poured forth; even the enemy concealed their joy under a manly sympathy, which at that time was seldom accorded to opponents.
His death was considered as a national misfortune; the deliverer and the saviour of the people was lost: we also, whether Catholic or Protestant, should not only regard with heartfelt sympathy that pure hero life, which in the prime of its strength was so suddenly extinguished, but we should also contemplate with the deepest gratitude the influence of the King upon the German war; for he had, in a time of desperation, defended that which Luther had attained for the whole nation,--freedom of soul, and capacity for the development of national strength against the most fearful enemy of the German national existence, against a crushing despotism in Church and State. But we must also observe concerning him, that the fate which he met strikes us as more peculiarly tragical because he drew it upon himself. History makes us acquainted with some characters which, after mighty deeds, are suddenly struck down at the height of their fame by a rapid change of fate in the midst of powerful but unaccomplished conception. Such heroes have a popular mixture of qualities of soul, which make them the privileged favourites both of posterity and art. Such was the case with the almost fabulous hero, the great Alexander; and thus it was, in a more limited sphere, with smaller means, with the Swedish King Gustavus Adolphus: but however accidental the fever or the bullet which carried them off may appear to us, their destruction arose from their own greatness. The conqueror of Asia had become an Asiatic despot before he died; the deliverer of Germany was shot by an Imperial mercenary when he was rushing through the dust of the battle-field, not like a General of the seventeenth century, but like a "Viking" of the olden time, who fought their battles in wild excitement under the protection of the battle-maidens of Odin. Often already had the incautious heroism of the King led him into rash daring and useless danger, and long had his faithful adherents feared that he would at some time meet his end thus. It was a wise policy which led him to establish himself on the German coast, in order to secure to his Sweden the dominion of the Baltic, also to draw the sea-ports to his interests, and to desire firm points of support on the Oder, Elbe, and Weser. But what duty did he owe to the German Empire, whose own Emperor wished to suppress the national life and popular development by Roman money, and calling thither hordes of soldiers from half Europe? When Gustavus Adolphus conceived the idea of making himself lord paramount over the German Princes, when he proceeded to form an hereditary power for himself in Germany, he was no longer the great cotemporary of Richelieu, but again the descendant of an old Norman chieftain. It is possible that the power of the man, during a longer life and after many victories, might have brought under his sway, with or without an Imperial throne, the greater part of Germany; but that Sweden, the foundation of his power, was not in a position to exercise a lasting supremacy over Germany, a small distant country over a larger, must have been obvious even then to the weakest politician. The King might still for some years longer have sacrificed the peasant sons of Sweden on the German battle-fields, and corrupted the Swedish nobility by German plunder; but he could not build up an enduring dynasty for both people, whatever his genius might have accomplished for a time. Men of ordinary powers would soon have restored things to their natural condition. We are therefore of opinion, that he died just when his lofty desires were beginning to contend against a fundamental law of the new state life, and we may assume that even a longer life of success would not have made much alteration in our position. When he died, his natural heir in Germany was already twelve years of age: this heir was Frederic William, the great Elector of Brandenburg. Gustavus Adolphus was the last but one of the northern princes to whom the old Scandinavian expedition to the south proved fatal. Charles XII., dying before Friedrichshall, was the last.
As the funeral lament died away in Germany, there began a reaction in public opinion against the foreigners. The Catholic faction had, during the whole war, the doubtful advantage that their quarrels and private dissensions were not brought to light by the press, but their Protestant opponents were broken into parties. It was more especially after Saxony, in 1635, had endeavoured, at Prague, to make an inglorious reconciliation with the Emperor by a separate peace, that there arose both in the north and south an Imperial and a Swedish party, and much weak dissension besides. The French endeavoured, but without success, to gain by means of the press, adherents on the Rhine. Bernhard von Weimar found warm admirers, who foresaw in him the successor of Gustavus Adolphus. He possessed great talents as a General, and some of the winning qualities of the great King; but he was only in one respect his successor, that he carried on in the most dangerous way the too great political daring of his instructor. He wished to make use of, and at the same time deceive, a foreign power which was greater and stronger than himself: it was an unequal struggle, and he, as the weaker party, was soon put aside by France, and these foreigners possessed themselves of his political legacy, his fortress and his army.
While love and hate were thus divided in this gloomy period, there arose among the better portion of the nation a characteristic patriotism, which the German people, in the midst of their great need and sufferings, opposed to the egotistic interests of the rulers who helped to destroy each other. There no longer existed any party to which a wise man could from his heart wish success. Differences of faith had diminished, and the soldiers complained, without scruple, of confession. Then began for the first time a new political system, called a constitution founded on reason, in opposition to the reckless selfishness of the rulers. But even this constitutional principle, the basis of which was the advantage of the whole, as it was then understood, was still without greatness of conception or any deep moral purport; and there was no repugnance to the employment of the worst means in carrying it out. Still it was an advance. Even the peaceful citizen, after eighteen years of troubles, was obliged to take an interest in this political system. The character of the ruling powers and their interests became everywhere a subject of deliberation. Every one was terrified out of his provincial narrowness of mind, and had urgent reasons for interesting themselves in the fate of foreign countries. Thousands of fugitives, the most powerful members of the community, had scattered themselves over distant provinces, the same misfortunes had befallen them also. Thus, amidst the horrors of war, was developed in Germany a feeling of distrust of their rulers, a longing for a better national condition. It was a great but dearly bought advance of public opinion; it may be discerned more particularly in the political literature after the peace of Prague. A specimen of this tendency is here introduced from a small flying-sheet, which appeared in 1636 under the title of 'The German Brutus: that is, a letter thrown before the public.'
"You Swedes complain that Germany is ungrateful, that it drives you away with violence, that the good deeds, done with God's power by Joshua, are forgotten, the alliance no longer thought of, in short, that you are less valued, like an old worn-out horse, or decrepit hound, both of which, when no longer useful, get such thanks as the world gives. Thus you are treated with great injustice before God and the world.
"Be of good comfort: there are many remaining who wish you well from their heart, who pray for you, and show their devotion to you in every possible way. A country where such people are to be found cannot be accused of ingratitude; and that there are yet many thousand such people, even your enemies know right well. But that selfishness, secret envy, hidden counsels, and clandestine negotiations are stirred up against you, must not be ascribed to the whole of this praiseworthy German nation, but only to the causes which have led to such results; for you have on your part shown a double amount of selfishness.
"In the first place, in raising at your pleasure the toll on the Baltic; for I have been told by honest trustworthy seafaring folk, that you have exacted from people, not only from fifteen to thirty, but up to forty, nay, even to fifty out of a hundred, and have troubled all hearts by this rapacity; and as no improvement has taken place, but commerce has been thereby miserably straitened, and many honest people have been lamentably brought to beggary, the minds of men being thereby much embittered, your best friends began at first to condemn you secretly, and at last through their falling fortunes were made your worst enemies. Would you throw the blame on the toll gatherers? They are your servants. It is a well-known rule of law: what I do by my servant is as though done by myself. You appear to me exactly like him who carried off a pair of shoes secretly and offered them afterwards to the holy Benno.
"The states and cities of the Empire, so long as they were in your hands, contributed fully and sufficiently to your maintenance; many, nay too many, to say the least of it, as a proof of their fidelity, have lost soul and body, wealth and life, nay all their privileges, and, in a great measure, religion itself. Ratisbon testifies to this. Augsburg laments over it. All grieve together over it. You have allowed the old regiments to dissolve, have completed no companies, nor paid either new or old, notwithstanding you have demanded, and in fact received large sums of money from many Diets; I say nothing of what you have extorted from your enemies in their own countries. How has this money been spent? In superfluous pomp and luxury which is hateful to every one. We have observed this silently, and made a virtue of necessity. The children of Israel, when they had intercourse with the daughters of their enemies, and afterwards boasted of their victory, and tormented their brethren of Judah with the hardest yoke of bondage, were both times severely punished by God. And shall it fare better with you who have exercised more than Turkish cruelty in many evangelical places? The corn from the monastery of Magdeburg, the Dukedom of Brunswick and other places, has been thrashed out and carried off in heaps from the country, sold at a very high price, and the money spent for your own use, nothing given to the poor soldiers; the country people, harassed to death, are dying of hunger; and many fortresses, from avarice, either not supplied with provisions, or not amply provided with powder and shot, and, in short, general mismanagement. Now we see ourselves everywhere abandoned by fortune, so that at last we discover there is no money in hand, and no people to be got, as those who were available have run away, and the remainder will no longer be restrained by martial law. Dear friends, think you of the saying of Boccalini: 'When the prince leads the life of Lucifer, what wonder that the subjects become devils!'
"Our politicians know well that the Electors hold kingly rank in the Empire. But who has exalted himself above them with kingly magnificence, a great retinue and boundless expense, is it not your chief (Oxenstiern)? Do you think that this has not been complained of at every court? His Kingly Majesty of Christian memory never did the like. From these and countless other reasons the Princes, states, and cities have become first secretly, and then publicly offended with you; to this may be added a conduct towards the established inhabitants which they cannot well bear, when foreigners place themselves higher than their native princes.
"You say that electoral Saxony should have made peace by force of arms. Let us leave that uncertain. It is known to every one that certain persons have helped to shove the cart into the mud, and afterwards left it there. If electoral Saxony has been wrong, you with your procedures are not less guilty. In short, every one, be he who he may, has sought his own advantage; therefore Magdeburg lies in ashes, Wismar is in ruins, Augsburg is bound with the fetters of servitude, Nuremberg is in peril of death, Ulm is in quotidian fever, Strasburg has passed to the French, Frankfort has the jaundice, and the whole Empire is consumed. The enemy have beaten with rods, but you have chastised with scorpions. The Wallensteiners inflicted wounds, and you physicians have applied drawing plasters as a remedy instead of oil, have corrupted the blood and fastened yourselves on like a crab; such a crab must either be cut out by force, or satisfied daily by inordinate sums of money. The last is out of our power, the first we do not wish to do to you, but cannot help it. If God thus harasses you it is your own fault. Meanwhile, do you think that God has a flaxen beard, and will allow himself to be led by the nose? Oh, no, He sees well that you shelter yourselves under the name of freedom, that you make use of the cloak of the gospel, and at the same time live as Turks.
"You cry out much about the Spanish monarchy. I have no fears of it. Give me one of the best chemists who is sufficiently scientific to know how to mingle earth and ores, so that they will hold together firm and infrangible, and then let us see whether we have to fear the Spanish monarchy. But I am afraid that France will be to us Germans, the broken reed of Egypt, which will pierce the hand of whoever leans on it. All empires have their fixed time appointed by God, and a boundary across which they cannot pass. First they arise, then grow like boys; some improve as youths, remain for a time at a standstill in their manhood, then decline, become old, languish and at last die; nay, are so utterly annihilated, that one scarcely knows that they have existed. This course of things cannot be prevented by any human wisdom. The wise man sees this, and prepares himself beforehand; the fool does not believe it, and is ruined, like the surviving Generals of Alexander the Great, who so long divided his conquests, till the Romans became their masters. And truly the Empire has great need to rid herself at last of foreign physicians.
"I have been severe, but a steel axe is necessary to sever such a hard knot, one cannot cut with a fur coat.
"It is asked what will be the issue? It rests with God. Have you had too little bloodshed? Let God be the judge, and fly ye from his wrath. Although the Church still suffers, it is not yet dead. You cannot complain that you have gained nothing for the money you have spent and the dangers you have undergone. You have brought copper out of your country, but carried silver and gold back to it. Sweden, before this war, was of wood thatched with straw, now it is of stone, and splendidly adorned, and that you have obtained from the abducted vessels of Egypt. This no one would grudge you if you would only thank God yourselves for it. The Germans have indeed been excited to rise against their Emperor, but they will take no one who is not of their race and language. If the house of Austria has done evil, God will truly search it out. As concerns the French, I know well that God will, through them, punish Germany; for we have daily imitated in manners, ceremonies, demeanour, and entertainments, in language and clothing, together with music, this nation of apish behaviour and dress, and frivolous manners. How can we expect better than to fall into their hands? But the Frenchman will not therefore become our Emperor. To him belongs the Lily, the Eagle to the Germans, the East to the Turks, and the West to the Spaniards. None among them can reach higher.
"I must hope that it will not be taken amiss of me, that I have so roundly described these transactions. But frankness suits a German well. Would to God that any one had in good time thus placed the matter before you. Now we can indeed complain, but help, none either will or can give. God alone will and can help us; to Him we must pray that He may at last have compassion on us, and turn the hearts of the high potentates to love and long-wished-for peace."
Here ends the flying-sheet. The author, without putting sympathy with the Imperialists in the foreground, evidently belongs less to the Swedish party than we do now. Undoubtedly the Swedish soldiers and officers had become merciless devils, like the Imperialists, and, like them, they ruined the country and people. But it was not their exorbitant demands which hindered the peace, but the injustice of the Emperor, who still continued to raise the execrable pretension to subdue the life and freedom of the nation to his interest. Had it been possible for the Hapsburgers to assure freedom of faith, and the independence of the Imperial tribunals, almost all the German princes would have succumbed to him to drive away the foreigners. But the struggle stood thus: either the nation must be crushed, and all the ideas suppressed, which had grown up in the German soil for one hundred and forty years, or the pretensions of the Imperial House must be certainly and fundamentally overcome: The last was impossible to the Germans without the help of Sweden. Thus on a retrospect of those years, every one will be well disposed to Sweden, who does not consider it a mere accident that well-known men of later times, like Lessing, Goethe, Schiller, Kant, Fichte, Hegel, and Humboldt did not blossom out of the country in which hundreds of thousands were driven from Church and school, by the Jesuits of Ferdinand II. But at that period the patriot undoubtedly felt the weakness of the Empire more than all the fearful misery of the people. And great ground there was for anxiety about the future. From this point of view this brochure is to us the first expression of that feeling which still, in the present day, unites hundreds of thousands of Germans. That love of Fatherland took root in the oppressed souls of our ancestors during the Thirty years' war, which has not yet attained to political life by a unity of constitutions. Such a feeling indeed only existed then in the minds of the noblest. But we must honour those who, in a century poor in hope, left in their teaching and writings, as an inheritance to their descendants, the idea of a German Empire.
After Banner's devastating expedition all was quiet in Germany. Almost all the news and State records which the war had left, flowed from the press. In the last years thousands of printed sheets were filled with the negotiations for peace. Finally the peace was announced to the poor people in large placards.