The Thirty Years' War, 1618-1648 |
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Alsace ambassador amongst arms army attack Baltic battle Bavaria Bernhard Bethlen Gabor bishoprics Bohemia Breitenfeld Catholic cause Charles Christian of Anhalt Christian of Brunswick cities command Danish defend duchy Duke of Pomerania Dutch ecclesiastical Edict of Restitution Elector of Brandenburg Elector of Saxony Emperor Empire enemy England English favour Ferdi Ferdinand fight force foreign France Frederick French garrison Germany Gustavus hands hoped House of Austria Huguenots imperial imperialists Italy John George King of Denmark lands League lenstein Lewis Lower Saxon Lutheran Magdeburg Mansfeld Maximilian military Mühlhausen nand Netherlands never Nüremberg offered Palatinate peace Prague princes Protestant Protestantism Ratisbon ready refused religion religious resistance Rhine Richelieu Rochelle SECTION side siege soldiers Spain Spaniards Spanish stein Stralsund strong success Sweden Swedish tavus territories testant Tilly Tilly's tion towns treaty troops unity victory Vienna Wallen Wallenstein whilst
Popular passages
Page 124 - Straight forward goes The lightning's path, and straight the fearful path Of the cannon-ball. Direct it flies and rapid, Shattering that it may reach, and shattering what it reaches. My son ! the road, the human being travels, That, on which BLESSING comes and goes, doth follow The river's course, the valley's playful windings, Curves round the corn-field and the hill of vines, Honouring the holy bounds of property ! And thus secure, though late, leads to its end.
Page 7 - ... fortunes and their own at the end of the fifteenth, and the beginning of the sixteenth centuries in all the courts of western Europe.
Page 3 - We have chosen your grace,' said the electors to Frederick III., ' as head, protector, and governor of all Christendom." Yet it would be hard to find a single fragment of reality corresponding to the magnificence of the claim. As far, however, as the period now under review is concerned, though the name of Emperor was retained, it is unnecessary to trouble ourselves with the man kingship! rights, real or imaginary, connected with the imperial dignity. Charles the Great, before the imperial crown...
Page 163 - The words which he spoke at Nuremberg to the princes, telling them how well off he might be at home, were conceived in the very spirit of the Homeric Achilles, when the hardness of the work he had undertaken and the ingratitude of men revealed itself to him. Like Achilles, he dearly loved war, with its excitement and danger, for its own sake. But he desired more than the glory of a conqueror. The establishment of Protestantism in Europe as a power safe from attack by reason of its own strength was...
Page vi - Every history, to be a history, must have a unity of its own, and here we have no unity of national life such as that which is reflected in the institutions of England and France, not even the unity of a great race of sovereigns handing down the traditions of government from one generation to another. The unity of the subject which I have chosen must be sought in the growth of the principle of religious toleration as it is adopted or repelled by the institutions under which Germany and France, the...
Page 162 - And Gustavus was not even more than half a German by birth ; politically he was not a German at all. In his own mind he could not help thinking first of Sweden. In the minds of others the suspicion that he was so thinking was certain to arise. He clung firmly to his demand for Pomerania as a bulwark for Sweden's interests in the Baltic. Next to that came the Corpus Evangelicorum, the league of German Protestant cities and princes to stand up against the renewal of the overpowering tyranny of the...
Page 184 - Further on, a French garrison was in Ehrenbreitstein, firing down upon Coblentz, which had just been taken by the imperialists. "They in the town, if they do but look out of their windows, have a bullet presently presented at their head." More to the south, things grew worse. At Bacharach, " the poor people are found dead with grass in their mouths.
Page iv - History of England from the Accession of James I. to the Disgrace of Chief Justice Coke
Page 55 - But it is impossible to forget he was the enemy of the peasants as well. Burning-masters appear among the regular officers of his army ; and many a village, unable to satisfy his demands, went up in flames, with its peaceful industry ruined for ever. At last, satiated with plunder, he turned southward to the support of Mansfeld. Such were the commanders into whose hands the fortunes of German Protestantism had fallen.' Mansfeld told Vere plainly that whether there were a feid will not truce or not,...
Page 179 - But during the long dreary years of confusion which were to follow, it was something to think of the last supremely able man whose life had been spent in battling against the great evils of the land, against the spirit of religious intolerance, and the spirit of division.