The Missionary by Stephen Nelson Haskell

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Oct 7, 1886

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 12, No. 39.

The Missionary.

By Stephen Nelson Haskell

A New Line of Policy of the Bohemians.

The Bohemians had decided that the gulf between them and the emperor was impassable, made so by the death of Huss and Jerome; but Procopius was unwilling to forego the hope of peace so greatly needed by a stricken and bleeding country. He was ready to die for them on the battle-field; but he longed, if it were possible, to make peace on just terms, and so to close their fearful wars. Accordingly a Diet was assembled at Prague, and he was sent to lay before the emperor the terms upon which they would accept peace. This he did by presenting the following four cardinal points: The free preaching of the gospel, communion in both kinds, satisfactory arrangement of the ecclesiastical property, and the execution of the laws against crimes, by whomsoever committed. Sigismund would not agree to these terms. Procopius returned to his people with the satisfaction that he had held out the olive branch of peace, and that if the sword must be unsheathed, the blood which would flow would lie at the door of those who had spurned the overtures of a just and a reasonable settlement.

Up to this time the Hussites had only assumed the defensive; after they had proposed to make peace with the emperor, and their propositions were rejected, they decided to follow another policy,—to enter Germany and see what could be accomplished by carrying the war upon the emperor’s own borders. Accordingly Procopius entered Germany in 1429, and during the campaign that followed, the whole of Western Germany felt the weight of his sword. One hundred towns and castles he converted into ruins, and he exacted heavy ransoms from wealthy cities. The barons and bishops he made pay equally large sums as the price of their escape from captivity or death. Some of the most prominent towns, and such magnates as the Elector of Brandenburg, and the Bishop of Salzburg, he rated at ten thousand ducats [$20,000]. This was an enormous sum at this time, before the gold-yielding countries were discovered. He returned home with three hundred wagons which groaned under the weight of the immense booty which he carried back to Bohemia.

This move has been censured by many historians; but Procopius felt that the time had come when they should do something that would bring peace to their borders, and if the enemy would not accept peace on reasonable terms, willingly, they should be forced to do so. It, however, turned the sympathies in favor of the papal party and the German nation. It was not men clad in metal that Rome dreaded the most; but it was men clothed in the armor of truth, wielding not the sword, but the Scriptures, before whom that apostate body trembled.

The Pope and emperor again took counsel how they might rid themselves of this source of danger which seemed to threaten all Christendom. As the result, an army of one hundred and thirty thousand men was raised, and on the first of August, 1431, they crossed the Bohemian frontier, penetrating through the great forests which covered the country on the Bavarian side. This crusade resulted as the one before it had done. The army became panic-stricken and fled from the field. The Duke of Bavaria was one of the first to flee. It is said that the only man who did not lose his head that day was the legate Cesarini. It would be expected that the Bohemians, with their inferior numbers, would have been the ones to flee; but that the Germans should flee is inexplicable, unless on account of the moral state of the combatants. It shows that a good conscience is the best equipment for even an army, and that it will do much to secure the victory. There is here seen the touch of a divine finger,—the infusion of a supernatural terror. Their enemies were so frightened, it is said, that some of them really lost their way and wandered back into the ranks of the Bohemians, others, fleeing to their own cities, began to beg for lodging as though they were strangers, and had no acquaintance with the country.

S. N. H.