Sentenced, He wishes to give me time to weep for my sins, and to console myself in this protracted trial by the hope of their remission. He has granted me this interval, that, through meditation on the sufferings of Christ Jesus, I may become better qualified to support my own*.' The time of those sufferings at length arrived. On the morning of July 6, 1415, he was conducted before the Council, then holding its fifteenth session; and after various articles of accusation had been read, a sentence was passed to the following effect, That for several years John Huss has seduced and scandalized the people by the dissemination of many doctrines manifestly heretical, and condemned by the Church, especially those of John Wiclif. That he has obstinately trampled upon the keys of the Church and the ecclesiastical censures. That he has appealed to Jesus Christ as sovereign judge, to the contempt of the ordinary judges of the Church; and that such an appeal was injurious, scandalous, and made in derision of ecclesiastical authority †. That he has persisted to the last in his errors, and even maintained them in full Council. It is therefore ordained that he be publicly deposed and degraded from holy orders, as an obstinate and incorrigible heretic.' . . . The prelates appointed then proceeded to the office of degradation. He was stripped, one by one, of his sacerdotal vestments; the holy cup, which had been purposely placed in his hands, was taken from them; his hair was cut in such a manner as to lose every mark of the priestly character; and a crown of paper was placed on his head, marked with hideous figures of demons, and that still more frightful superscription, Heresiarch. The prelates then piously devoted his soul to the infernal devils ; he was pronounced to be cut off from the ecclesiastical body, and being released from the grasp of the Church, he was consigned, as a layman, to the vengeance of the secular arm. It was in the character of advocate and defender of the Church,' that the Emperor took charge of the culprit, and commanded his immediate execution. and executed. The last, which was not perhaps the bitterest, of his sufferings was endured with equal constancy and in the same blessed spirit. On his way to the stake he repeated pious prayers and penitential psalms; and when the order was given to kindle the flames, he only uttered these words'Lord Jesus, I endure with humility this cruel death for thy sake; and I pray thee to pardon all my enemies.' The ministers executed their office; the martyr continued in uninterrupted devotion; and it was not long before a rising volume of fire and smoke extinguished at the same time his voice and his life.... His ashes were carefully collected and cast into the lake. But the miserable precaution was without any effect; since his disciples tore up the earth from the spot of his martyrdom, and adored it with the same reverence and moistened it with those same tears, which would otherwise have sanctified his sepulehre. The points of difference strictly doctrinal between Huss and his persecutors were, after all, neither numerous nor important; since we are bound in this inquiry to give credit to the solemn disavowals of the accused, rather than to the malignant imputations of his accusers. Lenfant, in his *Opera Joh. Huss., epist. 14, apud Lenfant. + Probably, in the long list of Huss's imputed heresies there was no single article which inflamed the Council against him nearly so violently as this appeal. The point which, above all others, that assembly was interested to establish, was its own omnipotence and infallibility-its agency under the immediate operation of the Holy Spirit-in fact, its divine power. Consequently, an appeal to any superior, even though it were Christ himself, was derogatory to the heavenly attributes, with which the Council had clothed itself. Animam tuam devovemus infernis Diabolis.' ww. accurate history* of this affair, has investigated very minutely the real extent of the offences of Huss, and reduced them under two heads. (1.) He unquestionably refused to subscribe to any general condemnation of the articles of Wiclif. There were many particulars on which he dissented from that reformer, but in several others he professed the same notions; and among these last were disparagement of the Pope and the Roman Church, and opposition to tithes, indulgences, and ecclesiastical censures. (2.) It was also made a dangerous charge against him, that the spirit of ecclesiastical insubordination, which had already appeared in Bohemia, was principally occasioned by his preaching.... Such was the burden of his offence. And though all the leading authors and orators of the time were as unsparing as Huss himself, in their denunciations of papal and ecclesiastical enormities, even from the pulpits of Constance; though it was even usual with them to ascribe to these abuses the heresies of the day; still the independent exertions of a Bohemian preacher in the same cause were stigmatized by them as indiscreet and immoderate zeal-because the principles, from which that zeal proceeded, were not in accordance with their own hierarchical pretensions; because the Bible, and not the Church, was the source from which it flowed.... And as to the disaffection of the Bohemians, if the Council really hoped to repress it by the perfidious execution of the most pious and popular of their teachers, the events, which presently followed, were a lesson of bloody and indelible instruction both to those who indulged that error, and to their latest posterity. III. In less than a year from the execution of Huss, the same scene of injustice and barbarity was acted a second time, Jerome of Prague. though with some variety of circumstances, in the same polluted theatre. Jerome, master in theology in the university of Prague, and a layman, was the disciple of John Huss. Huss (says Æneas Sylvius) was superior in age and authority; but Jerome was held more excellent in learning and eloquence. While the former presided in the chair, the latter delivered his lectures in the schools; and the same opinions were taught with equal zeal and effect by the one and by the other. In the troubles, which had been excited through those opinions, Jerome had had, perhaps, the greater share; there was at least no favourable feature to distinguish his offence from that of his master. Accordingly he was summoned to Constance soon after the meeting of the Council; and he appeared there on the 4th of April, 1415, not unprepared for the treatment which awaited him. It should be observed, that he also obtained a safe-conduct from the Emperor; but that in his case the conditional clause, salva semper justitia, was inserted; whereas that of Huss contained no such provision. At his first audience (on May 23rd) he exhibited great firmness; but at the second, which took place only thirteen days after the execution of Huss, it was expected that the impression made by that frightful example would render him more tractable. And so assuredly it proved; for on his third examination (on September 11th) he submitted, after suffering much insult and intimidation, to make a formal and solemn retractation. He 'anathematized all heresies, and especially that of Wiclif and Huss with which he had been previously infected (infamatus); he denounced the various articles which expressed it, as blasphemous, erroneous, scandalous, offensive to pious ears, rash, and seditious; and professed his absolute adhesion to all the tenets of the Roman Church.'... It was admitted that, in this mournful exhibition of human inconstancy, he had satisfied every demand which was made upon his weakness, both in Hist. Conc. Const. lib. iii. § 52, 60. His execution. substance and in form; nevertheless he was still retained in confinement. After a short space, his enemies pressed forward with new charges against him. They found many eager listeners among the members of the Council; and Gerson* himself again took up the pen of bigotry, and again sought to dip it in blood. Matters continued thus until the 23rd of May, 1416, when a final and public audience was granted to his repeated entreaties. On this occasion he recalled, with sorrow and shame, his former retractation, and openly attributed the unworthy act to its real and only motive-the fear of a painful death. His bitterest foes desired no further proof against him; and only seven days were allowed to elapse before he was condemned, and executed on the same spot which had been hallowed by the sufferings of his master. The courage, which had abandoned him in the anticipation of the flames, returned with redoubled force as he approached them. The executioner would have kindled the faggots behind his back: Place the fire before me,' he exclaimed; if I had dreaded it, I could have escaped it.' Such (says Poggio † the Florentine) the end of a man incredibly excellent. I was an eye-witness to that catastrophe, and beheld every act. I know not whether it was obstinacy or incredulity which moved him; but his death was like that of some one of the philosophers of antiquity. Mutius Scævola placed his hand in the flame, and Socrates drank the poison with less firmness and spontaneousness, than Jerome presented his body to the torture of the fire.' was Whatsoever may have been the respective excellence, in their living or in their martyrdom, of those two venerable heralds of the Reformation, the conduct of the Council was not at all less iniquitous in respect to its second, than to its first victim. If in the one instance the violation of the safe-conduct displayed unblushing perfidy, the contempt of the retractation was at least as shameless in the other. The first crime was followed by no remorse; it seems rather to have led to the more calm and deliberate perpetration of the second. The principle by which the deeds were justified was never, for an instant, questioned in either case. And we should, at the same time, bear in mind (for it is a consideration deserving repeated notice), that this was not a principle exclusively papal-no peculiar emanation from the apostolical chair or the Court of Rome-it was a principle strictly ecclesiastical, animating the Council as the representative of the Church, and inflaming the individual bosom of the churchmen who composed it. It was embraced by the French and English, as warmly as by the Italians themselves; nor was it pressed to any greater extremity by the champions of ecclesiastical corruption, than by the men who called themselves its reformers. * He composed at this time (in October, 1415) his treatise De Protestatione et Revocatione in Negotio Fidei, ad eluendam Hæreseos notam.' He sought to cast suspicion on such retractations; and this was the first step towards the execution of Jerome. The Composition may be found in Von der Hardt, tom. iii. p. iv. In a letter addressed to Leonardus Aretinus, of which the whole is valuable, as describing the entire transaction, and painting the character of Jerome. It is cited by Beausobre, Histoire de la Réformation, lib. ii.; by Von der Hardt, tom. iii. pars iii.; and other writers. There was, indeed, a little more of philosophical parade, and a little less of the genuine Christian spirit in the death of Jerome than in that of his master. Eneas Sylvius, however, whose eye was not likely to perceive this distinction, or to value it when perceived, includes both in the same sentence of admiration. 'Pertulerunt ambo constanti auimo necem et quasi ad epulas invitati ad incendium properârunt, nullam emittentes vocem, quæ miseri animi posset facere indicium. Ubi ardere cœperunt, hymnum cecinerunt, quem vix flamma et fragor ignis intercipere potuit. Nemo Philosophorum tam forti animo mortem pertulisse traditur, quam isti incendium.' Bohem. cap. xxxvi. Hist. IV. The condition of Bohemia is described to have been singularly flourishing at that moment. There was no other region* more abundant in useful productions, or in which the people were blessed with greater comforts; none more distinguished for the splendour of its churches and monasteries, and the wealth of its clergy. Unhappily, that body had used with little moderation the advantages enjoyed by it; and its excesses had for many years excited the murmurs of the laity. This disaffection had even shown itself in occasional outrages; but no systematic hostility had yet been arrayed either against the persons or the property of the sacred order. Howbeit, no sooner were the proceedings of the Council made known throughout the country, than the people gave indications of a ferocious spirit; the nobles† likewise addressed a bold remonstrance to the fathers; and as their rising opposition was met by new edicts of condemnation, which still farther inflamed it; and as Martin V. at length published a Bull§ of Crusade against the contumacious heretics, every hope of reconciliation was removed, and the difference was fairly committed to the decision of the sword. Insurrection of the It was one of the earliest and most innocent acts of insubordination to spread three hundred tables in the open air, for the public celebration of the communion in both kinds. And as the sense of some one specific grievance is necessary for the union of a large multitude in revolt against any established power, so it was wise in the Bohemian insurgents to select one among their spiritual wrongs, as the principal motive of resistance, and to select that which would be most intelligible to the lowest classes. Again, the distinction of a name was useful in rousing enthusiasm, and preserving the show of concord. And so this chosen people *Cochlæus (lib. i. p. 314) cites some verses' Conradi Celtis primi apud Germanos Poeta Laureati,' in praise of the city of Prague : Visa non est Urbs meliore cœlo; Explicat septem hæc spatiosa colles, +They had previously addressed several remonstrances to the Emperor on the subject of Huss's imprisonment, representing that there was no person, great or small, who did not see the violation of his safe-conduct with indignation. Their letter to the Council immediately followed the execution of Huss, and was dated September 2. The great considered the act as an affront to the kingdom of Bohemia; the populace exclaimed against the fathers, as persecutors and executioners, and assembling in the chapel of Bethlehem, decreed to the victim the honours of martyrdom. It is related, that Jerome of Prague was prematurely associated with his master in this popular canonization; and it is remarkable that this crown was conferred upon him within a few days from that, on which he made his retractation. Among the edicts published at Constance against the Hussites, there was one, in 1418, which prohibited the singing of songs in derision of the Catholic Church. The Bull published by Martin in 1421 contained a prohibition to keep faith with heretics, as distinctly conveyed as words can express it,' Quod si tu aliquo modo inductus defensionem eorum suscipere promisisti; scito te dare fidem hæreticis, violatoribus Fidei Sanctæ, non potuisse, et idcirco peccare mortaliter, si servabis ; quia fideli ad infidelem non potest esse ulla communio.' It is addressed to Alexander, Duke of Lithuania, and published by Cochlæus, a prejudiced Catholic. Lib. v. p. 212. After all, it appears nearly certain, that Huss was not the author of the restoration of the cup. Lenfant follows the account of Æneas Sylvius, and argues that he was not. The retrenchment of the cup appears to that author to be a necessary consequence of the doctrine of transubstantiation, which Huss seems to have professed to the last. The Catholics of Constance, and even Gerson himself, (for he published a very elaborate and artificial treatise on the subject,) appear to have been more perplexed in the defence of this, than of any other of their abuses. Antiquity, of course, is the great object of appeal; and yet the antiquity of this practice could scarcely reach two centuries (Lenfant, liv. iii., Sxxxi.); and it certainly never acquired the force of a law till the contrary was declared to be heresy, in the 10th Session of the Council (May 14, 1415). stigmatised the surrounding nations as Idumæans or Moabites, as Amalekites or Philistines; themselves were the well-beloved and elect of God; Thabor was the mount on which they pitched their tents, and Thaborite the appellation which they adopted. The first effects of their indignation were directed against the monks and clergy. These were plundered and even massacred without pity and without remorse. The sacred buildings were overthrown, the sanctuaries profaned, the altars stained with blood; and all those abominations were unsparingly committed, which commonly attend a premature resistance to inveterate oppression. Their triumphs. Sigismond conducted the armies of the Church; Zisca led the rebels against them; and the name of Zisca is signalised by several triumphs over the imperial crusaders, which evinced not only his great military genius and resolution, but the deep religious enthusiasm and devotion of his followers. Atrocities were perpetrated by both parties, as if in emulation of each other, and of the heroes of former holy wars; and so keen was the thirst for blood, that the Hussites indulged it in the massacre of a sect of brother-heretics. A number of unfortunate enthusiasts, usually designated Adamites, were collected in an insular spot, in the neighbourhood of Zisca's encampment. They are accused by various writers of the habit of nudity, and of many scandalous crimes; and in this matter it is probable that they have been much calumniated. It may be, as Mosheim is disposed to think, that they were infected with some of the absurdities of mysticism; or, as Beausobre learnedly argues, that their difference from the Catholics was confined to the use of the cup. It is beyond dispute, that they did not maintain all the opinions of the Thaborites; and it would seem that some fatal quarrels had taken place between individuals of the two sects. Zisca surrounded and destroyed them without any discrimination or mercy; but lest we should on this account consider him as having surpassed the wickedness of his Catholic adversaries, we may remark, that by this very act he has incurred the deliberate praise of their historians†, and redeemed in their eyes some portion of the guilt of his apostacy. Divisions. Zisca died in 1424, and divisions immediately ensued among his followers. Two other factions, the Orebites and the Orphans, distracted the Bohemian reformers; but they united on occasions of common danger. In 1431 they repelled another formidable crusade, which was conducted by the celebrated cardinal of St. Angelo; and in this affair the rout was so complete, that the Pope's Bull, as well as the hat, cross, and bell of the cardinal, fell into the hands of the victors. In the meantime, a more moderate party arose and acquired influence among the Hussites; its hopes were turned to a pacific accommodation with the Church; and with that view it was arranged, that the Bohemians should send deputies to treat with the council of Basle... Accordingly some of the most renowned among their military and ecclesiastical directors appeared at that city on the day appointed. The fame of their fierce exploits made them objects of deep and fearful curiosity with that peaceful assembly; they were treated with respect, for they had earned it by their sword; and no *This very ingenious writer, in his dissertation on the 'Adamites,' addressed in two books to M. Lenfant, and published together with the History of the Council of Constance' by the latter, certainly clears the Adamites from the worst charges that have been brought against them, which he shows to have been Catholic calumnies. Still the question, why Zisca destroyed them, is scarcely answered satisfactorily. † See Cochlæus, lib. v., p. 218. See Lenfant, Guerre des Hussites, l. xvi. s. v. &c. |