language of heretics. It was mainly in the interest of these intruders and of the members of the Roman Church on whom vast estates had been bestowed and among whom there were at first hardly any Bohemians, that the new regulations in favour of the German language were established. A yet greater change took place in the Bohemian towns. The numerous Protestants, mostly of the Bohemian nationality, who had inhabited these towns and who had refused to apostatize were driven into exile, and they were replaced by German immigrants belonging to the Church of Rome. Many Bohemian towns such as Litoměřice and Louny,[1] formerly national strongholds during the Hussite wars, now became German and have continued so up to the present day.
While the nobles and citizens, who wished to preserve their religious convictions, were at least allowed to leave their country, though often in a state of complete destitution, no such option was granted to the peasants whom serfdom attached to the soil, for the cultivation of which they were required. They were to remain there, but to remain there as Romanists. Serfdom now only appeared in its full horror. The new landowners punished with fiendish cruelty all who did not regularly attend at Mass or avoided receiving communion according to the Roman rites.
It has already been mentioned that the Imperial arms were generally victorious during the years that immediately followed the battle of the White Mountain. These successful campaigns confirmed Ferdinand in his plan of restoring the Roman supremacy not only in Bohemia, but also in Germany. Recent research proved that the Emperor began about this time to cherish such far-reaching plans. The Imperial power had, in Germany, receded for centuries, and the princes had to an ever-increasing extent assumed the position of sovereign powers. It appears very probable that the Emperor, who knew how completely the Spanish branch of his family had succeeded in establishing absolutism in Spain, hoped to achieve a similar constitutional change in Germany. Ferdinand was greatly encouraged in these ambitious plans by his powerful general Albert of Waldstein.
Though it would be very tempting to search for a new solution of the Waldstein problem—one of the strangest
- ↑ In German "Leitmeritz" and "Laun."
