capital of his future kingdom. His
ill-disguised attempts upon the Electorate of Mentz, which he first
intended to bestow upon the Elector of Brandenburg, as the dower of his
daughter Christina, and afterwards destined for his chancellor and
friend Oxenstiern, evinced plainly what liberties he was disposed to
take with the constitution of the empire. His allies, the Protestant
princes, had claims on his gratitude, which could be satisfied only at
the expense of their Roman Catholic neighbours, and particularly of the
immediate Ecclesiastical Chapters; and it seems probable a plan was
early formed for dividing the conquered provinces, (after the precedent
of the barbarian hordes who overran the German empire,) as a common
spoil, among the German and Swedish confederates. In his treatment of
the Elector Palatine, he entirely belied the magnanimity of the hero,
and forgot the sacred character of a protector. The Palatinate was in
his hands, and the obligations both of justice and honour demanded its
full and immediate restoration to the legitimate sovereign. But, by a
subtlety unworthy of a great mind, and disgraceful to the honourable
title of protector of the oppressed, he eluded that obligation. He
treated the Palatinate as a conquest wrested from the enemy, and thought
that this circumstance gave him a right to deal with it as he pleased.
He surrendered it to the Elector as a favour, not as a debt; and that,
too, as a Swedish fief, fettered by conditions which diminished half its
value, and degraded this unfortunate prince into a humble vassal of
Sweden. One of these conditions obliged the Elector, after the
conclusion of the war, to furnish, along with the other princes, his
contribution towards the maintenance of the Swedish army, a condition
which plainly indicates the fate which, in the event of the ultimate
success of the king, awaited Germany. His sudden disappearance secured
the liberties of Germany, and saved his reputation, while it probably
spared him the mortification of seeing his own allies in arms against
him, and all the fruits of his victories torn from him by a
disadvantageous peace. Saxony was already disposed to abandon him,
Denmark viewed his success with alarm and jealousy; and even France, the
firmest and most potent of his allies, terrified at the rapid growth of
his power and the imperious tone which he assumed, looked around at the
very moment he past the Lech, for foreign alliances, in order to