before his
death, to secure the succession of the imperial crown to his son who
bore his own name. He accordingly assembled a meeting of the electors at
Prague, and by the free use of bribes and diplomatic intrigue, obtained
their engagement to support his son. He accomplished his purpose, and
Ferdinand, quite to the astonishment of Germany, was chosen unanimously,
King of the Romans--the title assumed by the emperor elect. In June,
1653, the young prince was crowned at Ratisbon. The joy of his father,
however, was of short duration. In one year from that time the
small-pox, in its most loathsome form, seized the prince, and after a
few days of anguish he died. His father was almost inconsolable with
grief. As soon as he had partially recovered from the blow, he brought
forward his second son, Leopold, and with but little difficulty secured
for him the crowns of Hungary and Bohemia, but was disappointed in his
attempts to secure the suffrages of the German electors.

With energy, moderation and sagacity, the peacefully disposed Ferdinand
so administered the government as to allay for seven years all the
menaces of war which were continually arising. For so long a period had
Germany been devastated by this most direful of earthly calamities,
which is indeed the accumulation of all conceivable woes, ever leading
in its train pestilence and famine, that peace seemed to the people a
heavenly boon. The fields were again cultivated, the cities and villages
repaired, and comfort began again gradually to make its appearance in
homes long desolate. It is one of the deepest mysteries of the divine
government that the destinies of millions should be so entirely placed
in the hands of a single man. Had Ferdinand II. been an enlightened,
good man, millions would have been saved from life-long ruin and misery.

One pert young king, in the search of glory, kindled again the lurid
flames of war. Christina, Queen of Sweden, daughter of Gustavus
Adolphus, influenced by romantic dreams, abdicated the throne and
retired to the seclusion of the cloister. Her cousin, Charles Gustavus,
succeeded her. He thought it a fine thing to play the soldier, and to
win renown by consigning the homes of thousands to blood and misery. He
was a king, and the power was in his hands. Merely to gratify this
fiend-like ambition, he laid claim to the crown of Poland, and raised an
army for the invasion of that kingdom. A portion of Poland was then in a
state