k and defied all authority, both human and divine, and
invoked all the maddening passions of Revolution itself.

AUTHORITIES.

Histoire de Thou; L'Estoile; Memoires de la Reine Marguerite; Histoire
de Henri le Grand, par Madame de Genlis; Memoires de Sully; D'Aubigne;
Matthien; Brantome's Vie de Charles IX.; Henri Martin's History of
France; Mezerai; Perefixe; Sismondi.

GUSTAVUS ADOLPHUS.

1594-1632.

THE THIRTY YEARS' WAR (1618-1648).

The Thirty Years' War, of which Gustavus Adolphus was the greatest hero,
was the result of those religious agitations which the ideas of Luther
produced. It was the struggle to secure religious liberty,--a warfare
between Catholic and Protestant Germany. It differed from the Huguenot
contest in this,--that the Protestants of France took up arms against
their king to extort religious privileges; whereas the Protestants of
Germany were marshalled by independent princes against other independent
princes of a different religion, who sought to suppress Protestantism.
In this warfare between Catholic and Protestant States, there were great
political entanglements and issues that affected the balance of power in
Europe. Hence the Thirty Years' War was political as well as religious.
It was not purely a religious war like the crusades, although religious
ideas gave rise to it. Nor was it an insurrection of the people against
their rulers to secure religious rights, so much as a contest between
Catholic and Protestant princes to secure the recognition of their
religious opinions in their respective States.

The Emperor of Germany in the time of Luther was Charles V.,--the most
powerful potentate of Europe, and, moreover, a bigoted Catholic. On his
abdication,--one of the most extraordinary events in history,--the
German dominions were given to his brother Ferdinand; Spain and the Low
Countries were bestowed on his son Philip. Ferdinand had already been
elected King of the Romans. There was a close alliance between these
princes of the House of Austria to suppress Protestantism in Europe. The
new Austrian emperor was not, indeed, so formidable as his father had
been, but was still one of the greatest monarchs of Europe; and so
powerful was the House of Austria that it excited the jealousy of the
other European powers. It was to prevent the dangerous ascendency of
Austria that Henry IV. of France raised a great army with a view of
invading Germany, but was assassinated before he coul