burg, together with
the districts of Beeskow and Storkow which had been added by purchase to
the new mark, were united under the rule of his nephew, John George.
Born on the 11th of September 1525 this prince had served in the field
under Charles V., and, disliking his father's policy and associates, had
absented himself from Berlin, and mainly confined his attention to
administering the secularized bishopric of Brandenburg which he had
obtained in 1560. When he became elector he hastened to put his ideas
into practice. His father's favourites were exiled; foreigners were
ousted from public positions and their places taken by natives; and
important economies were effected, which earned for John George the
surname of _Oekonom_, or steward. To lighten the heavy burden of debt
left by Joachim the elector proposed a tax on wheat and other cereals.
Some opposition was shown, but eventually the estates of both divisions
of the mark assented; only, however at the price of concessions to the
nobles, predominant in the diet, which thrust the peasantry into
servitude. Thus the rule of John George was popular with the nobles, and
to some extent with the towns. Protestant refugees from France and the
Netherlands were encouraged to settle in Brandenburg, and a period of
peace was beneficial to a land, the condition of which was still much
inferior to that of other parts of Germany. In religion the elector was
a follower of Luther, whose doctrines were prevalent among his people.
He had accepted the _Formula Concordiae_, a Lutheran document
promulgated in June 1580, and sought to prevent any departure from its
tenets. His dislike of Calvinism, or his antipathy to external
complications, however, prevented him from taking any serious steps to
defend Protestantism from the attacks of the counter-reformation. He did
indeed join the league of Torgau, which voted assistance to Henry IV. of
France in 1591; but he refused to aid the United Provinces, or even to
give assistance to his eldest son, Joachim Frederick, administrator of
the archbishopric of Magdeburg, whose claim to sit and vote in the
imperial diet was contested, or to his grandson, John George, whose
election to the bishopric of Strassburg was opposed by a Roman Catholic
minority in the chapter. This indifference to the welfare of the
Protestants added to the estrangement between the elector and his eldest
son, which was further accentuated when John George, ignoring the
_Dispos