History of the World/History of the World (Bureau Development, Inc.)(1992).BIN/dp/0068/00687.txt

Text File | 1992-10-11 | 22KB | 365 lines

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$Title{Civilizations Past And Present
Internal Religious And Political Developments}
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$Date{1992}
$Log{See Europe, 1620*0068701.scf
See Europe About 1560*0068702.scf
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Title:       Civilizations Past And Present
Book:        Chapter 17: The Strife Of States And Kings
Author:      Wallbank;Taylor;Bailkey;Jewsbury;Lewis;Hackett
Date:        1992

Internal Religious And Political Developments

[See Europe, 1620]

European Religion, Politics, And Art In A Century Of Strife, 1560-1660

Introduction

     On a dark misty day in November 1632, two great armies, one Protestant
and one Catholic, met in the German Saxon countryside near Lutzen. The
Protestants won a decisive victory that day but lost their general, King
Gustavus Adolphus (1594-1632) of Sweden, known as the "Lion of the North."
According to a familiar story, the dying king was discovered on the
battlefield and asked his name by enemy soldiers. "I am the King of Sweden,"
he replied, "who so seal the religion and liberty of the German nation with my
blood." ^1

[Footnote 1: Quoted in C. R. L. Fletcher, Gustavus Adolphus and the Struggle
of Protestantism in Europe (New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1923) p. 284.

     The fate of Sweden's warrior-king reflected the tragedy and the ambiguity
of the age. This second phase of the Reformation was marked by bloody
religious wars, economic depression, and rampant disease. It was also a time
when religious fanaticism interacted with pragmatic politics, contributing, in
the process, to the development of modern states. Sometimes religious conflict
caused the reshaping of feudal values to justify movements against royal
authority; more often, it promoted centralized monarchies, whose rulers
promised to restore order by wielding absolute power. Despite pious
declarations, kings and generals often conducted war with little regard for
moral principles; indeed, as time passed, they steadily subordinated religious
concerns to dynastic ambitions or assumed national interests. This change,
however, came slowly and was completed only after Europe had been ravaged by
the human suffering and material destruction of religious conflict.

     A specific political result of the long religious conflict was a shift in
the European balance of power. At the opening of the period, the Habsburg
dynasty sought to maintain its dominant position in alliance with the Catholic
Church. It failed in its struggle against opposing coalitions, which were
often allied with Protestantism. The long-term beneficiary of this political
struggle was France, a leading Catholic state.

     Baroque art and literature somewhat ambiguously expressed the values of
its period. The baroque style emphasized the heroic, the bizarre, and the
powerful, in keeping with strong rulers and warring states. Despite its
masculine values, the Baroque glorified women in the abstract at a time when
ordinary women were losing social status. This apparent contradiction might be
explained by the dominant contemporary roles of famous queens, powerful female
regents, and the aristocratic women who acted as hostesses of the salons.

Internal Religious And Political Developments

     Although it ended a short war in Germany, the Peace of Augsburg (1555)
failed to end religious contention. Even before John Calvin died in 1564, his
movement was spreading rapidly in France, Germany, Poland, Bohemia, and
Hungary. The Council of Trent launched a formidable counteroffensive, led by
the Jesuits and supported by Spain, against all Protestants. England narrowly
avoided the religious civil wars that ended the Valois line in France; the
Spanish Netherlands exploded in religious rebellion; and the militant
counter-Reformation suppressed Protestantism in eastern Europe. For decades,
problems of religion dominated politics within every European state.

[See Europe About 1560: Political Divisions of Europe about 1560.]

Spain As The Model For Catholic Absolutism

     Under Philip II (1556-1598), Spain was recognized as the strongest
military power in Europe and the major defender of the Catholic faith. This
reputation arose from the rigidly disciplined Spanish infantry, silver that
seemed to flow in unlimited quantities from America, and the record of the
famed Spanish Inquisition, which had dealt effectively earlier with the Jews
and Moors and was now being used to snuff out Spanish Protestantism. Philip
accepted this interpretation, deliberately projecting an image of himself as
the iron-willed champion of Catholic orthodoxy.

     This responsibility was part of Philip's inheritance from his father,
Charles V, whose long reign ended in 1556 when he abdicated his imperial
throne and entered a monastery. As Charles stepped down from the throne, he
split his holdings between his brother, Ferdinand, who received Austria,
Bohemia, and Hungary; and his son, Philip, who received Naples, Sicily, Milan,
the Netherlands, and Spain. Philip also gained control of a vast overseas
empire, which was much more lucrative than had been his father's imperial
crown in the Germanies. indeed, the division of Habsburg lands appeared to be
a blessing for Philip, allowing him to shed his father's worrisome "German
problem" and concentrate more effectively upon his Spanish realm. There were,
however, less favorable aspects of the legacy - Charles left his son the
Turkish menace in the Mediterranean as well as the expensive task of leading
the Catholic crusade against Protestantism.

     Philip was an obedient son and took very seriously his father's
admonitions. A slight, somber, and unemotional man, he was almost completely
absorbed by his awesome official obligations. Charles had warned him about
becoming too intimate with subordinates and, particularly, against trusting or
depending upon women. Philip heeded this advice. Although he was involved
briefly with mistresses, none of them influenced his judgment or policies. The
same could be said about his four wives, Maria of Portugal, Mary of England,
Elizabeth of France, and his niece, Anne of Austria, all of whom he married
for political reasons. They bore his children, but did not eat at his table,
except at official banquets. Elizabeth was his favorite and Philip doted on
her daughters, to whom he wrote notes of tender and loving concern; but such
revelations of his inner feelings were very rare.

     The standard historical portrait of Philip, depicting him as a
single-minded idealogue and lackey of the pope, is largely false. By using the
Inquisition to destroy Islamic and Protestant heresies, Philip sought to
enforce Spanish traditions, arouse patriotism, increase his popularity, and
strengthen the state. But he was no tool of the papacy; indeed, like his
father, he defied more than one pope, carefully weighing the costs of papal
military proposals against the benefits and using the church for his own
political purposes. He denied the pope jurisdiction over Spanish church
courts, ignored objectionable papal decrees, defied the Council of Trent on
church appointments in Spanish territories, and fought the Jesuits when they
challenged his authority. Although a dedicated Catholic, Philip saw the church
as an arm of his government, expecting its cooperation in return for his
support.

     Throughout his long reign, Philip tried with only moderate success to be
an absolute monarch. His councilors, appointed as advisors more than as
administrators, submitted most decisions for his resolution. In the Escorial,
the cold and somber palace which he had built north of Madrid, he labored
endlessly, reading and annotating their documents. His concerns were directed
mainly towards Castile, where Philip furthered the process of developing
absolutism, issuing royal edicts as law and using the Cortes, the traditional
assembly of estates, as a device for measuring public opinion rather than as a
legislative body. But such pretensions of centralized government were without
much meaning in other parts of Spain. There, as well as in the Netherlands and
Italy, proud noble families dominated the assemblies, jealously guarding their
privileges and often opposing royal viceroys. They were aided by the weight of
tradition, by poor communications, and - in the eastern Spanish kingdoms of
Aragon and Catalonia - by revenue potentials below the cost of subjecting
them.

     The backward Spanish sociopolitical system caused Philip many economic
problems. Tax-exempt nobilities, comprising under 2 percent of the people,
owned 95 percent of the land; the middle classes, overtaxed and depleted by
purges of Jews and Moriscos (Spanish Muslims), were almost eliminated; and the
peasants were so exploited that agricultural production, particularly grains,
was insufficient to feed the population. The use of arable lands for the
nobles' sheep runs worsened the situation. State regulation of industry and
trade further limited revenues and forced primary reliance on specie from
America, which ultimately brought ruinous inflation. When his income failed to
meet expenses, Philip borrowed at rising interest rates. In 1557 and 1575, he
had to suspend payments, effectively declaring national bankruptcy.

The Revolt Of The Netherlands

     Philip's Catholic absolutism encouraged some unity in Spain; in the
Netherlands, which he also controlled, his policies promoted disaster. The
seventeen provinces, each with its own feudal tradition, were originally
suspicious of their Spanish king. When Philip confirmed their fears by
attempting to enforce Catholic conformity, he generated resistance which soon
grew into open rebellion.

     This outcome could have been expected. The Netherlands then included much
of modern Holland, Belgium, Luxembourg, and a few petty fiefs, located along
200 miles of marshy coast between France and Germany, an area not open to easy
conquest. The geography promoted strong local nobilities but also relatively
independent peasants and townsfolk. Even in medieval times, cities were
centers of rapidly expanding commerce; of the 300 walled towns in 1560,
nineteen had populations over 10,000 (England had only three or four); and
Antwerp was the leading commercial and banking center of northern Europe. This
combination of localism, feudalism, and commerce found a truly appropriate
religious expression in the Reformation, first with Anabaptism and then with
Calvinism after the 1550s.

     Philip first appointed his illegitimate half-sister, Margaret of Parma,
as regent of the Netherlands. An able administrator and like her father, a
native of the region, this thick-set, hard-riding matron was at first popular
because she understood her subjects. Philip wasted this asset by ordering her
to combat heresy with the Inquisition, a policy which drove the leading nobles
from her council and brought increasingly threatening popular protests. For
years, Philip ignored Margaret's frantic appeals for leniency before
permitting her to dismiss the hated Cardinal Granville from her government.
Margaret also authorized Protestant preaching. Despite these belated
concessions, Calvinist mobs began desecrating churches and terrorizing
Catholics.

     To meet this challenge, Philip dispatched the Duke of Alva, with 10,000
Spanish troops, a great baggage train, and 2000 prostitutes, to the
Netherlands. Alva relieved Margaret of her regency and clamped a brutal
military dictatorship on the country. By decree, he centralized church
administration, imposed new taxes, and established a special tribunal - soon
dubbed "The Council of Blood" - to stamp out treason and heresy. During Alva's
regime, between 1567 and 1573, at least 8,000 people were killed, including
the powerful Counts of Egmont and Horne. Women and children were often
victims. In 1568, one woman was executed because she had refused to eat pork;
an eighty-four-old woman whose son-in-law had given hospitality to a heretic,
was condemned at Utrecht. In addition to such atrocities, the Catholic terror
deprived 30,000 people of their property and forced 100,000 to flee the
country.

     By 1568, Alva's excesses had provoked open rebellion, led by William of
Orange (1533-1584), nicknamed the silent. Born of Lutheran parents, William
had been raised a Catholic at the court of Charles V, where he became a
favorite, known for his practical statecraft. Alienated by Spanish violation
of traditional rights, he reluctantly became a rebel. His gradual ideological
transformation is illustrated by his four marriages. The first two, before
1561, were for status and convenience; the last two, after 1577, were to
Charlotte de Bourbon and Louise de Coligny, both sincere French Huguenots, who
served him as committed partners in a religious cause.

     Until 1579, William persevered. Constant early defeats left him
impoverished and nearly disgraced, but in 1572, the port of Brill fell to his
notorious privateers, "the sea beggars," an event which triggered revolts
throughout the north. Soon after, William cut the dikes, mired down a weary
Spanish army, and forced Alva's recall to Spain. The continuing war was marked
by savage ferocity, such as the sack of Antwerp by mutinous Spanish soldiers
(1576). At the Spanish siege of Maestricht (1579), women fought beside their
men on the walls, and soldiers massacred the population, raping the women
before tearing some limb from limb in the streets. That same year, in the
Pacification of Ghent, Catholics and Protestants from the seventeen provinces
united to defy Philip, demand the recall of his army, and proclaim the
authority of their traditional assembly, the States General.

     Unfortunately for the rebel cause, this unity was soon destroyed by
religious differences between militant northern Calvinists and Catholic
southerners, particularly the many powerful nobles. The Spanish commander,
Alexander Farnese, exploited these differences by restoring lands and
privileges to the southern nobles. He was then able to win victories which
induced the ten southern provinces to make peace with Spain in 1579. The
Dutch, now alone, proclaimed their continued resistance to Spanish persecution
and in 1581 declared their independence of Spain. They persisted after William
was assissinated in 1584, while the Spanish continued their war on heresy,
hanging, butchering, burning, and burying alive Protestants who would not
renounce their faith. This cruelty lasted until a truce was negotiated in
1609.

Religious Wars In France

     Although frustrated in the Netherlands, Philip did not face his father's
French problem. By the Treaty of Cateau-Cambresis in 1559, France gave up
claims in Italy and the Netherlands. This humiliating surrender to the
Habsburgs marked a definite hiatus in French history. Over the next four
decades, France gradually lost its leverage in foreign affairs as the country
was torn by internal dissension.

     By the 1560s Calvinism had become a major source of that contention.
Although outlawed and persecuted earlier, the movement appealed to the urban
middle classes, particularly to women, who were among its most active
promoters. It also attracted nobles through the influential friends of Jeanne
d'Albret, the Calvinist Queen of Navarre and wife of Antoine de Bourbon, a
Prince of the blood. In 1559, the Huguenots held a secret synod in Paris which
drew representatives from seventy-two congregations and a million members.
Although still a minority, the Calvinists were well organized, with articulate
leaders and the promise of military support from an increasing number of
converts from among the nobility.

     The growing interest among nobles was largely political. When Henry II
died in 1559, the throne passed to his sickly fifteen-year-old son, Francis
II. Francis' queen was Mary Stuart (later Mary, Queen of Scots), whose uncles,
the brothers Guise, assumed control of the government. The Guises championed
the Catholic cause and were opposed, although not always openly, by the
Bourbons, who were turning Protestant, and by the Montmorency family, some of
whose members were Protestants.

     Francis died in 1560 and was succeeded by his nine-year-old brother,
Charles IX. The real power behind the throne, however, was his mother,
Catherine de Medicis, the neglected wife of Henry II. She was a most able
woman, single-minded, crafty, ready to take any advantage but also open to
compromise, and determined to save the throne for one of her three sons, none
of whom had produced a male heir. Exploiting the split between the Guises and
their enemies, she assumed the regency for Charles. She then attempted,
through reforms of the church, to reconcile the differences between Catholics
and Protestants. In this endeavor she was unsuccessful, but she retained a
tenuous control by using every political strategy, including a squadron of
high-born ladies who solicited information by seducing powerful nobles.

     Religious wars erupted in 1561, lasting through eight uneasy truces until
1593. Religious fanaticism evoked the most violent and inhumane acts on both
sides. Assassinations, raids, and atrocities became commonplace. Catherine
maneuvered through war and uneasy peace, first favoring the Guises and then
the Bourbons. In 1572, when she feared the Huguenots were gaining supremacy
over Charles, she joined a Guise plot which resulted in the murder of some
10,000 Huguenots in Paris. This "massacre of Saint Bartholomew's Eve" was a
turning point in decisively dividing the country. The final "war of the three
Henries" in the 1580s involved Catherine's third son, Henry III, who became
king on the death of Charles IX in 1574, Henry of Guise, and the Protestant
Henry of Navarre. When the first two were assassinated, Henry of Navarre
proclaimed himself king of France in 1589.

Elizabethan England

     England, like France in the late sixteenth century, was threatened with
civil war and governed by a woman who sought stability in compromise. But
unlike Catherine de Medicis, Elizabeth I of England had learned earlier to
separate personal attachments from Tudor politics, where she almost lost her
head as well as her chance for the crown. England became her family and her
primary interest. She was skilled at judging people, projected charisma in
public speeches, and dealt with foreign diplomats in their own languages.
These talents were especially valuable at her succession in 1558, when the
country's religious divisions invited foreign invasion.

     The immediate danger was Scotland, where Mary of Guise, a stalwart
proponent of Catholicism, was regent for her daughter, Mary Stuart, queen of
both France and Scotland. French troops in Scotland supported this Catholic
regime. Because Mary Stuart was also a direct descendent of Henry VII of
England, she was a leading claimant for the English throne and a potential
rallying symbol for Catholic interests, who hoped to reestablish their
religion in England. These expectations were diminished in 1559 when a zealous
Calvinist named John Knox (1505-1572), fresh from Geneva, led a revolt of
Scottish nobles. Aided by English naval forces, they broke religious ties with
Rome, established a Presbyterian (Calvinist) state church, and drove the
French soldiers out of Scotland. Temporarily, Elizabeth had averted disaster.

     She furthered her escape from the sectarian strife which was destroying
France by a compromise policy more effective than that of Catherine de
Medicis. Moving firmly but slowly, Elizabeth recreated an Anglican Church
similar to her father's. It confirmed the monarch as its head, recognized only
baptism and communion as sacraments, rejected the veneration of relics,
conducted services in English, and avoided other controversial Protestant
tenets. It also retained the old organization, under bishops and archbishops,
along with much of the Catholic ritual.

     This policy avoided open rebellion but failed to end the opposition of
both Protestants and Catholics to the state church. Nonconformists attacked
the establishment in sermons and pamphlets; some, like the Presbyterian
minister Thomas Cartwright, were jailed by church courts. Catholics faced more
severe persecution and were therefore even more determined and daring. A
network of Jesuit priests operated throughout the country, particularly in the
north and west, secretly performing masses and working with a Catholic
political underground. Women played prominent roles on both sides. The Duchess
of Suffolk and Lady Russell were two of the Protestant women who steadily
pressured the queen; others organized meetings and distributed literature.
Catholic women were most effective allies of the Jesuits; one of them,
Margaret Clitherow, died under torture in 1586 rather than deny her faith.

     While dealing with this internal dissension, Elizabeth faced a serious
danger from abroad. In 1568, Mary Stuart was forced into exile by her
Protestant subjects and received in England by her royal cousin. Although kept
a virtual prisoner, Mary became involved in a series of Catholic plots, which
appeared even more dangerous after the pope excommunicated Elizabeth in 1570.
Philip of Spain aided the plotters but still hoped to enlist Elizabeth's
cooperation in helping him create a Catholic hegemony in Europe.