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diately related to the empire, was confirmed to them. All ecclesiastics who should renounce the Catholic religion for that of the Augsburg Confession, "whether archbishop, bishop, prelate or any other of the spiritual order," should lose the church goods and rights which they had before enjoyed. This goes by the name of the reservatum ecclesiasticum, and proved to be a source of countless troubles. (Dumont, u. s. IV. 3, 88.)

1579, Jan. 23. The union of Utrecht, out of which grew the Dutch republic. (Dumont, V. 1, 322.)

1631, April 6. Treaty of Cherasco (Querasque), between the Emperor Ferdinand II. and Louis XIII. of France (Dumont, VI. 1, 9), carrying out the treaty of Ratisbon (Regensburg), of Oct. 13, 1630, by virtue of which the Emperor was to acknowledge Charles Duke of Nevers as Duke of Mantua and Montferrat. (Dumont, V. 2, 615.) But Trino (Train) and certain other places in Montferrat were to go to the Duke of Savoy. The French also renounced their conquests in Italy. In a secret treaty however between France and Savoy, the best parts of Montferrat, the town of Alba and its environs, were to be handed over to the Duke of Savoy, who in turn was to give back Pignerol, and a road from France leading to it, to the French king, thus opening the way into Italy. By this secret treaty the Pope was deceived, and the interests of the French pretendant to Mantua were sacrificed. (Comp. Schlosser's Weltgesch. XIV. 398.)

1648, Oct. 24. PEACE of Westphalia, consisting of the two treaties of Münster where the French, and of Osnabrück where the Swedes negotiated with the Emperor-the smaller German powers being also represented. This peace put an end to the thirty years' war, and adjusted the relations of a large part of Europe. In the same year, on the 30th of January, Spain and Holland made a treaty of peace at Münster.

Some of the more important diplomatic transactions, before this war or during its course, and relating to the quarrels in the German empire, were the Protestant Union, May, 1608; the Catholic Liga, 1610 (Dumont, V. 2, 118); the treaty of Ulm, July 3, 1620, by which the Protestant princes virtually abandoned the Elector Palatine, as far as Bohemia was concerned (Dumont, u. s. 369); the peace of Lübeck, May 22, 1629, in which the King of Denmark withdrew from the war in Germany (Dumont, u. s. 584); the edict of restitution, March 6, 1629 (Dumont, u. s. 564); and the peace of Prague, May 30, 1635 (Dumont, VI. 1, 88), between the Emperor and the Elector of Saxony, to which last nearly all the German estates ere long acceded, thus abandoning the war and the cause of the Swedes. The edict of restitution was an interpretation, given by the Emperor's arbitrary act, to the treaties of Passau and of Augsburg, to the effect that all ecclesiastical property, seized by the Protestant estates since the year 1552, should be restored; that Catholic princes had the right of requiring their Protestant subjects to conform to their religion or of sending them out of

their territories; and that the peace did not include any Protestants, except those who adhered to the Confession of Augsburg non variata, thus excluding the Reformed or Calvinists. The peace of Prague, on the other hand, virtually gave into the hands of the Protestant estates all immediate property which they had appropriated before, and all mediate or immediate which they had appropriated since the religious peace, by conceding to them the control and use of it for forty years, etc.

The principal provisions of the peace of Westphalia (Dumont VI. 1, 450, 469 in French,-for the original Latin see Ghillany, manual diplom. I. 1-100) were in brief these:

1. Sweden, as a satisfaction for restoring places occupied in the war, received hither Pomerania, the isle of Rügen, parts of further Pomerania, viz.: Stettin, Garz, Damm, Golnow and the isle of Wollin, the course of the Oder between these places, the 'frische Haff' and its mouths, etc., with the expectancy of the rest of further Pomerania, should the males of the house of Brandenburg become extinct; further, the archbishopric of Bremen (the city retaining its rights and immediate relation to the empire), the bishopric of Werden, the town and port of Wismar with various appurtenances. These were to continue parts of the Empire, of which the King of Sweden, as Duke of Bremen, Werden and Pomerania, Prince of Rügen, and Lord of Wismar, was to become a member with three votes in the Diet; with the privilege of supreme jurisdiction on condition of erecting a court of highest instance within the territory,-which was established at Wismar;-with the power of choosing between the Aulic Council and the Imperial Chamber, in case suits should be brought against Sweden touching these German territories; and with the right of founding a University, for which Greifswald was afterward selected (peace of Osnabrück, Art. X).—To the Swedish troops five million rix dollars were to be paid by the Empire (Art. XVI), and a secret article bound the Emperor to pay to Sweden 600,000 rix dollars, and determined the mode of payment.

2. To France were ceded the bishoprics of Metz, Toul and Verdun, the town of Pignerol (see treaty of Cherasco), Breisach, the landgravate of Upper and Lower Alsace, the Sundgau, the prefecture or "landvogtei ” of ten imperial towns in Alsace, and the right to occupy the fortress of Philippsburg. The ceded places in Alsace, the Sundgau and the prefecture. were to pertain to the Crown of France forever and to be incorporated with its dominions (peace of Münst. § 70-876). Yet a later article of this peace, (§ 87) binds the King of France to leave the bishops of Basel and of Strasburg, with all estates in either Alsace holding immediately of the Empire, the ten imperial towns before mentioned, etc., "in that liberty and possession of immediacy toward the Empire which they had before enjoyed." For the questions which grew out of these articles, see De Garden, I. 213–

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3. A general amnesty running back to the beginning of the war, restitution of the state of things in 1624 among the estates of the Empire were agreed upon. But in express terms a number of the German States had territory confirmed to them, or granted by way of compensation. Thus to the Elector of Brandenburg, for his territory ceded to Sweden, were assigned the bishoprics of Minden, Halberstadt and Camin, and archbishopric of Magdeburg or rather the greater part of its territory, after the rights of its present administrator, the Duke of Saxony, should cease. It came into the hands of the Prussian House not until 1680. Whatever power of collation within the bishopric of Camin the Dukes of hither Pomerania formerly had was to go to Sweden, but the patronage held by the former dukes of further Pomerania, the episcopal territory, and the part of further Pomerania not secured to Sweden, were to go to Brandenburg. Again, to Mecklenburg, in lieu of Wismar, were given the episcopal territories of Schwerin and Ratzeburg with two commanderies, or benefices of the Knights of St. John, within the Duchy, Mirau and Nemerau, the latter being put into the hands of the line of Gustrow, the rest into those of Schwerin. Further, to Brunswick-Lüneburg, as a compensation for rights renounced to Sweden, Brandenburg and Mecklenburg, was given, together with the monastic foundations of Walkenried and Gröningen, etc., the perpetual alternate succession in the bishopric of Osnabrück. After the decease of the present bishop, a Protestant one was to be elected from the houses of Brunswick, during whose office the archbishop of Cologne was to exercise episcopal rights, as metropolitan, but over Catholics only. The house of Hesse-Cassel received the abbey of Hersfeld or Hirschfeld, as a secular principality with the sovereignty over Schaumburg and other territory formerly claimed by the bishop of Minden, an indemnity in money of 600,000 thalers, and an acknowledgment of its claims to a share in the inheritance of Marburg (treaty of Osnab., Art. XIXV).

4. The exiled and despoiled house of the Electors Palatine recovered the lower Palatinate, with the right of reversion to the upper; and an eighth electorate was erected in its favor, the old dignity of Elector Palatine and the upper Palatinate remaining with Bavaria until the expiration of its ducal line. So also the outlawed or expelled princes of Würtemberg, Baden, Nassau, etc., were restored to their pristine state (Art. IV).

5. Switzerland, long independent and disconnected from the Empire in fact, was acknowledged to be such in right.

6. The Emperor was to be governed by the votes of the diet,-which was thus conceded to be more than an advisory body,-in all matters pertaining to war, peace, legislation, etc. The members of the diet obtained the right not only of contracting alliances among themselves but with

foreign princes also, provided no prejudice came thereby to the Emperor and the Empire,—an unmeaning clause, which could not prevent the effect of this vast concession to weaken the power of the Emperor and the unity of the Empire very greatly. The imperial court was to have members of both religions in nearly equal numbers; that is, two Catholic presidents and twenty-six assessors, two presidents of the Augsburg Confession, appointed by the Emperor, and twenty-four assessors. If the opinions of the court were divided according to the religious faith of the members, a case was to go up to the Diet (Art. VIII., Art. V., §53).

7. Among the provisions affecting Religion, the most important are the following:-1. The religious freedom, guaranteed in the treaty of Passau and in the religious peace of Augsburg, was confirmed to the Lutherans, and extended to the Reformed or Calvinists. But no other form of religion besides these and the Catholic was to be tolerated in the Empire (Art. V., § 1, Art. VII). 2. The reservatum ecclesiasticum of the earlier treaties was replaced by a rule making the year 1624 the normal year for the purpose of deciding which confession should have the control over ecclesiastical properties: that is, a benefice, held by a Catholic or Protestant in January, 1624, should remain in perpetuity attached to the same religion (Art. V., §2). But in the Palatinate, Baden, Würtemberg, etc., by the act of amnesty (Art. IV., §§ 6, 24, 26) all things were to be restored to the condition which existed before the 'Bohemian movements,' i. e., the year 1618 was the normal year for the Elector Palatine and his allies, the old religious constitution of whose territories would otherwise have been wholly altered. The Protestants long insisted on 1618 as the normal year, but as most of the counterreforms in the Emperor's hereditary dominions took place between this year and 1624, he would not yield, and the Swedes gave way. This suppressed the Reformation in Bohemia and a large part of Southern Germany. Moreover, as the amnesty (Art. IV. §§ 52, 53), conceded to subjects of Austria, included no restoration of their confiscated estates, their condition was a very hard one. An exception however was made in favor of certain of the higher Silesian nobility, and of the town of Breslau: though subjects of Austria, these were allowed to retain such rights of Protestant worship as they enjoyed before the war. Other nobles of Silesia and of lower Austria with their subjects, adherents of the Augsburg confession, had the right of private worship and could not be compelled to emigrate. Three Lutheran churches were to be allowed in Silesia (Art. V., §§ 38, 39, 40). 3. If a holder of an ecclesiastical benefice should change his religion, he was to vacate his benefice without restoring the former fruits of it, or losing his honor or good name. 4. If any territorial sovereign should change his religion (as from the Lutheran to the Reformed), or acquire sovereignty over a land where another cultus was established, he could there only enjoy his own domestic worship, without

having the power of altering the existing church, or filling the offices with persons of his own faith. If a community should go over to the religion of the new sovereign, it might do so unhindered, but the old state of things in school and church must continue (Art. VII., §§ 1, 2). 5. The jus reformandi of the old treaties was renewed to all the immediate estates of the Empire, but the following limitations were imposed on its exercise: Subjects differing in religion from their sovereign, and holding ecclesiastical goods in any part of 1624, were secured in possession of the same. Those who had enjoyed the right of public or of house worship, in any part of 1624, were to retain the right, and were secured in all things incidental to it. Those subjects of sovereigns of a different religion, who had neither the public nor the domestic exercise of their religion at the time aforesaid, or who should change their religion after the peace, had liberty of conscience and the civil advantages of other citizens guaranteed to them. This toleration consisted in the free exercise of private devotions, the public exercise of their religion in the vicinity, if they were near places of worship, and in the right of sending their children to schools abroad, or of employing instructors at home, of their own faith. They might however be compelled to emigrate, or might emigrate of their own accord. In this case they should be free to dispose of their own estates, and if required to leave their homes, a term of several years was to be granted to them for this purpose (Art. V., §§ 36, 37, 39, 40).

The peace of Westphalia, says Wheaton (Hist., part 1, at the beginning), "established the equality of the three religious communities of Catholics, Lutherans, and Calvinists, in Germany, and sought to oppose a perpetual barrier to further religious innovations and secularizations of ecclesiastical property. At the same time, it rendered the states of the Empire almost independent of the Emperor, its federal head. It arrested the progress of Germany toward national unity under the Catholic banner, and prepared the way for the subsequent development of the power of Prussia,--the child of the Reformation,-which thus became the natural head of the Protestant party, and the political rival of the house of Austria, which last still maintained its ancient position as the temporal chief of the Catholic body. It introduced two foreign elements into the internal constitution of the Empire,-France and Sweden, as guarantees of the peace, and Sweden as a member of the federal body,-thus giving to these two powers a perpetual right of interference in the internal affairs of Germany. It reserved to the individual states the liberty of forming alliances among themselves, as well as with foreign powers, for their preservation and security, provided these alliances were not directed against the Emperor and the Empire, nor contrary to the public peace and that of Westphalia. This liberty contributed to render the federative system of Germany a new security for the general

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