CHAPTER XIX.

Charles V. succeeds to the Throne of Spain-Elected Emperor of GermanyContest with Francis I-Alliance with Henry VIII-The Constable of Bourbon takes Francis I. Prisoner-Treaty of Madrid-Henry VIII. takes part with Francis-Charles defeats the Turks in Hungary-Defeats Barba rossa in Africa-Francis allies himself with the Turks-War carried on in Italy and France-Death of Francis I.-Rise and History of the Order of Jesuits-Ferdinand of Saxony Head of the Protestant League-Resignation of Charles V.-The Constitution of the German Emoire.

WE are now arrived at an era which is distinguished by some of the most remarkable events in the history of mankind:-the aggrandizement of the house of Austria, by the elevation of Charles V. to the imperial throne-a display of the greatest schemes of policy and ambition--the reformation of the Christian religion from the errors of the church of Rome and the discovery of the Western World. But these interesting subjects demand a separate and an attentive consideration. We begin with a brief delineation of the most remarkable events of the reign of the emperor Charles V.

From the time of the emperor Sigismund, and the memorable transactions that attended the Council of the Church which was

early days Lord Bacon should have lent his powerful mind to arrest the prosperity of his country. But how would the case stand now, had the counsels of Sir Walter Raleigh become the fashionable political economy of the succeeding reigns? The marsh lands of Kent, which he would have condemned to the production of reeds and sedges, amount to 82,000 acres of the finest land in England-those of Lincolnshire, equal, or, perhaps, superior in productiveness, to 473,000 acres. Stating their produce at three quarters of wheat per acre, (thus, on such land, allowing for the inferior value of intermediate crops,) they would yield 1,665,000 quarters, being three times the average amount of all the wheat imported annually into Great Britain for the last thirty years.

The wealds of Kent, Surrey, and Sussex contain nearly 1000 square miles, described in the Saxon Chronicles as a wild, unprofitable waste, covered with heath and rushes, which the application of capital and industry has now converted into one of the most beautiful and fertile districts of England. The whole county of Norfolk, in like manner, is the most artificial soil in England. It is little more than one hundred years since half the county was a rabbit warren, and the greater part of the remainder a poor, thin clay. It is now the most uniform in productiveness of any county in England, exporting grain to the value of £1,000,000 sterling; yet is it essentially a very poor soil, which any suspension of the culture bestowed on it would, in a very few years, cast back to its original sterility. And to this the political economists of the present day would consign for it corresponds precisely to No. 6, of Mr. Macculloch's scale. Had this theory been acted on for the last three centuries, where would have been the home market for British manufactures? or rather what would British manufac tures have been ?-EDITOR, 1834.]

it;

assembled at Constance by this emperor-where he enjoyed the proud triumph of degrading three rival popes, and placing a fourth upon the papal chair-the empire of Germany, which was governed for two years with spirit and ability by his son-in-law, Albert II., enjoyed a state of languid tranquillity during the long reign of his successor, Frederic III., surnamed the Peaceable, which was of fifty-three years' duration. The only circumstance that renders this reign at all worthy of notice was the marriage of his eldest son, Maximilian, with Mary, duchess of Burgundy, who brought, as her dowry, the sovereignty of the Netherlands; which, from that time, with the exception of those provinces that revolted, and formed themselves into the Republic of Holland, have continued, till of late, to be part of the patrimonial dominions of the house of Austria. Maximilian, after the death of his father, was elected emperor in the year 1493. This prince, who was an able politician, laid the foundation of the permanent greatness of the German empire, by procuring the enactment of that celebrated constitutional law, which establishes a perpetual peace between the whole of the states composing the Germanic body, which states, before that time, had been at constant variance upon every trivial opposition of interests. Thenceforth, every such contest was to be treated as an act of rebellion against the empire. It is easy to see of what vast importance this law was to the solid interests of the Germanic body.

Maximilian had one son, who died before himself, Philip, hereditary lord of the Netherlands, who, marrying Jane, the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, acquired the succession to the whole kingdom of Spain as her fortune. He died, however, before this succession opened to his family, which was destined to be the patrimonial crown of his eldest son, the celebrated Charles V.

He was

Charles V. was born at Ghent in the year 1500. endowed by nature with a very extensive genius: he possessed acuteness of talents, indefatigable activity, and unbounded ambition; but his policy was of that crafty nature which is inconsistent with real greatness of soul.

He succeeded to the throne of Spain in the year 1516, upon the death of Ferdinand, his maternal grandfather, and was obliged to struggle with great disorders in that monarchy, which had their origin in the antipathy which the Spaniards conceived against their new sovereigns of the house of Austria. A rebellion actually arose upon this account, which was of several years' duration. It was at length happily quelled; and Charles, at peace in his hereditary dominions, preferred his claim to the German empire upon the death of his grandfather, the emperor Maximilian. He had a formidable rival and competitor for that dignity in Francis I., king of France, a monarch five years older than himself, who had already distinguished himself in Italy by the conquest of the

Milanese, in which war he had defeated the army of pope Leo and of the Swiss in the battle of Marignan. Francis, however, from being the enemy, became soon after the ally of pope Leo X., and of the Swiss. He had compelled the emperor Maximilian to restore the territory of Verona to the Venetians, and procured for Leo the duchy of Urbino. Thus the king of France, at the age of twenty-five, was considered as the umpire of Italy, and the most powerful prince in Europe.

The claims of these illustrious competitors for the German empire were, then, very nearly balanced; but the electors, apprehensive for their own liberties, under the government of either of those great monarchs, determined to reject both the candidates, and made offer of the imperial crown to Frederic, duke of Saxony. This prince, however, undazzled by the splendor of so high an object of ambition, rejected the proffered sovereignty with a magnanimity no less singular than great, and strongly urging the policy of preferring the Spanish monarch, procured the election of Charles of Spain.

The two candidates had hitherto conducted their rivalship without enmity, and even with a show of friendship. Francis declared, with his usual vivacity, "that his brother Charles and he were fairly and openly suitors to the same mistress. The most assiduous and fortunate will succeed; and the other," said he, "must rest contented." No sooner, however, was the contest decided, than he found himself unable to practise that moderation he had promised. He could not suppress his indignation at being foiled in the competition, in the face of all Europe, by a youth yet unknown to fame. The spirit of Charles resented this contempt, and from this jealousy, as much as from opposition of interests, arose that emulation between those two great monarchs, which involved them in perpetual hostilities, and kept the greatest part of Europe in commotion.

Charles and Francis had many mutual claims upon each other's dominions. Charles claimed Artois, as sovereign of the Netherlands. Francis prepared to make good his pretensions to Naples and Sicily. Charles had, as emperor, to defend the duchy of Milan; and, as king of Spain, to support his title to Navarre, which his grandfather, Ferdinand, had wrested from the dominion of France. In short, nature, or rather fortune, seem to have decreed that these two princes should be perpetually at war with each other.

Henry VIII. of England had power enough to have held the balance; as the contest at first between these rival princes was so equal, that the weight of England on either side must have given a decided superiority, and entirely overpowered the single party. But Henry, though he had ambition, had not judgment to direct his conduct, which seems to have been influenced solely by the caprice of his own disposition, when he was not absolutely led,

as was frequently the case, by his ministers. He was at this time governed by Thomas Wolsey, a man whom he had raised from an obscure station to the dignity of archbishop of York, and chancellor of England, and whom the pope had made a cardinal, and his legate in England. The counsels and the measures of Wolsey had less in view the interests of the nation than his own greatness and unmeasurable ambition. Wolsey, it is plain, could take no side in directing the part to be chosen by Henry between the rival princes, unless what was agreeable to his master, Leo X.; and the fact was, that Leo was as much in doubt what part to take as any of them. Henry, however, was courted by both the rivals, and had address enough, for some time, to flatter each with the prospect of his friendship. Francis contrived to have an interview with him at Calais, where the only object seemed to be an ostentatious display of the magnificence of the two sovereigns. Charles, who had more art, went himself in person to England to pay his court, and Henry, flattered by this condescension of the emperor, conducted him back to Gravelines, and gave him the strongest grounds to hope for an alliance between them.

A great party of the Spaniards, dissatisfied with the absence of their sovereign, broke out into rebellion; and Francis, judging this a favorable opportunity for the recovery of Navarre, invaded that province, and made an entire conquest of it; but the French, elated with this success, imprudently made an attack likewise upon the kingdom of Castile, which united the Spaniards against them, and they were driven out of Navarre almost as soon as they had got possession of it. The emperor, in the meanwhile, attacked France on the quarter of Picardy; and the French, at the same time, were beaten out of the Milanese and Genoa, a misfortune which was chiefly owing to Francis's own extravagance and want of economy. The Swiss troops in his service had deserted for want of pay.

At this juncture died Leo X.; and Charles, that he might have a pope securely in his interest, and one whom he could absolutely manage, caused the triple diadem to be given to his former preceptor, cardinal Adrian. Cardinal Wolsey had expected the papal dignity, but the emperor found means to soothe him with the hopes of soon succeeding Adrian, who was far advanced in life. The policy of Charles appeared now in its utmost extent. The pope was his dependent, Wolsey was his friend, and Henry, of course, was at length induced to declare himself his ally, and to proclaim war against France, under the delusive idea of recovering the former possessions of the English in that kingdom.

A most formidable combination seemed now ready to overwhelm Francis I., under which a monarch of less spirit and abilities than himself must certainly have succumbed at once. The pope, the emperor, the king of England, the archduke Ferdinand-to whom his brother, Charles V., had ceded the German domin

ions of the house of Austria-were all united against the king of France.

Francis had formerly owed to the great military abilities of the constable of Bourbon the signal victory of Marignan, and the conquest of the Milanese. It was the misfortune and the imprudence of the French monarch to quarrel with this useful subject, at the very time when he most needed his assistance.

An iniquitous decree of the parliament of Paris, by which the constable was deprived of the whole estates belonging to the family of Bourbon, was the cause of an irreconcilable animosity, and of a firm purpose of vengeance now meditated by the constable against the king of France. He immediately offered his services to the emperor; and, like another Coriolanus, with equal valor and ability, and with equal infamy, became the determined enemy of his country. The emperor received him, as may be believed, with open arms; but in the breast of every worthy man his conduct excited that detestation which it merited. Even the Spanish officers themselves abhorred his perfidy. "If the constable of Bourbon," said one of these generals, "should enter my house, I would burn it after his departure, as a place polluted by treason and perfidy." But Charles V. saw this acquisition through the medium of his own interest, and created the constable generalissimo of his armies.

Too much confidence seems to have been the great error of Francis I. While the troops of the emperor were commanded in Italy by Bourbon, by Pescara, and John de' Medicis, all of them generals of consummate ability, they were opposed by the admiral Bonnivet, a man of very moderate talents, with a very inconsiderable army. The French were defeated at Biagrassa, where the most remarkable circumstance was the death of the illustrious Chevalier Bayard, who had distinguished himself not only by his great military prowess, but by a life regulated by the maxims of the strictest honor, and the most romantic generosity. He was termed by his contemporaries, in the language of chivalry, the Chevalier sans peur et sans reproche. In his last moments, while the constable of Bourbon, standing by his side, was lamenting his fate, "It is not I," said he, "who am an object of commiseration; it is you, who are fighting against your king, your country, and vour oaths."

The troops of the emperor, under this illustrious renegade, were carrying every thing before them, when Francis himself hastened into Italy, entered the territory of Milan, and, without difficulty, retook the city; but the imprudent Bonnivet thought proper to besiege Pavia, while a great part of the French army had been detached against the kingdom of Navarre. In this divided situation, the imperial troops, infinitely superior in numbers, and most ably commanded, presented themselves in order of battle. Francis disdaining to retreat, a desperate engagement ensued, in which the