which the counts of Schlick have, to this day, their title,) Elnbogen, and Gratz in Styria.

When the condemned Huss, with his crown of paper, was led by the hangman from the church to the fagot, his spirits rose; and it is testified of him, even by his enemies, as well as his friends, by M. Hieronymus, and especially, Sylvius, (who afterwards became Pope,) that he seemed as though he were going to a gladsome meal, or, as the vulgar saying is, to a dance. But, when he saw his books burning in the churchyard, he stopped, and smiled. As he passed along, he exhorted the people "not to believe that he was going to be burnt for his er rors; for, that some articles were charged against him, on the false testimony of his deadly enemies, although he had never taught them; that others had never been proved to be false, although he had urgently requested it." But the people who went along with him, were all armed, especially the burghers, who had been called upon to attend. When they arrived at the place where he was to be burnt, Huss fell upon his knees, clasped his hands, which were not tied, looked towards heaven, and repeated the thirtieth and fiftieth Psalms of David. And he especially repeated many times the verse, "Into thy hands I commend my spirit; Thou hast delivered it, faithful God!" When some of the common people heard this, they said, "What this man has previously taught or preached, we know not; but, now, we hear none but holy words from his lips. Others said, "He ought to have a confesBut a fat priest, clad in a green gown, with a red lining, rode along, saying, "They shall not hear the heretic, and there is no need of a confessor." But Huss had confessed, seven days previously, to a monk, who had been allowed him by the council, and who absolved him. The crown, which had fallen from the head of Huss, while praying, was put on again, at which he smiled. They said, "The devils should be burnt along with the devils' servant." When, by order of the executioner, he stood upright, he began to pray thus, in a loud voice: "Lord Jesus Christ, I will cheerfully suffer this fearful ana shameful death, for the sake of thy holy gospel and

sor."

thy Divine word; O! forgive my enemies for this sin." The executioner then led him about, to bless the people,* whom he earnestly begged "not to believe that he had taught any thing contrary to the word of God." Lastly,

he begged to speak once more to those who had been his keepers, when he was in prison; and when he came to them, he said, "Dear brethren, I give you many thanks for the favors which you have bestowed upon me, during my long imprisonment. You have not been my keepers, but brethren; and I declare to you, that I faithfully believe I shall reign this day with my Lord and Saviour, for whose name I suffer this death." He then advanced, cheerfully, and without one sign of fear, to the stake, which had been planted in the ground, to which the executioner bound. him with six ropes, his arms being tied behind his back. But, in doing this, the executioners had made a mistake; for they had placed his face toward the east, and they were obliged to turn him, being a heretic, towards the west. Around his neck they placed an old rusty chain, as though he were unworthy of a new one when Huss saw this, he said, with a smile, "My Lord Christ was bound for me, with a far heavier chain. Why should I be ashamed to be bound with so old and rusty a one ?" Under his feet, on which his boots still remained, and the fetters also, they placed two fagots, and around him, much wood, and straw, and branches, as high as his neck. But before the executioners lighted it, Duke Lewis of Bavaria, with the marshal of some imperial city by his side, rode up to him, and exhorted him to renounce his errors, (as they thought them,) and to abjure his doctrines. Then Huss cried, with a clear voice, from the stake, "I call God to witness, that I have not taught nor written what false witnesses have laid to my charge; but that the aim of all my sermons, doctrines, and writings, has been, to turn the people from their sins, and lead them to the kingdom of God. This truth, which I have taught,

*This means, I believe, to bid them farewell, because one of the common forms of doing so is, "God bless you ;" hence, blessing, for wishing this blessing. Otherwise, the text would contain a contradiction, since a heretic and outcast priest could not bless the people.

preached, written, and diffused, and which agrees with the word of God, I will keep, and seal with my death." When they heard this, they clasped their hands together, and rode off. Soon after, the executioners lighted the fire, which caught quickly, because there was much straw between the wood. When Huss saw the smoke, he sang, in a clear voice, "Christ, Son of God, have mercy upon me." But when he was about to say, the third time, "Christ, son of God, born of a pure Virgin," the flame reached his face, and deprived him of speech, so that he could not pronounce, "Have mercy upon me ;" but he prayed, and nodded with his head, as long as it takes one to repeat the Lord's prayer, upon which he died. When the wood was burnt, but the body, not entirely consumed, yet hung upon the stake, the executioners pushed it down with poles, and threw more wood upon it. They then broke the bones with the poles, that they might burn the sooner. The head, too, they beat to pieces; but the heart, which was found among the entrails, they put on the end of a pointed pole, and roasted it.

When Duke Lewis was informed that one of the executioners had the cloak, girdle, and other articles of clothing, belonging to Huss, he ordered them "to burn every thing, or" (as certainly would have happened,) "the Bohemians would keep them, as relics." The executioner, at first, refused; but, when a stipulated sum of money was promised him, he threw every thing into the fire. At length, when every thing was consumed, they put the ashes, together with the earth, which they dug out to the depth of some feet, upon a cart, and threw it into the Rhine. The place, where this happened, is between the gardens of the suburb, by the road leading to Gottleben. Some, who have been at the place, say, that, to this day, no grass will grow on the spot. Whether this be true, I know not.

Before Huss suffered, the Council had wreaked a tardy vengeance on his forerunner and preceptor, Wiclif, whose body was ordered "to be taken from the ground,

and thrown far away from the burial of any church." After the lapse of thirteen years, the sentence was executed, by disinterring and burning the Reformer's body, and casting the ashes into a neighboring brook.

The

often quoted words of Fuller, on this occasion, may be equally well applied to the good man, whose history has just been related: "The brook did convey his ashes into Avon; Avon into Severn; Severn into the narrow seas; they into the main ocean. And thus, the ashes of Wiclif are the emblem of his doctrine, which now is dispersed all the world over."

Jerome of Prague has been already mentioned, as the most distinguished among Huss's followers, and his coadjutor in preaching. He was summoned to Constance, in the Spring of 1415, before Huss had suffered martyrdom; and it was probably in consequence of witnessing his companion's sufferings, that he was induced to retract, to condemn, in the strongest terms, as blasphemous and seditious, the tenets which, in his heart, he still continued to hold, and to profess his entire adherence to all the doctrines of the Roman Church. Fortunately, he was not left to endure, through life, the reproaches of conscience; for the continued enmity and mistaken persecution of his adversaries conferred a benefit on him, which they were far from intending. He was still retained in confinement, and harassed with fresh charges, though his retractation had been ample and complete. At last, he obtained at public audience before the Council, on the twenty-third of May, 1416; when he recalled his former recantation, confessing that it had been dictated only by the fear of a painful death. Poggio, the Florentine, who was a witness of the whole course of Jerome's trial, has left a long and interesting account of it, in a letter to Leonardo Aretino ; from which, it appears that his sympathy had been strongly excited, by the constancy of the sufferer. Though connected with the highest dignitaries of the Church, he writes in such a strain of admiration, that his friend thought it necessary to warn him of the danger which he might incur, by speaking of a condemned heretic in such terms.

THE CONQUEST OF CONSTANTINOPLE.

BY GIBBON.

EDWARD GIBBON was born in 1737, at Putney, in England, and died in 1794. The biography of this great historian, of the Decline and final Fall of the Roman Empire, may be found in so many works, accessible to every one, and in a form so much more complete than it would be possible to give it here, that readers will not expect from us, even a hasty outline. Whatever Gibbon's faults may be, for instance, his peculiar skepticism, still his work is a truly-great one; and I may be permitted to repeat, here, what I have stated in another place, at great length, that few works are more instructive to a reflecting man. For it shows the protracted disease and corruption of an empire; the anatomy of a body politic laid bare; and is full of warning to every one, disposed to heed the grave lessons furnished by that period.

The Byzantine empire had gradually dwindled in extent, as well as internal power, so that nothing could restore its vigor. The Greeks had become grossly corrupt, in morals and politics, and had given themselves up to the most wayward folly, in religion, while they still were puffed up by the recollection of former grandeur and early civilization. Degenerated, as they were, in almost every respect, and to so frightful a degree, nothing, according to the experience we derive from history, could resuscitate that country and establish a better order of things, but a total regeneration, by a fresh admixture from foreign nations,- -a conquest by a better race. Such was not their fate. Asiatic race, which, out of the many tribes which profess Islamism, is one of those least susceptible of civilization,— the Turks, were the conquerors of this tottering empire. Nor is this the only melancholy reflection which forces itself upon our mind, in regarding this conquest. It happened, in this case, as in so many others recorded in history, that those, who would have been worthy of better days, and who would not have caused or promoted the general degeneracy, were nevertheless often obliged to bear its frightful consequences, and the ultimate ruin brought on by it.

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