SECTION III.

 

The German Empire

After taking this view of state of France, I proceed to consider that of the German empire, from which Charles V derived his title of highest dignity. In explaining the constitution of this great and complex body at the beginning of the sixteenth century, I shall avoid entering into such a detail as would involve my readers in that inextricable labyrinth, which is formed by the multiplicity of its tribunals, the number of its members, their interfering rights, and by the endless discussions or refinements of the public lawyers of Germany, with respect to all these.

The empire of Charlemagne was a structure erected in so short a time, that it could not be permanent. Under his immediate successor it began to totter; and soon after fell to pieces. The crown of Germany was separated from that of France, and the descendants of Charlemagne established two great monarchies so situated as to give rise to a perpetual rivalship and enmity between them. But the princes of the race of Charlemagne who were placed on the Imperial throne, were not altogether so degenerate, as those of the same family who reigned in France. In the hands of the former the royal authority retained some vigor, and the nobles of Germany, though possessed of extensive privileges as well as ample territories, did not so early attain independence. The great offices of the crown continued to be at the disposal of the sovereign, and during a long period, fiefs remained in their original state, without becoming hereditary and perpetual in the families of the persons to whom they had been granted.

At length the German branch of the family of Charlemagne became extinct, and his feeble descendants who reigned in France had sunk into such contempt, that the Germans, without looking towards them, exercised the right inherent in a free people; and in a general assembly of the nation elected Conrad count of Franconia emperor [911]. After him Henry of Saxony, and his descendants the three Othos, were placed, in succession, on the Imperial throne, by the suffrages of their countrymen. The extensive territories of the Saxon emperors, their eminent abilities and enterprising genius, not only added new vigour to the Imperial dignity, but raised it to higher power and preeminence. Otho the Great marched at the head of a numerous army into Italy [952], and after the example of Charlemagne, gave law to that country. Every power there acknowledged his authority. He created popes, and deposed them by his sovereign mandate. He annexed the kingdom of Italy to the German empire. Elated with his success, he assumed the title of Cesar Augustus. A prince, born in the heart of Germany, pretended to be the successor of the emperors of ancient Rome, and claimed a right to the same power and prerogative.

But while the emperors, by means of these new titles and new dominions, gradually acquired additional authority and splendor, the nobility of Germany had gone on at the same time, extending their privileges and jurisdiction. The situation of affairs was favorable to their attempts. The vigour which Charlemagne had given to government quickly relaxed. The incapacity of some of his successors was such, as would have encouraged vassals less enterprising than the nobles of that age, to have claimed new rights, and to have assumed new powers. The civil wars in which other emperors were engaged, obliged them to pay perpetual court to their subjects, on whose support they depended, and not only to connive at their usurpations, but to permit, and even to authorize them. Fiefs gradually became hereditary. They were transmitted not only in the direct, but also in the collateral line. The investiture of them was demanded not only by male but by female heirs. Every baron began to exercise sovereign jurisdiction within his own domains; and the dukes and counts of Germany took wide steps towards rendering their territories distinct and independent states. The Saxon emperors observed their progress, and were aware of its tendency. But as they could not hope to humble vassals already grown too potent, unless they had turned their whole force as well as attention to that enterprise, and as they were extremely intent on their expeditions into Italy, which they could not undertake without the concurrence of their nobles, they were solicitous not to alarm them by any direct attack on their privileges and jurisdictions. They aimed, however, at undermining their power. With this view, they inconsiderately bestowed additional territories, and accumulated new honors on the clergy, in hopes that this order might serve as a counterpoise to that of the nobility in any future struggle.

The unhappy effects of this fatal error in policy were quickly felt. Under the emperors of the Franconian and Suabian lines, whom the Germans, by their voluntary election, placed on the Imperial throne, a new face of things appeared, and a scene was exhibited in Germany, which astonished all Christendom at that time [1024], and in the present age appears almost incredible. The popes, hitherto dependent on the emperors, and indebted for power as well as dignity to their beneficence and protection, began to claim a superior jurisdiction; and, in virtue of authority which they pretended to derive from heaven, tried, condemned, excommunicated, and deposed their former masters. Nor is this to be considered merely as a frantic sally of passion in a pontiff intoxicated with high ideas concerning the extent of priestly domination, and the plenitude of papal authority.

Gregory VII was able as well as daring. His presumption and violence were accompanied with political discernment and sagacity. He had observed that the princes and nobles of Germany had acquired such considerable territories and such extensive jurisdiction, as rendered them not only formidable to the emperors, but disposed them to favor any attempt to circumscribe their power. He foresaw that the ecclesiastics of Germany, raised almost to a level with its princes, were ready to support any person who would stand forth as the protector of their privileges and independence. With both of these Gregory negotiated, and had secured many devoted adherents among them, before he ventured to enter the lists against the head of the empire.

He began his rupture with Henry IV upon a pretext that was popular and plausible. He complained of the venality and corruption with which the emperor had granted the investiture of benefices to ecclesiastics. He contended that this right belonged to him as head of the church; he required Henry to confine himself within the bounds of his civil jurisdiction, and to abstain for the future from such sacrilegious encroachments on the spiritual dominion. All the censures of the church were denounced against Henry, because he refused to relinquish those powers which his predecessors had uniformly exercised. The most considerable of the German princes and ecclesiastics were excited to take arms against him. His mother, his wife, his sons, were wrought upon to disregard all the ties of blood as well as of duty, and to join the party of his enemies. Such were the successful arts with which the court of Rome inflamed the superstitious zeal, and conducted the factious spirit of the Germans and Italians, that an emperor, distinguished not only for many virtues, but possessed of considerable talents, was at length obliged to appear as a suppliant at the gate of the castle in which the pope resided, and to stand there three days, barefooted, in the depth of winter, imploring a pardon, which at length he obtained with difficulty.

This act of humiliation degraded the Imperial dignity. Nor was the depression momentary only. The contest between Gregory and Henry gave rise to the two great factions of the Guelfs and Ghibellines; the former of which supporting the pretensions of the popes, and the latter defending the rights of the emperor, kept Germany and Italy in perpetual agitation during three centuries. A regular system for humbling the emperors and circumscribing their power was formed, and adhered to uniformly throughout that period. The popes, the free states in Italy, the nobility and ecclesiastics of Germany, were all interested in its success: and notwithstanding the return of some short intervals of vigor, under the administration of a few able emperors, the Imperial authority continued to decline. During the anarchy of the long interregnum, subsequent to the death of William of Holland [1256], it dwindled down almost to nothing. Rudolph of Hapsburg, the founder of the House of Austria, and who first opened the way to its future grandeur, was at length elected emperor [1271], not that he might reestablish and extend the Imperial authority, but because his territories and influence were so inconsiderable as to excite no jealousy in the German princes, who were willing to preserve the forms of a constitution, the power and vigor of which they had destroyed. Several of his successors were placed on the Imperial throne from the same motive; and almost every remaining prerogative was rescued out of the hands of feeble princes unable to exercise or to defend them.

During this period of turbulence and confusion, the constitution of the Germanic body underwent a total change. The ancient names of courts and magistrates, together with the original forms and appearance of policy, were preserved; but such new privileges and jurisdiction were assumed, and so many various rights established, that the same species of government no longer subsisted. The princes, the great nobility, the dignified ecclesiastics, the free cities, had taken advantage of the interregnum, which I have mentioned, to establish or to extend their usurpations. They claimed and exercised the right of governing their respective territories with full sovereignty. They acknowledged no superior with respect to any point, relative to the interior administration and police of their domains. They enacted laws, imposed taxes, coined money, declared war, concluded peace, and exerted every prerogative peculiar to independent states. The ideas of order and political union, which had originally formed the various provinces of Germany into one body, were almost entirely lost; and the society must have dissolved, if the forms of feudal subordination had not preserved such an appearance of connection or dependence among the various members of the community, as preserved it from falling to pieces.

This bond of union, however, was extremely feeble and hardly any principle remained in the German constitution, of sufficient force to maintain public order, or even to ascertain personal security. From the accession of Rudolph of Hapsburg, to the reign of Maximilian, the immediate predecessor of Charles V, the empire felt every calamity which a state must endure, when the authority of government is so much relaxed as to have lost its proper degree of vigor. The causes of dissension among that vast number of members, which composed the Germanic body, were infinite and unavoidable.

These gave rise to perpetual private wars, which were carried on with all the violence that usually accompanies resentment, when unrestrained by superior authority. Rapine, outrage, exactions, became universal. Commerce was interrupted; industry suspended; and every part of Germany resembled a country which an enemy had plundered and left desolate. The variety of expedients employed with a view to restore order and tranquility, prove that the grievances occasioned by this state of anarchy had grown intolerable. Arbiters were appointed to terminate the differences among the several states. The cities united in a league, the object of which was to check the rapine and extortions of the nobility. The nobility formed confederacies, on purpose to maintain tranquility among their own order. Germany was divided into several circles, in each of which a provincial and partial jurisdiction was established, to supply the place of a public and common tribunal.

But all these remedies were so ineffectual, that they served only to demonstrate the violence of that anarchy which prevailed, and the insufficiency of the means employed to correct it. At length Maximilian re-established public order in the empire, by instituting the imperial chamber [1495], a tribunal composed of judges named partly by the emperor, partly y the several states, and vested with authority to decide filially concerning all differences among the members of the Germanic body. A few years after [1512] by giving a new form to the Aulic council, which takes cognizance of all feudal causes, and such as belong to the emperor’s immediate jurisdiction, he restored some degree of vigor to the imperial authority.

But notwithstanding the salutary effects of these regulations and improvements, the political constitution of the German empire, at the commencement of the period of which I propose to write the history, was of a species so peculiar, as not to resemble perfectly any form of government known either in the ancient or modern world. It was a complex body, formed by the association of several states, each of which possessed sovereign and independent jurisdiction within its own territories. Of all the members which composed this united body, the emperor was the head. In his name, all decrees and regulations, with respect to points of common concern, were issued; and to him the power of carrying them into execution was committed. But this appearance of monarchical power in the emperor was more than counterbalanced by the influence of the princes and states of the empire in every act of administration. No law extending to the whole body could pass, no resolution that affected the general interest could be taken, without the approbation of the diet of the empire. In this assembly, every sovereign prince and state of the Germanic body had a right to be present, to deliberate, and to vote. The decrees or recesses of the diet were the laws of the empire, which the emperor was bound to ratify and enforce.

Under this aspect, the constitution of the empire appears a regular confederacy, similar to the Achaean league in ancient Greece, or to that of the United Provinces and of the Swiss Cantons in modern times. But if viewed in another light, striking peculiarities in its political state present themselves. The Germanic body was not formed by the union of members altogether distinct and independent.

All the princes and states joined in this association, were originally subject to the emperors, and acknowledged them as sovereigns. Besides this, they originally held their lands as Imperial fiefs, and in consequence of this tenure owed the emperors all those services which feudal vassals are bound to perform to their liege lord. But though this political subjection was entirely at an end, and the influence of the feudal relation much diminished, the ancient forms and institutions, introduced while the emperors governed Germany with authority not inferior to that which the other monarchs of Europe possessed, still remained. Thus an opposition was established between the genius of the government, and the forms of administration in the German empire. The former considered the emperor only as the head of a confederacy, the members of which, by their voluntary choice, have raised him to that dignity; the latter seemed to imply, that he is really invested with sovereign power. By this circumstance, such principles of hostility and discord were interwoven into the frame of the Germanic body, as affected each of its members, rendering their interior union incomplete, and their external efforts feeble and irregular. The pernicious influence of this defect inherent in the constitution of the empire is so considerable, that, without attending to it, we cannot fully comprehend many transactions in the reign of Charles V or form just ideas concerning the genius of the German government.

The emperors of Germany, at the beginning of the sixteenth century, were distinguished by the most pompous titles, and by such ensigns of dignity, as intimated their authority to be superior to that of all other monarchs. The greatest princes of the empire attended, and served them, on some occasions, as the officers of their household. They exercised prerogatives which no other sovereign ever claimed. They retained pretensions to all the extensive powers which their predecessors had enjoyed in any former age. But, at the same time, instead of possessing that ample domain which had belonged to the ancient emperors of Germany, and which stretched from Basil to Cologne, along both banks of the Rhine, they were stripped of all territorial property, and had not a single city, a single castle, a single foot of land, that belonged to them, as heads of the empire. As their domain was alienated, their stated revenues were reduced almost to nothing; and the extraordinary aids, which on a few occasions they obtained, were granted sparingly and paid with reluctance. The princes and states of the empire, though they seemed to recognize the Imperial authority, were subjects only in name, each of them possessing a complete municipal jurisdiction within the precincts of his own territories.

From this ill-compacted frame of government, effects that were unavoidable resulted. The emperors, dazzled with the splendor of their titles, and the external signs of vast authority, were apt to imagine themselves to be the real sovereigns of Germany, and were led to aim continually at recovering the exercise of those powers which the forms of the constitution seemed to vest in them, and which their predecessors, Charlemagne and the Othos, had actually enjoyed. The princes and states, aware of the nature as well as extent of these pretensions, were perpetually on their guard, in order to watch all the motions of the Imperial court, and to circumscribe its power within limits still more narrow. The emperors, in support of their claims, appealed to ancient forms and institutions, which the states held to be obsolete. The states founded their rights on recent practice and modern privileges, which the emperors considered as usurpations.

This jealousy of the Imperial authority, together with the opposition between it and the rights of the states, increased considerably from the time that the emperors were elected, not by the collective body of German nobles, but by a few princes of chief dignity. During a long period, all the members of the Germanic body had a right to assemble, and to make choice of the person whom they appointed to be their head. But amidst the violence and anarchy which prevailed for several centuries in the empire, seven princes who possessed the most extensive territories, and who had obtained a hereditary title to the great offices of the state, acquired the exclusive privilege of nominating the emperor. This right was confirmed to them by the Golden Bull: the mode of exercising it was ascertained, and they were dignified with the appellation of Electors. The nobility and free cities being thus stripped of a privilege which they had once enjoyed, were less connected with a prince, towards whose elevation they had not contributed by their suffrages, and came to be more apprehensive of his authority. The electors, by their extensive power, and the distinguishing privileges which they possessed, became formidable to the emperors, with whom they were placed almost on a level in several acts of jurisdiction. Thus the introduction of the electoral college into the empire, and the authority which it acquired, instead of diminishing, contributed to strengthen, the principles of hostility and discord in the Germanic constitution.

These were further augmented by the various and repugnant forms of civil policy in the several states which composed the Germanic body. It is no easy matter to render the union of independent states perfect and entire, even when the genius and forms of their respective governments happen to be altogether similar. But in the Germanic empire, which was a confederacy of princes, of ecclesiastics, and of free cities, it was impossible that they could incorporate thoroughly. The free cities were small republics, in which the maxims and spirit peculiar to that species of government prevailed. The princes and nobles, to whom supreme jurisdiction belonged, possessed a sort of monarchical power within their own territories, and the forms of their interior administration nearly resembled those of the great feudal kingdoms. The interests, the ideas, the objects of states so differently constituted, cannot be the same. Nor could their common deliberations be carried on with the same spirit, while the love of liberty, and attention to commerce, were the reigning principles in the cities; while the desire of power, and ardor for military glory, were the governing passions of the princes and nobility.

The secular and ecclesiastical members of the empire were as little fitted for union as the free cities and the nobility. Considerable territories had been granted to several of the bishoprics and abbeys, and some of the highest offices in the empire having been annexed to them inalienably, were held by the ecclesiastics raised to these dignities. The younger sons of noblemen of the second order, who had devoted themselves to the church, were commonly promoted to these stations of eminence and power; and it was no small mortification to the princes and great nobility, to see persons raised from an inferior rank to the same level with themselves, or even exalted to superior dignity. The education of these churchmen, the genius of their profession, and their connection with the court of Rome, rendered their character as well as their interest different from those of the other members of the Germanic body, with whom they were called to act in concert. Thus another source of jealousy and variance was opened, which ought not to be overlooked when we are searching into the nature of the German constitution.

To all these causes of dissension may be added one more, arising from the unequal distribution of power and wealth among the states of the empire. The electors, and other nobles of the highest rank, not only possessed sovereign jurisdiction, but governed such extensive, populous, and rich countries, as rendered them great princes. Many of the other members, though they enjoyed all the rights of sovereignty, ruled over such petty domains, that their real power bore no proportion to this high prerogative. A well compacted and vigorous confederacy could not be formed of such dissimilar states. The weaker were jealous, timid, and unable either to assert or defend their just privileges. The more powerful were apt to assume and to become oppressive. The electors and emperors, by turns, endeavored to extend their own authority, by encroaching on those feeble members of the Germanic body, who sometimes defended their rights with much spirit, but more frequently, being overawed or corrupted, they tamely surrendered their privileges, or meanly favored the designs formed against them.

After contemplating all these principles of disunion and opposition in the constitution of the German empire, it will be easy to account for the want of concord and uniformity, conspicuous in its councils and proceedings. That slow, dilatory, distrustful, and irresolute spirit, which characterizes all its deliberations, will appear natural in a body, the junction of whose members was so incomplete, the different parts of which were held together by such feeble ties, and set at variance by such powerful motives.

But the empire of Germany, nevertheless, comprehended countries of such great extent, and was inhabited by such a martial and hardy race of men, that when the abilities of an emperor, or zeal for any common cause, could rouse this unwieldy body to put forth its strength, it acted with almost irresistible force. In the following history we shall find, that as the measures on which Charles V was most intent, were often thwarted or rendered abortive by the spirit of jealousy and division peculiar to the Germanic constitution; so it was by the influence which he acquired over the prices of the empire, and by engaging them to co-operate with him, that he was enabled to make some of the greatest efforts which distinguish his reign.   

 

The Empire of the Ottomans