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The Lost Opportunities of the House of Austria
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 February 2009
Extract
Whether, in deciding to uphold the old faith in Germany, the Emperor Charles V. and his brother Ferdinand I. missed a great opportunity of establishing the House they represented in a position of permanent predominance in that country, is a question to which I shall only refer as forming the historical starting-point of this paper. It has been argued with great ability by Schiller, and Schiller—certainly not under-estimating the enormous difficulties which would have beset the House of Habsburg had its representative cast in his lot with the Reformation—apparently leans to the conclusion that the actual decision arrived at by that representative was, in reality, a lost opportunity. ‘It is hard to say’ he observes towards the close of his argument, ‘what would have become of the Reformation, what of the liberties of the German Empire, if the dreaded House of Austria had not decided against the former. This much, however, seems proved, that the Austrian princes in no way so barred their way to universal monarchy, as by engaging in stubborn conflict against the new doctrines. Under no other circumstances and in no other eventuality would the weaker princes have been able to force their Order to make the extraordinary efforts which gave them strength to withstand the House of Austria. Under no other circumstances and in no other eventuality would the minor States have combined against one common enemy.’
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- Copyright © Royal Historical Society 1885
References
page 227 note 1 History of England from the Accession of James I. to the Outbreak of the First Civil War, vol. iii., pp. 267–9Google Scholar.
page 228 note 1 Gardiner. The reader will bear in mind that, even when sheltered by the strong arm of Austria, Southern Germany all but succumbed to the invasion of the Turks, under Kara Mustapha, nearly fifty years later. What would have been the position had the invader been met by the petty armies of small and disunited States?
page 229 note 1 The expulsion of the Protestants of Styria by the Emperor Charles VI is an exception to this general rule.
page 229 note 2 Who won the second battle of Mohács, August 12, 1689.
page 229 note 3 Who defeated the Turks at Salankama, August 19, 1691, slaying one-fifth their number.
page 229 note 4 Who crushed the Turks at Zenta, Sept. 11, 1697.
page 230 note 1 The first battle of Mohács had transferred the elective crown of Hungary from the extinct line of the JageHons to the Habsburg. The result of the second tattle was to cause the estates of Hungary to pass at Pressburg a decree solemnly conferring upon the House of Habsburg the right of succession in male line to the throne of Hungary. They proceeded, on the spot, to crown the eldest son of the Emperor, thg Archduke Joseph, though he was hardly nine years old, Dec, 9, 1687.
page 231 note 1 Prinz Eugen von Savoyen, in three volumes, Wien, 1864.
page 235 note 1 Mémoires de Torcy, Coll-Petitot, , lxvii. 340Google Scholar. The despatch of the French king to Torcy is dated May 14, 1709.
page 237 note 1 They had taken the town of Balaguer on the Segre.
page 243 note 1 ‘I see,’ wrote Wratislaw to Eugene in 1712, ‘that, though the pill is bitter, if some arrangements could be made to preserve his honour with respect to the pledges he has given to the Catalonians, it will eventually be swallowed.’
page 244 note 1 In his later years he directed all his efforts to secure adhesion to the Pragmatic Sanction, neglecting his army by which alone the conditions of that instrument could have been upheld. The consequences are well known.
page 248 note 1 Frederic himself. ‘We ail committed faults,’ said he one day to his generals, speaking of the events of the Seven Years' War, ‘except my brother Henry and London.’