And great had been the Kaiser's reception that morning; the flower of Germany, all the Princes of the Empire, Protestant and Papal alike, riding out to meet him, in the open country, at the Bridge of the Lech. With high-flown speeches and benignities, on both sides;--only that the Kaiser willed all men, Protestant and other, should in the mean while do the Popish litanyings, waxlight processionings and idolatrous stage-performances with him on the morrow, which was CORPUS-CHRISTI Day; and the Protestants could not nor would. Imperial hints there had already been, from Innspruck; benign hopes, of the nature of commands, That loyal Protestant Princes would in the interim avoid open discrepancies, --perhaps be so loyal as keep their chaplains, peculiar divine-services, private in the interim? These were hints;--and now this of the CORPUS-CHRISTI, a still more pregnant hint! Loyal Protestants refused it, therefore; flatly declined, though bidden and again bidden. They attended in a body, old Johann of Saxony, young Philip of Hessen, and the rest; Margraf George, as spokesman, with eloquent simplicity stating their reasons,--to somewhat this effect:--Invinciblest all-gracious Kaiser, loyal are we to your high Majesty, ready to do your bidding by night and by day.
But it is your bidding under God, not against God. Ask us not, 0 gracious Kaiser! I cannot, and we cannot; and we must not, and dare not. And "before I would deny my God and his Evangel," these are George's own words, "I would rather kneel down here before your Majesty, and have my head struck off,"--hitting his hind-head, or neck, with the edge of his hand, by way of accompaniment; a strange radiance in the eyes of him, voice risen into musical alt: <italic> "Ehe Ich wolte meinen Gott und sein Evangelium verlaugnen, ehe wolte Ich hier vor Eurer Majestat niderknien, und mir den Kopf abhauen lassen."--"Nit Kop ab, lover Forst, nit Kop ab!" <end italic> answered Charles in his Flemish-German; "Not head off, dear Furst, not head off!" said the Kaiser, a faint smile enlightening those weighty gray eyes of his, and imperceptibly animating the thick Austrian under-lip. [Rentsch, p. 637. Marheineke, <italic> Geschichte der Teutschen Reformation <end italic> (Berlin, 1831), ii. 487.]
Speaker and company attended again on the morrow; Margraf George still more eloquent. Whose Speech flew over Germany, like fire over dry flax; and still exists,--both Speeches now oftenest rolled into one by inaccurate editors. [As by Rentsch, ubi supra.]
And the CORPUS-CHRISTI idolatries were forborne the Margraf and his company this time;--the Kaiser himself, however, walking, nearly roasted in the sun, in heavy purple-velvet cloak, with a big wax-candle, very superfluous, guttering and blubbering in the right hand of him, along the streets of Augsburg. Kur-Brandenburg, Kur-Mainz, high cousins of George, were at this Diet of Augsburg;Kur-Brandenburg (Elector Joachim I., Cicero's son, of whom we have spoken, and shall speak again) being often very loud on the conservative side; and eloquent Kur-Mainz going on the conciliatory tack. Kur-Brandenburg, in his zeal, had ridden on to Innspruck, to meet the Kaiser there, and have a preliminary word with him. Both these high Cousins spoke, and bestirred themselves, a good deal, at this Diet. They had met the Kaiser on the plains of the Lech, this morning; and, no doubt, gloomed unutterable things on George and his Speech. George could not help it.
Till his death in 1543, George is to be found always in the front line of this high Movement, in the line where Kur-Sachsen, John the Steadfast (DER BESTANDIGE), and young Philip the Magnanimous of Hessen were, and where danger and difficulty were. Readers of this enlightened gold-nugget generation can form to themselves no conception of the spirit that then possessed the nobler kingly mind. "The command of God endures through Eternity, <italic>
Verbum Dei Manet In AEternum," <end italic> was the Epigraph and Life-motto which John the Steadfast had adopted for himself;"V. D. M. I. AE.," these initials he had engraved on all the furnitures of his existence, on his standards, pictures, plate, on the very sleeves of his lackeys,--and I can perceive, on his own deep heart first of all. V. D. M. I. E.:--or might it not be read withal, as Philip of Hessen sometimes said (Philip, still a young fellow, capable of sport in his magnanimous scorn), <italic>
"Verbum Diaboli Manet In Episcopis, <end italic> The Devil's Word sticks fast in the Bishops"?
We must now take leave of Margraf George and his fine procedures in that crisis of World-History. He had got Jugerndorf, which became important for his Family and others: but what was that to the Promethean conquests (such we may call them) which he had the honor to assist in making for his Family, and for his Country, and for all men;--very unconscious he of "bringing fire from Heaven,"good modest simple man! So far as I can gather, there lived, in that day, few truer specimens of the Honest Man. A rugged, rough-hewn, rather blunt-nosed physiognomy: cheek-bones high, cheeks somewhat bagged and wrinkly; eyes with a due shade of anxiety and sadness in them; affectionate simplicity, faithfulness, intelligence, veracity looking out of every feature of him. Wears plentiful white beard short-cut, plentiful gold-chains, ruffs, ermines;--a hat not to be approved of, in comparison with brother Casimir's; miserable inverted-colander of a hat; hanging at an angle of forty-five degrees; with band of pearls round the top not the bottom of it; insecure upon the fine head of George, and by no means to its embellishment.