Henry VII of Germany

“ Harassed by Gregory VII’s successors who continued to advocate papal supremacy, faced by one rebellion after another in Germany and Italy, Henry IV yielded at last to weariness and old age, when he found his sons had become leaders of the forces most hostile to him. Even in his submission to their demands he found no peace, for he was thrust into prison, compelled to abdicate, and left to die miserably of starvation and neglect. ”

“ Of the Latin princes, the allies of Alexius and enemies of Robert, the most prompt and powerful was Henry IV, king of Germany and Italy, and future emperor of the West. Henry was the severe adversary of the Normans, the allies and vassals of Gregory VII, his implacable foe. The long quarrel of the throne and mitre had been recently kindled by the zeal and ambition of that haughty priest; the king and the pope had degraded each other, and each had seated a rival on the temporal or spiritual throne of his antagonist. ”

“ Shall flesh his tooth in every innocent.
O my poor kingdom, sick with civil blows!
HENRY IV. Shut out from Augsburg by the treachery of the emperor, Gregory VII retired to Canossa, where he resolved to let the affairs of Germany shape themselves for a time, while he awaited a more favorable moment for action. Nor was his gigantic mind occupied with Germany alone, and the movements there which menaced his life and the liberty and purity of the Church. Dalmatia, Poland, and England claimed his constant attention. ”

“ The eleventh century presents almost an entire blank in the history of literature. Under the Frankish or Salic dynasty, Germany had either to defend herself against the inroads of Hungarian and Slavonic armies, or it was the battle-field of violent feuds between the Emperors and their vassals. The second half of that century was filled with the struggles between [pg 008] Henry IV. and Pope Gregory VII. The clergy, hitherto the chief support of German literature, became estranged from the German people ”

“ His son and successor Henry III. (1039-1056) governed Germany wisely, and his reign witnessed the culminating point of the Holy Roman Empire. At the time of his death it seemed probable that Germany, like England and France, would gradually escape from the thraldom of the great feudatories. The future of the German monarchy depended upon the ability of future kings to suppress the forces of feudal disintegration in Germany, and to withstand the temptation of struggling to establish their influence over Italy. ”

“ Had he succeeded, the whole face of Europe would have been changed, Southern Germany would have been secured for Protestantism, and the Thirty Years’ War averted. He failed as men fail who stand ahead of their age. The German princes shrank from a contest with the emperor, France from a struggle which would be fatal to Catholicism; and Henry, left alone to bear the resentment of the House of Austria, and chained to a wife he loathed, turned savagely on Cromwell. The nobles sprang on him with a fierceness that told of their long-hoarded hate. ”

“ On the other hand, he succeeded in forming an alliance with the Lombards in December 1234, but his few supporters fell away when the emperor reached Germany in 1235, and, after a vain attack on Worms, Henry submitted and was kept for some time as a prisoner in Germany, though his formal deposition as German king was not considered necessary, as he had broken the oath taken in 1232. ”

“ As in former times the effect of the connexion of Germany with Italy was altogether mischievous, because to expedite his Italian journey the king 847 had added to the great privileges of the princes and had repressed the energies of the towns.
After Henry’s death the electors, again fearing lest the German crown should become hereditary, refused to choose the late king’s young son, John of Bohemia, as their ruler, although the candidature of this prince was supported Louis the Bavarian and Frederick of Austria. by the powerful archbishops Baldwin of Trier and Peter of Mainz. ”

“ Crushed by this blow, Henry remained almost helpless and inactive in northern Italy for five years, until 1097, when having lost every shred of authority in that country, he returned to Germany, where his position was stronger than ever. Welf had submitted, had forsaken the cause of Matilda and had been restored to Bavaria, and in 1098 the diet assembled at Mainz declared Conrad deposed, and chose the emperor’s second son, Henry, afterwards the emperor Henry V., as German king. ”

“ In the intervening space, however, while Henry VII. was comparatively undisturbed by domestic rebellion, he Foreign alliances. found opportunity for a first tentative experiment at interfering in European politics. He allied himself with Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain and with Maximilian of Austria, who was ruling the Netherlands in behalf of his young son, Philip, the heir of the Burgundian inheritance, for the purpose of preventing France from annexing Brittany, the last great fief of the crown which had not yet been absorbed into the Valois royal domain. ”

“ During the disturbed fifty years of Henry IV.'s reign, Burgundy and Italy had become practically independent of Germany; Hungary and Poland had thrown off their dependent condition, and even the Wends beyond the Elbe were no longer loyal to the Empire. Within the German States, the Imperial power was already so much weakened by the establishment of hereditary Dukes and Counts, not related to the ruling family, that the king (or Emperor) exercised very little direct authority over the people. ”

“ Practically they became independent sovereigns, and to make their victory more complete serious restraints were laid upon the freedom of the towns. Before this date King Henry had begun to take a personal part in the government and was already involved in a quarrel with Otto II., duke of Bavaria. He disliked the Privilege of Worms and, favouring the towns against the princes, his policy was diametrically opposed to that of the emperor; however, in 1232 he went to Italy and promised to 844 obey his father’s commands. ”

“ But—as it chanced—the issue of this alliance was destined to unite the English and the Scottish crowns, when the male line of the Tudors died out, and Henry, quite unintentionally, had his share in bringing about the consummation, by peaceful means, of that end which Edward I. had sought for so long to win by the strong hand.
All the foreign politics of the reign of Henry VII. have small importance compared with his work within the realm. The true monument of his ability was that he left England tamed and orderly, with an obedient people and a full Character of Henry’s internal rule. ”

“ Having established his position in Germany and Italy, Henry began to cherish ideas of universal empire. Richard of England had already owned his supremacy, and declaring he would compel the king of France to do the same Henry sought to stir up strife between France and England. Nor did the Spanish kingdoms escape his notice. Tunis and Tripoli were claimed, and when the eastern emperor, Isaac Angelus, asked his help, he demanded in return the cession of the Balkan peninsula. The kings of Cyprus and Armenia asked for investiture at his hands ”

“ The least hint to Francis of any hostile intent towards Henry would, thought Charles, be at once revealed to the English King, and the two would join in making war on himself. War he was determined to avoid, for, apart from the ruin of Flanders, which it would involve, Henry and Francis had long been intriguing with the Lutherans in Germany. A breach might easily precipitate civil strife in the Empire; and, indeed, in June, 1534, Würtemberg was wrested from the Habsburgs by Philip of Hesse with the connivance of France. ”

“ Strenuous efforts were made by Albert's widow to obtain the succession to the imperial throne for her son, Frederick, Duke of Austria, but the choice of the prince-electors, headed by the Archbishop of Mainz, fell on Count Henry of Luxemburg, a liberal-minded and generous noble, who was accordingly crowned, under the title of Henry VII. During the short reign of this monarch he proved himself a wise and generous friend to the Swiss, whose privileges he confirmed. ”

“ Among these candidates was Henry of Bavaria, son Henry II. of Duke Henry the Quarrelsome and a great-grandson of Henry the Fowler, and at Mainz in June 1002 this prince was chosen German king as Henry II. Having been recognized as king by the Saxons, the Thuringians and the nobles of Lorraine, the new king was able to turn his attention to the affairs of government, but on the whole his reign was an unfortunate one for Germany. For ten years civil war raged in Lorraine; in Saxony much blood was shed in petty quarrels ”

“ I have said enough about the political importance of the reign, and perhaps in the last lecture more than enough about personal incidents and characteristics. To the last, however, Henry VII remains somewhat of an enigma to us. Was he a great king? If it be enough to constitute a great king, to have reigned twenty-four years without a single important war, and to have united in apparent peace a number of dynastic forces that had been struggling for a century ”

“ Before he was twenty-one he had broken up a combination of feudal barons against him. Then he turned to England. Queen Eleanor and her sons were conspiring against Henry II. So he made friends with them. The palace on the island in the Seine was an asylum where John and Richard might plot against their father. And when a third Crusade was planned, 1189, it had as leaders Philip Augustus of France, Richard I., who had just succeeded his father, Henry II., as King of England, and Barbarossa (Frederick I.) , the great Emperor of Germany. ”

“ At the end of 1191 he returned to Germany, where he was soon faced by two serious risings. The first of these centred round the restless and unruly Welfs; after a time these insurgents were joined by their former enemies, the rulers of Saxony, of Thuringia and of Meissen, who were angered by Henry’s conduct. The Welfs also gained the assistance of Canute VI., king of Denmark. Equally dangerous was a rebellion in the Lower Rhineland, where the emperor made many foes by appointing, regardless of their fitness, his own candidates to vacant bishoprics. ”

“ Henry failed to take Cologne, his forces were defeated at Welfesholz on the 11th of February 1115, and complications in Italy compelled him to leave Germany to the care of Frederick II. of Hohenstaufen, duke of Swabia, and his brother Conrad, afterwards the German king Conrad III. After the departure of Henry from Rome in 1111 a council had declared the privilege of lay investiture, which had been extorted from Paschal, to be invalid, and Guido, archbishop of Vienne, excommunicated the emperor and called upon the pope to ratify this sentence. ”

“ The English sought to supplement their military successes by diplomacy. Richard of Cornwall made an alliance with the counts of Auvergne, and the home administration negotiated with all possible enemies of the French King. A proposal to affiance Henry's sister, Isabella, to Henry, King of the Romans, the infant son of Frederick II., led to no results, for the Archbishop of Cologne, the chief upholder of the scheme in Germany, was murdered, and the young king found a bride in Austria. ”

“ This marriage took place at Milan on the 27th of January 1186, and soon afterwards Henry was crowned king of Italy. The claim of Henry and his wife on Sicily was recognized by the barons of that kingdom; and having been recognized by the pope as Roman emperor elect, Henry returned to Germany, and was again appointed regent when Frederick set out on crusade in May 1189. His attempts to bring peace to Germany were interrupted by the return of Henry the Lion, duke of Saxony, in October 1189, and a campaign against him was followed by a peace made at Fulda in July 1190. ”

“ The German princes were divided into partisans of the Hohenstaufen and of the pope. Pope Alexander IV, who had just succeeded Innocent IV, perceived that a strong German king, a partisan of the Hohenstaufen, might well ruin papal predominance in Italy as well as Germany. Henry III watched German affairs with no less interest. Now that he was pledged to Edmund's Sicilian candidature, he was anxious that the next German king should not stand in his son's way. It was soon felt that Richard's candidature would meet many difficulties. ”

“ The foreigner who is interested in the future of Germany is naturally inclined to raise the question: Is it an advantage or merely a burden for the Prussian State to possess so large a royal family? He need only ask any honest German who is not afraid to say what he thinks, whether princes who live a life apart, cut off from modern ideas and interests, and antagonistic to every Liberal tendency, are a blessing or a curse to their dynasty and their country. There can be little doubt as to the answer he will receive.
A more interesting personality is that of Prince Henry, the Emperor’s brother. ”

“ Henry was a pious and peace-loving prince, who favoured church reform, sought earnestly to suppress private warfare, and alone among the early emperors is said to have been innocent of simony. Although under his rule Germany enjoyed considerable tranquillity, and a period of wealth and progress set in for the towns, yet his secular and ecclesiastical policy showed signs of weakness. ”