The
Protestants were too numerous to be annihilated, and too strong in their
desperation to be crushed. But Ferdinand, guided by the Jesuits, was
implacable. He issued a manifesto, which was but a transcript of his own
soul, and which is really sublime in the sincerity and fervor of its
intolerance.
"All attempts," said he, "to bring to reason a people whom God has
struck with judicial blindness will be in vain. Since the introduction
of heresy into Bohemia, we have seen nothing but tumults, disobedience
and rebellion. While the Catholics and the sovereign have displayed only
lenity and moderation, these sects have become stronger, more violent
and more insolent; having gained all their objects in religious affairs,
they turn their arms against the civil government, and attack the
supreme authority under the pretense of conscience; not content with
confederating themselves against their sovereign, they have usurped the
power of taxation, and have made alliances with foreign States,
particularly with the Protestant princes of Germany, in order to deprive
him of the very means of reducing them to obedience. They have left
nothing to the sovereign but his palaces and the convents; and after
their recent outrages against his ministers, and the usurpation of the
regal revenues, no object remains for their vengeance and rapacity but
the persons of the sovereign and his successor, and the whole house of
Austria.
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