Protestantism in Poland and Bohemia - James Aitken Wylie

the emperor to bring the whole of Bohemia back to
Rome. He was terrified at the spirit of liberty and
patriotism which he saw rising in the nation; he
ascribed that spirit entirely to the new religion of
which John Muss had been the great apostle, since,
all down from the martyr's day, he could trace the
popular convulsions to which it had given rise; and
he despaired of restoring quiet and order to
Bohemia till it should again be of one religion, and
that religion the Roman. Thus political were
blended with religious motives in the terrible
persecution which Ferdinand now commenced.
It was nearly a year till the plan of persecution
was arranged; and when at last the plain was
settled, it was resolved to baptize it by the name of
"Reformation." To restore the altars and images
which the preachers of the new faith had east out,
and again plant the old faith in the deformed
churches, was, they affirmed, to effect a real
Reformation. They had a perfect right to the word.
They appointed a Commission of Reformers,
having at its head the Archbishop of Prague and
several of the Bohemian grandees, and united with
209