The Thirty Years' War - James Aitken Wylie

moment the Emperor Matthias died, and was
succeeded by the fanatical and stem Ferdinand II.
There followed with starting rapidity a
succession of significant events, all adverse to
Bohemia and to the cause of Protestantism. These
occurrences form the prologue, as it were, of that
great drama of horrors which we are about to
narrate. Some of them have already come before us
in connection with the history of Protestantism in
Bohemia. First of all came the accession of Silesia
and Moravia to the insurrection; the deposition of
Ferdinand II as King of Bohemia, and the election
of Frederick, Elector of the Palatinate, in his room.
This was followed by the victorious march of
Count Thurn and his army to Vienna. The
appearance of the Bohemian army under the walls
of the capital raised the Protestant nobles in
Vienna, who, while the Bohemian balls were
falling on the royal palace, forced their way into
Ferdinand's presence, and insisted that he should
make peace with Count Thurn by guaranteeing
toleration to the Protestants of his empire. One of
the Austrian magnates was so urgent that he seized
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