The Thirty Years' War - James Aitken Wylie

Chapter 10
The Pacification of Westphalia
MOST historians, reviewing the career of
Gustavus Adolphus, have given it as their opinion
that when he died he had reached the maturity of
his glory, but not of his designs. We are disposed
to regard this judgment as a narrow and mistaken
one. That he had reached the summit of his fame
we readily admit; but we also hold that at the
moment of his death he had reached the
consummation of his plans, so far as their
accomplishment rested with himself. Had Gustavus
Adolphus crossed the Baltic to found a new
kingdom, and reign as head of the German Empire,
then indisputably he failed in the object for which
he had girded on the sword; and, in the words of
Schiller, "the proud edifice of his past greatness
sunk into ruins when he died." But this was far
indeed from being what the hero of Sweden aimed
at. He sought to roll back the Catholic reaction, and
to set free the princes and States of Germany from
the treble despotism of Ferdinand, of the League,
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