BOOK X. A.D. 1618. Frederick Ulrick was a munificent patron of learning and learned men: he greatly augmented the revenues of the University of Helmstadt, and added to its library. He built the arsenal at Wolfenbuttel, and renewed the pedestal of the Lion of Brunswick, which had been erected in the great square of that city, by his ancestor Henry. The rest of his life belongs to general history, and as such will find its place in our subsequent pages. Christian, Christian of Wolfenthe brother of Frederick, and Bishop of Halberstadt, is also a public character; but Christopher, their younger brother, is one of whom we have neither public nor private annals, and we only know that he was employed in the Danish service, and killed in battle about the year 1626. buttel. Christopher. The long-gathering tempest had now burst Affairs of Bohemia forth in Bohemia; the Emperor's ministers had been tossed from the windows of the senate house of Prague, and the imperial authorities, in a great measure, driven from the kingdom. The eloquence of Count De la Tour, a nobleman of Moravia, had roused the energies of the people, and inflamed their patriotism, while the military skill of Ernest, Count of Mansfeldt, was BOOK X. A.D. 1618. employed to discipline their armies; but it was not till after the death of the Emperor Matthias, that the parties ceased to negotiate with the head of the empire. Ferdinand had been forced upon them by the Catholics, and the influence of his party, even during the lifetime of his cousin, had been too severely felt, to admit of any compromise, when he had the supreme power in his own hands. The states of Bohemia, therefore, declared their throne vacant; and as they held it to have been elective, from the first establishment of their moThe Elector Pala- narchy, they made choice of the Elector Palatine, Frederick V., to succeed Matthias. tine made king: It was the influence of the Count De la Tour that determined the states to make this choice; and although his motives may have been more personal than was consistent with his avowed patriotism, their preference of Frederick was justified by many concurrent circumstances. that His hereditary dominions were extensive, and in a state of great prosperity; his alliance with England, even then considered the most powerful state in Europe; his rank in the Protestant union, and well known public and private virtues, were all such as to entitle him |