§ 45. HUSS AT CONSTANCE. 385
views in practice by continuing to preach in spite of repeated sentences of excommunication, and attacking the pope's right to call a crusade. If the Church be the company of the elect, as Huss maintained, then God rules in His people and they are sovereign. With such assertions, the teachings of Thomas Aquinas were set aside.
The enlightened group of men who shared the spirit of Gerson and D'Ailly did not comprehend Wycliffism, for Wycliffisra was a revolt against an alleged divine institution, the visible Church. Gerson denied that the appeal to conscience was an excuse for refusing to submit to ecclesiastical authority. Faith, with him, was agreement with the Church's system. The chancellor not only voted for Huss' condemnation, but declared he had busily worked to bring the sentence about. Nineteen articles he drew from Huss' work on the Church, he pronounced " notoriously heretical." However, at a later time, in a huff over the leniency shown to Jean Petit, he stated that if Huss had been given an advocate, he would never have been convicted.^
In starting out for Constance, Huss knew well the punishment appointed for heretics. The amazing thing is that he should ever have thought it possible to clear himself by a public address before the council. In view of the procedure of the Inquisition, the council showed him unheard-of consideration in allowing him to appear in the cathedral. This was done out of regard for Sigismund, who was on the eve of his journey to Spain to induce Benedict of Luna to abdicate. ^
As for the safe-conduct — salvo-conductus — issued by Sigismund, all that can be said is that a king did not keep his word. He was more concerned to be regarded as the patron of a great council than to protect a Bohemian preacher, his future subject. Writing with reference to the solemn pledge, Huss said, " Christ deceives no man by a safe-conduct. What he pledges he fulfils. Sigismund has acted deceitfully throughout. " ^ The plea,
1 Schwab, pp. 588-599, 600. On the whole subject of Huss' views Schwab has excellent remarks, p. 596 sqq.
2 See Workman : Age of Hus, pp. 284, 293, 364, and Wylie, p. 175 sqq. 8 Workman : Hus'' Letters, p. 269 sq.
2c
386 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1294-1517.
often made, that the king had no intention of giving Huss an unconditional pledge of protection, is in the face of the documentary evidence. In September, 1415, the Council of Constance took formal notice of the criticisms floating about that in Huss' execution a solemn promise had been broken, and announced that no brief of safe-conduct in the case of a heretic is binding. No pledge is to be observed which is jprejudiciaLto the Catholic faith and ecclesiastical jurisdiction. ^
The safe-conduct was in the ordinary form, addressed to all theprincesand subjects of the empire, ecclesiastical and secular, and informing them that Huss should be allowed to pass, remain and return without impediment. Jerome, according to the sentence passed upon him by the council, declared that the safe-conduct had been grossly violated, and when, in 1433, the legates of the Council of Basel attempted to throw the responsibility for Huss' condemnation on false witnesses, so called, Rokyzana asked how the Council of Constance could have been moved by the Holy Ghost if it were controlled by perjurers, and showed that the violation of the safe-conduct had not been forgotten. When the Bohemian deputies a year earlier had come to Basel, they demanded the most carefully prepared briefs of safe-conduct from the Council of Basel, the cities of Eger and Basel and from Sigismund and others. Frederick of Brandenburg and John of Bavaria agreed to furnish troops to protect the Hussites on their way to Basel, at Basel, and on their journey home. A hundred and six years later, Luther profited by Huss' misfortune when he recalled Sigismund's perfidy, perfidy which the papal system of the 16th century would have repeated, had Charles V. given his consent. ^
In a real sense, Huss was the precursor of the Ileformatioii. It is true, the prophecy was wrongly ascribed to him, "To-day you roast a goose — Huss — but a hundred years from now a swan will arise out of my aslies which you shall not roast." Unknown to contemporary writers, it probably originated after
1 Mansi, XXVII. 791, 799. Also Mirbt, p. 156. Lea, Inquisition, II. p. 462 sqq., has an excellent statement of the whole question of Huss' safe-conduct.
2 Luther declared that a safe-conduct promised to the devil must be kept. See Kdstlin, i»f. Luther, I. 352.