§ 47. THE HUSSITES. 399
blank. Matthias chose one of the printed ballots.^ Matthias, in turn, ordained Thomas and Elias bishops, men who had drawn the other two printed ballots.
By 1500, the Bohemian Brethren numbered 200,000 scattered in 300 or 400 congregations in Bohemia and Moravia. They had their own confession, catechism and hymnology.^ Of the 60 Bohemian books printed 1500-1510, 50 are said to have been by members of the sect. A new period in their history was introduced by Lucas of Prag, d. 1528, a voluminous writer. He gave explanations of the Brethren's doctrine of the Lord's Supper to Luther. Brethren, including Michael Weiss, the hymnwriter, visited the German Reformer, and in 1521 he had in his possession their catechism.
The merciless persecutions of the Brethren and the other remaining Hussite sectarists were opened under the Austrian rule of Ferdinand I. in 1549, and continued, with interruptions, till the Thirty Years' War when, under inspiration of the Jesuits, the government resorted to measures memorable for their heartlessness to blot out heresy from Bohemia and Moravia.
Tlie„Church of the Brethren had a remarkable resurrection ill the Moravians, starting with the settlement of Christian David and other Hussite families in 1722 on land given by Count Zinzendorf ac Herrnhut. They preserve the venerable name of their spiritual ancestry, Unitas Fratrum^ and they have made good their heritage by their missionary labors which have carried the Gospel to the remotest ends of the earth, from Greenland to the West Indies and Guiana, and from the leper colony of Jerusalem to Thibet and Australia. In our own land, David Zeisbererer and other Moravian missionaries have shown in their labors among the Indian tribes the godly devotion of John Huss, whose body the flames at Constance were able to destroy, but not his sacred memory and influence.
1 See GoU, p. 87, and the letter to Rokyzana, whose nephew Gregory belonged to the Lititz colony, p. 92. Of the consecration of Michael by Stephen there is no doubt. There is some uncertainty about the details.
2 See MuUer's art. on Bohemian Hymnody in Julian's Dicty.
CHAPTER VI.
THE LAST POPES OF THE MIDDLE AGES. 1447-1521
§ 48. Literature and General Survey.
Works on the Entire Chapter. — Bitllarium, ed. by Tomasetti, 5 vols., Turin, 1859 sq. — Mansi : Councils, XXXI., XXXII. — Muratori : Berum ital. scriptores. Gives Lives of the popes. — Stefano Infessura : Diario della citta di Roma, ed. by O. Tommasini, Rome, 1890. Extends to 1494, and is the journal of an eye-witness. Also in Muratori. — Joh. Blrchard : Diariumsive rerumiirbanarumcoinmentarii, 1483-1506, ed. by L. Thuasne, 3 vols., Paris, 1883-1885. Also in Muratori. — B. Platina, b. 1421 in Cremona, d. as superintendent of the Vatican libr., 1481 : Lives of the Popes to the Death of Paul II., 1st Lat. ed., Venice, 1479, Engl, trans, by W. Benham in Anc. and Mod. Libr. of Theol. No date. — Sigismondo dei Conti ua Fomgno : Le storie de stioi tempi 1475-1510, 2 vols., Rome, 1883. Lat. and Ital. texts in parallel columns. — Pastor: Ungedruekte Akten zur Gesch. der Pdpste, vol. I., 1376-1404, Freiburg, 1904. — Ranke: Hist, of the Popes. — A. von Reumont : Gesch. d. Stadt Rom., vol. III., Berlin, 1870. — *Manuell Creighton, bp. of London: Hist, of the Papacy during the Period of the Reformation, II. 235-IV., London, 1887. — * Gregorovius : Hist. of the City of Rome, Engl, trans., VII., VIII. — *L. Pastor, R. Cath. Prof. at Innsbruck: Gesch. der Pcipste im Zeitalter der Renaissance, 4 vols., Freiburg, 1886-1900, 4th ed., 1901-1906, Engl, trans. F. I. Ambrosius, etc., 8 vols., 1908. — Wattenbach : Gesch. des r'om. Papstthums, 2d ed., Berlin, 1876, pp. 284-300. — Hkfele-Hergenrother : Conciliengeschichte, VIII. Hergenrother's continuation of Hefele's work falls far below the previous vols. by Hefele's own hand as rev. by Knupfler. — The Ch. Ilistt. of Hergen- RoTHER-KiRscH, Hefele, Funk, Karl Muller. — II. TiuRSTON : The Holy Year of Jubilee. An Account of the Hist, and Ceremonial of the Rom. .Jubilee, London, 1900. — Pertinent artt. in Wetzer-Welte and Herzog. — The Histt. of the Renaissance of Birckhaudt and Svmonds. — For fuller lit., see the extensive lists prefixed to Pa.stor's first three vols, and for a judicious estimate of the contemporary writers, see Creighton at the close of his vols.
Note. — The works of Creighton, Gregorovius and Pastor are very full. It is doubtful whether any period of history has been treated so thoroughly and satisfactorily by three contemporary historians. Pastor and Gregorovius have used new documents discovered by themselves in the archives of Mantua, Milan, Modena, Florence, the Vatican, etc. Pastor's notes are vols, of erudite investigation. Creighton is judicial but inclined to be too