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212 Acknowledgment of the new
king by the estates. HISTORY OF THE SWFDES. Effects of the hereditary
settlement. [IGII
—
The old king, in nominating his elder son grand
duke of Finland and duke of Estland, acted not
without a particular view. The council had declared
in the statute of Calmar tluit these territories should
never be made the duchies of a Swedish prince ;
probably because during the contests of the royal
family, they were moi-e than once in danger of
being severed from the kingdom. Charles on the
other hand chose this very region to be titular for
Gustavus Adolphus, j)lacing him as if upon a fore-
post against Russia and Poland ; and as he likewise
actually conferred upon him Westmanland, and
gave to his younger son his own former duchy of
Suthennanlandj Nerike, and Vermehvnd, he there-
by i)lanted the power of his house in the heart of
the land. This he did with a fair view to his
future security. For, despite the hereditary settle-
ment of Norrkdping, the succession was uncertain,
chiefly from the hesitation of Charles himself, in
other matters so prompt of decision. This marks
the king as the man of all Sweden, who could never
be induced to deny the unftn’feited claims of his
nephew duke John ;
and it is a triumph of generous
policy, to have made these claims innoxious by
acknowledging them. John was throughout treated
as his own son ;
and when Charles crossed into
Livonia in 1605, he was placed in the government.
His instruction was cared for equally with that of
Gustavus Adolphus, and, though he was five years
older, by the same teachers. It was during his
education in the royal household, that the duke
conceived that love for Mary Elizabeth, sister of
Gustavus Adolphus, which, favoui-ed by her parents,
led ultimately to their union. Thus Charles might
venture by his will *
to leave the estates the choice
between John and Gustavus.
Herewiihal, after his father’s death, Gustavus
Adolphus assumed not immediately the I’egal title,
and the kingdom was for two months without a
sovereign. A diet was convened at Nykijping by
the queen dowager and duke John, who meanwhile,
with six lords of the council, managed the ad-
ministration. The estates declared their willmg-
ness to abide by then* former resolutions. Duke
John resigned his claims, receiving an augmenta-
tion of his duchy 2; and both he and the queen
dowager renounced all participation in the govern-
ment; although, accorduig to the hereditary settle-
ment of Norrkoping, and the testament of the
deceased king, it devolved upon them to conduct it,
mitil the successor to the crown had attained the
age of eighteen, and to partake in it, until he
should be four-and-twenty. "On the 10th of De-
cember, 1611," writes Axel Oxenstierna ^,
"
began
the diet of Nykoping, and the first proposition to
the estates was made in the name of the queen,
duke John, and the lords of the council. On the
17th the queen and duke John I’enounced, through
ine, the guardianship and the government, which
they transferred, in presence of the estates, to duke
Gustavus Adolphus. The 26th, duke Gustavus
Adolphus assumed, in presence of the estates, the
government committed to him ; may God grant in
an happy hour !" Gustavus Adolphus took the
of the last War of Sweden, in which are amply described the
Sieges, Combats, Rencounters, and Battles of the Swedes
with the Danes.) Paris, 1622. The author wrote from the
accounts of the French soldiers who had served in Sweden.
’
Drawn up so early as 1605.
2 His principality of East-Gothland and Dalsland was
style of his father; elected King, and hereditary
Pi’ince of the Swedes, Goths, and Vandals. He
was in the first month of his eighteenth year ;
his chancellor, whose words we have just quoted,
was twenty-eight years old *.
Hardly ever did any sovereign receive his do-
minions in a more exhausted condition. Sweden
had enjoyed no peace since the days of Gustavus 1.
If we look back upon its internal state during the
past fifty years, how much of distraction and strife !
Fraternal war, civil war, two kuigs overthrown.
Charles bequeathed to his son a throne blood-
besprent, an.d war with all his neighbours. And if
we cast our glance forvk-ards—war, again war with-
out intermission, during long times to come ! We
have arrived at the moment, when through Gus-
tavus Adolphus the weight of the Swedish arms
was to be felt over the world, and we purpose
devoting in future to the military history that
greater attention which it demands. Yet it seems
expedient that we should first gather into a whole
the occurrences of his domestic administration,
ordinarily little noted, or but in straggling out-
lines, and begin therewith the picture of this
renowned monarch’s reign. It is a foreground
lighted up by the flames of war. But that fame
which may outstand the probing gaze of history,
must possess other claims to the homage of the
afterworld, than the splendour of arms alone.
We begin with what concerns most neai-ly the
constitution itself. The greatest change in this
respect was the hereditary monarchy, and the con-
test which it had called forth was scarcely yet
fought out. This was carried on under circum-
stances which instructively show, how in politics
the phrase of liberty is not always a sure indi-
cation of the presence of its real benefits. Who
can doubt, that in Sweden during the Union this
interest was, in fact, represented by the insurgent
peasants and the lawless power of the Adminis-
trator ? and that, while the magnates employed
all the liberty known to the law of Sweden only to
preserve for the Uuion-kuigs the name, but for
themselves the exercise of power. Gustavus Vasa
stamped legality on revolt, and suppressed it after-
wards ;
but found himself on the instant directly
opposed to that party which so long had used the
cloak of the law for their own advantage. Thus
was the foundation of regal power in Sweden, as
everywhere at the commencement of more modern
history, the work of all-stringent absoluteness ;
and
yet who can deny, that the unity and self-rule of
our native land, which thus was established, was in
very deed the cause of freedom ? Of this the best
proof is, that the principal legal security for the
new order of things, namely, the heritableness of
the crown, was secretly the main object of the
hostility of the magnates, while they had the rights
and freedom of Swedish men upon their tongiies.
With the consolidation by Charles of his father’s
work, men in Sweden seemed to have ascertianed
the dangers of extremts clearly enough to return
to a middle way ; and the royal warranty (konunga-
increased hy four hundreds of West-Gotliland. He obt.iined
permission to exchange the royal hereditary estates situated
in his duchy, and compensation for his claims in right of
inheritance.
3 See his Latin observations in his almanack. Palmskold
MSS. t. 35, 109.
" Born June IC, 1583.
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