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1654.]
Imminent danger of
civil war. CHRISTINA’S ADMINISTRATION. ^"v’Llorthe’queenirhand!’’’
331)
the needs and rights of the realm; concluding with
the wish, that the nobles who against law and legal
statutes held estates of the crown, might set them-
selves right in the matter, and perceive that they,
after this reclamation now made by (three) estates,
could never acquire any prescriptive or legal title
thereto*."
The high-chancellor, who sought on the part of
the nobility to refute this protest of the unnoble
estates, alleged as his main ai’gument, that they
hereby attacked the royal supremacy, and should
therefore be severely reprimanded. This brought
him into a difficult position, since the queen took
the matter quite otherwise, and it was clear that
this step had not been taken without her good
will.
" Now or never," she said to Terserus ’’.
This bold and active man, professor of theology at
Upsala, was chosen by the inferior clergy in this
diet to be their speaker, after the bishops, who all
sided with the nobility, had separated from the
other representatives of the spiritual order. This
schism between the bishops and the parochial
ministers lasted for six weeks; the former retaining
the hall commonly used for meetings of the order,
the latter deliberating by themselves. The deepest
perturbation filled men’s minds ; yeomen and
bui’gesses vented menaces ;
a civil war seemed at
hand. The most opulent of the nobility began to
place their valuables in security, and to turn their
thoughts towards flight ^. The high-chancellor
remained undismayed. He sat all day ia his
chamber, says a traditional story, and expected
nothing else, each time the door opened, than that
some one should come to take his life ’. The
clergy at last assumed the part of mediators, after
the bishops had coalesced with the others ; which
however was only effected upon condition of their
subsci’ibing the protest concerning the crown es-
tates. Two projects were drawn up with that
view, one by Terserus, the other by Master Nicho-
las, secretai’y to the magistrates of Stockholm.
Both propositions were approved by the queen,
and ultimately combined into a single instrument’,
which was presented to her by the unnoble es-
tates. She received it graciously, but evaded a
•
Compare Essay at a Pragmatic History of the ortier of
Franklins in Sweden.
5 Huic trium ordinum intention!, ut maxime salutari,
magnopere favit regina,
—eos quam severissime monens, ut
in hoc proposito constanter permanerent, identidem illud
ingeminans : aut nunc aut nunqaam. Ortus et Vitse Cursus
Johannis Terser! Dalecarli. MS. in the Nordin Collections.
Tliis ardent-minded man, like Johannes Matthiae, one of a
different character, was afterwards accused by his colleagues
of secret Calvinism, and was by a parity of lot deprived in
1664, under the minority of Charles XI., of his episcopal see
of Abo ; to which the anger he had roused against himself in
the diet of 1650 not a little contributed. Charles XI., in
1671, nominated hira bishop of Linkoeping.
6 Res ad bellum intestinura spectabat, ad quod non rustici
tantum, sed et cives valde erant propensi. E nobilitate
ditissimi quique. coUectis pretiosissimis thesauris, fugani in
tutiora meditabantur. Terserus, 1. c. In the previous year
a rumour to this effect had already reached France. "
Depuis
quinze jours il a couru un bruit a Paris, ce qui me mettoit
fort en peine. On disoit qu’il y avoit gutrre civile en Suede,
sur le sujet du couronnement et du mariage de la Reine."
Du Quesne (formerly a sea-ofi5cer in the Swedish service) to
C.G.Wrangel. Paris, March 5, 1649. C. G. Wrangel’s corre-
spondence.
7 Eric Benzelius, from count Nicholas Bielke’s relation.
declaration of her sentiments as to the main ques-
tion. A controversy had now been excited, whicii
was to lead in the future to deeply penetrating
changes. Christina could but comiuit their issue
to the hand of another. The diet of 1650, the
longest yet known in Sweden, had stretched to the
unheard-of duration of four months.
The prospects of the monarchy inspired just
apprehension. Christina was unmarried, and the
succession to the throne consequently uncertain,
though her hand had been sought by several
princes. Frederic William, elector of Branden-
burg, renewed with this intention in 1G42 the
negotiations which had been commenced in the
time of Gustavus A<1olphus. The guardians re-
turned an evasive answer, and the envoys never
obtained an opportunity of themselves opening
their commission to the young queen, whom the
ministry had at that time conducted on a progress
through her dominions. The popular voice was
for Christina’s cousin, the palsgrave Charles Gus-
tavus, as having been born and educated in
Sweden ;
but the magnates had constantly sought
to keep down the palsgravine family, and Chris-
tina, though she had in childhood promised her
hand to that prince, appeared in maturer age to
have no affection either towards him personally ^,
or the bonds of marriage generally. Meanwhile
she had formed her determination in respect to the
succession, and we shall see that this resolve em-
braced more than at first appeared
—not the tender
merely, but the sacrifice of a crown. Upon the
event of his courtship we may refer to the state-
ment of Charles Gustavus, in a narrative compo.sed
by himself, from which we quote some passages.
"On the evening of the IStli July, 1G48, in the
presence of count IMagnus (de la Gardie), and
bishop Dr. Johannes (Matthiaj)," says the prince,
"the following passed between the qvieen’s majesty
and me. Having signified that I expected a cate-
gorical resolution in respect to the marriage, 1 was
called in by her majesty, who declared jifter some
delay, that she would attest her affection for me
in presence of those two personages, and in the
sight of God, and not by illusory words, but in
in the Anecdota Benzeliana. MS. The statement there
added, however, that Magnus Gabriel de la Gardie had
undertaken, at the queen’s order, to put the chancellor out
of the way, on account of his opposition to the election of
Charles Gustavus as her successor, but that neither de la
Gardie nor count Gustave Gustaveson had courage for the
performance,
—we consider to be groundless.
s Ex anibobus unum composuimus. Terserus, 1. c. Mas-
ter Nicholas, in his Reminiicences of his own Li’e (Upsala
Transactions for 1777, p. 36), states, that the document pre-
sented to the queen was framed by him. " Axel Oxen
stierna," he says,
" bore me no good will, on account of the
public memorial which I had to draw up at the coronation
of queen Christina, by the gracious pleasure of her majesty
and the estates of the realm, for the unanimous petition of
the clergy, burgesses, and peasants, de applicandis et resti-
Uiendis regni bnnis fisco et regi. There were many that
wrote on the same subject, as doctor Jens Terserus, pro-
fessor in Upsala, Magister Jacob Scotus, of the Kopparberg,
and many others ; but after the concept of a memorial by
each of these had been read in the consistory, mine was
approved, and finally presented to queen Christina by the
archbishop doctor Joliannes Lenaeus, the burgomaster (of
Stockholm), and myself."
9 She used to call him "the hurgomasterling," from his
short and thick figure. Mem. for the Hist, of Scand., ix. 128.
z 2
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