CHAPTER VI. Wealth of the clergy- The Reformation in The brothers Petri Discussions Financial difficulties Translation of the The Anabaptists - Judicious conduct of Gustavus Deposition of the Bishops of Vesterås and Upsala Their attempts to produce a rebellion in the Dales The King's letter to the Dean of Upsala His address to the Dalesmen Trial and execution of the deposed Bishops - Banishment of Archbishop Johannes Magnus. GUSTAVUS was reminded at the very beginning of his reign that one of its chief difficulties would be financial. On the day of his election a deputation from Lubeck pressed for the immediate payment of their debt, and, when time was asked, would grant it only on the following hard conditions. That Sweden should conclude no treaty, either with Christian or any other power, without the Lubeckers' consent; that at the surrender of Stockholm and Calmar all goods, which the Lubeck and Dantzic merchants should claim upon oath, should be restored to them ; that the wares of the same cities should be admitted free of duty, and the whole foreign trade of Sweden be confined to the Hanse towns.1 The necessities of the King obliged him to accede to this intolerable treaty. To pay off the debt and 1 Tegel, 1523. The treaty is dated "Strengness, Wednesday after octav. Corporis Christi, 1523." CHAP. VI. FINANCIAL DIFFICULTIES. 107 to satisfy the German troops there was imposed at the same congress a tax in silver to be levied throughout the kingdom. A scale of fees also to be paid into the treasury upon the granting of fiefs, the appointment to offices, the collations to benefices, &c., was now settled.1 On the 29th of June following the King wrote from Stockholm respecting the collection of the silver tax in the following terms :-" We hope, dear Dannemen, that you are able thoroughly to estimate the great outlays and expenses which have hung upon us since we became Regent, and which, almost all, will still hang upon us until, as we are now meditating, we shall have got rid of the Lubeck soldiers, who will not be content with little, and more especially not with the Klippingar which, from pure necessity, are struck here in the kingdom. Moreover it is demanded of us to send out, with the Lubeckers, payment for the ships and munitions which we purchased for the protection of the kingdom, so that we on these accounts are compelled to borrow of churches and monasteries, both here and elsewhere. We therefore enjoin you without delay to search in your churches and monasteries, both in the town and in the adjoining country, and observe what can best be spared, and select therefrom the valuables-to wit, the monstrances, the chalices, or whatever else of the kind there may be and also any coin which may come to hand, and send them here by a sure Tegel, 1523. messenger without any delay or negligence. When we have received the same and know the amount, we will give an acknowledgment, so that the debt may be duly repaid, when we and the state shall be in better circumstances." All these measures were too little for the necessities of the state. The silver raised from the Church was expended chiefly in the pay of the army. The debt to Lubeck of 68,681 Lubeck mares for war munitions, exclusive of 8609 for money advanced, remained still unpaid. A fresh debt was incurred for the reduction of Finland and for the Gothland expedition. Moreover the yearly expenses of the kingdom after the restoration of peace were 60,000 marcs annually, while the income was only 24,000. The balance-sheet, therefore, was the more unsatisfactory, that there appeared no prospect of liquidating, but rather of increasing the debt. The population generally was too much impoverished by long-continued disturbances to bear the new imposts required for the defence of the kingdom and the discharge of its outstanding obligations. The only classes which still remained comparatively wealthy were the ecclesiastics. To them belonged two-thirds of the lands of the whole realm. It seemed just that these should contribute, in proportion to their ability, and to the protection which they enjoyed, for the maintenance and defence of the commonwealth. == It 1 Stockholm, 29 June, 1523; R. R., fol. 126; vol. i. p. 1; Thyselii. 2 Reckoning the Lubeck mark 2 Swedish marks nearly, the debt may be estimated in round numbers at 14,0007. See Appendix. CHAP. VI. HIS DISTRUST OF POPERY. 109 seemed unreasonable and impolitic that so large a share of the wealth of the kingdom should be devoted nominally to religious uses, but in a great part to uses questionable, and in some part to uses evidently bad. Gustavus felt this keenly, for he was not only personally displeased with the Papal See for having connived at Christian's impunity, and attempted to intrude Francisco de Potentia, a foreigner who had been a party to that escape, into the bishopric of Skara,' but his very faith in Popery had been shaken. He suspected it to be in theory as much opposed to the truth and simplicity of the Gospel, as in practice it was detrimental to the interests of the state. suspicion was, in the progress of his inquiries, more and more confirmed. In working, therefore, for its overthrow he obeyed only the convictions of his reason and conscience. But it was in the spirit of an able and not over-scrupulous statesman, rather than with the simplicity of an Apostle, that he began and carried on the work of the Reformation, till he This In his letter to Cardinal L. Campegia, Calmar, 24th May, 1524, he scarcely conceals his feelings :-"In summa tamen id pro responso habere placeat, nos alienigenas ad ecclesias regnorum nostrorum non æquo animo admissuros dum indigenas de quorum dexteritate experti sumus non paucos habeamus. Existimamus etiam ad vestram notitiam indubie pervenisse, quantum injuriæ passa est ecclesia Scarensis, quando sanctissimus ejus pastor Vincentius gladio Sevissimi Christierni Danorum regis absumptus est, quæ profecto parum consolationis a sede Romanâ reportaret, si, contra votum eorum, quorum interest, aliquis illi Episcopus præficeretur, et maxime Franciscus iste, qui, in legatione suâ ad Daciam satis (nisi dissimulare voluerit) intellexerat quam tyrannice crudelissimeque cum eâdem ecclesià actum est."-R. R., fol. 193; Thys., vol. i. p. 3. brought it, step by step, to its successful close. Two brothers, Olaus and Laurentius Petri, courageous and earnest men, had led the way in this enterprise. They were the sons of a smith at Örebro, had studied with great distinction at Wittemburg under Luther and Melanchthon, and been encouraged by them to return and evangelize their native land. They arrived in Sweden in 1519. In 1520 Olaus was made canon of Strengness, and both soon began to preach in secret against indulgences, vows of celibacy, the worship of saints and images, prayer for the dead, auricular confession, and the power of the Pope.2 On the first of these topics, the impudence and rapacity of Arcemboldi, the Pope's legate, who in Denmark and Sweden had lately been rivalling his colleague Tetzel in Germany, afforded the most palpable marks for invective. For a small sum of money, in addition to a certain number of Aves and Paternosters, this man, "by the authority (as he ex pressed it) of our Saviour and of his blessed Apostles St. Peter and St. Paul and of his Holiness the Pope, gave a plenary indulgence for all sins, remitted all the pains of purgatory, restored to the sacraments, to the unity of the faithful, to the purity and innocence of baptismal grace, so that at death the gates of 1 Messenius writes in 1523,-"Hoc, præcedenti, ac sequentibus annis immensis Clerum, Sueciæque emunxit Ecclesias opibus, sub prætextu militi potissimum et Lubecensibus solvendi, extortis, solutione promissâ; verum ad Græcas numeranda Calendas."-Scond. Illust., tom. v. p. 14. 2 Tegel, 1524. |