Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 2.djvu/483

Rh mians in case of any unredressed violation of the pledge. These pre- cautions were superfluous, for the envoys had at their back the terrible Bohemian levies which could enforce respect for plighted faith; but when reconciliation had taken place and Sigismund was seated on the throne of his fathers, his guarantees were again re- garded as valueless. In April, 1437, he urged John Rokyzana to visit the council, and on the latter alleging fear that he might be treated as was Huss at Constance, the emperor was greatly moved and exclaimed, “Do you think that for you or for this city I would do aught against mine honor? I have given a safe-conduct and so also has the council;” but Rokyzana was not to be tempted by this appeal to the forfeited imperial honor, and steadfastly refused to go.*

The explanation of the controversy over the violation of the safe-conduct is perfectly simple. Germany and especially Bohemia knew so little about the Inquisition and the systematic persecution of heresy that surprise and indignation were excited by the appli- cation to the case of Huss of the recognized principles of the canon law. The council could not have done otherwise than it did with- out surrendering those principles. To allow a heresiarch who had become conspicuous to all Christendom, like Huss, to evade the punishment due to his crimes on so flimsy a pretext as that of his having confided himself to them on a promise of safety to which the public faith was pledged, would have seemed to the most con- scientious jurists of the council the most absurd of solecisms. In point of fact, the best men who were there—the Gersons, the Peter d’Aillys, the Zabarellas—were as unflinching as the worst creatures of the curia. It had been, as we have seen, too long a principle of inquisitorial practice that the heretic had no rights,

Johann Hus u. König Sigmund, p. 138.— Palacky Documenta, 541, 543, 546–53.— Jo.Hus Epistt. xxxiii., liv., lix., Ix. (Monument. I. 68-9, 74-77).— Mladenovic Relat. (Palacky,p.314-15).— Narr. Hist. de Condemnatione (Monument. II. 346 a; Von der Hardt IV.393). — Ægid. Carlerii Lib. de Legat. (Monument. Concil. Gen. Sæc. XV. Tom. I. p. 435).— Martene Ampl. Coll. VIII. 174-6, 179-83.-Jo. de Turonis Reges- trum (Monument. Con. Gen. Sæc. XV. T. I. p. 860).
 * Von der Hardt IV. 32, 311-13,329. — Martene Thesaur. II. 1611. — Berger,

The incident of Sigismund's blush has been disputed by some recent writers. It is a matter not worth controversy, but as the only evidence to his credit in the whole affair it may be hoped to be true.