Page:Edvard Beneš – Bohemia's case for independence.pdf/33

Rh best sons, amongst others, Comenius and members of the Unity of Bohemian Brethren, abandoned by their allies, were obliged to take refuge for ever in exile. Ferdinand III., the successor of Ferdinand II., continued the persecution with even greater harshness; he increased the confiscations, and forced the best of the Czechs to leave their native land.

The Habsburg victors, determined to assure their power over the Czechs, who were ever ready to revolt, succeeded admirably. They banished nearly the whole of the population capable of resistance, and tried to exterminate the rest. They destroyed all Czech books, and persecuted without mercy all patriots who tried to defend Czech traditions. Their cold, calculating methods of destroying the Czech civilisation were only too successful.

One hundred and twenty years after the establishment of the New Constitution, when Maria Therese accomplished a last coup d'état against the Constitution of the kingdom of Bohemia, the Czech nation had almost ceased to exist.

Such was the work of the first Habsburgs in Bohemia.

Let us now consider the second phase in their fight against the Czechs.

The successors of Ferdinand III. had only to continue the work of their predecessors: the