Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 5.djvu/429

Rh EMPEROR.] CHARLES V. 417 evening of their days in religious exercises. On his return from the unhappy expedition against Algiers his suke remarked the impression made on him by the quiet simplicity of the monastic life. In 1542, the secret had been confided to Francisco Borja, afterwards famous in the Society of Jesus. Now when he had been thwarted in his dearest schemes, obliged to renounce all pretension to control the religious movement in Germany, and foiled in a great attempt to recover an imperial city treacherously seized by his bitterest foes, and when the last great effort of his statesmanship depended on the life of a sickly woman, it is no wonder that he proceeded to carry his plan into execu tion. But beyond a doubt the great reason for finally adopting the resolution to abdicate was his feeble health. The vigour which in his younger days had fitted him so well for the chase, the tournament, and the battle-field, was already completely undermined by incessant labour and anxiety, by repeated attacks of gout, and, it must be added, by the most extraordinary excess at table. In 1554 he transferred the crown of Naples to his son Philip, in order that Philip might marry Mary of England on equal terms. Next year, on the 25th of October, the States of the Nether lands were assembled at Brussels to receive a formal abdication of those provinces. Supported by a crutch on the right hand, the left leaning on the shoulder of the young prince of Orange, afterwards renowned as the liberator of Holland, Charles recounted the many journeys he had made an:l the long and arduous labours he had undergone in the service of his people ; he intimated that the state of his health now required that he should transfer the cares of government to his young son, whom he introduced to the assembly ; and, exhorting them to adhere stedfastly to the Catholic faith, requested their forgiveness of all the errors committed during his reign. The assembly, full of the ancient spirit of reverent loyalty, and struck by the marvellous spectacle of the highest earthly power voluntarily divesting itself of its majesty and descending into obscurity before the natural time, burst into tears and sobs. The emperor himself, as he sunk exhausted in his chair, wept like a child. The same year Charles intimated to his brother Ferdinand his determination to resign the imperial dignity ; but owing to the tedious formalities of the empire, and the objections of Ferdinand, it was not till 1558 that the process of abdication was completed. In the beginning of 1556 he formally laid down the crown of Spain. After he had thus relieved himself of the responsibilities of government, Charles sailed from Flushing on the 17th September for a climate better suited to his broken health. He landed at Laredo in Spain on the 28th, and in the beginning of February of next year finally settled at Yuste, a Hieronymite monastery in the north of Estremadura. It stood in a pleasant and genial valley, protected from the north wind by a range of mountains. He had selected the spot some time before, and had caused a house to be built for his reception adjoining the monastery. Here he stayed till his death, a period of one year and eight months nearly. His life in retirement, so erroneously painted by Robertson, has been described with great minuteness by many recent historians of great ability. The romance in which it has been enveloped has been done away, and his character appears in unborrowed and somewhat prosaic reality. It is tru^ that he devoted much, of his time to religious exercises ; for it was not to be expected that a prince, who had not allowed a single day to pass since the age of twenty-one without spending a portion of it in inward prayer, would intermit the practice in his declining years, and during a retreat chosen for the purpose. He spent much of his leisure in gratifying his mechanical tastes, but so far was he from learning the principle of toleration from the impossibility of making two watches go exactly alike, that he exhorted his children, in the most urgent manner, to destroy heresy with fire and sword. He still delighted in the converse of learned and experienced men, but instead of entertaining them familiarly at table he maintained the stately Castilian etiquette of dining alone, only once deigning to partake of the meal of the friars, whom he con tinued to respect as much as ever. The simplicity of his table especially is a mere imagination. So long as he was tolerably well he kept his dependents in continual anxiety to have it well furnished with those pernicious dainties which had contributed to ruin his health, and this was only equalled by the anxiety of his medical and other advisers, when excess had brought about its natural consequences. His retirement certainly delivered him from the necessity of moving in a prescribed line of anxious duty and responsibility, but his own sympathy with public affairs, and the emergencies in which Philip found himself in con sequence of a new combination of the French, the Turks, and tLe Pope, obliged him to come forward with his advice, which was always attended to with the utmost deference, and in financial matters, with his active help. The couriers despatched to Yuste found him keenly alive to all the vicissitudes of good and evil fortune which his empire was still destined to experience. The brilliant, but somewhat barren victories of St Quentin and Graveliues, the extra ordinary peace concluded by Philip with the Pope, the loss of Calais and Thionville, the advance of the Turkish fleet to the coast of Spain, and the much-desired but never to- be-fulfilled hope of Mary of England, that God might give her a child for the good of the church all these matters interested him as much as when he was the moving spirit of European politics. The soft air of Yuste and the easy way of life he led had for some time a most beneficial effect on his health. He became stronger than he had been. But his gout, and above all his injudicious diet, still rendered him an invalid. He could not ride, nor could he walk much, but was usually carried about in a chair, and delighted to enjoy the warm air under the shade of the trees of the monastery. At length, during the month of August 1558, serious symptoms began to show themselves, and it was remarked that his mind dwelt more than ever on the religious ceremonies prescribed by the church for the souls of the dead. The Hieronymite chroniclers relate that he even caused his own obsequies to be performed before his death. There are a good many difficulties in the way of accepting their narrative ; but Sir W. Stirling Maxwell and Prescott are both disposed to believe that his funeral service was in some form celebrated during his life. The same day, the 30th August, he felt considerably worse. In a little time his ailment took the form of fever, of which he expired at two o clock in the morning. of the 21st September (1558). He died the death of a good Catholic, earnestly commending his soul to God according to all the forms observed by the church. He was interred in the monastery ; but after the completion of the Escorial by Philip, his remains were removed thither, where they were again laid to rest by the side of his dearly beloved and much regretted Isabella. An important point in the codicil to his will, executed some days before his decease, must be mentioned for the light it throws on the character of Charles and on the subsequent history of Europe. In the very year of his death the most conclusive proof had been given of the influence of Luther s teaching even at the court and round the throne of Spain. At the time of this alarming dis closure Charles had urged the severest measures for the extinction of heresy, and now in this codicil he enjoined his son in the solemnest manner to root it out. Thus the last energies of the emperor were spent in consecrating that V. 53