Page:Sienkiewicz - The knights of the cross.djvu/18

viii practical. But when the road to the East was barred by Polish victory there was no way for Germany to meet Rome but with obedience or a new religion; hence the German Reformation. Luther himself declared that he could not have succeeded had Huss not lived before him. Huss gave the intellectual experience needed by the Germans while Polish victory threw them back upon Germany and thus forced the issue between Roman and German tendencies.

The history ending at Tannenberg is of profound interest, whether we consider the objects sought for on each side, or the details involved in the policy and the acts, diplomatic and military, of the two opposing forces.

The struggle between German and Slav began long before the Knights of the Cross were in existence. Originating in earlier ages in what undoubtedly was mere race opposition, it grew envenomed at the beginning of the ninth century, after the restoration, or more correctly, perhaps, after the creation of the Western Empire in 800, in the person of Charlemagne. This new Roman Empire was German; there was little of Roman in it save the claim to universal dominion. This pretension to empire was reinforced greatly by association with the Church, whose unbending resolve it was to bring all men to the doctrine of Christ, that is, to bring them within its own fold and jurisdiction.

The position of peoples outside the Empire and the Church, that is, people independent and not Christian, who refused the rule of the Empire and the teachings of the Church, was that of rebels against Imperial authority, and dupes of Satan.

The position was aggravated intensely by the fact that those peoples were forced to accept political subjection and the new religion together. Political subjection meant that the subordinated race went into contempt and inferiority, was thrust down to a servile condition;