Page:The life & times of Master John Hus by Count Lützow.djvu/139

 believed to be sacred. The citizens indeed proved this a few years later by their splendid defence of the capital when it was attacked by an army of so-called crusaders, gathered together from all parts of Europe. It must also be stated that the continued residence of German students in Prague would at this period, in any case, have proved an impossibility. Overbearing as German students have shown themselves in that city, not only in the fifteenth century, their presence would have led to constant conflicts. Even the German citizens were somewhat later obliged to leave Prague, as the Praguers not unnaturally feared the presence of enemies in their camp. There was at that period of excitement no room within the walls of Prague for upholders of German supremacy and of the extreme claims of the Roman hierarchy.

As regards the university, it cannot be truthfully said that it lost its importance by becoming a national one. Indeed it became, as will be mentioned later, after the death of Hus, for a time the supreme authority in Bohemia on matters of religion, as most of the higher members of the Bohemian clergy were opposed to the cause of church-reform. The downfall of the University of Prague belongs to a far later period, that which followed the battle of the Bila Hora (White Mountain). 2em