Page:The life & times of Master John Hus by Count Lützow.djvu/370

 Prague when his life was menaced there by the Germans, who were determined to destroy the Bethlehem chapel. His difficulty of deciding what course to adopt in this case is shown by many passages of his writings belonging to this period. When, on the other hand, the council demanded that he should recant heretical opinions which he had never held, he refused and calmly and unhesitatingly laid down his life. He well knew that had he himself admitted that he had been a heretic, his life-work for the church and the state of Bohemia would have been undone. Jerome, on the other hand, did not hesitate both at Vienna and at Constance to preserve his life by means that can hardly be called otherwise than dishonourable. When life, or at least the pleasures and interests of life, appeared to vanish, he faced and certainly bravely faced death.