Page:The life & times of Master John Hus by Count Lützow.djvu/376

 but among whom were some of the most powerful nobles, also formed a confederacy whose members pledged themselves to continue obedient to the universal church and to the council.

Sigismund at this moment displayed a great literary activity, perhaps still hoping to avert war with Bohemia. He had left Constance for a time and proceeded to Paris, from where he sent two letters to Bohemia, both dated March 21, 1416. The one was addressed to the utraquist nobles. As communion in the two kinds was one of the principal tenets of the national party in Bohemia, they began at this time to be generally known as utraquists. The letter certainly bears witness to the excessive perfidy and falseness of Sigismund, on which most historians have not laid sufficient stress. Sigismund began by stating that he deeply regretted that the nobles had acted in opposition to the authority of his dearly beloved brother Venceslas, who could not approve of a confederation among the nobles of his realm formed without his consent. He further declared that had Hus not arrived at Constance before him, but appeared in his train, matters might have turned out differently. This statement can hardly have greatly impressed the Bohemians, who knew that next to the Bishop of Litomysl and the spies in his pay, no one was more responsible for the execution of Hus than Sigismund himself. Sigismund’s words overheard by Mladenovic stating that even should Hus recant, he should not be allowed to return to his country, had already become widely known. The King of Hungary ended his letter by informing the Bohemians that as even the princes who had previously adhered to Peter de Luna (Benedict XIII.) now recognised the authority of the council, Bohemia would incur great danger, should its representatives venture to resist the entire power and authority of the Roman Church. On the same day Sigismund addressed a letter to the Romanist nobles of Bohemia, and particularly to Conrad,