Page:The life & times of Master John Hus by Count Lützow.djvu/95

 doubt from his earliest youth was interested in this strife, it was also about this time that he began to brood more seriously over the wrongs of his country. In 1401 Bohemia was invaded by the German troops of the Margrave of Meissen, the ally of Rupert, Elector Palatine, whom the enemies of King Venceslas had elected King of the Romans. These troops ravaged Bohemia in a cruel manner—a fact to which Hus alludes in one of his earliest sermons, preached probably in 1401, in which he also incidentally expatiates on the inferior position which his countrymen occupied in their own country. “The Bohemians,” he said, “are more wretched than dogs or snakes; for a dog defends the couch on which he lies, and if another dog tries to drive him away, he rights with him, and a snake does the same. But us the Germans oppress, seizing all the offices of state, while we are silent. Bohemians in the kingdom of Bohemia, according to all laws, indeed also according to the law of God and according to the natural order of things, should be foremost in all offices in the Bohemian kingdom; thus the French are so in the French kingdom, and the Germans in the German lands. Therefore should a Bohemian rule his own subordinates, and a German German (subordinates). But of what use would it be if a Bohemian, not knowing German, became a priest or a bishop in Germany? He assuredly would be as useful as a dumb dog who cannot bark is to a herd! And equally useless to us Bohemians is a German; and knowing that this (i.e. the rule of Germans over Bohemians) is against God’s law and the regulations, I declare it to be illegal.” The great talents of Hus as a preacher appear to have been from the beginning recognised by his countrymen. In 1401 we already find him preaching at the church of St. Michael by permission of Bernard, a monk of the Zderaz monastery, who was the parish priest of St. Michael’s. Though the monk Bernard was a strong opponent of church-reform, Hus was on terms of friendship with him and often dined at the parsonage.