intoxication of success, and justice in the plenitude of power. It may
be doubted whether, had he lived longer, he would still have deserved
the tears which Germany shed over his grave, or maintained his title to
the admiration with which posterity regards him, as the first and only
JUST conqueror that the world has produced. The untimely fall of their
great leader seemed to threaten the ruin of his party; but to the Power
which rules the world, no loss of a single man is irreparable. As the
helm of war dropped from the hand of the falling hero, it was seized by
two great statesmen, Oxenstiern and Richelieu. Destiny still pursued
its relentless course, and for full sixteen years longer the flames of
war blazed over the ashes of the long-forgotten king and soldier.

I may now be permitted to take a cursory retrospect of Gustavus Adolphus
in his victorious career; glance at the scene in which he alone was the
great actor; and then, when Austria becomes reduced to extremity by the
successes of the Swedes, and by a series of disasters is driven to the
most humiliating and desperate expedients, to return to the history of
the Emperor.

As soon as the plan of operations had been concerted at Halle, between
the King of Sweden and the Elector of Saxony; as soon as the alliance
had been concluded with the neighbouring princes of Weimar and Anhalt,
and preparations made for the recovery of the bishopric of Magdeburg,
the king began his march into the empire. He had here no despicable foe
to contend with. Within the empire, the Emperor was still powerful;
throughout Franconia, Swabia, and the Palatinate, imperial garrisons
were posted, with whom the possession of every place of importance must
be disputed sword in hand. On the Rhine he was opposed by the
Spaniards, who had overrun the territory of the banished Elector
Palatine, seized all its strong places, and would everywhere dispute