Nevertheless, the Catholic party found full compensation for their failure in Moravia in a specially fierce enforcement of the law just passed in Bohemia. Indeed, the former patrons of the Brotherhood became so much alarmed, that even Kostka forbade the Brothers to hold any further meetings on his estates. In spite of this opposition, the Brothers still maintained their ground, and even extended their preaching further; and but few of them could be persuaded, even by the most cruel tortures, to submit to the authorities of the Church. In 1511 the Brothers hoped, for a short time, to secure the protection of the greatest scholar of the time, Erasmus of Rotterdam. They had heard of some private letters of his, in which he had defended them against the attacks of their enemies; and they now prepared a Defence in Latin, which they sent to him. He thanked them for their communication, and expressed approval of at least part of their defence; but he declined to publish his opinion, on the ground that it would not help them, and might injure his work. So the persecution went on. Even Peter of Rosenberg found himself unable to protect a Brother, in whom he was interested, from being imprisoned and nearly starved to death. He succeeded, indeed, in getting him released before death had actually occurred, and he then urged him to submit to the Church; but the Brother, though almost too exhausted to speak, steadily refused to submit; and he was set free without further persecution. Lukas, who was now the most prominent member of the Brotherhood, succeeded for a long time in escaping the vigilance of his persecutors; but, in 1515, he was treacherously seized under false pretences, brought to Prague, and subjected to the torture. When nothing could be obtained from him by this means, he was set free, on the understanding that he was to appear before the Utraquist Consistory in April, 1516; but in the month before this appearance was to take place King Ladislaus died, and the persecution again slackened for a time. In the meantime, the long absence of the King in Hungary, and the growing sense of his weakness of character, had been producing other divisions in Bohemia which gradually turned men’s minds away from the religious controversies. The wars of the fifteenth century, like all wars, had tended to draw the people away from their ordinary occupations, and to make them dependent on their military leaders. As long as the Taborite organisation lasted, its democratic spirit provided at least some check on the oppressions of the military nobles; and the alliance between the peasants and the Order of Knights, to which Z̆iz̆ka had belonged, counteracted any advantages which the nobles might have gained by their military prowess. But the fall of Tabor had destroyed any hopes, which the peasantry and townsmen might have had, of strengthening their position through war.