It might be expected, perhaps, that all this stirring of thought and life would be favourable to the revival of civic and religious liberty; and some of the men who were eminent in the literature and art of the time did take an active part in the struggles at the beginning of the seventeenth century. But a power had arisen in Bohemia, which continued steadily to gain ground during the reign of Rudolf, that could turn even literature and art into the cause of opposition to reform. This was the Order of the Jesuits, which, since the time of Ferdinand, had been steadily gaining ground in Bohemia. They eagerly seized upon the literary and artistic revival, and made use of it for their own purposes. George Bartold Pontanus, one of the poets who were crowned by Rudolf, fell into the hands of the Jesuits, and became one of their most eloquent preachers. William of Rosenberg, who was a great patron of the Order, founded an institution for poor scholars, which must have greatly forwarded the Catholic reaction. Even students of languages, and men engaged in foreign discoveries, were made use of by the Order. Moreover their great power then, as ever, was through the education of children. Many of these came from the poorest ranks, and were educated gratuitously by the Jesuits; and, through them, an influence was prepared which it was very difficult to resist. But the Jesuits were intended by Ignatius Loyola to be, before everything, a fighting body; and, as they looked round on the forces opposed to them in Bohemia, they speedily marked the Bohemian Brotherhood as the foemen most worthy of their steel.