At the death of Justinus, the senior bishop of the Moravian Brethren in 1648, Comenius was elected his successor. His new duties made his removal to Lissa necessary, and he took with him the unfinished treatises for the Swedes, and sent them to de Geer as rapidly as he was able to complete them. It caused him no pang of sorrow to sever his connection with the Dutch merchant and the Swedes. For he was isolated at Elbing; his labors were uncongenial, and the remuneration which he received was small. It is apparent from his letters, subsequently written, that it was not merely the Dutchman’s gold that held him to tasks so arduous and uncongenial. He hoped by this connection to secure the moral support of the Swedes in removing from the Moravian Brethren the ban which exiled them from their beloved fatherland. The treaty of Westphalia, however, shattered this hope. There was not a single stipulation in favor of the exiled brethren. The promises Sweden had made to Comenius in this matter were disregarded. In vain he implored Oxenstiern not to forsake his people. “My people have aided your arms with their weapons, the unceasing offerings of their tears and supplications to God; and now, when they see your success and may rejoice in the hope for a more favorable issue of affairs, they are troubled with dread apprehension lest they should be forsaken.” Later he wrote him: “Of what use is it to us, who are now deprived of every hope of peace, to have assisted you with our tears in obtaining victory; when, although it lay within your power to release us from our prison-house, you surrender us anew into the hands of our oppressors? Of what avail now all those holy evangelical alliances formed by our ancestors, and consecrated with their sacred martyr-blood?”[21] But these importunities were of no avail; for, while equal privileges were granted to the Reformed, Lutheran, and Catholic churches in Germany, in Bohemia, and Moravia, the ritual of the latter alone was established. It was a severe blow to Comenius, as well as to the whole brotherhood of the Moravian Church. The years 1648 to 1650 were passed in ministrations to the dispersed brethren;[22] he was especially conscientious in the discharge of the duties of his episcopal office; he established more intimate relations between the Polish and Hungarian branches of the Moravian churches; he sought and secured important financial aid for the brotherhood in England, Holland, and Sweden; he secured positions as teachers for many of his exiled countrymen; and induced the University of Oxford to create stipends for Bohemian students. Gindely remarks that at this period there were few European countries in which the protégés of Comenius could not be found in the capacity of private tutors, public school-teachers, artists, or clergymen.