completed shortly before his death--the features are less rugged, and reveal somewhat more of the sanguine spirit of Maximilian's early days. With the exception of these sketches,[123] Dürer's last commission for Maximilian was the exquisite decoration for the latter's private Gebetbuch (Book of Prayer), of which only ten copies were printed,[124] and which will ever remain one of the gems of artistic and devotional literature. With Dürer's career after 1519 we are not concerned; but it is worthy of notice that his most brilliant work dates from the reign of Maximilian, and that his sympathy with "the nightingale of Wittenberg" seems to have partially diverted his attention from his art. {98} It must not be supposed that Maximilian's humanistic enthusiasms were confined to the three great centres which have just been described, or that he only helped on such movements as were already animated by a vigorous existence and a fair prospect of success. His own hereditary dominions were even more directly indebted to his efforts than were other parts of the Empire. [Illustration: DAS ROSENKRANZFEST. Painting by Dürer, with Kneeling Figure of Maximilian] During the first century of its existence, Vienna University[125] was an autonomous ecclesiastical corporation, over which the methods of the mediaeval Schoolmen held complete sway. But during the long reign of Frederick III., several circumstances combined to cast a blight upon its hitherto flourishing condition. During the Council of Basel it assumed a hostile attitude to the Pope, and its surrender of that position only emphasised its folly; while in the struggle of Frederick and his brother Albert the professors were unwise enough to dabble in politics and thus to throw off the immunity which guarded their proper sphere. Their open sympathy with Albert was fatal to a good understanding with Frederick, who never showed any favour to their body. Vienna further suffered from a six months' siege by Matthias of Hungary (1477) and from a violent outbreak of the plague (1481); and this had scarce abated, when war was renewed and Matthias overran the whole of Lower Austria. During the ensuing siege (December 1484 to June 1485) all lectures were inevitably suspended, and the whole work of the University was at a standstill. The refusal of the University authorities to take the oath of {99} allegiance to Matthias--on the ground that, as a clerical corporation, they were independent of the temporal power--induced the conqueror to stop all the revenues which they derived from the government; and though he at length granted[126] a sum sufficient for the payment of the Professors and other necessities, yet he never extended to Vienna the same liberality towards Art and Science which had distinguished his relations with Buda-Pest. By the time of his death (1490) Vienna University was in a state of almost complete decay.