This was the political state of Germany before the Thirty years' war; a most unsatisfactory state. Discontent was general, a mournful tendency, a disposition to prophecy evil, were the significant signs of the times. Every deed of violence which was announced to the people in the flying-sheets, was accompanied by remarks on the bad times. And yet we know for certain that immorality had not become strikingly greater in the country. There was wealth in the cities, and even in the country increase of prosperity; there was regular government everywhere, better order and greater security of existence, luxury and an inordinate love of enjoyment had undoubtedly increased, together with riches; even among the lower strata of the people greed was awakened, life became more varied and dearer, and much indifference began to be shown concerning the quarrels of ecclesiastics. The best began to be gloomy, and even cheerful natures, like the honest Bartholomäus Ringwald, became prophets of misfortune, and wished for death. And there was good reason for this gloom. There was something diseased in the life of Germany, an incomprehensible burden weighed it down, which marred its development. Luther's teaching, it is true, produced the greatest spiritual and intellectual progress which Germany had ever made through one man, but the demands of life increased with every expansion of the soul. The new mental culture must be followed by a corresponding advance in earthly condition, a greater independence in faith, demanded imperiously a stronger power of political development But it was precisely this teaching, which appeared like the early dawn of a better life, that conveyed to the people the consciousness of their own political weakness, and by this weakness they became one-sided and narrow minded. Germany being divided into countless territories under weak princes, its people everywhere involved in and occupied with trifling disputes, were deficient in that which is indispensable to a genial growth; they needed a general elevation, a great united will, and a sphere of moral duties, which alone makes men pre-eminently cheerful and manly. The fatherland of the Germans extended probably from Lorraine to the Oder, but in no single portion of it did they live like the citizens of Elizabeth or Henry IV. Thus already inwardly diseased, Germany entered upon a war of thirty years. When the war ended, there was little remaining of the great nation. For yet a century to come, the successors of the survivors were deficient in that most manly of all feelings,--political enthusiasm. Luther had raised his people out of the epic life of the middle ages. The Thirty years' war had destroyed the popular strength, and forced the Germans into individual life, the mental constitution of which one may truly call lyrical. That which will here be depicted from the accounts of cotemporaries, is a sad joyless time. CHAPTER I. THE THIRTY YEARS' WAR.--THE ARMY.