1635-The Tangled Web

by Virginia DeMarce

  The longer he lived in the Rhineland, the more he appreciated wine rather than beer.

  Derek Utt leaned back. "What do you think of this business with Wamboldt von Umstadt and Calixtus, by the way? Is it anything we'll have to worry about up in Fulda, since we've already worked things out with Schweinsberg? Do I need to bring it up with Wes?"

  Nils Brahe stretched his lanky legs out somewhat farther under the table. "As Duke Ernst explains it to me—we correspond extensively—you are all sectarians. You have embraced 'universal sectarianism' as a way of life, the Catholics and Calvinists as wholeheartedly as the sectarians themselves, there not being enough Lutherans or adherents of the Church of England among you to make a significant difference. And, yes, I have heard that your wife's grandmother is a most fervent adherent of the Church of England."

  "So's Mary Kat, actually." Derek Utt laughed. "Not quite as gung-ho as her grandma, who is busily restoring the abandoned Episcopalian church building and recruiting for a priest, but definitely pretty much committed. There were more of them up-time. More of them in the United States of America, I mean, not just in the whole world. Millions of them, Lutherans and Episcopalians. Several million of each. Maybe four, five, six million of each."

  "In an overall population that was how large?"

  "Umm. About two hundred eighty million, I think. They were just starting to take the new census the year of the Ring of Fire, but that's somewhere in the range of what they were predicting."

  "Sects," Nils Brahe said firmly. "They were sects. Our best estimate of the population of the USE now is somewhere between twelve and fifteen million. It should be toward the larger end since the emperor's campaigns of last month in the northwest. Using a fifteen-million population base for the USE, proportionally, that would mean that we would have . . ." He paused for mental calculations. ". . . somewhere between two hundred thousand and a quarter million Lutherans in the USE, rather than, probably, eight to nine million. Up-time, Lutherans and Episcopalians were sects as much as your Methodists and your Baptists just as much as your Mormons and your Pentecostals. Just as much as our Mennonites and Socinians. Muselius in Grantville sent Duke Ernst a fascinating book by an up-time German named Ernst Troeltsch, found in the library of the Baptist pastor named Green. It's being reprinted in Jena and Muselius managed to get an advance copy. I've ordered one myself. Troeltsch maintained . . ."

  Derek cocked his head to one side. "Just exactly how has Duke Ernst come to define the concept of 'universal sectarianism'? It's not something I've ever heard of."

  "I believe he formulated it himself, based on various comments by Troeltsch," Brahe admitted. "Also after multiple readings of the proceedings of the Rudolstadt Colloquy. It doesn't just involve your concepts of separation of church and state—though, as a good Swedish Lutheran myself, I have to say that's drastic enough. Rather, there is the ingrained cultural concept—cultural, not a matter of constitutional law—as the up-time Lutheran speaker Gary Lambert phrased it at one point in the discussions, that 'everybody has the right to go to hell in his own way.' Which seems to be the fundamental religious belief among you—that you bear no responsibility for the salvation of anyone beyond the bounds and borders of your own 'denomination.' Which defines you all as sectarians, from his perspective, and mine, and the emperor's, no matter how you think of yourselves."

  "And we are talking about this because?"

  Brahe refilled his wine glass. "It's terribly Mennonite, really—it's a quintessentially sectarian perspective. There is the question of what we are going to do about it. No one can doubt that it is arising in everyone's mind."

  "Perhaps not everyone's," Derek said. "Only consider Sergeant Garand."

  Brahe snorted. "In the mind of every aware politician, let us say then. No matter how influential Michael Stearns is at present, the fact remains—there are only about three thousand of you up-timers in the USE's new population of fifteen million or so, and your three thousand are divided into multiple sects. There are three or four million more people at the emperor's disposal if one adds in all of Scandinavia, which it is only reasonable to presume that we may do since Ahrensbök and the revived Union of Kalmar, all Lutheran, add weight to the several million in Germany. So. Given that Wettin, also, is Lutheran and may become prime minister after the upcoming election, what is to prevent the establishment of Lutheranism as a state church throughout the USE? Please do not say, 'Larry Mazzare.' "

  Derek laughed and reached for the bottle. "Did someone say that? Stearns is willing to live with Gustav's insistence on some kind of a Lutheran state church in the USE, if it's nothing more than a bow in the direction of 'first among equals.' The sort of thing that the Church of England had turned into, up-time, or the Lutherans in Denmark. They're writing that into the constitution, knowing perfectly well that he handles it differently in Sweden and probably won't ever change the way he handles it in Sweden."

  Brahe nodded. "As far as Sweden goes, and will continue to go for that matter, 'co-terminous church and society' might describe it quite well."

  "It's not that anyone thinks that the Lutherans and the rest of them here in the USE are going to learn to 'love one another, right now.' You might say that religious intolerance falls into the category of an undoubted fact. It might be more reasonable for you to ask exactly what Stearns thinks is going to prevent that state church, once the constitution establishes it, from going ahead and persecuting the rest of the religions in the USE no matter what the written constitution says. Ask me what's likely to happen in a real world situation, so to speak. Did you read that book that Mary Kat sent?"

  Brahe smiled. "What were the motives for persecution? Professor Roland H. Bainton, clearly a most learned man among the up-timers and a sectarian of the Quaker persuasion himself, gives three prerequisites: '(1) The persecutor must believe that he is right; (2) that the point in question is important; (3) that coercion will be effective.' Personally, I am inclined to think that the third point will turn out to be the USE's saving grace from the perspective of you up-timers. Not toleration as a matter of conviction, for most people, but rather as a matter of sheer practicality, as I have learned, sometimes rather painfully, during these last eighteen months of administering a Catholic archdiocese. Duke Ernst has made it quite clear, in his letters, that his analysis is taking him in that direction. Whether or not he can persuade his older brother is, or course, another question."

  "I have admit to some curiosity as to why we're discussing the problem right at the moment."

  "That goes back to your first question of this conversation—about whether your people in Fulda need to be concerned about Wamboldt von Umstadt."

  Utt nodded. "Starting point. When the Swedes took Mainz in 1632, the archbishop of Mainz, Anselm Casimir Wamboldt von Umstadt, chose exile in Cologne."

  "In Bonn, to be more precise. Under the protection of the archbishop-elector of Cologne, Or, in other words, under the protection of Ferdinand, the younger brother of Duke Maximilian of Bavaria. He is now reconsidering. I have a letter. Preliminary. Exploratory. Tentative, so to speak. Considering the circumstances under which he might be allowed to return to Mainz."

  "Ah, considering, perhaps, such circumstances as those under which we permitted Schweinsberg to come back to Fulda? You might want to talk to Wes Jenkins. He was more in on the discussions between Piazza and Schweinsberg than I was. To be honest, I wasn't in on them at all. The army doesn't make policy. It just carries it out."

  "If you say so." Nils Brahe was far from fully convinced on that point.

  Botvidsson appeared at the door, giving the kind of wave that meant "your next appointment is waiting." They both stood up.

  "Thanks for everything," Utt said. "I'll be heading back to Fulda tomorrow. I'll see you again one of these days, I guess."

  "Taking those boys with you," Brahe stipulated.

  "Taking them with me, not to mention their entourage. That was an interesting idea of yours, appointing Duke Eberhard to i
nvestigate Grantville's arrangement with Schweinsberg. I could have just had Ed Piazza send you a copy of the agreement, you know."

  "Oh, yes. I know. I most definitely know."

  "So the archbishop-elector of Mainz is really willing to drop the 'prince' part of his title in order to come back," Simrock announced. "At least, that's what the newspapers are reporting."

  Eberhard knew perfectly well that it was true, since he had been at the council meeting at which General Brahe had discussed it, but he couldn't say that, since it hadn't been announced. "I guess," he said, "that I should have held my breath."

  "I get confused every time I look at that picture of him," Joel Matowski grabbed the paper. "Wamboldt von Umstadt, I mean. See."

  Reichard Donner looked across the bar at the Horn of Plenty. "Why?"

  "I'm Catholic myself."

  Theo Pistor opened his mouth; then closed it again after Eberhard and Tata both gave him a good glare.

  Joel caught it though. "Didn't know that, did you? Thought I was human, maybe? What's your beef? Simrock's Catholic and you're friends with him. Jeffie doesn't belong to any church at all, if that makes you feel better."

  From Theo's expression, it clearly didn't.

  Jeffie yawned and looked at him. "I think the CoC still has quite a way to go with you, boy."

  Joel made a "stuff it" motion at him and looked back at Reichard. "I guess I think of archbishops looking sort of like the pictures of John Paul II that were in our CCD classroom when Ed Piazza taught us. I don't think of them as looking like leprechauns."

  "Leprechauns?"

  "The little Irish critters. Finian's Rainbow. It's the little pointy face, the little pointy goatee. The little pointy points on his moustache. Really—I have trouble getting my mind around an archbishop with a moustache at all. The little pointy points on his collar. Most of all, the big widow's peak point where his hair is receding."

  "CCD? Who was John Paul II?"

  Joel decided that Herr Donner was likely to have a very informative evening. He opened his mouth.

  Joel had a very informative evening, too. He had never heard of the synergistic controversy.

  "Well, I hadn't either," Theo said cheerfully, "considering that it hasn't happened yet. But Papa has been collecting everything he can afford to buy about what will be happening—would have been happening—you know what I mean—in the churches for the next twenty-five years or so. For as long as he's likely to live. He wants to do whatever he can to make sure that things he doesn't like don't happen. Won't happen here. Does that make sense?"

  Jeffie nodded. "Call in the cavalry and head them off at the pass."

  "There's not a lot he'll be able to do about Calixtus, probably, considering that he's teaching at a Lutheran university in Brunswick, while Papa's a Calvinist. But he'll see if he can get Landgrave Wilhelm of Hesse-Kassel to talk to the Brunswickers and see if they'll put pressure on the Helmstedt faculty to fire the man. If any of the dukes can be brought to see the dangers of this 'Pietism' movement that's going to develop . . . Calixtus is a natural target for the Flacians. Without a university base, he'll have a lot less prestige if he keeps going around spouting this stuff about ecumenism. Papa has written to his former teacher, Gomar, to see if he'll intervene with Fredrik Hendrik in the Netherlands."

  "Gomar," Reichard muttered. "He's as old as the hills. He must be seventy if he's a day. Can't you deal with modern writers?"

  "Donner, you're the one who keeps quoting Althusius at us. He's just as old." Jeffie grinned. "I looked him up. Wes spent some of Fulda's stingy budget on a set of reprint encyclopedias. Bet you weren't sure that I can read and write."

  "More to the point," Theo said, "Gomar opposes toleration for Catholics. And for Jews. And for Protestants who don't follow Calvin. And for Calvinists who aren't supralapsarians."

  "Papa's even right-wing for a Gomarist," Margarethe added, as cheerily as if she were saying that Chaplain Pistor liked ice cream.

  "Papa sticks to his principles."

  "Hey, Theo," Jeffie slapped him on the shoulder. "You're in the CoC. You're supposed to be in favor of religious tolerance. That sounds more like you agree with your father."

  "Well, I do agree with Papa—at least about some things. I guess I can learn to tolerate toleration, if I have to, but that doesn't mean I'm going to compromise my own beliefs. I can put up with the fact that some people are obstinate in their errors, but I don't have to like it."

  "Papa can't even put up with it," Margarethe said. "That's where he and Theo are different."

  "The Flacians can't put up with it, either," Eberhard said, "when it comes to Lutherans. Württemberg has enough problems right now without another knockdown, drag out, theological battle over Calixtus and his ideas."

  "Write to Count Ludwig Guenther," Joel recommended. "Maybe he can give you some pointers." He turned a page. "See the new cartoon?"

  Sure enough, it was another van de Passe. This time, the scene involved a three-branched hall of mirrors showing endless past and potential future Lutheran theological colloquies in one direction, endless past and future Catholic councils in another, and endless to infinite ecumenical conversations in the middle. At the juncture stood Count Ludwig Guenther of Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt, wearing the backwards baseball cap that had become his trademark in the various illustrations, even though the dignified middle-aged nobleman had only donned the item upon one brief occasion in real life.

  "He's a Mennonite, you know," Simrock said.

  "Not Count Ludwig Guenther," Eberhard protested.

  "No, not the count. Van de Passe is a Mennonite."

  Jeffie perked up. "I thought they were all farmers who wear funny, flat hats."

  "That was up-time, in the United States and Canada, after they'd been put through the wringer for another three hundred fifty years or so. Hey, the University of Mainz bought a reprint of the 1911 edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica, too." Simrock thought a minute. "Or maybe those were Amish. Anabaptist sectarians, anyway. In the here and now, the Mennonites are mostly pretty urban and pretty uppity."

  Tata clapped. "Uppity like 'uppity women'?"

  "You got it. Uppity. Van de Passe has moved around a lot. He left Antwerp when they expelled the Protestants. He left Aachen when they expelled the Protestants. He managed about twenty years in Cologne before they expelled the Protestants. He did engravings and his wife ran a book and print shop to help support the family."

  Joel winced. "Expelled, expelled, expelled. That sounds like a liturgy. I apologize on behalf of my church."

  "Why?" Theo wrinkled his forehead. "If the Calvinists had expelled him, I wouldn't apologize for it."

  "I think you should," Margarethe said, "if they had. But as it happened, they didn't get a chance. The Catholics beat them to it."

  Joel didn't feel exactly like leading a cheer for the Counter-Reformation. Thank God for the USE's newly hatched cardinal protector—once known as Father Mazzare.

  Friedrich looked at the morning edition with delight. "It's the first time I've ever been in the newspaper," he exclaimed.

  "Father saw it too," Margarethe said. "He went off to file a complaint with General Brahe."

  Eberhard snatched it away. "The quality of the cartoon doesn't quite measure up to a van de Passe."

  "Hey, a person has to be really influential, politically, to earn a van de Passe cartoon. How many people outside of our family will really care that I have renounced my title? Or that you let me?"

  "More than you would dream," Theo predicted. "Papa had Georg Wulf von Wildenstein in tow. He intends to get the landgrave of Hesse-Kassel involved on the grounds that Margarethe is one of his subjects."

  "How did the newspaper find out?" Justina asked. "That's a better question."

  "I like it," Reichard said. "Good publicity for the Horn of Plenty. Good example in regard to the equality of all men. The image of Margarethe as leading Brillo on a leash is particularly good, given the current events in Franconia. B
ut who drew the cartoon?"

  Every head in the taproom turned toward Hartmann Simrock.

  "If it will make you feel better, you may consider their transfer to the Fulda Barracks Regiment in the SoTF forces as a disciplinary measure," Brahe said. "It is my sincere belief that the newspapers will make less furor about the title renunciation and morganatic marriage if they appear to have taken place under the aegis of the up-timers."

  Colonel von Zitzewitz had not enjoyed having the young dukes of Württemberg under his command, but losing them was a considerable blow to his prestige, so on balance he was not happy.

  "Mainz will be more tranquil without their presence, right now. Fulda will do very well and Utt has agreed that he will take them." Since von Zitzewitz didn't know, Brahe saw no reason to mention that he had been trying to palm this particular simmering pot of trouble off on Fulda for three months.

  Zitzewitz inclined his head.

  "Just think," Botvidsson added. "There is some consolation. Their friends Simrock and Pistor have patriotically volunteered for the army also, as a gesture of solidarity with Friedrich the ex-duke, since neither of them has a title to renounce. You might have had two more radical CoC sympathizers among your junior officers."

  The colonel began to perceive the benefits that would compensate for his losses. He inclined his head again and backed out of the room.

  Botvidsson mentioned that he needed a draft memo for communicating the information about the transfer of the young dukes to the king. To the emperor, that was. They were, after all, dukes. Or, in one case, had been a duke just yesterday.

  "Bury it," Brahe said. "Bury it somewhere between a list of statistics on how many improved latrines we have constructed and a report on how many of the draft horses have gone down with colic. In front of the latrine statistics, put a memo on the training of city gate guards. Behind the horse colic, attach a discussion of how we are handling the directive that we are to get rid of the train of camp followers when the army is moving. Do not include anything about the renunciation of titles, and I see no real reason to pester the king with Pistor's complaints about the marriage. The chaplain is a Calvinist, after all, and so is his daughter, so what concern is her marriage to Gustavus Adolphus?