[Gutenberg 6780] • History of the Revolt of the Netherlands — Complete

Excerpt from The Works of Frederick Schiller: Historical; History of the Thirty Years' War, Complete; History of the Revolt of the Netherlands to the Confederacy of the Gueux

Fearful indeed, and destructive, was the first movement in which this general political sympathy announced itself; a desolating war of thirty years, which, from the interior of Bohemia to the mouth of the Scheldt, and from the banks of the P0 to the coasts of the Baltic, devastated whole coun tries, destroyed harvests, and reduced towns and villages to ashes; which opened a grave for many thousand combatants, and for half a century smothered the glimmering sparks of civilization in Germany, and threw back the improving man ners of the country into their pristine barbarity and wildness. Yet out of this fearful war Europe came forth free and in dependent. In it she first learned to recognize herself as a community of nations; and this intercommunion of states, which originated in the thirty years' war, would alone be sufficient to reconcile the philosopher to its horrors. The hand of industry has slowly but gradually effaced the traces of its ravages, while its beneficent in uence still survives; and this general sympathy among the states of Europe. Which grew out of the troubles in Bohemia, is our guarantee for the continuance of that peace which was the result of the war. As the ames of destruction found their way from the interior of Bohemia, Moravia, and Austria, to kindle Germany, France, and the half of Europe, so also will the torch of civilization make a path 101' itself from the latter t.) enlighten the former countries.

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