HUSS, JOHN, was born at Hussinatz, a village of Bohemia, of humble parents, about the year 1370. He studied in tho University of Prague, where be distinguished himself by his assiduity and talents. Being ordained priest in 1400, he soon after adopted the opinions of Wycliffe, which he proclaimed loudly from the pulpit, and by so doing gave offence to the Archbishop of Prague, who denounced his tenets as heretical. But Huss was confessor to Sophia, queen of Bohemia, and was favoured by King Wenceslaus himself, and thus he was able to maintain his ground for several years. In 1408 the heads of the university declared that whoever taught the opinions of Wycliffe should be expelled from that body. Hues identified his cause with that of his Bohemian countrymen, ever jealous of Gorman influence, and the consequence was that the German students withdrew from the university and the city of Prague, and repaired to Leipzig, where the elector of Saxony founded a uni versity for them. Huss being now Installed rector of the University of Prague, inculcated the doctrines of Wycliffe, whose works he caused to be translated into Bohemian. The Archbishop of Prague ordered these works to be publicly burned, and excommunicated those who still adhered to the opinions contained in them. • He also sus pended lines from his sacerdotal functions, who however assembled the people, either in private houses or in the fields, where he preached against the pope, against purgatory, and above all against indulgences. The people were thus invited and encouraged to examine doctrines, which till then had been considered the eolo province of the clergy; and the humblest among them, women as well as men, began to discuss the mysteries of grace, predestination, and justification. The Archbishop of Prague took the alarm, and lluss was summoned by the Pope, John XXIII., to appear in person at Bologna to answer the charges against him, which neglecting to do, he was excommunicated. Huse however had a strong party in his favour, and the consequence was that frequent tumults occurred in the streets of Prague between his partisans and those who supported the papal authority. Unwilling to appear as encouraging these dis orders, Hoes retired to his native village, and there both by his tongue and pen he defended the propositions of Wycliffe, rejecting at the same time all human authority In matters of faith, and exhorting the multitudes who flocked to hear him to make the Scriptures alone their rule of faith. Some time after, on the death of the archbishop Huss returned to Prague, and there publicly opposed a papal bull which had been just Issued by the court of Rome against Ladislaus, king of Naples, and which invited all Christians to a crusade against him. In the University of Prare Huse stood on vantage ground, and being assisted by his slaver disciple Jerome, he began to denounce the sale of Indulgences in the strongest terms.
Fresh tumults took place ; and after more cilations from the pope which Huss disdained to obey, the council of Constance at last assembled. Hues was cited to appear before the council, and he obeyed in 1414, after receiving a safe conduct from the Emperor Sigismuod. On arriving at Constauce however ho was arrested ; his
doctrines were condemned as heretical, and as he would not retract, he was publicly degraded from hie priestly office, and then consigned to the civil magistrate, who by order of the emperor had him burnt. Huss died with a fortitude which was admired even by his antagonists : while the infamous conduct of the emperor has branded the name of Sigismund with an indelible atigrna. (Ltraccioliol, Poggio, 'Epistle' to Leonardo Aretino; and hIneas Sylvius, llistoria Bohemica.') The morals of Hurl wore irreproachable; his opinions, whether right or wrong, were oonsclentiously entertained ; and it Is but a poor excuse for the members of the council to say that they did not condemn him to death, but consigned him to the secular arm, as they were perfectly well aware of the meaning of that expression. The council thus gave a fatal example, which was followed over all Europe for centuries after, and almost to our own days. Jerome of Prague soon after met with the same fate as hie master. The death of these two die tinguished men created a revolt in Bohemia. The Hussites began a furious war against the Roman Catholics; they burned churohee and monasteries, they overawed King Wenceslaus, and after his death his brother, the Emperor Sigiemuud, found himself opposed by the Hussite leader Ziska, a man of extraordinary powers, who had taken possession of Prague. Sigismuud, after a great loss of men in the field, was glad to come to an accommodation upon the following terms :-1. That the church-service ahould be celebrated in the vulgar tongue; 2. That the communion should be administered in both kinds ; 3. That clergymen should be deprived of all temporal juris diction ; 4. That moral crimes should be punished with the same severity as violations of the criminal laws of the country. This truce however was of no long duration, and Ziska carried on the war with success against the emperor. The Hussites now divided into several branches, some very fanatical and cruel, euch as the Taboritee, the Ilorebites, and the Adamitee, of whom strange bnt not well authenticated stories are told; and others more moderate and rational, ouch as the Callixtines. After the death of Ziska the warfare between the Bohemian Hussitea and the Imperial troops continued until the convocation of the council of Basel, in 1431 After long and tedious conferences the council conceded to the Bohemian laity tho use of the cup in the communion, and the Emperor Sigiamund on his side agreed that the Hussite priests should be tolerated, even at court, that no more monasteries should be built, that the University of Prague should be reinstated in all its former privileges, and a general amnesty granted for all past disturbances. Thus peace was concluded in 1437. Bohemia however remained still in a feverish state until about a century after, when the reform of Luther revived old feelings and antipathies, of which the Thirty Years' War, which another century later desolated all Germany, may be said to have been the remote consequence.
There are a few Hussitea now in Bohemia; the rest have merged into Calvinists, Lutherans, Moravians, and other sects.