Spanish claimants. Many constitutional reforms—such as the formation of a council for war and for foreign affairs—were effected in this reign. John IV. died in 1656. His daughter Catherine was the wife of Charles II. of England.
John V., born in 1689, succeeded his father, Pedro II., in 1706. The war with Spain, which he inherited, was speedily brought to a close; and by a treaty in 1715 the difficulties between Spain and Portugal with regard to America were finally arranged. The treaty of Utrecht, settled in 1713, was signed at Lisbon in February, 1715. The enormous treasures which accrued from Brazil were lavished on the erection of a monastic palace at Mafra. In every respect John V. emulated the glory of being the Portuguese Louis XIV. He died in 1750, and was succeeded by his son Don Jozé I.
John VI., born in 1769, was the second son of Maria I., and of her husband and uncle, Don Pedro. Owing to the incapacity of the queen he was called to assume the sovereign power at the age of twenty-two, without having received any fitting education; and the history of his reign is less the narrative of his personal acts, than of the intrigues of his ministers. After vain attempts to purchase the right of neutrality in the war then pending, the regent had to witness the invasion of his states (1801) by a French army, pursuant to the treaty made by Berthier with Godoy, minister of Charles IV. of Spain, whose daughter John had married. The treaty of Badajoz, modified by the peace of Amiens, 25th March, 1802, averted the blow for a time. But in 1807 Junot received orders to march upon Portugal, and arrived at Sacavem, near Lisbon, on the 29th November. On the 27th of the same month the prince regent with the royal family sailed for Brazil, escorted by the British fleet. The convention of Cintra compelled the French to withdraw in 1808. The prince regent was proclaimed king in Brazil on the death of his mother in 1816, and in 1820 a popular revolution against the overbearing authority of the English led to the recall of the king, who landed in Lisbon on the 3rd July, 1821. In 1823 French intervention again destroyed the hopes of the constitutional party in Portugal. The independence of Brazil was recognized in 1825, and the king died in 1826. Of his family, by the Infanto Farlota Joaquina, daughter of Charles IV., the most notable are—Pedro IV., who succeeded him; Don Miguel, banished during his father's lifetime, and afterwards a pretender to the crown; Maria Francesca d'Assis, wife of Don Carlos; and Maria Isabella, wife of Ferdinand VII.—F. M. W.
ELECTORS OF SAXONY.
John the Constant, Elector of Saxony, youngest son of Elector Ernest, was born at Meissen on the 30th June, 1468. He was carefully educated, in part at the court of the Emperor Frederick III, and carried arms under the Emperor Maximilian I. against the Hungarians. On the death of his brother, Frederick the Wise, in 1525, he succeeded to the electorate; and having been long before convinced of the justice of Luther's controversy with Rome, he openly espoused the cause of the infant Reformation, and not only followed the example of his deceased brother in protecting the reformers within his own dominions, but endowed with a bolder and more resolute character than Frederick, he stood up fearlessly against the enemies of reform in the diets of the empire, and opposed a powerful barrier to the hostile policy and designs of the emperor and the pope. He was often slow and hesitating in determining what his course of action should be—greatly differing in this respect from his ardent and impetuous ally the landgrave of Hesse; but when his mind was once made up and his line of action at last resolved upon, he was immovable in his purpose, inflexible in the face of opposition, and of heroic constancy in front of menaces and danger. Hence the honourable name by which he is distinguished in German history—der Beständige (the Firm or the Constant). He was strongly attached to Luther, and had a high value for Melancthon, both of whom he was wont to consult on all matters of importance affecting the interest of the Reformation, and who sometimes appeared to have more influence in shaping his ecclesiastical policy than Philip of Hesse and the other evangelical princes—an influence which was occasionally felt to be hurtful, when the dangers which threatened the common cause of the Reformation made it necessary that the doctrinal differences between the Saxon and the Helvetic divines should be forgotten, and that a united front should be opposed to the formidable foe. Still the services which he rendered to the evangelical cause were great and ever memorable. At the diet at Augsburg in 1525, he joined with the landgrave in an earnest remonstrance against an accusation contained in a rescript of the emperor, that all the late troubles of Germany connected with the war of the peasants were to be traced to the disciples of Luther. At the diet of Spires in 1526 he had the gospel preached before him and his numerous household under the very eyes of the bishop; and his firm and intrepid bearing on that occasion was the main cause of the favourable turn which the deliberations of the diet took, to the great relief of the evangelicals and the vast chagrin of Rome. In the diet of 1529 held in the same city, he was the leader and champion of the celebrated Protest, which ere long gave a name, not yet fallen into disuse, to one-half of the christianity of Europe; and at Augsburg in 1530 he was again the foremost man in the ranks of the protestants in the noble act of reading their confession before Charles and the assembled estates of the empire. He was also the chief author of the two defensive leagues of Gotha-Torgau and Schmalcald, which exercised so important an influence upon the imperial policy, and had the effect of warding off attacks from the evangelical church, till it had taken such deep root in the German soil, and grown up to such strength and stature, as to be able to abide them when they came at last. He survived till the 16th August, 1532. He died at Schweinitz, and was buried in the church of All Saints in Wittemberg, where he lies close to his brother, Frederick the Wise, and not far from the tombs of Luther and Melancthon.—P. L.
John Frederick I., Elector of Saxony, surnamed der Grossmüthige (the Magnanimous), was the son of John the Constant, and was born at Torgau, 30th June, 1503. When scarcely six years old he was put under the tutorial care of George Spalatin, whom he in after years admitted to the number of his most trusted councillors. He was only fourteen years of age when the Reformation began, and at seventeen he was already a zealous disciple and admirer of Luther. At the important diets of Worms, Spires, and Augsburg, between 1521 and 1530, he was present at the side of his father. The Reformation found in his administration, which commenced on the death of his father in 1532, a powerful and steady support. Taking the university of Wittenberg under his special care, he added so largely to its efficiency, that he has been honoured with the name of its second founder. To Luther he remained cordially attached to the last day of the reformer's life; and when deviations from pure Lutheran doctrine began to appear in Wittemberg, he displayed the most ardent zeal in defence of what he considered the truth of God; and even at the lowest ebb of his fortunes, when he was a prisoner in the hands of the emperor, he founded, through his sons, in 1548, the university of Jena, to serve as a bulwark against the innovations and errors of Melancthon and his colleagues. He was no great statesman nor warrior; and he had to contend against Charles V., the most powerful and most politic ruler of the age. He was at the head of the league of Schmalcald; but in council he was often slow and irresolute; and he had a fatal proneness to harbour suspicion and distrust even of his nearest allies. When the emperor declared war with the league in 1546, the elector saw his dominions invaded and overrun by Duke Maurice of Saxony, and though he was able to drive out the invaders and make reprisals upon the territory of the duke, the struggle ended in his defeat and capture at Mühlberg, 24th April, 1547. He was not restored to his dominions till 1552, and even then he failed to recover his electoral rights, which passed to Maurice. The emperor pressed him to accept the Augsburg interim, and even made use of severe and unworthy measures to force him to accept it. But John Frederick remained nobly steadfast to his principles, and preferred rather to remain a captive than prove a renegade from his cherished faith. He died on 3rd March, 1554.—P. L.
KING OF SWEDEN.
John III., born in 1537, was a younger son of the celebrated Gustavus Vasa, on whose demise in 1560 he bore the title of Duke of Finland. But this inferior dignity did not long content his bold and unscrupulous ambition; and unfortunately his brother Erik's misuse of regal power afforded only too much scope for the development of John's aspiring projects. Erik proved the unworthy owner of an illustrious name, and speedily alienated from himself the affections of his subjects; and John adroitly organized a secret conspiracy against him, which was ultimately crowned with success. The luckless sovereign was deposed; and his death, which occurred after an imprisonment
