soldiers sent by Sigismimd, he proceeded to Radolfzell, there to await his final sentence. He was here informed of the decree published by the council on May 25, which, after enumerating all his crimes, declared him to be “an abettor of simoniacs, a mirror of infamy, an idolator of the flesh and one whom all who knew him considered a devil incarnate,” and proclaimed his deposition from the papal throne.[1] Cossa offered no further resistance, and gave up the insignia of papacy without any opposition. From Radolfzell he was conveyed to Gottlieben, a castle about eight miles from Constance, which for some time served also as a prison for Hus. As he was suspected of intriguing with his Italian friends in Constance, Sigismund placed him in the custody of Louis Count Palatine, by whose order he was removed to the castle of Heidelberg. He remained there up to the termination of the Council of Constance. He soon made his peace with the Roman Church, and submitted to Pope Martin V., by whom he was again created a cardinal. He retired to Florence, where he died on December 22, 1418. His tomb in the Battisterio by Michelozzo and Donatello is a noble work of the early Italian renaissance. It is striking to contrast his end with that of Hus. While the diavolo cardinale died surrounded with all honours and was buried in a magnificent tomb that is still admired by all visitors to Florence, Hus died by that hideous and painful death which mediæval Christianity seems to have borrowed from Nero, while his ashes were scattered and thrown into the Rhine.
Before returning to Hus, who remained imprisoned in and near Constance during the momentous events that occurred in that city, it will be necessary to refer to events in Bohemia that had considerable influence on the fate of Hus. The pious congregation at Bethlehem and the Bohemian patriots and church-reformers generally had been anxious for the safety of Hus from the moment that he had crossed the
- ↑ The decree of the council is printed by Von der Hardt.
