17 - Hus Condemned
Chapter XVII - Hus Condemned On Saturday, July 6, the Council had great scruples in condemning the Duke of Burgundy, a self-confessed would-be assassin, but it had absolutely no scruples in condemning the blameless patriot reformer of Bohemia.
“Dressed in black with a handsome silver girdle, and wore his robes as a Magister” Hus was led after Mass before the whole Council in the cathedral. He kneeled and prayed fervently for several minutes. James Arigoni, Bishop of Lodi, preached from Ro:6 “That the body of sin might be destroyed.” Henry de Piro proposed that Hus be delivered to the civil power for burning.
Sixteen charges from Wiclif’s writings were read. When Hus tried to explain, he was brutally refused. Thirty articles from Hus’ own works were then read. He attempted to speak, but was stopped by loud cries, despite the admonition of the Bishop of Constance.
Hus knelt down and cried: “I beg you, in the name of God, to grant me a hearing, that those who are present may not think I am a heretic. After that deal with me as you see fit.”
They threatened to silence him forcibly by the soldiers. He continued to kneel and pray with uplifted face to God, the just Judge.
Hus was next charged with saying, “that he was and would be a Fourth Person in the Trinity.”
Even the Roman Catholic Hefele admits the absolute falsehood of this infamous accusation. When his appeal to Christ was condemned as a damnable heresy, Hus cried out: “O God and Lord, now the Council condemns even Thine own act and Thy law as heresy, for Thou Thyself didst commend Thy case into the hands of Thy Father as the righteous judge.”
Charged with treating the papal excommunication with contempt, Hus replied he had three times sent representatives to the papal court and had never had a hearing. “For this reason I came freely to this Council, relying upon the public faith of the Emperor, who is here present, assuring me that I should be safe from all violence, so that I might attest my innocence and give a reason of my faith to the whole Council.” As he spoke of the safe-conduct, the prisoner looked straight at the Emperor; the Emperor blushed. That blush was never forgotten. Urged to betray Luther at Worms, the Emperor Charles V said: “I should not like to blush like Sigismund.”
“A bald and old Italian priest” then read the two decrees of the Council that all the writings of Hus, both Latin and Bohemian, should be destroyed, and that Hus as a true and manifest heretic was to be burned.
Hus loudly protested: “Up to now you have not proved that my books contain any heresies. As to my Bohemian writings, which you have never seen, why do you condemn them?”
Hus again knelt and prayed with a loud voice: “Lord Jesus Christ, forgive all my enemies, I entreat Thee, because of Thy great mercy. Thou knowest that they have falsely accused me, brought forth false witnesses against me, devised false articles against me. Forgive them because of Thy boundless mercy.” This touching prayer was greeted with derisive laughter by the foremost ecclesiastical dignitaries.