house of Habsburg took place. Ferdinand III had in 1567 been succeeded as Roman Emperor by his son Leopold I, who had previously already been crowned as King of Bohemia. Leopold's successors were Joseph I, and after his short reign Leopold's second son Charles VI—or II—as King of Bohemia. Charles was a very worthy prince, quite devoid of the cruelty which had stained the reign of his father Leopold. A good father and husband he was, according to the spiteful description of Frederick the Great, not exempt from superstition.[1] As he was the last male representative of the house of Habsburg, the principal purpose of his life was to assure the succession to his throne to his daughter and to obtain general consent to the future indivisibility of the Habsburg domains. This had not always been the custom of that house. Thus Ferdinand I had divided his dominions among his three sons. In 1713, only two years after his accession, Charles issued a decree stating that in default of a male heir all the Habsburg dominions should devolve undivided, and according to primogeniture to his female descendants. In 1716 a son was born to the Emperor, but after his early death Charles again devoted his whole energy to the purpose of assuring the succession to his throne to his daughter Maria Theresa.
However absolutist the Habsburg rule was at this period, it was yet considered necessary to obtain the consent of the Estates of Hungary, Bohemia, and even the so-called "hereditary lands," to this constitutional change. The matter was brought before the Estates of Bohemia in 1720. The "renewed ordinance of the land" had already established the hereditary right of the house of Habsburg in the female as well as in the male line. The new rule as to the succession to the throne, therefore, involved no change in Bohemia, and the Estates retained their right of electing a king, should the Habsburg dynasty become extinct. The decree which declared the indivisibility of all the Habsburg dominions also found no opposition in an assembly consisting mainly of Imperial courtiers and generals. On October 16, 1720, the Estates of Bohemia unanimously accepted the Imperial decree, which after it had also been accepted by the German
- ↑ "Bon père, bon mari, mais bigot et superstitieux comme tous les princes de la maison d'Autriche." (Frederic II Histoire de men temps, tome I, p. 28, ed. 1788.)
