Njegos and Strossmayer

But above all the divines of Southern Slavdom the Orthodox Prince-Bishop of Montenegro, Petar II., Njegos, and Strossmayer, the Catholic Bishop of Djakovo, tower as the mightiest champions of National union.

In all his writings Njegos gave eloquent expression to his grief and bitter distress that religious tradition could break up a nation into separate fragments, each sick and unhappy without the other. In short, the sum of his experience is this:

“Be a Serb and believe what you believe.”

Further on he says:

“Do not ask how a man crosses himself, But whose the blood that warms his heart, And whose the milk that nourished him.”

Njegos did not speak thus from a lack of reverence, but rather because of his heartfelt piety. He conceived religion as a force for unifying, not for disuniting, and it grieved him to see in his country everywhere the destructive results of religious discord. To-day the illustrious Bishop of Montenegro is equally beloved by Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. This was made evident in Zagreb on the 1st of March, 1914, on the occasion of the centenary of his birth. On that day Zagreb was gay with Serbian flags, at a solemn gathering lectures about Njegos were delivered by a Slovene, a Croat, and a Serb, successively. Catholics and Orthodox alike jointly celebrated their national hero. The Austrian authorities were plunged in consternation by this unexpected manifestation of brotherly solidarity between the very elements among whom they were unceasingly endeavouring to promote discord.

Bishop Strossmayer is probably better known to the Western world than Bishop Njegos. He was that great Bishop who so distinguished himself as a Catholic divine and orator at the Vatican Council in 1870. Equally great in his broad religious views, and his national ideals, Strossmayer was in very truth a God-sent blessing to his people. A son of the people, he lived and worked for his people. Everything great that Croatia to-day possesses in the way of national and cultural wealth, is bound up with the name of Strossmayer; everything was created, revived, or amended by him.

But he was not unaided in his efforts and his ideals. He had the unfailing support of the entire Catholic clergy of Croatia at his back;—as the fiery defender of true Catholicism in Rome,—as leader of the propaganda of liberation for all Jugoslav lands from the Austrian yoke, and the union with Serbia under Prince Michael,—as the founder of the Jugoslav Academy in Zagreb,—or as the tireless builder-up, stone by stone, of the material welfare of the Croatian people. He was in constant correspondence with Prince Michael, with Michael, Metropolitan of Belgrade, and with Gladstone. His political ideas were readily accepted by the Serbian Prince, and his love of peace and religious toleration earned him the friendship of the Orthodox Metropolitan. His broad-minded culture and sincere sorrow for his people deeply touched Gladstone who, as is well known, did his utmost to help the cause of Jugoslav freedom.

Strossmayer’s generation and that which succeeded him, whether clergy or laity, fully appreciated his teaching. Nor did the Austrian government fail to understand it, and they strove by every means in their power to uproot or to destroy the seed sown by the Bishop of Djakovo. But this seed germinated and sprang up in the field, tall and green, till both Germans and Magyars contemplated this dangerous crop with rage and envy. They inaugurated new terrors, new tortures, new inhumanities, new calumnies. Serbia was represented as the black plague-spot of the earth. But these calumnies were not well received by the Austrian Slavs. Then,—especially since 1894,—Austria began her clerical propaganda; but this also failed to influence the souls of the Croats and Slovenes. The Serbo-Croatian tongue was officially suppressed and the Magyar language forcibly introduced in its place; but this only roused such vehement opposition, that even those who had learnt Magyar from interest or curiosity, ceased to use it. Then the Government endeavoured to influence the elections in favor of the Monarchy by new political combinations, i.e. by an arbitrary re-distribution of the electoral districts; but so far from being successful, this measure only resulted in a coalition between Serbs and Croats, who, under the influence of Austrian intrigue, had hitherto always voted separately. This Coalition has in fact during recent years controlled the government of Croatia.

Strossmayer died in 1905, but his physical death only meant the resurrection of his ideals. Austria-Hungary rejoiced over his death, but her joy was short lived. In 1908 Austria burdened her conscience with a further crime,—the annexation of Bosnia. Instantly it became evident that Strossmayer still lived, indeed that he was more than ever alive. For the annexation of Bosnia was a blow that fell equally upon Zagreb, Ljubljana (Laibach), Trieste, and all Dalmatia no less than upon Serbia and Montenegro. The harvest that Strossmayer and Njegos had sown, was now ripe. Austria saw with sorrow that her prisons were too small to contain an entire nation; but she herself was a dark dungeon for Jugoslavs, irrespective of creeds, for at this juncture she discovered that she could reckon as little on the Catholic clergy as the Orthodox.

Several Bishops sided with their clergy in the national struggle. Thus Ucellini, the Catholic Bishop of Kotor (Cattaro) translated the “Divina Commedia” and dedicated his translation to the Serbo-Croat nation, and because of his wish to introduce the Slav tongue into the liturgy Bishop Dvornik had to fly from his native town of Zadar in Dalmatia to Constantinople, where he died.

The Catholic clergy of Dalmatia especially distinguished themselves in this struggle against Austria, and in Zadar, where Bishop Dvornik had lived and worked, another priest, Dum Bianchini, preached Nationalism with religious fervour.